S06.E10: START

[Chaos Theory]

I think my final opinion is The Americans is as of right now #2 on my top ten (completed) shows of recent memory.  Shows that have had gone from pilot to finale.   It lands right below Breaking Bad.  I really like that it chose emotional heartbreak over physical violence or a big ol’ Shootout.   I like that we didn't get all the answers and are left wondering about almost everyone’s fate. I am not one to dig into reality too much and I don’t particularly care what happened to real people in these situations.  In my head Stan is able to salvage his career because he was essentially right about the Jennings.  Although he is no longer in counter intelligence he was never happy there anyway.  I am not sure about Paige.  I alternately go with her turning herself in and her just disappearing into the night to live a simple life in some nowhere place.  I like both options.  I know there are a lot of Paige haters who are going to say she is too stupid to do this but I disagree and always have I think she knows just enough to vanish and just enough to dig herself out of the hole she is in with the FBI.  Depending what option she chooses. 

Edited June 4, 2018 by Chaos Theory

[Erin9]

3 hours ago, BW Manilowe said:

Once back in Moscow, do you think they'd still use their American identities or would they resume their original USSR names?

They’d use their USSR/birth names. 

I imagine the biggest adjustment would be using them with each other. Just like I expect them to go back and forth between English and Russian with each other. It’s so deeply ingrained to speak English when they talk to each other, to call each other by their American names.

[SunnyBeBe]

23 hours ago, Bannon said:

Good grief, the KGB Rezidentura, in full disguise, and carrying an obvious assassination device, was just gunned down in public, while approaching Gorbachev's negotiater. Unless Gorbachev is as dumb as Stan (!), I think ol' Gorby is going to grasp something is amiss, no matter what Stan does, and no, it is not credible that Gorbachev would not be informed of this assassination attempt. 

It's just another instance of these writers often lazily obscuring the logical consequences of widescale  murderous violence.

Exactly.  That's one of the things that I didn't get is how they placed so much emphasis on getting that coup message back to their people.  Imo, Gorbachev and his people would have known of a coup, as soon as it was discovered that a KGB person attempted to assassinate one of his top people.  AND, P and E should have known that too, because, E stopped her.  I can't imagine a more clear message to Gorbachez.....yet, it continued to be something that seemed illusive.  Even with Arkady met with Oleg's father.....wouldn't Arkady have word by then of the attempted assassination?  So, why is Oleg's mission a waste?  It would seem to me that that assassination shed light on that coup attempt and it could be addressed and the Summit not deterred.  So, that would be a success.  And Arkady says the coup faction may be after him and Oleg's father, but, it would seem that it's not a secret now....they would have some support, since the coup (assassination attempt) was known and thereby afforded more protection. I'm trying to figure this out.    

[Boilergal]

For me Renee gave herself away early in the relationship with Stan, they were sitting on the couch watching Breaking Away, I think, and she referred to Indiana University as the University of Indiana.   The way she met Stan seemed to be pretty parallel to Elizabeth meeting guys.  No disguise, Renee was playing a long game, like using Stan to get a job in the FBI -personnel - PERFECT!! Is there a better way to get info on agents?  I just wanted a real confirmation of it.

Glad that Henry has Stan, Stan has always been the parent that Henry needed.  

[sistermagpie]

7 hours ago, companionenvy said:

To the extent that Stan is ultimately a parallel to Oleg, far more than to Philip, it also suggests that Stan himself is someone who, like Oleg, may be willing to step outside the rules when he thinks his government is in the wrong, but is ultimately committed to country.

 

This really got me thinking about this because it's true Stan is more of a parallel to Oleg but I think he's very different from both Oleg and Philip. All three men are willing to step outside the rules when they think their government in the wrong but are ultimately committed to country. But Stan, imo, is the only one of the three who seems to go outside the rules for reasons that really can't be justified in that way.

For instance, Oleg handing over William and Philip protecting Kimmy in his final phone call are both acting out of moral reasons. So is Stan refusing to blackmail Oleg. But Stan going after Zinaida with an eye towards trading her for Nina is Stan acting out of personal reasons. It's not just that the government failed Nina it's that he did and he wants to save her for himself because there really isn't any justification for him to claim that they should trade for Nina rather than American agents. Even if he doesn't know she was a triple agent. I don't think Oleg and Philip would do that--Philip is pointedly *not* saving Martha just so he himself won't have her on his conscious or because he loves her. It's the principle of the thing. And I think this fits with Stan being an American. The maverick and the individual is central to the US character. No Russian characters ever expect that.

Basically while I agree with what you're saying here for the most part I do think Stan is the one character of the three who has been shown to think his personal feelings should be the same as US interests when they're clearly not. Though not to the point where Stan letting two top KGB officers go because one of them was his friend before he knew he was KGB is in keeping with his previous behavior.

6 hours ago, BW Manilowe said:

Once back in Moscow, do you think they'd still use their American identities or would they resume their original USSR names?

They discussed this when they talked about going back in S5. Not only would they use their real names but Elizabeth had decided to take Philip's family name, which is a bit unusual. But even if they hadn't there's zero reason they'd be wanting to move around Moscow with American names that aren't even theirs anyway.

2 hours ago, Chaos Theory said:

 I know there are a lot of Paige haters who are going to say she is too stupid to do this but I disagree and always have I think she knows just enough to vanish and just enough to dig herself out of the hole she is in with the FBI.  Depending what option she chooses. 

I don't think it's a question of her being stupid, it's that she doesn't live in 1940 where you could just drive to a different town and give yourself a new name and maybe be fine. There's no reason to think she knows anything about how to vanish beyond what she was doing with her parents where they had all the stuff they needed provided already.

More importantly, the only thing she *did* have to help her vanish was the fake ID she was traveling with with her parents. But the last thing we see of her is that she's come back to DC from the Canadian border and dropped her disguise. So she's not vanishing.

1 hour ago, Boilergal said:

Glad that Henry has Stan, Stan has always been the parent that Henry needed.  

That would imply that Henry needed a parent who wasn't a parent to him at all (Stan wasn't even actively parenting Matthew). Henry's grown and on his own now. He never lacked a father or lacked a good father. He loved his father and mother, even if he and his mother had problems as he grew up--many people have those kinds of issues with their parents. They parented him through his entire childhood. Stan was an adult friend and support he could talk to. Henry's now having to become an adult earlier than he should have and he no longer has parents in his life.

6 hours ago, BW Manilowe said:

Henry is 16.  Paige is 20.  Misha is around 26.  Philip is between 42 and 47, they only say he was born "the early 40's."

The wiki's wrong on Paige's age. She's 19. She was born in 1968 so she won't turn 20 until November 1988.

12 hours ago, hellmouse said:

I was noticing in other episodes when Elizabeth is in fights and is grabbed in a choke hold, she uses her legs to help gain leverage and give herself a chance to get free. Pushing off against a wall, for example. But Paige just kind of crumples when Philip has her in a choke hold. She uses her arms, but not her legs at all. He's not even holding her that hard - if he had wanted to snap her neck he could have. I wish we'd gotten to see them talk about that, but I guess given how Paige didn't think too deeply about her spy training, she was unlikely to bring it up. 

