S06.E10: START

[Totale]

10 hours ago, Pickles said:

Will Paige have a normal life?

I think she'll go on the run by disappearing into the Grateful Dead tour and meet Lindsay Weir.  They are married now and live in Portland on one coast or the other.

I was pretty disappointed with the drama level here, and while I'm not really like this normally I kept getting distracted by continuity errors.  Liz seemed to have a cut on her lip which kept coming and going in the early scenes.  Phil is barely finished breaking into the driver's side of the red car with the slim jim when Liz pops up and just opens the passenger door.  If the Mickey D's bags actually held food there would be enough for an army and the grease would be seeping through.  Unless they are within a couple of blocks of Henry's school, one coin in a phone booth is not going to get them several minutes on the phone with him.  (Callback to an early season, where Paige puts a coin in a pay phone, doesn't get through, hangs up, and fails to retrieve the returned coin like no one who used a phone booth ever).  There was nothing new or crucial in the dead drop, just Liz confirming what they already suspected.  The car they drive into Russia had different plates on front and back. 

[Higgs]

I have not read any posts on the most recent episodes, so I apologize if I am repeating others' observations. While I was utterly enthralled by the finale, the sticking point for me was Stan telling Oleg that he "didn't give a shit" about what happened in Russia. I found it utterly inconceivable that any FBI agent, let alone someone as astute as Stan, would have failed to recognize the existential threat posed by a coup of intransigently militaristic KGB officers against a Soviet leader with whom Reagan was eager to negotiate a cooling down of the Cold War and the consequent potential undermining of an "Evil Empire.". Oleg's confession would have gone immediately to the White House and then to the Kremlin. Stan's head could not have been that "thick" on that subject.

What turned Stan in the garage scene was hearing Elizabeth repeat Oleg's claim. That's when one plus one became two and he finally saw the dark light. Stan now had two sources of shame to live down: failing to understand the transcendance of Oleg's information, and the betrayal by the Jennings. He let them go, in part, to save himself. But now he has the enigma of Renee. Wars, whether hot or cold, destroy relationships.

[Bannon]

3 minutes ago, Umbelina said:

He, and the rest of the FBI thought it was in retaliation for the CIA killing Zhukov.

No one knew he was at Martha's.  They had no reason to even suspect he'd been at Martha's.

We aren't going to agree. I think that Stan's an idiot if he doesn't grasp by now that Clark was likely Phil, and that Amador's interest in Martha,  and the proximity of his murder to Martha's apartment indicates a strong likelihood that Phil killed Amador. Heck, Phil just being an illegal in D.C.  makes him a strong candidate for Amador's murder. Yet Stan conveniently forgets about what that murder meant to him, in the garage scene. I really, really, hated the garage scene.

[ChromaKelly]

8 hours ago, Cthulhudrew said:

The burning question is: Will Phillip be reunited with Mischa now that he's back in Russia? Because something needs to justify that entire go-nowhere subplot from last season.

 I was almost expecting the checkpoint guard to be Mischa. The fact that there was zero mention of him this season only reinforces that that plot was pointless. Philip has a son! that he never meets.. um ok.

[Umbelina]

I really like what he says about where he thinks happens to Henry.   Stan will be a father figure to him, and he'll be close to Paige--but not when Stan is around.  He thinks Paige will avoid Stan.  It's also cool to here what he says about that final scene, and what Stan said to him, first a joke, but then it sounds like they played it straight, and many times, many different ways.  Like everyone else, he loves Rhys and Russell.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2balpDLngI&feature=youtu.be

Edited May 31, 2018 by Umbelina

[companionenvy]

46 minutes ago, Dminches said:

I don't see how can discount the depth of Stan's and Philip's relationship.  When things when sour with Stan and his wife he went to Philip.  That in itself defines what Stan thought about Philip.  And, he loved Henry which also speaks volumes

I don't think I'm discounting it. I'm not saying that it was nothing more than a casual friendship; clearly, it wasn't. I'm saying I think while it was a strong friendship, maybe even strong enough that I could see Stan not being able to pull the trigger, I do not believe that it was so extraordinarily intimate that it would take total priority over finding out that your friend and his wife are KGB spies who you know are implicated in multiple murders. Especially not when you are an FBI agent who has spent considerable time chasing precisely this couple, has racked up personal losses in the Cold War spy game, and came into the garage at least somewhat prepared for the confrontation. On the most basic level, scheduling conflicts alone limit the amount of time Phil and Stan could have been spending together over the years, and of course there were factors on both sides that would have limited how much each could share with the other about key aspects of their lives. Again, I'm not saying that this wasn't a strong friendship. But these aren't guys who practically lived in each other's homes and shared their deepest and darkest secrets, isolated moments of emotional vulnerability notwithstanding. We're talking about good friends who probably got together at most a couple of times a week, in between dealing with day jobs, secret night jobs, spouses and children. 

