S06.E03: Urban Transport Planning

[sistermagpie]

1 minute ago, Clanstarling said:

I always notice knife skills on TV shows.  And I sure noticed the lack thereof. I always wonder if it's an acting choice, or simply that the actor/actress doesn't have a clue. I'm no chef, but I can handle my knives in the kitchen.

It's funny for Elizabeth given how much time on the show she spends making salads.

[snarktini]

On 4/19/2018 at 12:11 PM, misstwpherecool said:

I don't care how good one's disguises are. Eating pizza near her employer is extremely risky. If someone had accidentally  bumped into her or spilled something, those events alone could triggered a glance from her employer/negotiator-they draw attention even if momentary.

 

OMG this. One more piece of proof that Elizabeth is the only available spy for the entire city of DC. She went within inches of him! She did look very different but taking that risk isn't believable.

OTOH, I liked the comment from another poster that noted the pizza link, and the potential importance of her being able to hear the Russians at the table talking. I didn't make those connections and now can see why they made that choice from a storytelling perspective. Still.

[SusanSunflower]

Apparently, as was mentioned to me when I had the same objection,  Elizabeth's pizza-eavesdrop mission was part of the Mexican-supersecret-coup-plot and so the KGB/Claudia/the Centre could not/would not be tapped for a backup snooper.   Elizabeth (as a member of that tiny "elite" deadly potential coup) was the only person who was available or needed to spy on that conversation. 

Edited April 27, 2018 by SusanSunflower

[White Sheep]

It was Thai food NOT Chinese food Phillip had when Elizabeth brought some Russia type food before.

[Inquisitionist]

Wasn't it Kung Pao chicken and lo mein?  Those are Chinese dishes.

[limecoke]

Quote

Finally, somebody oughta tell Liz that millions of Americans eat and enjoy a stew made with beef, vegetables and herbs, so a Tupperware container of it in the fridge won't tip anybody off.

Thank you so much for this.  I was screaming at my computer, “It’s stew, people.  Americans eat it all the time.  It’s not some big ‘Hey, I’m a spy’ giveaway.”

Elizabeth has left a string of bodies all over DC and parts beyond.  We do have police here in America.  The detectives are generally pretty good at their jobs.  She kills this poor guy in the hotel, leaving fingerprints all over the table.  Even if she wipes the place down, it’s not going to go away in the real world.  Do the bodies of her victims just vanish?

Philip I can handle.  Elizabeth, I despise.  She completely lost me when she let that poor old woman die by withholding her heart medication.  That, for me, was the most chilling and horrific scene of the entire series.  

Oleg forever.  Probably the most balanced character of the entire series and the true hero.

[sistermagpie]

10 minutes ago, limecoke said:

Thank you so much for this.  I was screaming at my computer, “It’s stew, people.  Americans eat it all the time.  It’s not some big ‘Hey, I’m a spy’ giveaway.”

 

To Elizabeth is probably seems somehow better than any other stew from any other country. LOL. 

Though to be fair, it's probably more just something they're psychologically trained to do now. And also she's passive-aggressively punishing Philip for not leaping on it for bonding purposes.

11 minutes ago, limecoke said:

She completely lost me when she let that poor old woman die by withholding her heart medication.  

I think she forced her to overdose on it, didn't she? Why wait around for a heart attack when you can induce one with drugs?

What I hated about her in that scene was that once she knows she's going to kill the woman she takes advantage of the opportunity to talk about her mother. She sneers at EST but the world is her group therapy.

[Roseanna]

On ‎12‎.‎4‎.‎2018 at 6:46 AM, sistermagpie said:

 

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There is a future episode titled Rafifi, after all!

Elizabeth wants to be in Russia in 1960, dammit! She doesn't believe the Washington Post with their lies about black market blue jeans and Russian kids listening to rock n' 

Can't Elizabeth read Soviet newspapers? After all, glaznost meant that many things are written openly.  

[Roseanna]

On ‎12‎.‎4‎.‎2018 at 6:27 AM, chocolatine said:

I laughed at Elizabeth's dismay that the there might be a Pizza Hut opening in Moscow. I hope she lives to see 1990, when Moscow got not only a Pizza Hut, but also a McDonald's. I still remember how big of a deal it was at the time, and I wasn't even living in Moscow.

I remember when I was with my friend in France in 90ies. We had eaten fine French foods for a week - but then in Lyon we saw McDonald and said "home!"

Russians doesn't become "just like Americans" if they sometimes eat pizza or hamburgers.    

[Roseanna]

The beginning of the season seems more interesting than the last one but the problem is, as others had already said, that the writers missed the chance to ground the characters's motivations and their relation to the changes in the Soviet Union. 

Take f.ex. Elizabeth and Philip's discussion. Whether there is Pizza Hut in Moscow or not, is trivial compared that in 1982 the Soviet population in some areas were given food cards the first time after the after-war years and that Brezhnev himself had admitted previous spring that 20 % pf vegetables were spoiled before they reached the consumers. (some said that the real number was 50 %). The standard of living after the WWII was so low that the Soviet leaderhip could keep the population relatively contended when the living standard increased for decardes, but since trhe 70ies the growth of production had been steadily in decline and the numbers of the pland had not been reached.  

There was no wonder that Gorbatchov was a protege of the KGB-chief Andropov as KGB had better methods to learn the problems of the country. And the Conservatives inside the Politburo didn't like Gorbatchov, they had no alternative program nor candidate.   

[Roseanna]

I find Elizabeth claim that American newspapers lie about the Soviet Union very funny because it shows that, although she is clearly intelligent, she lacks a critical mind which would be useful for an agnet: she believes what she hopes to be true and refused to believe what she is told to be untrue.   

As it happens, the former deputy chief of the Finnish military intelligence was today intervievew in a newspaper. He mentioned (I have heard it before) that there are three words for lie in Russian. "Lozh" is a straightforward lie or scam. "Nepravda" is a defect. Then there is "vranjo" that is "a lie that both performer and often the recipient know as a lie, but still behave just as the claim is true".