This made me think about the sparring scene. Paige and Philip have no real interaction at all after that scene. That's their last one-on-one forever. So what does it mean to her? We know it's got to have something to do with her coming to see more of the truth of what her parents do and reject it. I know we've talked about how Philip is maybe showing Paige how Elizabeth's been holding back and letting her believe she was invincible.

But this post made me think of something else about it. As you say, if he'd wanted to snap her neck he could have. It ends with him putting her in a chokehold which is murderous. We've seen people killed this way on the show.

Maybe that's an important thing Paige is getting--though not not yet acknowledging--about what he's doing here. He's not hurting her, he's just subduing her. But he could be killing her and maybe that's the point. That these are deadly holds and he does kill people. He often doesn't fight like Paige and Elizabeth and the garage, getting hits in on each other while wearing pads before jabbing and kicking again. He tells her there's no pads in the real world. When she does a few faints he smacks her arm away easily in a way that stings. She's surprised enough to say, "Ouch!" and it looked like he just flicked his hand at her.

Maybe what he's saying to her here without words is that he is a killer and if she's not she's not like them. Maybe on some level she does get that--maybe that's the point of the choke hold that doesn't kill her or knock her out but would stop her breathing enough that it should give her a little taste of what it's like to be on her way to death. And her father is the one doing it.

[Token]

Paige.... stupid right until the end.

[Plums]

1 hour ago, sistermagpie said:

This made me think about the sparring scene. Paige and Philip have no real interaction at all after that scene. That's their last one-on-one forever. So what does it mean to her? We know it's got to have something to do with her coming to see more of the truth of what her parents do and reject it. I know we've talked about how Philip is maybe showing Paige how Elizabeth's been holding back and letting her believe she was invincible.

But this post made me think of something else about it. As you say, if he'd wanted to snap her neck he could have. It ends with him putting her in a chokehold which is murderous. We've seen people killed this way on the show.

Maybe that's an important thing Paige is getting--though not not yet acknowledging--about what he's doing here. He's not hurting her, he's just subduing her. But he could be killing her and maybe that's the point. That these are deadly holds and he does kill people. He often doesn't fight like Paige and Elizabeth and the garage, getting hits in on each other while wearing pads before jabbing and kicking again. He tells her there's no pads in the real world. When she does a few faints he smacks her arm away easily in a way that stings. She's surprised enough to say, "Ouch!" and it looked like he just flicked his hand at her.

 

I loved that scene because of all this basically. There are so many amazing layers to it. Philip is showing Paige she's not nearly the badass she thinks she is, that she's deeply mistaken to think of him as the disapproving, sensitive milquetoast not cut out for spying, that her mother has been lying to her about what she's physically capable of and giving Paige a sense of unwarranted confidence in her capabilities. And this level as well, that he could easily have killed her, that he's trained to kill. Implication being that he has killed, because killing people is something spies do, in contradiction to what her mother has been telling her. He couldn't bring himself to come right out and say they kill people, but he implied it pretty strongly, and that piece probably fell into place for Paige when Stan asked her if she knew how many people Soviet agents had killed in the past 10 years. 

1 hour ago, sistermagpie said:

I was noticing in other episodes when Elizabeth is in fights and is grabbed in a choke hold, she uses her legs to help gain leverage and give herself a chance to get free. Pushing off against a wall, for example. But Paige just kind of crumples when Philip has her in a choke hold. She uses her arms, but not her legs at all. He's not even holding her that hard - if he had wanted to snap her neck he could have. I wish we'd gotten to see them talk about that, but I guess given how Paige didn't think too deeply about her spy training, she was unlikely to bring it up. 

Something else though that's interesting in that scene- We've seen Elizabeth use her legs to push off and gain the advantage when a stronger person has her in a chokehold. She did it to Claudia's goon who her broke into her house in s1, and she did it to Aderholdt in s3. Paige didn't use her legs at all, but she did improvise in a way that Elizabeth never did. She bites him. She really goes for it and digs in too. And you can see he's not expecting her to do that, and that she's really hurting him. He still could have killed her, but I think the fact that she actually was able to do anything to him very reluctantly impressed him. I think that "not bad" was sincere. She had the presence of mind to fight back in a way none of their actual victims did. 

[Inquisitionist]

On ‎6‎/‎1‎/‎2018 at 4:18 PM, Avaleigh said:

I'm still thinking about it two days later and am still gutted by the separations even though this is what I wanted for all ofthe characters involved. My stomach genuinely lurched when I realized that Paige wasn't on the train. The fact that a character I've perceived as being weak for so long ended up showing how strong she can be was a terrific moment. She showed strength, wisdom, character and independence in that moment and I absolutely loved it. 

After watching the finale a few times, I went back and watched episode 6-1 again.  There's a lot of foreshadowing and many thematic tie-ins to the finale -- it's really worth revisiting, if you haven't done so already.  One thing that jumped out at me about Paige was how she messed up the incident with the navy guy, e.g., not getting his name right, not figuring out how to get her ID back from him.  Elizabeth downplayed these lapses and said something to the effect that Paige held up under pressure, in that she didn't blow her cover.  Now flash-forward to the train ride.  Since we didn't see the agent ask Paige for her passport, I'm assuming this didn't happen -- that she got off the train beforehand, which would make sense if she'd already decided not to leave with her parents -- why take the risk of being found out?  But that incident in 6-1, along with all the other evidence viewers have pointed out about Paige being a poor liar, made me wonder if that wasn't also a factor in her decision.  Perhaps Paige herself realized she wasn't strong enough to pull off the subterfuge on the train, and if she failed, she'd be putting her parents at risk, too.  Just one more element of a complicated scenario that's open to multiple interpretations.  To me, that is a mark of strong, not weak, writing.  :-)

 

On ‎6‎/‎1‎/‎2018 at 6:36 PM, AllyB said:

I've got to say this episode really didn't work too well for me. The whole bittersweet ending is spoiled by our knowledge of the future.

But the characters themselves didn't have that knowledge, so the stakes were high for them.  And what we know about the future is still no guarantee for the characters.  A lot could happen to them in 4 years.  I liked the ending a lot. 

[sistermagpie]

30 minutes ago, Plums said:

Something else though that's interesting in that scene- We've seen Elizabeth use her legs to push off and gain the advantage when a stronger person has her in a chokehold. She did it to Claudia's goon who her broke into her house in s1, and she did it to Aderholdt in s3. Paige didn't use her legs at all, but she did improvise in a way that Elizabeth never did. She bites him. She really goes for it and digs in too. And you can see he's not expecting her to do that, and that she's really hurting him. He still could have killed her, but I think the fact that she actually was able to do anything to him very reluctantly impressed him. I think that "not bad" was sincere. She had the presence of mind to fight back in a way none of their actual victims did. 