I'm not qualified to comment on exactly how the CIA/FBI stacks up compared to the KGB in real life. But what we've seen on screen, while it doesn't whitewash the actions of American forces, and Stan has been rightly disgusted by it in the past, doesn't really support the idea that the two sides are equally awful. We've never seen anything equivalent, for instance, to Elizabeth and Philip's kills of innocent witnesses, or Elizabeth murdering that guy under the car simply to get a potential asset into position, or the bloody assassination of Russian defectors no longer in a position to pass information to the Americans. The wheat plot last year seemed specifically designed to suggest that while P&E found it comforting to think that the Americans were capable of something so vile, there wound up being limits on vaunted American depravity. So if Stan is operating on the logic that he doesn't have the moral high ground, that's not a conclusion I accept, and it is an excessively quick turnaround for Stan. He's been conflicted about his job before, but not to the point that I believe that, after suspecting the Jenningses for days or weeks, all with the thought of bringing them down if he was right, an appeal from known KGB-operative Phil is going to make him go, "Well, we kill people, too." 

To the extent that it is plausible only because Stan doesn't know the depths of what Philip and Elizabeth have done, it is not satisfying for me. This wasn't being framed as Philip duping Stan; it was framed as Stan making a choice. That rings totally hollow if we have to rationalize it by assuming that not only does he not connect P/E with Amador, Martha, Gaad, etc., but that he wouldn't have made that choice if he knew about people like the old lady or young cop that Elizabeth killed. Because that means that Stan's big moment is still based on fundamentally false pretenses that the show isn't acknowledging. 

[Bannon]

5 minutes ago, Ellaria Sand said:

I hesitate to jump into the "Stan is an Idiot" discussion but here goes...

I, too, have been critical of the writing for Stan. Choices were made to give us his epiphany about his BFFs quite late in the story. We can quibble with that decision. However, in the context of what we watched last night, I accept that Stan has not yet put ALL of the pieces together about who P&E were and the crimes they committed.

That confrontation was about personal betrayal; he was questioning the authenticity of his relationship with them and Philip most of all. That was not Law & Order Stan. Perhaps it should have been. Instead, it was Beer-Drinking Buddy Stan. I imagine that weeks/months from now, as Stan continues to process these events, the law & order version of him may come to understand the extent of their crimes. 

And this why I enjoyed the finale: all of these characters will be dealing with the choices that they made (good ones and bad ones) for a long time.

As an aside, I accept that many will not agree with my opinion.

This was Stan who the writers had forget about what impact Amador's murder meant to him, or become such a moron that he doesn't grasp that Phil just being a D.C. illegal (even ignoring the likely connection to Martha), means that Phil is a strong likelihood for Amador's murderer.  So we can have near parodic yakking about feelings in a garage. I hate it, with the caveat that I have no problem with those that loved it.

[gunderda]

I haven't read all of the comments but I had to get my thoughts out before I forget them: 

I bawled every time they talked about Henry. 

So many things I want to know... will Paige go on to live a normal life? Will she just go back to school? Will they not look for her and question her? Stan knows that she knows. I'm not surprised she stayed.  When they told her Henry had a life in America I wanted her to say "what about me!?!" 

So many characters we won't know about and I think that drives me nuts the most! We won't know how long Oleg will spend in jail.  And the people he protected got away.

What's her face just vanished - where did she go?  Why was Paige able to get back into that apartment of her's? 

Why were they so stupid as to NOT wear disguises to Paige's apartment when they think the FBI might be after them. 

Wasn't Arkady part of the shady group and boss to the KGB lady that Elizabeth killed at the end? Or am I getting him confused with someone else? 

I did find it slightly humorous that everyone was dying to know if Renae was KGB or not and they just threw in a little "she's probably one of us... but I'm not sure" 

I think Stan let them go because of Henry and only because of that reason.  How was he going to tell Henry that he was the one to kill or arrest his parents? I suppose it's better to tell him they ran off to Russia. 

Edited May 31, 2018 by gunderda

[J-Man]

Once the FBI realizes the full extent of Philip and Elizabeth's actions in the US, could they get the CIA to try to take them out in the USSR?

