Gella

For an accomplished ballroom dancer Kiki sure had a lot of missed connections with Jenna. She should've gone with Kevin/Konkrete. At least they would have stood out. I think Kristina was a better match for Paul but Sydney must be more versatile (she reminds me of Sansa/Sophie Turner for some reason). Kaylee and Cyrus were just Ok. Gaby and Lex were smooth and gorgeous. I loved Robert and Taylor dance. He can do no wrong. All the hip hop dances were entertaining in completely different ways. Yeay for a break from Nappy Tabs lyrical (although they probably would've done a good lyrical hip-hop for Kaylee). It will be interesting to see who goes home first. I feel like Nigel damned Kaylee and Cyrus with very faint praise. Logan was hurt by Alison's absence I think.

King Theatre actually has a lot going on across the street but it sits on a weird mini block with the Sears parking lot behind it, so the way they are filming it is misleading. Additionally there is always much more vehicular traffic on the that street.

It was both on the podcasts and also in the latest interview posted in the media thread. They filmed a lot of exterior Moscow shots in New York. Last night's Park scene with Martha for instance. The scene where Oleg and his colleague are spying on the secretary was also not Moscow.

Генрих and Пейдж. Neither one is a Russian name, although Генрих would be more acceptable. In reality he'd probably become Garry, like Garry Kasparov. Paige would need a new name entirely.

I don't see them killing Pastor Tim. In some bizarre way they have got somewhat close to him. He is the only person outside of the Centre who knows who they are, and to some extent they can be honest with him. There must be nice to have a counterweight to Claudia and her constant manipulation. They are after all human. I also think if he was going to rat them out he would have done it. He has kept this information to himself for so long at this point he is complicit. "So, Pastor Tim, you know about an active Soviet cell in Virginia for how long? And it never occurred to you to contact the authorities? And why is that?" I think Elizabeth is pretty much done. She is still a patriot and she will trudge along if she needs to but she's had it just as much as Phillip and its pretty obvious.

No, lights were most certainly turned on. One of the fondest memories is coming home from school in the dark winter evenings (gets dark very early) and seeing all the be-draped well lit windows in the buildings reflected in the snow along the path. Another thing is the crowds. Any time Oleg goes to and from work there is barely anyone on the street and that just would not be the case. It was always "sardines in a tin case" in the metro during rush hour. Oleg is a spy. He would want to act normal. Normal would be socialising with his elite friends.

Yes, a thousand times. Russians love to eat (and drink) and even in the darkest times there is always gallows humour at the dinner table. And all the "Moscow" eating scenes on the show are sadder than a funeral. Oleg is a young man with plenty of prospects yet he has no friends? No former classmates? All he does is go to work and come home to lovingly gaze at his mother or morosely drink with his dad.

Funny thing is that Henry would do very well in a Russian school, provided it were one of those "English immersion" schools where he'd probably end up. He seems quite sociable, he is a math geek, he is "cool", he has perfect English. Paige probably would have more trouble adjusting. But I don't think P&E have thought this through any more than well they've moved when they were very young and they survived so why wouldn't their children? And more to the point I don't see the Centre giving up on second gen spies so easily. Once again, I really wish the writers would stop with the incessantly depressing drab showing of the Soviet side, it drags the show down unnecessarily. The problem wasn't that people had nothing. The problem was that one had to hustle and scheme and use "connections" to get anything. There is a scene in "Irony of Fate" where the two protagonists discuss how much each gave "under the table" for the new identical Polish wall unit in their respective apartments. Nothing was straight, everyone was jaded and either on a take or actively dealing with people on a take, and corruption permeated every level of society, but it could certainly make for very interesting material. But the way it is written and filmed I just don't understand why anyone bothers to wake up in the morning, and it's a disservice to some really good acting by Krutonog and Ronin and others. I most certainly don't want to see an entire season of P&E in Moscow, and I hope it never goes there. As an aside we are getting somewhat close to April 1986 and I wonder what Phillip would make of that disaster.