And iirc if you look at that last sequence of moves, it's like a slow motion action and response. She punches at him and he grabs her, then pushes her against the wall. She does keep fighting--she tries to kick back at him. He shoves her legs apart and kicks them against the wall. He's holding her the way he's been all along, she's pulling at his arm but can't move it. She bites him--I would take that as not only a sign that she's fighting back but also desperation. Elizabeth probably did tell her not to forget about biting since that's self-defense 101, but the fact that she's doing it is upping the stakes from sparring to her really feeling threatened. She's moved to stuff she'd only do in a real situation and not a sparring one in the garage. She'd started out saying they didn't even have pads and asking if he wanted her to "pretend to hit him" because it wouldn't be a real fight. But for her to actually bite him means she probably was feeling angry and desperate and was willing to hurt him to make him stop. He said they were fighting like it was real and they were--now she is too because the physical instinct kicked in.

His response to that is that he doesn't release her at all. In fact, he just methodically ups that stakes again and puts her in a choke hold that would be even more terrifying--and that she's unable to fight. So it's taking her slowly from a feeling of security and even condescension with goofy dad, to maybe some humiliation that goofy dad can beat her, to frustration at none of her moves working, to real alarm at being helpless, to desperation, to fear to probably just relief that she's free because he backed off after making his point.

[Mrs peel]

On ‎6‎/‎3‎/‎2018 at 1:01 PM, Bannon said:

Paige is not a marketing major at the University of Maryland. She is at George Washington University, taking classes appropriate for applying for a State Department internship, and she is among like minded students. People like this are news junkies. Her mother has been training her to be an intelligence operative for more than 3 years. Intelligence operatives are trained to consume local media, because even when it is complete propaganda, you learn things by doing do. I'm sorry, but there is no way I can find it remotely possible that Paige has not been exposed to the information that warehouse caper resulted in 3 murders. If the point is that she has, and then chose to block that out, then the writers need to show us that.

Yeah, but that would be to be interested in national and international news, not necessarily local news.  The main section of the Washington Post was all national news, the Metro section was separate.  I went to graduate school in DC (GW actually!), and I don't recall being especially knowledgeable about local news, though I got the Post and watched the news.  Even local news in DC was often about the federal government.

I'm not sure we know how intensive her training has been with the KGB.

Edited June 4, 2018 by Mrs peel

[Bannon]

3 minutes ago, Mrs peel said:

Yeah, but that would be to be interested in national and international news, not necessarily local news.  The main section of the Washington Post was all national news, the Metro section was separate.  I went to graduate school in DC (GW actually!), and I don't recall being especially knowledgeable about local news, though I got the Post and watched the news.

I'm not sure we know how intensive her training has been with the KGB.

Ok, so now we are left to believe that she looks at the national and international news stories, but she doesn't spot the headline in the metro section that reads "Three Security Guards Slain in Chevy Chase Warehouse Break-in" two mornings after she participated in a Chevy Chase warehouse break in. Because she is so determined to avoid examining her life that she would have no curiosity regarding how her criminal activity was being reported.

Again, I simply do not get it.

[SusanSunflower]

,... and sad to think how much more interesting SHE would have been had she bothered to raise her head and look around her ..... oh, and maybe wonder .... 

(She remained so underdeveloped .... we are and were left to create her motivations largely out of whole cloth ... what a very very dull and dulled young lady) 

Edited June 4, 2018 by SusanSunflower

[Bannon]

6 minutes ago, SusanSunflower said:

,... and sad to think how much more interesting SHE would have been had she bothered to raise her head and look around her ..... oh, and maybe wonder .... 

(She remained so underdeveloped .... we are and were left to create her motivations largely out of whole cloth ... what a very very dull and dulled young lady) 

It's really a shame. Some reality based conflict between Paige and Liz, beyond "don't charge into the park, while I'm doing a suicide intervention with an Air Force General", or "Only have sex with a Congressional intern if you think he's hot!" could have been interesting. Yes, we did get the "Mom, you schtupped a fellow student and ruined his life" in the next to last episode, but, to say the least, the conflict over "Hey, mom, you didn't tell me I was signing on to helping you shoot three people to death. I am not committed to your Cause in a way that convinces me that those murders are justified, and it causes me to doubt the path you've charted for me. You gonna shoot me, too?", earlier in the season, could have been more interesting

[SusanSunflower]

and unless suppressed, the story of the warehouse burglary (in which 3 died and nothing was taken) would have been "big news" because generic petty-criminal burglars steal stuff they can convert to money ...  and this company's warehouse wasn't filled with stuff like that .... just 3 dead guards and .... nothing was taken. 

I still shiver driving past a construction site on the freeway where a massive girder vibrated off it's mooring and crushed a family in an SUV on a Saturday morning, BECAUSE I had driven by there the prior day (everyone was amazed that this multi-ton girder (which had been in place for months waiting the site to be ready for it to be installed) could have possibly ever have moved enough to "drop" onto the roadway) 

I also suspect the "unsolved" TeaCup murders would have made some noise ... Shouldn't "Soviet Defectors" have piqued some interest? 

[Bannon]

6 minutes ago, SusanSunflower said:

and unless suppressed, the story of the warehouse burglary (in which 3 died and nothing was taken) would have been "big news" because generic petty-criminal burglars steal stuff they can convert to money ...  and this company's warehouse wasn't filled with stuff like that .... just 3 dead guards and .... nothing was taken. 

I still shiver driving past a construction site on the freeway where a massive girder vibrated off it's mooring and crushed a family in an SUV on a Saturday morning, BECAUSE I had driven by there the prior day (everyone was amazed that this multi-ton girder (which had been in place for months waiting the site to be ready for it to be installed) could have possibly ever have moved enough to "drop" onto the roadway) 

I also suspect the "unsolved" TeaCup murders would have made some noise ... Shouldn't "Soviet Defectors" have piqued some interest? 

Better yet, the homicide could have been dialed, way, way, down from the show's beginning, to just a few, and them happening in a way that really horrified Phil, not having his wife's religious Faith, then, this season, just one murder, that Paige knows about, causing her to abandon Mom's Faith, like Pastor Tim's Faith was abandoned. Claudia leans on Liz to get Paige's mind right, and Liz finally starts having a crisis of Faith. The writers simply didn't trust the audience enough to tell this more quiet story, so instead we had Murderpalooza for 6 seasons, it dialed up to "11" in the last one. Really too bad.

[SusanSunflower]

yes, biting my tongue ... it was "as if" the writers used Killer Elizabeth as a lazy crutch to keep a certain segment of the audience (likely also drawn by honey-pot Elizabeth) but it undermined (badly) the moral see-saw of the marriage and made Phillip (who knew pretty much only what Elizabeth told him) impotent.  The sparring with Paige was Phillip asserting both his father/husband role in the family and his "career KGB agent" bona fides... It was his daughter whose life was endangered by her inflated belief in her mad-martial-arts-skilz .... She could too easily end up dead ... little delicate 100 pound girl like her.  Pissing off Elizabeth by invading her "turf" and demonstrating Paige's vulnerabilities was secondary.   We've repeatedly seen Elizabeth pull off "unbelievable' moves and murders using those hand-to-hand combat skilz but ... that's Elizabeth. 

eta:  with folks rewatching earlier seasons, the change in focus (complexity of story arcs) is imho really obvious 

Edited June 4, 2018 by SusanSunflower

[Sweet-tea]

On 5/30/2018 at 10:37 PM, SailorGirl said:

The garage scene was the best of the entire episode.