[Umbelina]

We haven't seen it because we haven't seen the CIA on this show, and the FBI is in no way comparable to the KGB operating in the USA.  The FBI never leave US soil as undercover agents.

[Misstify]

9 minutes ago, Ellaria Sand said:

That was not Law & Order Stan. Perhaps it should have been. Instead, it was Beer-Drinking Buddy Stan. I imagine that weeks/months from now, as Stan continues to process these events, the law & order version of him may come to understand the extent of their crimes. 

Yeah, I agree that the FBI will put more together over time.  I just wish we could have gotten a peep at Stan dealing with that understanding.  

"Beer-Drinking Buddy Stan"...every time Stan came over for a beer, it reminded me of Noah Emmerich's role in The Truman Show (he always carried as six-pack of beer, partially as product placement in the show-within-a-show and partially to distract Truman from questioning what was going on).

[benteen]

Little details that I liked...

-Philip not being able to remember the name of the colonel that told him about his assignment.

-Stan seeing the little Christmas tree when he got home.

[SunnyBeBe]

I have a few questions still.

Was the place that P met up with E after he gave her the bug out code, a place that could have been on the FBI watch list?  

How did Arkady know to meet P and E on the roadside?  Was there a message that E gave the Soviet Border guard. She told him something, but, showed no papers.  He let her through.  Did he contact Arkady in light of that message?

What country were they leaving when they approached that Soviet Border Guard? 

[Ellaria]

1 minute ago, Misstify said:

Yeah, I agree that the FBI will put more together over time.  I just wish we could have gotten a peep at Stan dealing with that understanding.  

"Beer-Drinking Buddy Stan"...every time Stan came over for a beer, it reminded me of Noah Emmerich's role in The Truman Show (he always carried as six-pack of beer, partially as product placement in the show-within-a-show and partially to distract Truman from questioning what was going on).

What a great reference! I loved "The Truman Show" and it was then I started to appreciate NE as an actor. 

[Bannon]

4 minutes ago, J-Man said:

Once the FBI realizes the full extent of Philip and Elizabeth's actions in the US, could they get the CIA to try to take them out in the USSR?

They could, if the FBI and CIA was run by idiots. Then again, that is what the writers of the show would have us believe.

[Umbelina]

2 minutes ago, gunderda said:

I haven't read all of the comments but I had to get my thoughts out before I forget them: 

I bawled every time they talked about Henry. 

So many things I want to know... will Paige go on to live a normal life? Will she just go back to school? Will they not look for her and question her? Stan knows that she knows. I'm not surprised she stayed.  When they told her Henry had a life in America I wanted her to say "what about me!?!" 

So many characters we won't know about and I think that drives me nuts the most! We won't know how long Oleg will spend in jail.  And the people he protected got away.

What's her face just vanished - where did she go?  Why was Paige able to get back into that apartment of her's? 

Why were they so stupid as to NOT wear disguises to Paige's apartment when they think the FBI might be after them. 

Wasn't Arkady part of the shady group and boss to the KGB lady that Elizabeth killed at the end? Or am I getting him confused with someone else? 

I did find it slightly humorous that everyone was dying to know if Renae was KGB or not and they just threw in a little "she's probably one of us... but I'm not sure" 

Elizabeth betrayed Claudia, Claudia was not going to hang around a place that Elizabeth knew about. 

Paige had a key.

No, Arkady was pro-Gorbachev, he sent Oleg.

The rest, who knows?

2 minutes ago, J-Man said:

Once the FBI realizes the full extent of Philip and Elizabeth's actions in the US, could they get the CIA to try to take them out in the USSR?

Maybe, it's harder to operate in Moscow, since it was still a police state essentially, but as things loosen up there it could happen.  The Coup people will probably murder them first.

[JennyMominFL]

9 hours ago, kikaha said:

Soldiers fighting a war may separate from their families for years.  They want to be with them, but they understand the need to defend their country. 

Stan was like that, in a way.  A soldier in the war to save his nation against subversive threats, internal or external. 

As a soldier myself, I have always viewed all 3 of them, Stan, elizabeth and Philip, as soldiers Just without uniforms. I also wonder how people would view Phillip and Elizabeth if the show were revered.If they were American spies in Russia, spying and killing people for the greater good of America. Would  we be so quick to just label them as Murderers? Would it be easier to root for them?

