Dedicated people often break under interrogation or torture (which for a high level spy the Soviet Union might suspect would be used)
To commit suicide, you just need one moment of willful action. To keep from talking, you need indefinite commitment to willful action. Now some people may not have the discipline to kill themselves in that situation. But Elizabeth clearly is the sort of person who would not hesitate to give her life for her country - if her orders, and her belief, were that suicide was the best route to protect her country, she would do it without hesitation. She would prefer it to a situation in which she could potentially break or otherwise give away information without intending to.
You make it sound like she was being overprotective of her daughter. But that wasn’t it. He took her ID and clearly expected to meet her again and would likely try to contact her if she didn’t make contact with him. Which might end up resulting in him somehow identifying the ID as fake, or lead to other complications. Someone in the thread mentioned facial recognition but I don’t think that’s a factor - I think it’s more like that if she ends up in some sort of investigation as a suspicious person then her photo would be added to the FBI books as a suspicious person, and people that witnessed espionage-related activities would look through that record and potentially identify her. He was definitely a loose end as soon as he took the ID.
Paige said she wasn’t afraid to die for the cause. She sincerely believes she is down for the cause, but I don’t even think she knows what the cause is. And I don’t think she has been tested enough to know whether she’s ready to commit her life. While I don’t know if this foreshadows her death, I do think it foreshadows a true testing of her mettle.
Let the record show that when I said Paige (and Henry) she only had one vote and Elizabeth was in double-digits. I’d like to take credit, especially if my theory pans out, but I think Drum God gets credit for the sea-change. The idealists and the innocents are the victims in such wars.
As I recall, E was not pleased, but told P not to worry because both the ID and the phone number she gave the SP were fake. Then E went and murdered him anyway, since P made it easy to identify him by giving her the name on his coat tag. (She also recovered said ID and phone number from his wallet.)
Paige isn’t old (or smart) enough to know her ass from the proverbial hole in the ground. When she’s looking down the barrel of a gun or holding a cyanide pill in her hand, she’ll think twice about dying for “the cause.”
I disagree that Henry will be the death. Yeah, he’s the innocent in this story, but no one cares about him. I don’t really care what happens to him. Paige, though, while less innocent than Henry, is the idealistic, cute girl. A bullet through her head will have much more emotional resonance. Maybe axe her head and hands off. Wouldn’t it be amazing if Philip had to do the same things to page that he did to the Soviet agent in the parking garage? Talk about some well-deserved agony. Your kid just died and now you have to hack her body to pieces. That might make me question my commitment to this whole enterprise.
And she will be (I believe) an AIDS patient in a nation that lacks such medical research–and treatment–as existed in the USA of the era. Dramatic irony!
(I am guessing that the discoloration on Elizabeth’s cheek is Kaposi’s Sarcoma.)
I picked Paige in the poll (before reading the thread) for reasons similar to those posted by Drum God–it’s the most heart-wrenching option. But let’s not forget that the showrunners do like to avoid cliché. It’s quite possible that none of the characters named in the poll will die.
Which is not to say 'happy endings all ‘round’—those left alive will not be happy.
If Stan killed Henry accidentally there wouldn’t be a dry eye in the house
Typically, I emphatically said anyone-but-Elizabeth and she immediately got AIDS.
My dream ending has all four Jennings surviving to the final scene of them being exchanged on a bridge for a bizarro-Jennings family of Americans whose kids only speak Russian.
Perhaps Stan could kill Henry not so accidentally either. Stan starts to wonder why Philip’s and Henry’s story about the travel agency problems jibe so exactly, then starts to wonder why the kid was hanging around so much…
Edit: I can’t seem to vote for Henry, but chalk me up as a contrarian
This is paranoia carried to extremes. No freakin’ way the average American would identify *zharkoe *as anything other than plain old beef stew.
I just finished watching the latest episode on line. They throw out the zharkoe, and then Philip rents Garazh* at the local video store?!? :eek: He must really, *really *be homesick!
It would be great if there’s a showdown between Elizabeth and Claudia, each one whacking the other. Maybe E is finally starting to catch on as to what a tool she’s been, albeit a bit late in the day.
*A great movie, BTW. Very popular in Russia even today.
Claudia’s not even in the poll, but if she did die, I get the feeling it could be particularly violent (not accidentally taking the suicide pill as speculated in the other thread.)
Especially since Svetlana has now got The Center on his case. An order to whack him could come through at any time, and Claudia could take it on herself to carry it out, since Elizabeth can’t be relied on anymore. Will Philip get to him in time with the news about the plot against Gorbachev?
It seems clear that Philip is suffering from depression at this point. He was always a bit unhappy with their work, leading up to him retiring from active duty. Now we see him after a few years of enjoying himself, but things are starting to fall apart. His business is tanking, he’s failing to provide for his son, he’s been at odds with his wife, and now he’s seeing the USSR starting to fall apart, along with the Illegals program. He’s just watch two other agents die, and had to mutilate one of them himself. He’s finally internalizing the “We do it” part of the job, but he also has to be thinking about when it will be his turn to get chopped up in a garage. So, if he’s dead soon anyways, why not take one last chance to see something of home?
This also explains the buying a new tailored suit when he’s having money problems: he’s thinking he’s not long for this world. Whether he gets killed on the job or commits suicide, he expects to be dead soon. So why not buy a new suit? He won’t have to pay for it in the end.
Such splurges in their last days are pretty common among people planning to commit suicide. I really think they might be setting that up as a story arc, or least, they want us to think they are doing that.
Don’t worry about it, “Someone Else” is a good catch-all, and when one begins to ponder all the Shakespearean permutations, “Everyone!” could also have been a poll choice