I wanted some Stan resolution . . . does he just live with knowing he betrayed his country? Does he just not give a fuck anymore? Does he live in turmoil the rest of his life? WTH STAN???

Agree about the garage scene. I did not like the rest of the show. I wanted Elizabeth to get caught. 

[Umbelina]

4 hours ago, sistermagpie said:

The wiki's wrong on Paige's age. She's 19. She was born in 1968 so she won't turn 20 until November 1988.

17 hours ago, hellmouse said:

According to the actress and the showrunners, she is 20 this year.  They told her she would have to play "older" and she had to remind them she really is 20 in real life.

3 hours ago, Token said:

Paige.... stupid right until the end

Or just very young, innocent, immature for her age, as is the actress.

1 hour ago, SusanSunflower said:

... and sad to think how much more interesting SHE would have been had she bothered to raise her head and look around her ..... oh, and maybe wonder .... 

(She remained so underdeveloped .... we are and were left to create her motivations largely out of whole cloth ... what a very very dull and dulled young lady) 

I think this last season, they finally decided, THANKFULLY, to put some of who Holly Taylor really is into the character of Paige.  I think Holly Taylor is a naive young women, and possibly, we, and maybe the showrunners, are so used to the precocious, wise beyond their years young actresses, like Jennifer Lawrence, or a young Anna Paquin, or even Tatum O'Neil, that some, me included, were disappointed in her.

In truth though, since she couldn't really pull off the smart, capable, wise beyond her years, Russian-soul stuff the writers kept trying to sell us, because she is simply a kind, uncomplicated, optimistic KID?  Her story kept hitting brick walls.  This season they finally allowed more of the real Holly in, and it worked much better.  They also wisely kept her silent during the most important scenes.

She's just one of those lucky someones who really IS a kid, and even at twenty, still retains that naive, child-like self, honestly the "WOO!  I get to be a SPY!" is pure Holly, she even said that in interviews.

She's doing a horror film now, and she may do rom com in the future, where I think she could do well.  She'll have to grow into doing a troubled role again, maybe after she's actually had troubles she will be able to add more depth to roles.

[Cardie]

12 hours ago, companionenvy said:

I think you've nailed the logic of the writers. It is simply a step too far for me, and I don't see it as comparable to the other cases you mention.

You make good points about the precision of my analogies but I see this final confrontation, with Philip's powers of persuasion, Paige's presence, Henry's probable reaction to Stan as the guy who brought his parents in, the necessity to shoot them to stop them, as Stan simply going one step further in putting his emotional decisions ahead of what his status as FBI agent mandates. As this thread proves, this is not an issue we will all agree on and I respect your reasoned response.

[SusanSunflower]

Acting is harder than most people imagine .... seriously hard work with skill sets that involve training ... but more than anything deep concentration ... I think the showrunners may well have underestimated the skill and dedication it would take for Holly to be credible  -- "just act like a normal teenager" is far from helpful, having nothing to do with who Paige Jennning's is .... Paige (IMHO) not being a normal teenager having carried her family's (potentially deadly) secret for 6 years at age 20... a secret never to be mentioned or hinted at ... experiences that must never be referenced.  Want to come over?? No, mom and I are going to be staking out some guy  How many excuses not to join her friends did she run through in a week?  When she wasn't home and didn't answer the phone?  How exhausting to keep her "lives" straight and "act normal" ... Holly does seem very young, but we saw that amazing (to me anyway) leap in actorly skill in Keidrich Sellati a few years ago ... Henry had been largely absent and then had a knock-your-socks-off who is that young man scene that clearly (to me) represented the actor really "getting" his character (and acting).  Acting takes hard work and painful feedback ... almost no one (particularly in film where its so fragmented) is a "natural" 

eta:  I should note that we never saw the complexities of Paige's life, in fact, as was mentioned, we don't know what's she's studying or if she has any friends (ever/ anywhere)  .... she was more of a placeholder or, what I call a paperdoll ... without personal resonance. 

Edited June 4, 2018 by SusanSunflower

[Sweet-tea]

On 5/30/2018 at 10:39 PM, KBrownie said:

That's the most ridiculous part of this entire thing for me.  Why is Stan made to look like a complete and utter fool and end of betraying his country for two people who get off totally scot-free for all the horrific things they did in the name of theirs?   Awful.  If they were really worth it, they would have never left him to do it.  He obviously wasn't worth it to them.  They sure weren't willing to sacrifice shit for him, but he becomes a turncoat.  All for some true love conquers all bullshit.  

ITA! I could not believe he let them go. All the way up to the end, I was hoping he would show up and capture them. It was really frustrating to me to see them--especially Elizabeth--get off. 

[sistermagpie]

2 hours ago, Bannon said:

It's really a shame. Some reality based conflict between Paige and Liz, beyond "don't charge into the park, while I'm doing a suicide intervention with an Air Force General", or "Only have sex with a Congressional intern if you think he's hot!" could have been interesting. Yes, we did get the "Mom, you schtupped a fellow student and ruined his life" in the next to last episode, but, to say the least, the conflict over "Hey, mom, you didn't tell me I was signing on to helping you shoot three people to death. I am not committed to your Cause in a way that convinces me that those murders are justified, and it causes me to doubt the path you've charted for me. You gonna shoot me, too?", earlier in the season, could have been more interesting

Or alternately they would have had to really gone through in detail how none of this had to do with real world conflict, which would have been really hard. Basically, it would be trying to do the Martha storyline in a believable way with Paige. Martha wasn't drawn in by ideology either.

But of course, it's totally different with Martha because she was already FBI and it was clear how she could start doing little spying things (that were huge) to hold on to the love she had in her life. It seems Paige was actually in a similar situation. She was drawn in for emotional reasons because of the people involved (her parents) not the ideology exactly. But since we didn't see that we had no way of knowing how that worked and naturally would expect her to act like someone who had some belief in what they were doing. That would imply interacting with the world in a real way. Even if her reaction to it was twisted.

Doing it this way required a lot more nuance and time and convincing for us to actually understand where Paige was coming from, imo.

1 hour ago, Umbelina said:

According to the actress and the showrunners, she is 20 this year.  They told her she would have to play "older" and she had to remind them she really is 20 in real life.

I'm about to get crazy insistent. :-D

They're mistaken. Paige's age was harped on over and over and over for several seasons on the actual show. Gregory told us he met Elizabeth in 68 and they were already a couple before Paige was born. At the end of S2, which takes place post-November 1982, they talk about how she's 14--which means she's born in 1968. The next season it's 1983 and there's several episodes dedicated to her turning 15. She gets her driver's license in season 4 in 1984. So she actually starts S6 at 18 and turns 19, since it seemed like her birthday was in November sometime.

I make myself laugh that I even know this because usually I would *never* be sure of a characters' age but it was stated so definitively and so often and it was so close to my own age that with her I remember. I couldn't tell you at this moment how old *I* am right now, but I know how old Paige is. LOL.