[Bannon]

3 minutes ago, JennyMominFL said:

As a soldier myself, I have always viewed all 3 of them, Stan, elizabeth and Philip, as soldiers Just without uniforms. I also wonder how people would view Phillip and Elizabeth if the show were revered.If they were American spies in Russia, spying and killing people for the greater good of America. Would  we be so quick to just label them as Murderers? Would it be easier to root for them?

No, I would not root for American characters who were doing things in Russia, that mirrored what Phil and Liz did in the USA. I would call them murderers.

[MisterBluxom]

24 minutes ago, Ellaria Sand said:

I hesitate to jump into the "Stan is an Idiot" discussion but here goes...

I, too, have been critical of the writing for Stan. Choices were made to give us his epiphany about his BFFs quite late in the story. We can quibble with that decision. However, in the context of what we watched last night, I accept that Stan has not yet put ALL of the pieces together about who P&E were and the crimes they committed.

That confrontation was about personal betrayal; he was questioning the authenticity of his relationship with them and Philip most of all. That was not Law & Order Stan. Perhaps it should have been. Instead, it was Beer-Drinking Buddy Stan. I imagine that weeks/months from now, as Stan continues to process these events, the law & order version of him may come to understand the extent of their crimes. 

And this is why I enjoyed the finale: all of these characters will be dealing with the choices that they made (good ones and bad ones) for a long time.

As an aside, I accept that many will not agree with my opinion.

For whatever it may be worth, you are also one of my most favorite posters here. I normally would not kiss up to people as freely as I'm doing today. But I consider this thread to be my "Goodbye" to all the people I've kept company with for the past six years and with whom I've shared this extraordinary show.

[KBrownie]

2 minutes ago, JennyMominFL said:

If they were American spies in Russia, spying and killing people for the greater good of America. Would  we be so quick to just label them as Murderers? Would it be easier to root for them?

1

If you read the previous couple of pages, this has been addressed.  For myself, YES.  The country doesn't matter.  Wrong is wrong.  Maybe the question some of you letting Phillip and Elizabeth off the hook should ask yourselves is if you or someone you loved who was not part of the spy life was one of their victims would you still have all this compassion for them?  It's really easy when it's not you.  And please, no one throw out this is just a fictional show.  Real life institutions have been inserted into the conversation to support the "just doing their jobs" argument, so it's perfectly valid for the opposing opinion. 

[companionenvy]

7 minutes ago, Umbelina said:

We haven't seen it because we haven't seen the CIA on this show, and the FBI is in no way comparable to the KGB operating in the USA.  The FBI never leave US soil as undercover agents.

Which makes sense, but then we can't just default to, "well, American agents in a similar position would be just as bad," because that isn't what we've seen. If the show wanted us to draw that equivalence, they could have spent some of their time in Russia with Nina, Oleg, Mischa et al on a plot with a genuine American equivalent of Phil and Liz. They didn't, and in fact the most apparently diabolical American action they introduced - poisoning the wheat -- turned out to be a false alarm. Instead, IMO, they showed us that Stan and his co-workers are all morally compromised without generally implying that there was no moral difference between them and P&E. Stan and Oleg, sure, Oleg actually being the nobler character in that comparison, despite working for the "wrong" side for much of our acquaintance with him, but Stan and Philip? I don't see it. 

[Bannon]

24 minutes ago, Higgs said:

I have not read any posts on the most recent episodes, so I apologize if I am repeating others' observations. While I was utterly enthralled by the finale, the sticking point for me was Stan telling Oleg that he "didn't give a shit" about what happened in Russia. I found it utterly inconceivable that any FBI agent, let alone someone as astute as Stan, would have failed to recognize the existential threat posed by a coup of intransigently militaristic KGB officers against a Soviet leader with whom Reagan was eager to negotiate a cooling down of the Cold War and the consequent potential undermining of an "Evil Empire.". Oleg's confession would have gone immediately to the White House and then to the Kremlin. Stan's head could not have been that "thick" on that subject.

What turned Stan in the garage scene was hearing Elizabeth repeat Oleg's claim. That's when one plus one became two and he finally saw the dark light. Stan now had two sources of shame to live down: failing to understand the transcendance of Oleg's information, and the betrayal by the Jennings. He let them go, in part, to save himself. But now he has the enigma of Renee. Wars, whether hot or cold, destroy relationships.

Oh, I agree. It's just another miswriting of Stan's character.