It just might be easier for the Centre to send P&E home than have them blow operations or possibly defect. So not sure what the play will be. P&E don't have many (any really) people who know their situation and with whom they can honestly discuss what would be best for the kids. Claudia gave them a BS non answer. So yes it makes some weird sense they'd talk to Pastor Tim. If nothing else he genuinely cares about Paige and he is not against Soviet Union per se. He is taking his own baby to Argentina! I am tired of the drab Moscow filters. There was sunlight there too. And every single apartment didn't look like they were one step away from a jail cell. Even Burovs' place is dark and depressing. And no, that was not how "Universam" in Moscow would look in mid eighties. I went food shopping with parents all the time. Was it like a supermarket here with endless shelves of cereal? No, but it definitely wasn't the warehouse looking nightmare they keep showing. I mean I get the attempt to show contrast but for a show that is generally very subtle I feel like I am being hit over the head with this. Then again after they didn't even bother to cover up Frankie 457 sign in the last episode I am questioning their research accuracy. And I am not sure why go through the trouble of having legitimately awesome Russian dialogues only to mis-translate them for your main (English speaking) audience. Tuan is not smart. That attempted suicide would bring so much heat on everyone not to mention destroy any chances of controlling Evgenia. Who knows what she will do in all that grief? Sofia is toast. That fiance was as fake as they come. I think Stan knows it too.

Wives of political bigwigs were routinely put away as enemies of the state. Mikhail Kalinin was the chairman of the Party and his wife spent years in a camp. It only didn't make sense because Burovs shouldn't be old enough for Igor to be a bigwig forty to thirty years prior. I don't think Oleg is not his father's son. He wasn't told because no one was told things like this. Especially the older generations. They knew how to keep secrets. I still don't understand why Martha is so lonely and bitter. I mean it's not like she was sent to some hamlet in Siberia. Moscow was a big city. And frankly after what she did she didn't really have many options. At first she was duped into helping Phillip but later on she helped him quite willingly. The fact that she survived at all is miraculous. She has to realise on some level that some of it was of her own doing.

I love this show. I really do. But no. Martha would not have that sad grey apartment (for one they were all wall-papered, and the furniture was all wrong) and she would have real food. Stores back in 1983-1985 had food. Especially in Moscow. The fruit/vegetable selection was not great, especially in the winter (unless one went to the market where they were more expensive), but the grocery and dairy shelves were not empty. And she would have been connected enough where she could shop in party stores where selections were really really good. She would have access to clothes. And makeup. And not that sad little potato. Like not even a "kotleta" on a plate? Oleg's story fascinates me. He went from being a well connected playboy to... not quite sure what but it's interesting to watch.

I liked it. Yes, I'd rather have the all adults back but then I'd rather have this SYTYCD then nothing at all. The kids did well I thought. Better than what I expected. JT is the weakest technically (he is really very young) but I can see him going far based on his personality and the cuteness factor, plus Robert is popular, and they seem to genuinely have a connection. Daniela while dancing very proficiently looked straight up terrified. As opposed to Ruby who was eating up the stage. I hope she doesn't go home first as I actually think technically she is more interesting to watch. The kid dancing with Jenna is really genuinely infectiously happy. Plus he is really really good. It's going to be a tough choice between Tate and Jordan. I'm just happy there is dance on my TV screen.

Given what happened to Misha's mother he would be under some sort of observation. Someone would keep tabs on him (and his grandfather) so he'd go nowhere. But more to the point, I still can't get over the fact that this "dissident" would have any interest in searching for his father, an active KGB officer. Yes, we know Philip is conflicted and possibly less than enthused about the cause. His son has no way of knowing that. As far as English. Yes, he would have learnt either English or French or German in school. I don't see how that would make his task of getting to America any easier. I also find it silly that we need this external son to introduce conflict, when Henry's situation remains entirely unresolved. He is completely in the dark and he is personally emotionally attached to an FBI agent next door. Yes, Paige seems to be getting on board with the spying but what if Henry was vehemently against it. Would that not provide a better source of soul searching for Phillip rather than some son he has never met?