Not that it makes that much of a difference. She's a sophomore in college and still playing older compared to the year before when she was supposed to be 16. And Liz is actually putting an 18-year-old on surveillance.

Quote

She's just one of those lucky someones who really IS a kid, and even at twenty, still retains that naive, child-like self, honestly the "WOO!  I get to be a SPY!" is pure Holly, she even said that in interviews.

I would not be surprised if she didn't see most of Paige's spy stuff showing her being bad at it and Elizabeth in denial over it. After all, Paige didn't seem to realize it and there's no big scene where Paige realizes it.

Edited June 4, 2018 by sistermagpie

[Umbelina]

http://theamericans.wikia.com/wiki/Paige_Jennings

Looks like we are both correct.  If she's was born in late '68, say in November, she would be 19 when the season began and 20 when it ended, near Christmastime. 

Holly Taylor and the show runners definitely said 20 though, I'm a recap fanatic.  ;)

[sistermagpie]

8 minutes ago, Umbelina said:

Looks like we are both correct.  If she's was born in late '68, say in November, she would be 19 when the season began and 20 when it ended, near Christmastime. 

The show ends in December 1987. So she's 18 when the season began and turns 19 before the end. :-) She turns 20 in November 1988!

I think the showrunners and actress just didn't do the math and are thinking of Holly's own age of 13-20 over 6 years (81-87).

[SunnyBeBe]

Yeah, I think they got it mixed up.  I just saw a clip of Holly on the Media thread, where she talks about her age and Paige's age.

What was the drinking age in DC back then?  I think 21, oh no,  DC changed the drinking age to 21 in Dec. of 1987.  So, she could have been legally drinking under 21 for the time we saw her on the show. 

https://ghostsofdc.org/2014/01/29/d-c-one-last-raise-drinking-age-21/

Edited June 4, 2018 by SunnyBeBe

[Umbelina]

87-68 = 19.

87 is almost gone.

[sistermagpie]

7 minutes ago, Umbelina said:

87-68 = 19.

87 is almost gone.

It's not just the year, though. It's the month. Paige's birthday is at the end of the year. So she was 18 for most of 1987. At the end of it she turned 19. She'll be 19 for most of 1988, and then turn 20 in November. If she was born in a year ending in 8 she turns 20 at the end of a year also ending in 8.

[Clanstarling]

7 hours ago, Token said:

Paige.... stupid right until the end.

I've had my problems with Paige all along, and this season as well. But her choice at the end of this episode - the first time I really respected her. Is she naive? Probably. Stupid? Maybe, at least in terms of street smarts - we know she's book smart. But she finally made a completely independent decision, whatever the cost.

[SusanSunflower]

The writers whiffed on Paige's reasons and motivations .... and so she seems "emotional" or "impulsive" or "stupid"  .... who knows? It's par for the course with Paige's characterization.  

I was happy because "the door was closing" on the possibility of her escaping the dual life created by "the secret" and the guaranteed loneliness of being a spy ...  of course, it's not guaranteed that she'll get to -- once again -- be "just Paige" but if she'd followed her parents with her doubts and misgivings, she really didn't have a chance.  

Note that I doubt that Paige could honestly, based on deep feelings, articulate why she got off the train .... she might say "Henry" or "I don't want to live in Russia" or "I hate and mistrust my parents" .... she's another person whose clarity and honesty with herself is uncertain .... but (given this chance) will be evolving ... she has lived in a straight-jacket these last 6 years ... dedicated to "the secret" and, of course, "the cause" (which she can barely articulate). 

Edited June 5, 2018 by SusanSunflower

[sistermagpie]

Did anybody else notice in the last scene that it's like the lighting changes drastically halfway through? I think it's after Elizabeth is imagining their lives in Russia and she says about Philip, "You could've...hmmm."

Then it cuts to Philip and suddenly the light it much colder, like everything's gone blue. It was warmer before that. I kept rewinding to see if a light was supposed to have gone off somewhere. I feel like they might have said in the past that they use a more blue filter for Russia (maybe part of the reason people have complained the show makes it look like it's dark in Russia) so maybe it was intentional? It just really struck me when I watched it.

[MisterBluxom]

22 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

Thats practically a metaphor for Paige in general. She gets all excited about some new cause or person to get behind, but when it gets hard, she crumbles. 

That is a good insight. A nice metaphor.

Edited June 5, 2018 by MissBluxom

[Dev F]

On 6/3/2018 at 2:46 PM, Bannon said:

So Stan is swayed in part by Phil saying he didn't do those things anymore, despite the fact that Stan is 100% certain, and correctly so, of Phil being involved in the murders of FBI agents in Chicago within the past 10 days or so?

He also knows that it was unusual for Philip to run off on that kind of mission anymore, hence his earlier talk to Renee about how Elizabeth is "always off dealing with their big corporate clients, and he's --" Renee interrupts, but he's clearly aware that Philip's recent life was not not taken up by jet-setting. Given what Stan knows about his friend's life, Philip's assurances would have the ring of truth to him, because they are mostly true.

Now, I know part of your argument is that Stan's attention couldn't plausibly be diverted from the deaths of multiple FBI agents in Chicago, but in fact Stan has never been one to get especially emotional about the deaths of colleagues he doesn't personally know. Back in season 1, he begged off the mission to take out Arkady in revenge for the agents blown up by the KGB assassin, only changing his mind when the Russians took his partner. And that's Stan -- he was always driven to anger more by specific personal attachments than a more general sense of "You mess with one of us, you mess with all of us."

Which, again, is why I think that Gennadi and Sofia's murder made much more sense as the unsolved killing Stan would fixate on. And Stan did in fact think Philip was involved or at least complicit in it, calling him a "fucking liar" when he tried to deny it. And the way the Jenningses talked him past it was to focus his attention on Philip's regret for the (deliberately unspecified) terrible things he's done -- something Stan himself can certainly relate to -- and to remind him about the other boy who'd just lost his whole family and would soon need his help.

And I'm aware that none of these arguments make strict logical sense, and that for you and others that's a deal-breaker I'll never be able to argue around. But for me, at least, the emotional logic totally tracks.

[Plums]

The more I think about the layers of motivation for Paige's decision, the more I'm thoroughly convinced that one of them was her realizing she's an American, not a Russian. She had that whole night journey to the Canadian border to think about it, and besides knowing she couldn't leave Henry, I think she knew she didn't want to and just couldn't live in Russia. Playacting apprentice spy in the Russian Ladies' Cultural Appreciation Club on your afternoons off from school and referring to the Soviets as your people and the Americans as the enemy is one thing. Actually facing the imminent reality of uprooting your entire life and erasing your identity to live in the Soviet Union permanently is quite another. Especially when you so clearly have an American perspective of the world rather than a Soviet one. All that black and white thinking wrt morality. Also, you can't get much more American than being unfazed from seeing your mother covered in brains and viscera but freaking out and being scandalized from discovering she regularly has extramarital sex with her marks. 