[Umbelina]

The podcast from the finale:  https://slate.com/culture/2018/05/the-americans-insider-podcast-for-episode-610-start.html

First Keri Russell and Matthew Rhys share their feelings about the series finale. Then Noah Emmerich and Brandon J. Dirden discuss their reactions to Stan Beeman’s and Dennis Aderholt’s behavior in Episode 610. Finally, Russell, Rhys, Emmerich, Dirden, and Costa Ronin recall their strongest memories from their time on the show.

[Tara Ariano]

In case you missed it, here's Previously.TV's EPIC OLD-SCHOOL RECAP of the episode!

The Americans Have To Go Home

But before they can get there, will Father Andrei rat them out? Will Stan confirm his suspicions? Will everyone get too squishy about how to deal with Henry? It's all in our series finale EPIC OLD-SCHOOL RECAP!

[Misstify]

I had been thinking that Paige could not possibly get off scot-free.  I wasn't thinking of DNA evidence, but that she would crack under questioning.  After all, we've seen her shout "Mom!" at a crime scene, forget someone's name, and forget that she shouldn't punch people in public.  However, it does make sense to me that Stan might protect her, to prevent her from revealing that he let the killer spies go.  So thanks to everyone who brought up that possibility.

I do wonder what her alibi will be for that evening.  Best bet is probably to admit she was on the run but say she was coerced.  If she pretends she was out somewhere else, that's a whole complicated thing to make up and she'd have to explain why her ID is missing (unless she dug it up on her way back to the safe house).  Then again, since she never spoke on the phone to Henry, she could plausibly claim she wasn't with P&E, but I don't see Paige being able to stick to a convincing story about where she was that night (one that holds up when the FBI checks it out, including asking Paige's friends or people at the school library or wherever she claims to have been).

I thought it was interesting that P&E never told Paige before about the escape plan.  She was shocked to hear they were going to the USSR, and so flabbergasted that she couldn't comprehend that she had to pack a bag.  In the 2-3 years of her spy training, they never talked to her about the possibility of fleeing the country.  No wonder she hopped off the train.  What American kid would agree to go into exile, on an hour's notice.

As an aside, Paige's disguise was a perfect 80s look.  As she stood on the train platform looking tragic, her appearance reminded me of someone from the 80s, but I couldn't think of whom.  Then it hit me:

(Mike Mills, the bass player from R.E.M., center).

[MJ Frog]

10 minutes ago, gunderda said:

So many things I want to know... will Paige go on to live a normal life?

Not entirely. She will probably be watched to some extent for the rest of her life, but other than knowing her parents were spies and not saying anything, they cannot connect her to a single crime. They can rightly suspect her of much, but there is nothing they can charge her with, other than not turning her parents in. And as for that, I suspect they will let her off lightly. But she'll be fine -- especially if she just turns herself in to Stan and gets all the nasty business over with.

16 minutes ago, gunderda said:

Why were they so stupid as to NOT wear disguises to Paige's apartment when they think the FBI might be after them.

Even if she is seen leaving with them in disguise, the FBI would suspect it was them anyway. In disguise, which is pretty suspicious. It really wouldn't have served a purpose at that point.

[SunnyBeBe]

Another thing that Stan did that didn't seem right to me, but, maybe was minor, was leaving the other agent alone in that stake out. What if an illegal or two, had shown up and the guy had to subdue them? He would be in much more danger having to do it alone or he would have had to call for backup and wait, because Stan was violating protocol.   Maybe, the guy wasn't too optimistic about getting any action, but, I think that I would have told Stan that I wanted him to stay or get me alternate backup.  

[JennyMominFL]

4 minutes ago, KBrownie said:

If you read the previous couple of pages, this has been addressed.  For myself, YES.  The country doesn't matter.  Wrong is wrong.  Maybe the question some of you letting Phillip and Elizabeth off the hook should ask yourselves is if you or someone you loved who was not part of the spy life was one of their victims would you still have all this compassion for them?  It's really easy when it's not you.  And please, no one throw out this is just a fictional show.  Real life institutions have been inserted into the conversation to support the "just doing their jobs" argument, so it's perfectly valid for the opposing opinion. 

I'm working my way through the last couple of pages. I woke to 5 pages of new posts :) 

I missed the very first convo between Elizabeth and Phillip.   We had a flood warning on the TV and I missed a good 4minutes of dialogue. Can someone clarify whose idea it was to leave henry, and also,  did Philip  and Elizabeth each tell the other what had just happened.  

[kikaha]

3 hours ago, Kokapetl said:

The Renee KGB question that Phil threw out would likely resolve itself. With the Jennings gone, she has no reason to stay. If she stays, she’s not KGB. 