Russians, at least back in the day, invited everyone in, at least "for tea". Classmates, friends, potential boyfriends, etc. The whole "meeting parents" was really not a thing because it happened almost right away. Hanging out in someone's home was THE thing because there weren't really that many places you could go "out". (plus the food was free and better) And if you ended up getting married you'd live with one set of parents or the other. And then you had babushkas in the courtyard keeping tabs on who was coming and going. One wouldn't have a "motel" to go stay for the night either. Privacy was a luxury, so Irina keeping Misha Sr completely away from her parents is just a little strange. Like where did they even conceive this baby?? I can hardly imagine much privacy at the Academy, or wherever they trained. And yes, Afghanistan was totally Soviet "Vietnam" but the military involvement was on a smaller scale. Even Wikipedia says at the height of it there were 115k troops in the country. That's about 1/5th of what we had in Iraq in 2003. Well placed people were usually able to assign their conscripted kids to Moscow engineer battalion or some such. Or get a deferment for college. Basically I am not saying they should not have any characters ending up there, that would be completely false. But we already have Oleg's brother, Tatiana's brother and now Misha Jr. I love this show because it's very much character driven and this feels like a "plot point". Regarding passports... It does not really matter how many foreign passports he has. Any way he leaves the country, he has to cross the border passport control. He is either crossing it on a foreign passport, in which case there have to be stamps of him coming into the country, registration papers (where he was staying), and a visa, and him pretending to be a foreigner; or he is crossing it on the external soviet passport (good luck getting one after the mental dissident institution) with a legitimate visa for the country to which he is travelling. Is he really going to waltz into the American embassy and get a visa? Swim across Black or Baltic sea? He is a twenty year old kid, not Jason Bourne. And I am only critical because I think overall this show is brilliant and I guess my expectations are sky high.

I find it very hard to believe that the idea of her parents sleeping with other people for information has crossed Paige's mind. Yes, she probably thinks if she kisses Matthew he might tell her more but she also clearly likes him. To Phillip though it's all coloured through the lens of his experience, so he is projecting himself onto her motivations. My issue with the whole Misha subplot is that it smacks of melodrama and contrivance. We have an already pretty difficult scenario of two embedded spies who BOTH have dark personal histories. And they also somehow end up living right next door to an FBI agent who is actively looking for them. And their kids are of appropriate ages to have crushes on each other. I can hand wave that. Fine. But now we have Phillip's tragic love affair with a fellow spy in the academy who kept him a secret from her own parents (somewhat atypically for russians), secretly had his baby, that baby just happened to deploy to Afghanistan (not every conscripted 18 year old ended up deploying there) and not only came back disillusioned but actively engaged in dissident activities and now is actively seeking to leave the country and go look for his long lost father. Who as far as he knows is a die hard KGB agent and would likely turn him. It's just all too much.

P&E would get a nice apartment somewhere in Moscow (if that's what they choose), possibly a dacha, their kids would be enrolled into one of the specialised English language schools for easier transition, they would be given a car, and teaching jobs. Or desk jobs in Lubyanka. I am sure they were paid salaries all this time so there might be a hefty balance in Sberbank too. They would certainly have a comfortable life style. It would require some adjustment for them, but they've lived in the Soviet Union in a much worse time, so I can't imagine they wouldn't adjust. Life was harder in some aspects, but not impossible, and for some people in privileged positions it was even very very comfortable. As far as Paige and especially Henry, that would be complicated but people emigrate with teenage kids all the time, so that would not give any of their handlers a second thought. I think the real problem is that Philip has become somewhat more ambivalent and cynical about the whole thing than anyone expected him to be. He is also more invested in the comfort and happiness of his kids than his handlers counted on. He may still be a "patriot" but he is no longer a true believer.

Here is the thing though: children out of wedlock were extremely rare when I was a kid and even much more so at a time when Misha was supposedly born. Shotgun marriages and subsequent divorces however were MUCH more common, since there was much less stigma attached to that. There is no logical motivation for Irina's character to both have a child and to not marry his father. That whole story is making less and less sense to me. I liked it better when it seemed like the whole "Misha Jr" thing was something to manipulate Philip with. I don't know how a documented dissident whose mother is a traitor and whose father is an active KGB officer intends to leave the country in 1984. I suppose if he has enough valyuta (foreign money) he can buy his way out somehow. But even if he did, seems like he really has no clue who his father is. My only issue with the show is that it increasingly portrays 1980s Soviet Union like it's 1950s. Poor William. That was a nasty way to go. Stan's heart is going to be broken. I am glad Keri Russell will not have to wear that camel coat in every scene anymore.