Edited June 5, 2018 by Plums
clarity

[BetyBee]

I'm quite happy with the finale.  I must be - I've already watched it three times.  I also went back and watched the first two episodes of Season 1.  There has to be a rewatch.  I'm not done with the Jennings family yet, any more than Stan is.  I was surprised to see the finale right there in episode 2, where P&E are talking about their kids and E says Henry will be all right, but Paige is delicate.  In that episode, they were terrified by the arrival of the FBI agent living across the street from them and what that might mean.  Philip opined that they had better watch themselves crossing paths with Stan at odd hours or Stan would wonder why travel agents would be coming home at 4 in the morning.   I was also struck by Stan's first meeting of little Henry.  He was warm and friendly to Henry right off the bat.  They had a little rapport going.  Elizabeth was a warmer, more hands on mother then too. 

Back to the amazing finale.  I'm a big Henry fan and watched his scene when he learns about his parents, with great interest.  It's underplayed, imo, but as the camera pulls back and you see "Jennings" on the back of Henry's jersey, it just hit me that he's not Henry Jennings.  His whole life is just a lie.  His fancy school that he worked so hard for, that meant so much to him and the future it would bring him, was gone in an instant.  I fanfic that Stan will pay for Henry to finish there, but my point is that it's all been a lie and Henry will have to rebuild a life for himself, with that cloud of suspicion attached to his family, hanging over him.  But he will be okay.  Paige is another story, much harder to predict.  She got herself all the way back to her hometown and is wearing different clothes, having left Rouses Point with only the clothes on her back and probably a bit of cash.  She must have some resourcefulness after three years of spy training.  I don't think she'll finish college, at least not yet.  I hope that she relies a bit on Stan too, but if indeed Renee is a spy, she had better keep her distance.  I don't think Stan/Renee will last much longer, even if she's not a spy.  He will not be able to stay with her with his suspicions aroused and having just been burned by his friendship with Philip.  I just love this show, though there are storylines I could have done without (the wheat stuff, for example), but I'm really going to miss it.  

ETA - I just realized I forgot to discuss P&E's future.  I don't think Philip will be happy in Russia, but maybe the collapse of the Soviet Union and more freedom will make him happier.  He does love Elizabeth and always has.  I don't know if Elizabeth will be happy, unless she is given work that she considers important, to do.  I do think she'll take art classes and keep drawing.  I hope she can relax and that they have future contact with their kids, even if it's only to be rebuffed.  

Edited June 5, 2018 by BetyBee

[Bannon]

8 hours ago, Dev F said:

He also knows that it was unusual for Philip to run off on that kind of mission anymore, hence his earlier talk to Renee about how Elizabeth is "always off dealing with their big corporate clients, and he's --" Renee interrupts, but he's clearly aware that Philip's recent life was not not taken up by jet-setting. Given what Stan knows about his friend's life, Philip's assurances would have the ring of truth to him, because they are mostly true.

Now, I know part of your argument is that Stan's attention couldn't plausibly be diverted from the deaths of multiple FBI agents in Chicago, but in fact Stan has never been one to get especially emotional about the deaths of colleagues he doesn't personally know. Back in season 1, he begged off the mission to take out Arkady in revenge for the agents blown up by the KGB assassin, only changing his mind when the Russians took his partner. And that's Stan -- he was always driven to anger more by specific personal attachments than a more general sense of "You mess with one of us, you mess with all of us."

Which, again, is why I think that Gennadi and Sofia's murder made much more sense as the unsolved killing Stan would fixate on. And Stan did in fact think Philip was involved or at least complicit in it, calling him a "fucking liar" when he tried to deny it. And the way the Jenningses talked him past it was to focus his attention on Philip's regret for the (deliberately unspecified) terrible things he's done -- something Stan himself can certainly relate to -- and to remind him about the other boy who'd just lost his whole family and would soon need his help.

And I'm aware that none of these arguments make strict logical sense, and that for you and others that's a deal-breaker I'll never be able to argue around. But for me, at least, the emotional logic totally tracks.

I disagree that it makes emotional logical sense, either. "I'm done with this, except when my wife needs help in killing FBI Agents, and I'm lying to you by leaving out the part about killing the FBI Agents", as a means of swaying Stan, doesn't track emotional logic at all. YMMV, obviously.

Edited June 5, 2018 by Bannon

[EtheltoTillie]

@Bannon  What other shows do you watch?  I'm curious to see your perspective.  I hope you are not always so apoplectic, er, disappointed.   LOL.  I need to get a life myself.

Edited June 5, 2018 by GussieK

[Bannon]

2 minutes ago, GussieK said:

@Bannon  What other shows do you watch?  I'm curious to see your perspective.  I hope you are not always so apoplectic, er, disappointed.   LOL.  I need to get a life myself.

I think Better Call Saul is a marvel of character and plot development, acting, and it makes most t.v. shows, in terms of cinematography, look like local cable access. It may end up being better than Breaking Bad, and Breaking Bad was among the best ever. Most of the other shows I watch illuminate how hard it is to sustain excellence for more than a season or two.

Ray Donovan was quite good through the season which ended with Ray killing the hip hop music producer who threatened his daughter. It has been in steady decline since, the last season pretty bad, despite good acting. Homeland was good until Carrie obtained proof of Brody as terrorist. From there it descended into being unwatchable crap, came up for air with a couple seasons set in foreign locales, and now has descended into full crap mode again. Fargo season 1 was good. Season 2 wss great. Season 3 just ok. It's never been terrible, though. I've quit Westworld, it becoming unbelievably boring. Game of Thrones is not the genre for me, but the production values are the best of any t.v. show ever, and the acting is great.

The Americans is probably the most frustrating show I've ever watched, because I really should have been able to put it among my all time favorites. The premise of the show is one of the best ever. The acting was great, great, great. I really suspect, however, that the writers never really trusted the audience, and thus made a bunch of choices that they thought would hold the audience (the ridiculous level of violence most obviously), which really hampered coherent story telling and character development. So the show merely ended up being good enough for me to watch for 6 seasons (which, to be fair, I've rarely done), without it being among my top 5 shows ever.

[Clanstarling]

12 minutes ago, Bannon said:

I think Better Call Saul is a marvel of character and plot development, acting, and it makes most t.v. shows, in terms of cinematography, look like local cable access. It may end up being better than Breaking Bad, and Breaking Bad was among the best ever. Most of the other shows I watch illuminate how hard it is to sustain excellence for more than a season or two.

Ray Donovan was quite good through the season which ended with Ray killing the hip hop music producer who threatened his daughter. It has been in steady decline since, the last season pretty bad, despite good acting. Homeland was good until Carrie obtained proof of Brody as terrorist. From there it descended into being unwatchable crap, came up for air with a couple seasons set in foreign locales, and now has descended into full crap mode again. Fargo season 1 was good. Season 2 wss great. Season 3 just ok. It's never been terrible, though. I've quit Westworld, it becoming unbelievably boring. Game of Thrones is not the genre for me, but the production values are the best of any t.v. show ever, and the acting is great.