Having an inside source married to an FBI agent is a potential gold mine for the KGB.  If Renee somehow gets a job with the FBI, better still. 

i.e. plenty of reasons for Renee to stay. 

[SunnyBeBe]

1 minute ago, icemiser69 said:

I thought it would have been far more effective if she had said she was pregnant.  I think that would have really sent Stan into a tailspin and make him that much less likely to fire his gun.  

OH....that's good. Even better!  

[showme]

5 hours ago, GussieK said:

The cars will be found. All the human DNA in it is going to be analyzed. It will be established that Paige was in a car used in KGB operations, along with our now headless and handless corpse in Chicago. Paige is very unlikely to skate.

You worry too much. Was there even DNA testing back then??? Paige will be fine. FBI doesn't know anything about her, there is no evidence tie her to anything. she will be able to lead a relatively normal life.

[Umbelina]

1 minute ago, JennyMominFL said:

I'm working my way through the last couple of pages. I woke to 5 pages of new posts :) 

I missed the very first convo between Elizabeth and Phillip.   We had a flood warning on the TV and I missed a good 4minutes of dialogue. Can someone clarify whose idea it was to leave henry, and also,  did Philip  and Elizabeth each tell the other what had just happened.  

It was Philip's idea.   Elizabeth assumed they would pick up Paige then go get Henry in New Hampshire.  Philip rightly pointed out that it was a bad idea, Henry didn't know about them, and he was happy in school, etc.   Elizabeth was shocked, but then got it.  It was quite well done, I hope you get a chance to see it.  Tara's recap here covers it well.

[Bannon]

1 hour ago, Kokapetl said:

The FBI agents opened fire on the van. The Jennings fired back. In the end both sides lost men, and achieved nothing. I think that the outcome was lose-lose for a reason. 

The point is that it us ridiculous for Stan not to be enraged about the killing of his FBI colleagues, that he knows for a fact Phil and Liz killed. So enraged that he cannot allow them to escape.

I cannot believe how badly Stan has been written.

[SunnyBeBe]

3 minutes ago, JennyMominFL said:

I'm working my way through the last couple of pages. I woke to 5 pages of new posts :) 

I missed the very first convo between Elizabeth and Phillip.   We had a flood warning on the TV and I missed a good 4minutes of dialogue. Can someone clarify whose idea it was to leave henry, and also,  did Philip  and Elizabeth each tell the other what had just happened.  

Philip thought it was best to leave Henry.  He gave solid reasons. E protested, but, gave in.  P told E that Father Andrei had been made and followed and that he barely escaped.  They had been made. 

[Misstify]

3 minutes ago, JennyMominFL said:

I missed the very first convo between Elizabeth and Phillip.   We had a flood warning on the TV and I missed a good 4minutes of dialogue. Can someone clarify whose idea it was to leave henry, and also,  did Philip  and Elizabeth each tell the other what had just happened. 

It was Philip's idea to leave Henry, and he persuaded Elizabeth.  The recap gives the full dialogue, I think.  You should watch the scene if you can, though, to see Elizabeth's face as she digests the idea that he's really better off in America.  Philip tells Elizabeth right away about Father Andrei, and then after they're in a car driving to get Paige, she tells him what she did.

[jjj]

51 minutes ago, Bannon said:

Ahem, what? I never stated or implied the CIA would never do such a thing. I stated that I'd view such a thing as awful, if it did.

So Stan's such a moron that he doesn't grasp the likelihood that Phil was Clark, and Clark killed Amador. Like I said, ugh.

They certainly will compare the Clark fingerprint to Philip's, so will realize he was Clark, and directly bugging the FBI.  And then link him to the murder of the computer tech guy?  But this means Philip led to the downfall of Gaad. 

If they really had just been written as non-violent espionage agents, I could see letting them go.  But what a horrible trail of violence they left.  

3 minutes ago, Bannon said:

The point is that it us ridiculous for Stan not to be enraged about the killing of his FBI colleagues, that he knows for a fact Phil and Liz killed. So enraged that he cannot allow them to escape.

I cannot believe how badly Stan has been written.

Edited May 31, 2018 by jjj

[showme]

P and E had Canadian passports, and were able to go to Montreal. Maybe they could have stayed in Canada and become "The Canadians"? :-) 

[DrumJunkie]

Watched the show twice last night and finally getting caught up from the 9! pages on this thread.  I tried to get involved with the live chat, but I can't multitask like that.  I really really REALLY liked the finale.  It didn't go how I thought it would, but was believable to me.  The way they left certain threads loose and tied up the important ones was masterful in telling the story and also ensuring that there will be discussion and thought down the road.  The entire cast did some heavy lifting to close out the show.  Easily one of the best shows on TV.  It will be missed.