The green one was West Germany, the blue one was Canada, and the red one was USSR. I don't know how to do screenshots from my TV, but I read both Russian and German, so you can take my word for it. :) Can someone jog my memory about Irina? The only thing I remember of her is when she and Philip met up in Montreal, at which point she was still a KGB agent. What did she do to get the KGB to bring her back to Russia and arrest her? I thought she'd left Misha Jr. for her parents to raise and wasn't part of his life. And to whoever said the communal apartments no longer existed in 1984, yes, they absolutely did. My grandfather and his wife lived in one until they got a normal apartment in 1988 (they'd been on a waitlist for years). Theirs wasn't quite as rundown, but the scene of women from multiple families cooking dinner in the same kitchen totally rang true for me. The whole stated point of the ugly "Khruschev's buildings" was to get each moscovite family their own apartment. Families who were moving into the city shared apartments, but by the eighties at least in Moscow (which is what they showed) it was pretty rare. They certainly didn't look like they did during my mother's childhood. So for me that whole scene didn't not work. Especially given that this is a show that tries to get its time-relevant details meticulously accurate, and that there is a plethora of Soviet movies from that era to use as a reference point. I was under the impression that Irina was also in KGB and they met during training. I never understood why an ambitious KGB officer would get pregnant, have a baby out of wedlock and then abandon that baby with her parents. That seems like a bad career decision.

No one had those apartments in 1984. And that was supposed to have been somewhere in Moscow? I thought I was watching a scene out of some 1950s movie... Misha didn't look like he came back from Afghanistan. Those guys had a way about them. Thousand yard stare thing. And why would anyone get him out of a psych ward? He was a son of a traitor with no official father, right? I don't know. If they plan to do more scenes in Russia they should work on authenticity. Paige is totally getting into the game. And Phillip doesn't like it one bit. So Arkady Ivanovich is done... he would probably just get another posting somewhere out west. Doubt he would be posted back to Russia.

I don't remember what he said in Russian. I think it was not being able to go to the summer camp. I don't remember being disturbed by it as much so it couldn't have been egregious. Everyone was a young pioneer. It didn't matter how high up your family was. You were Oktyabryonok, then you became a Young Pioneer and then you joined Komsomol. Otherwise you didn't get into college and most certainly didn't get any plum USA postings.

I actually don't think Jenningses use Stan much for information. Yes, occasionally he randomly says something that Philip reports, but mostly Philip leaves him alone in that regard. I would imagine trying to ply a trained counterintelligence agent for information would be very risky. He is not Martha and could easily pick up exactly what is happening. After all he wasn't their mark. He just happened to move next door. If and when Stan finds out that his friends were the exact same people he was hunting and he had absolutely no clue -- I imagine that would cause him to no longer trust his own judgment and end his career. Yet, it's interesting that the people he imagines to be absolute villains are the very same couple whose house he regularly raids for leftovers and company. In that sense Philip is in a better position because while he knows that this is technically an adversary, it's also his friend. Lots of shades of grey there.

En Pointe work before turning twelve is criminal. The foot does not develop properly and eventually the poor girl will have truly ruined feet (beyond what normal ballet training would do). I wish instead of Dance Moms gimmick the show just brought different choreographers to make it fresh. This format certainly won't allow for memorable routines like prior seasons.

Keri Russell has always been able to believably play a gorgeous girl/woman who sincerely is unaware of exactly how beautiful she is. I think it's one of her acting strengths.

Pelmeni are always with meat. They are like little meat dumplings (beef, veal, chicken, etc). The non-meat version is called vareniki (potatoes, sour cherries, cottage cheese). In Ukraine, at least from what I remember, they called the same things galushki. There are also lazy vareniki, but those are basically gnocchi made with cottage cheese. Pirog is a stuffed large pie. Pirozhok is a little stuffed pie, about the size of empanada, either sweat or savoury, and either baked or deep fried. Pierogy on the other hand are Polish stuffed dumplings. They are somewhat bigger and the dough is thicker. They are pretty common in the USA and I notice a lot of TV shows use them as a "Russian" dish. I would expect someone like Gabriel to know the difference.

I usually love the little details in this show, but I am sorry, Gabriel, Russians don't eat "pierogy" for breakfast. There is a big pirog, little pirozhki, and then there are those things you offered Elizabeth, which are either vareniki (in Russia) or galushki (in Ukraine). That was seriously the first cultural mis-step I had seen so far. Elizabeth did what she had to do to protect her daughter. I am sure Paige will make a big deal out of it, but frankly she should be too shocked in the moment to think straight. Those guys were not interested in taking the money and leaving. Paige had to realise how badly it could have turned out for both her and her mother.