The Americans is probably the most frustrating show I've ever watched, because I really should have been able to put it among my all time favorites. The premise of the show is one of the best ever. The acting was great, great, great. I really suspect, however, that the writers never really trusted the audience, and thus made a bunch of choices that they thought would hold the audience (the ridiculous level of violence most obviously), which really hampered coherent story telling and character development. So the show merely ended up being good enough for me to watch for 6 seasons (which, to be fair, I've rarely done), without it being among my top 5 shows ever.

Better Call Saul is probably the best spin off I have ever seen, and for me it has already surpassed Breaking Bad. Both shows I started with very little expectation of quality and was blown away. I never thought I would love a show about Saul, but I was hooked by the end of the first episode.

As much as I loved The Americans, and was fine with the ending, I do have to agree that it didn't reach the same level and you are probably right that the writing was the reason, since the acting was at the same exceptional level

Edited June 5, 2018 by Clanstarling

[EtheltoTillie]

12 minutes ago, Bannon said:

I think Better Call Saul is a marvel of character and plot development, acting, and it makes most t.v. shows, in terms of cinematography, look like local cable access. It may end up being better than Breaking Bad, and Breaking Bad was among the best ever. Most of the other shows I watch illuminate how hard it is to sustain excellence for more than a season or two.

I agree! 

Quote

Ray Donovan was quite good through the season which ended with Ray killing the hip hop music producer who threatened his daughter. It has been in steady decline since, the last season pretty bad, despite good acting. Homeland was good until Carrie obtained proof of Brody as terrorist. From there it descended into being unwatchable crap, came up for air with a couple seasons set in foreign locales, and now has descended into full crap mode again. Fargo season 1 was good. Season 2 wss great. Season 3 just ok. It's never been terrible, though. I've quit Westworld, it becoming unbelievably boring. Game of Thrones is not the genre for me, but the production values are the best of any t.v. show ever, and the acting is great.

I had to give up Ray Donovan after about two seasons.  Same with Shameless.  I've stuck with Homeland, but it got wacky.  Yes, I also lose interest in many shows that start out good.  Showtime seems to have a poor track record in this regard.  The shows jump the shark, to use a cliche. 

Quote

 

Anything more, I guess I have to take over to the "Pantheon" thread. 

Edited June 5, 2018 by GussieK

[Bannon]

13 minutes ago, Clanstarling said:

Better Call Saul is probably the best spin off I have ever seen, and for me it has already surpassed Breaking Bad. Both shows I started with very little expectation of quality and was blown away. I never thought I would love a show about Saul, but I was hooked by the end of the first episode.

As much as I loved The Americans, and was fine with the ending, I do have to agree that it didn't reach the same level and you are probably right that the writing was the reason, since the acting was at the same exceptional level

I would have loved to see what Vince Gilligan & Co. could have done with the premise and cast of The Americans.

[benteen]

I think during its first four seasons The Americans was easily one of the best shows on television.  The last two years though really dragged it down storywise, not acting wise.  As good as Saul can be, that show can also drag and be self-indulgent.  The Americans fell into the self-indulgent trap in Season 5.  A sign of greatness is never falling into that trap in the first place or at least being able to get out of it.

Edited June 5, 2018 by benteen

[sistermagpie]

15 hours ago, Dev F said:

Now, I know part of your argument is that Stan's attention couldn't plausibly be diverted from the deaths of multiple FBI agents in Chicago, but in fact Stan has never been one to get especially emotional about the deaths of colleagues he doesn't personally know. Back in season 1, he begged off the mission to take out Arkady in revenge for the agents blown up by the KGB assassin, only changing his mind when the Russians took his partner. And that's Stan -- he was always driven to anger more by specific personal attachments than a more general sense of "You mess with one of us, you mess with all of us."

 

I don't hate Stan but God, there's a lot of ways where you can see why he wouldn't have friends. I liked it when he was dealing with the fallout from his operation with Oleg and everyone in the office hated him because of course they did. You couldn't be less of a team player than Stan and these are people who like their team. It's not even a question of him making moral decisions like Oleg and Philip. Often his biggest rogue moments are about him personally. 

14 hours ago, Plums said:

The more I think about the layers of motivation for Paige's decision, the more I'm thoroughly convinced that one of them was her realizing she's an American, not a Russian. She had that whole night journey to the Canadian border to think about it, and besides knowing she couldn't leave Henry, I think she knew she didn't want to and just couldn't live in Russia. Playacting apprentice spy in the Russian Ladies' Cultural Appreciation Club on your afternoons off from school and referring to the Soviets as your people and the Americans as the enemy is one thing. Actually facing the imminent reality of uprooting your entire life and erasing your identity to live in the Soviet Union permanently is quite another. Especially when you so clearly have an American perspective of the world rather than a Soviet one. All that black and white thinking wrt morality. Also, you can't get much more American than being unfazed from seeing your mother covered in brains and viscera but freaking out and being scandalized from discovering she regularly has extramarital sex with her marks. 

 

I remember when she had her first freakout over the possibility a friend of mine couldn't get over how she's so American saying, "What are we just going to start speaking RUSSIAN?!" like speaking another language is just the most impossible thing in the world that no one can actually do. She never believed in this place as a real country. In early seasons there's times where Paige is studying something about the Soviet Union in school just in a general way and I think those lessons ultimately made much more of an impression than Elizabeth and Claudia trying to explain something she can never really understand. She's really a homebody. For all her saying she wanted to be part of something that changed the world, she didn't mean she needed to do something extreme like her parents were doing. Stuffing envelopes helps too.

9 hours ago, BetyBee said:

Back to the amazing finale.  I'm a big Henry fan and watched his scene when he learns about his parents, with great interest.  It's underplayed, imo, but as the camera pulls back and you see "Jennings" on the back of Henry's jersey, it just hit me that he's not Henry Jennings.  

I just read the recap and there's a couple of things that I couldn't disagree with more (I don't know how anybody can say "Philip loves Henry so much he lets him go" and then call Stan Henry's "true father" in the same piece--I guess in this universe King Solomon totally got played by that woman!) and one of them was that the recapper thought KS did a terrible job acting that scene. I guess they thought there should be more rending of that hockey jersey, but I can't imagine Henry or most people reacting any differently than what we saw. He's in shock.

Quote

ETA - I just realized I forgot to discuss P&E's future.  I don't think Philip will be happy in Russia, but maybe the collapse of the Soviet Union and more freedom will make him happier.  He does love Elizabeth and always has.  I don't know if Elizabeth will be happy, unless she is given work that she considers important, to do.  I do think she'll take art classes and keep drawing.  I hope she can relax and that they have future contact with their kids, even if it's only to be rebuffed.  

 

Philip's never been happy anyway, really, so it probably doesn't much matter. I think both of them will have a hard time adjusting but "we'll get used to it" is how they live their life. They'll find things to like and not waste time wondering if they'd be happy in the US. They both would like work that's important to do--though they'll probably be driven crazy how hard it will become for them to do things to help people in the future.

2 hours ago, Bannon said:

I think Better Call Saul is a marvel of character and plot development, acting, and it makes most t.v. shows, in terms of cinematography, look like local cable access. It may end up being better than Breaking Bad, and Breaking Bad was among the best ever. Most of the other shows I watch illuminate how hard it is to sustain excellence for more than a season or two.