Before I wade into the conversation(s), I will preface that I have generally tried to see why/how an action or scene is plausible instead of trying to prove why it couldn't happen.  Life is messy and people rarely behave predictably or logically.  It is so much easier to find plausabilities than it is to nitpick and prove that something couldn't happen.

Edited May 31, 2018 by DrumJunkie

[lucindabelle]

We had to suffer through wheat murders   last season for this?  

 

This has all the marks of being something that the writers wrote along time ago I’m in the final scene, and then had to make the episode work, even though the series had a valve so it no longer made sense. This is why, writers, they advise you never to write a last scene or a scene far in advance of what you were working on, because it poses the danger of making you force your characters to do something that they won’t do by the time you get there.

It only started to get exciting when Stan started to catch on to them and then it was rushed. Weren’t  the real spies arrested before they went back to Russia? Also, there were so many hints that Philip wanted to defect, and didn’t Elisabeth say in the car that she would too if they could all be together? Why didn’t they just come in from the cold?

 

 

So many loose ends, including literally no follow up to the shooting on the street last week. I am incredibly disappointed.

[kikaha]

53 minutes ago, Bannon said:

Geez, how many illegals does Stan think are running around D.C.?

Don't know, but seems like Washington DC would be a magnet for them. 

I agree with you overall about the writing.  But I was willing to play along anyway.  e.g. I found the garage scene absurd but also gripping.  We've waited six years for the reveal: I sure wanted to see how things unfolded. 

Same for most of the sixth season.  It worked better than, say, the fifth season, because it brought to a head the key tensions, plots and question marks that had built up since the premier.  The concept, acting and themes were powerful enough to overcome writing shortcomings, at least for me.  

[tpplay]

8 hours ago, SusanSunflower said:

My impressions of Stan, just released from high-intensity undercover work as a single-man bad-ass, quite reluctant to put on the harness of husband and father, got completely lost quickly, and I felt he was living large on a rapidly fading reputation in a desk-job (counter intelligence may be sexy but I never thought Gaad liked or trusted Stan much due to his inflated self-regard).  Gaad valued team work and painstaking attention to details ... And then after Martha went to Russia (and a series of potentially career-ending bad decisions by Stan) he seemed to fade into the background in favor of Paige as mini-me and Afternoons with Claudia ... (I think the writing has been great in close up and incoherent wrt larger themes and continuity) 

This last sentence is right on, I think.

[DrumJunkie]

9 minutes ago, showme said:

You worry too much. Was there even DNA testing back then??? Paige will be fine. FBI doesn't know anything about her, there is no evidence tie her to anything. she will be able to lead a relatively normal life.

From various wiki pages:

CODIS: The creation of a national DNA database within the U.S. was first mentioned by the Technical Working Group on DNA Analysis Methods (TWGDAM) in 1989.  In 1990, the FBI began a pilot DNA databasing program with 14 state and local laboratories.

Colin Pitchfork (born 23 March 1960) is a British convicted murderer and rapist. He was the first person convicted of murder based on DNA fingerprinting evidence, and the first to be caught as a result of mass DNA screening. He was arrested on 19 September 1987 and sentenced to life imprisonment on 22 January 1988.

So, needless to say, DNA would not have been used by the FBI in 1987.

[Plums]

the only thing that now bugs me on rewatch is that border control appears to have actual black and white copies of photographs of Philip and Elizabeth, alongside copies of their disguise sketches, and still don't seem to recognize them. I guess the confidence combined with the different disguises was enough, but it's become a nitpick, tbh. They're capable of being more unrecognizable than they were on that train. 

[Chaiboy]

11 hours ago, MissBluxom said:

E won't be able to get American cigarettes in Russia. She won't be happy.

That's ok..she never did really smoke anyway.....For a heavy smoker she never really inhaled.  And was very quick to stub out the cigarette..  The fact that Liz was a heavy smoker was important for the plot...but obviously Keri Russell is not a smoker.. I give her kudos for trying.

[SunnyBeBe]

Did E even smoke any after leaving DC? 

[Bannon]

19 minutes ago, jjj said:

 

 

 

 

19 minutes ago, jjj said:

They certainly will compare the Clark fingerprint to Philip's, so will realize he was Clark, and directly bugging the FBI.  And then link him to the murder of the computer tech guy?  But this means Philip led to the downfall of Gaad. 

If they really had just been written as non-violent espionage agents, I coulseee letting them go.  But what a horrible trail of violence they left.  

 

Heck, in season 4, Martha's landlord gave the FBI a sketch of Clark/Phil. It's just dumb that nobody, Stan and Aderholt especially, don't grasp that Clark was likely Phil.

Edited May 31, 2018 by Bannon

[whiporee]

18 minutes ago, Misstify said:

had been thinking that Paige could not possibly get off scot-free.  I wasn't thinking of DNA evidence, but that she would crack under questioning. 

Don't forget that this is still America, and Paige is entitled to a lawyer. If she just keeps quiet, it's hard to implicate her in much. My guess is Stan -- or even Aderholdt -- would push her to get an attorney before they questioned her too vigorously. And a lawyer would tell her to keep quiet. 

Even if she talked, parental coercion and extenuating circumstance wouldn't be hard to convince a judge of. And if she gave up Claudia and Gabriel -- even if they'd left the country -- that would help mitigate any punishment she receives. I also think it's important to consider that the FBI has very little actual evidence of criminal activity by P&E. MY guess is they kept very little around. So all the crimes we know about, the FBI may suspect but they would be very hard to prove. Thinking that these crimes were committed by illegals is a long way from being able to prove these crimes were committed by illegals. And even with Stan's testimony, Phillip never actually confessed to anything. I've no doubt that -- if the FBI wanted to -- they could get convictions in absentia for P&E, and if Paige confessed to seeing the General, maybe murder with E (though, if E told her about the guy's previous treasonous act, suicide might be enough to create reasonable doubt). But unless P&E kept some kind of trophy room, actually convicting them of crimes beyond espionage would be difficult, and holding a teenager responsible for her parents espionage would be even harder. 

[Chaos Theory]

I know there will be people who will disagree but I think the Americans from pilot to finale has remained on par with top tier shows like Breaking Bad, The Shield and The Sopranos.      It wasn’t violent and I think that was its intention so when it did get violent you felt it.  Those teeth pulling,  person putting into a suitcase, occasional shoot outs were felt  because this show was one big punch to the gut.  

And that’s  why I think even at its worst it wasn’t really all that bad.  And yes I know some people love to complain about it’s weakness and hate Paige but ultimately I think she was a fascinating character and I don’t think the show would have worked without her and I am hoping Holly Taylor has an awesome career ahead of her.  So so long show you will have a fond place in my heart.

Edited May 31, 2018 by Chaos Theory

[Marianna]

10 hours ago, SlovakPrincess said:

On rewatch, I have a theory on Renee: maybe she’s just meant to be symbolic, in that you can never completely know another person.  You can’t even fully know yourself.  Philip was trying to find himself in EST, Liz started to explore her creative side, Stan’s identity has mostly been the FBI (which, quite frankly he’s not great at), and Paige has no idea who she really is.  

Maybe Paige’s vodka drinking at Claudia’s was her private farewell to that part of her life.  And her plan is to go to Stan and hope he protects her for Henry’s sake.

Stan will protect Paige because they are in a mutually assured destruction setup. She knows he let them go. 

I do  believe that under the circumstances, she’s worried about Henry, but never throughout the entire history of the show have they had any particular closeness, so I felt like they laid it on a bit thick re: Paige and Henry. Stan’s feelings were much more believable. 

[benteen]

3 minutes ago, Chaos Theory said:

I know there will be people who will disagree but I think the Americans from pilot to finale has remained on par with top tier shows like Breaking Bad, The Shield and The Sopranos.      It wasn’t violent and I think that was its intention so when it did get violent you felt it.  Thosr teeth pulling,  person putting into a suitcase, occasional shoot outs were felt  because this show was one big punch to the gut.  

Anf that why I think even at its worst it wasn’t really all that bad.  And yes I know some people love to complain about it’s weakes and hate Paige but ultimately I think she was a fascinating character and I don’t think the show would have worked without her and I am hoping Holly Taylor has an awesome career ahead of her.  So so long show you will have a fond place in my heart.

I think for its first four seasons, The American was absolutely a top tier show on par with those other ones.  No question about it.  The last two seasons definitely hurt the overall body of work though the acting remained top tier.

Quote

E won't be able to get American cigarettes in Russia. She won't be happy.

Liz is probably more worried about her shoe collection that she left behind.

Edited May 31, 2018 by benteen