 

Better Call Saul is good at the kind of thing the show did well with Martha, imo, and skipped over with Paige, which is bringing us along with people who do ultimately extreme things so that they make sense to the audience. Though I don't know how it would do with a show about a romance, although they've certainly done relationships in general really well.

Edited June 5, 2018 by sistermagpie

[SunnyBeBe]

I agree about how the writers can just get caught up, distracted, bored, clueless, or whatever, but, if they could just stay with it and use their original creativity, the projects wouldn't suffer, imo. I just don't buy that the creators of The Americans had some of the stuff planned from the beginning. I'll never buy that. 

  I just marvel at the way Matt and Keri went with those characters...it's just mesmerizing to watch them.  That's what I will miss the most, I think.  I read that the cutoff date for Emmy consideration was the end of May.....is that just coincidental? 

Edited June 5, 2018 by SunnyBeBe

[sistermagpie]

1 hour ago, icemiser69 said:

I thought Philip was at his happiest when he was line dancing.

I am confident he will be able to find some substitute for or version of this in the USSR! 

[Domestic Assassin]

Quote

 I read that the cutoff date for Emmy consideration was the end of May.....is that just coincidental? 

Probably not.  That's why most prestige-y shows start in April.

[tennisgurl]

I've always loved this show, but the first four seasons were absolutely the best, and were some of the most well written, shot, and acted episodes of TV. In the later two seasons, they got a bit self indulgent, and struggled to keep the balance between the spy stuff and the family stuff, the way they had earlier. But, even then, I still loved the show, and watching it rarely, if ever, felt like a chore. I always had something to come back to, even if the main plot wasn't grabbing me. So, I cant complain too much.

Stan, in some ways, reminds me of Paige. Both of them are strongly driven by emotions, instead of ideology, morals, their own self interest, or the bigger picture, which leads to them making rash decisions, they see the world in a sort of tunnel vision (what I believe is good, and anything else is bad!) and a tendency to overestimate their own abilities. 

[qtpye]

6 hours ago, Bannon said:

I think Better Call Saul is a marvel of character and plot development, acting, and it makes most t.v. shows, in terms of cinematography, look like local cable access. It may end up being better than Breaking Bad, and Breaking Bad was among the best ever. Most of the other shows I watch illuminate how hard it is to sustain excellence for more than a season or two.

Ray Donovan was quite good through the season which ended with Ray killing the hip hop music producer who threatened his daughter. It has been in steady decline since, the last season pretty bad, despite good acting. Homeland was good until Carrie obtained proof of Brody as terrorist. From there it descended into being unwatchable crap, came up for air with a couple seasons set in foreign locales, and now has descended into full crap mode again. Fargo season 1 was good. Season 2 wss great. Season 3 just ok. It's never been terrible, though. I've quit Westworld, it becoming unbelievably boring. Game of Thrones is not the genre for me, but the production values are the best of any t.v. show ever, and the acting is great.

The Americans is probably the most frustrating show I've ever watched, because I really should have been able to put it among my all time favorites. The premise of the show is one of the best ever. The acting was great, great, great. I really suspect, however, that the writers never really trusted the audience, and thus made a bunch of choices that they thought would hold the audience (the ridiculous level of violence most obviously), which really hampered coherent story telling and character development. So the show merely ended up being good enough for me to watch for 6 seasons (which, to be fair, I've rarely done), without it being among my top 5 shows ever.

 

5 hours ago, benteen said:

I think during its first four seasons The Americans was easily one of the best shows on television.  The last two years though really dragged it down storywise, not acting wise.  As good as Saul can be, that show can also drag and be self-indulgent.  The Americans fell into the self-indulgent trap in Season 5.  A sign of greatness is never falling into that trap in the first place or at least being able to get out of it.

 

I agree with both of you. This show was amazing the first four season and the last two seasons have been a complete waste of my time. The great acting is the only thing that saved it. I felt the character of Elizabeth was so compelling and now I really do not care what happens to her because the lazy writing just made her character a giant joke. For me, this show went out like a whisper of its former self. I do think the actors will finally get their Emmys. Now compare this to Kim from Better Call Saul, who is amazing and real.

Edited June 5, 2018 by qtpye

[Bannon]

13 minutes ago, qtpye said:

 

I agree with both of you. This show was amazing the first four season and the last two seasons have been a complete waste of my time. The great acting is the only thing that saved it. I felt the character of Elizabeth was so compelling and now I really do not care what happens to her because the lazy writing just made her character a giant joke. For me, this show went out like a whisper of its former self. I do think the actors will finally get their Emmys. Now compare this to Kim from Better Call Saul, who is amazing and real.

 

The last two seasons the problems were much more pronounced , no doubt, but the seeds were planted for trouble earlier, most significantly in the excessive violence creating a lot of plot and character incoherence, and Stan being in general poorly written. The show never recovered from losing the Martha arc, which was fantastic.

Edited June 5, 2018 by Bannon

[SusanSunflower]

To me, the reprieve of the Tims was an opportunity lost that I never got over ... because no, you can't go on with your life  "like normal" when there are two credible adult people who know you are are KGB illegals (particularly with that diary in existence to corroborate the account "contemporaneously"...  

Dramatically it could have raised the bar enormously for Paige's character's understanding of how deadly-serious this was .... even if she just had to live her suspicions ** with seeing a report of a plane crash on the TV news  (Bye-bye Tims)  because ** learning to live with being lied to is an important skill set too (as we saw repeatedly).  

I think the writers deliberately wanted to keep Paige extremely naive generally and in particular as well as blood-stain-free (in anticipation of the ending) ... but it kind of destroyed the stakes of her characters (like riding a bike with training wheels and a handle for mommy to hold onto).  

I found Elizabeth monstrous to a degree I couldn't really get past.  My respectful memories kept me watching but if I had known the ending I would have quit 2 years ago. 

Edited June 5, 2018 by SusanSunflower

[qtpye]

58 minutes ago, SusanSunflower said:

To me, the reprieve of the Tims was an opportunity lost that I never got over ... because no, you can't go on with your life  "like normal" when there are two credible adult people who know you are are KGB illegals (particularly with that diary in existence to corroborate the account "contemporaneously"...  

Dramatically it could have raised the bar enormously for Paige's character's understanding of how deadly-serious this was .... even if she just had to live her suspicions ** with seeing a report of a plane crash on the TV news  (Bye-bye Tims)  because ** learning to live with being lied to is an important skill set too (as we saw repeatedly).  

I think the writers deliberately wanted to keep Paige extremely naive generally and in particular as well as blood-stain-free (in anticipation of the ending) ... but it kind of destroyed the stakes of her characters (like riding a bike with training wheels and a handle for mommy to hold onto).  

I found Elizabeth monstrous to a degree I couldn't really get past.  My respectful memories kept me watching but if I had known the ending I would have quit 2 years ago. 

Totally agree. It has been a giant waste of my time for the last two seasons and I think most of the critics are brain-dead as to how pointless the show had become.