"The Americans"

Speaker 0 00:00:00 Alls fair in love and cold war. We are the SPFI guys, and this is the Americans. Welcome to the SPFI guys. We cover spy fact spy fiction and everything in between I'm Christian Speaker 2 00:00:20 And I'm Zach. Speaker 0 00:00:21 And today we are continuing with our rerun summer where we're covering spy, TV shows from all across the ages. And this week we're covering the Americans from 2013. Speaker 2 00:00:33 Yes. This is one of my dad's favorite TV shows and he has been bugging me. Okay. To have us cover it for basically since we started this Speaker 0 00:00:43 <laugh> all right. Speaker 2 00:00:44 Interesting. We can get to a little bit more about that when we hit our reviews. Speaker 0 00:00:48 So I had heard about this show, obviously, I like it was a big hit, but I just never got around to watching it. I don't know why. I just, I think, well, what did it air on originally? Like Showtime or something? I don't even remember. Speaker 2 00:01:00 Yeah. I don't recall. As far as I remember it, it was always an Amazon prime original oh Speaker 0 00:01:05 Show. Speaker 2 00:01:05 Okay. And I remember people loved it. People couldn't stop talking about it, but by the time I was getting interested, actually I tried to watch it once, but per my dad's prompting and I didn't make it too far. And then it was five seasons and each season is 13 episodes long. And that was just too long. Speaker 0 00:01:24 Eh, I mean, it could be worse. Could have been like a regular 22, 23 episode season. Speaker 2 00:01:28 Well then I definitely wouldn't be watching it. Speaker 0 00:01:30 Yeah. That looks like it aired on FX originally. Okay. Speaker 2 00:01:33 So yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. Speaker 0 00:01:35 General premise is that there are family and the mom and dad of the family are undercover, Russian spies and everything that goes on. So we covered the pilot episode for this. Do we have a synopsis from IMDB? Speaker 2 00:01:50 Yes. The pilot is called pilot and the synopsis is Philip and Elizabeth Jennings are two seemingly normal Americans who are really undercover KGB agents after kidnapping a Soviet defector. They discovered their new neighbor is an FBI agent assigned to their case. W sounds like a wacky sitcom, Speaker 0 00:02:09 Right? It does. Doesn't it. So we start off with title card, Washington, DC, Elizabeth played by Kerry. Russell is in a bar with a guy who's bragging about working with a president. He flashes a DOD badge and she seems very interested. He takes her home. She undreses. And she's about to go down on him when he starts blather out on him. Mm-hmm <affirmative> when he starts blathering on about the many threats to freedom, you know, dangerous the world is. And then she goes down on him. Speaker 2 00:02:36 Yeah. He's totally bragging. Yeah. Yeah. Right away. We get the adult content on the show. They don't waste Speaker 0 00:02:41 Any time. I was not expecting it. I didn't know that about the show. I just knew that there was like spies involved. So when that happened, I was very surprised Speaker 2 00:02:51 FX fearless. Mm. Or probably at the time their tagline was no limits or something like that. <laugh> I also wanted to point out that not only does it takes place in DC, it takes place in DC in 1981. Speaker 0 00:03:04 Is it 81? Okay. Yeah. I thought it was like around. Wow. We get something that indicates around what era later on. But yeah. I didn't know. It was specifically 81. Speaker 2 00:03:12 Yeah. Also this episode is one hour and nine minutes long. So it's almost as long as a movie. Speaker 0 00:03:18 What movies are you watching? Average movies are like two and a half hours nowadays. Speaker 2 00:03:22 Yeah. But those wacky comedies, like the spy who doned me, those are more like an hour and a half Speaker 0 00:03:29 In nowadays. They're probably like two, two Speaker 2 00:03:31 They're inching up. They're getting Speaker 0 00:03:32 Every movie's inching up anyways. Uh, she leaves and gets into her car and she pulls off her blonde wig. Mm-hmm <affirmative> and we cut to three days later, someone get off a bus. There's two men, Rob and Phillip who are waiting for the guy who came off the bus. Rob is a bit nervous. Apparently the guy that they're watching cuz killed a lot of people. Speaker 2 00:03:52 Yeah. He is a good fighter. And this part, first of all, I was confused. Cause I was like, is this the same guy that the mom was with at the beginning? But I think no, but then also this part reminded me a lot of Munich when they would wait for their targets walking down the street. Speaker 0 00:04:08 Yeah. We see her talking to someone through their door gap and she offers the man a few hundred dollars to look out his living room window for a few minutes. And so she signals to the two men below that she's in by shaking a curtain. Speaker 2 00:04:22 So yeah, that's also very reminiscent of Munich. Speaker 0 00:04:24 We see the silhouette of the man carrying a briefcase, walking around he's at the corner, right. Where Rob and Philip are, uh, they're all waiting. And he stops right before the corner looks around and he bolts, they run after him claiming to be immigration Speaker 2 00:04:40 Again also like Munich. I think they pretended to be cops or something. Yeah. Speaker 0 00:04:44 So Rob chases, but gets stabbed and then Philip catches up. They have a knife fight. Speaker 2 00:04:51 That was really good. Yeah. Really good. Really good action. Speaker 0 00:04:54 Eventually Phillip ends up on top and the guy who's being chased says that he knows that he's not supposed to be killed and that they could get a lot of money, $3 million if they just turn him into the Americans. So they bring him to the car and as they're doing it, they claim to be police. Speaker 2 00:05:11 They're like yelling at everybody. We're the police, we're the police. That's fine. Right. And the other guy's like, no, they're not the police. That's kind of wild. But it's also something that like a crazy guy would also say, Speaker 0 00:05:22 Yeah. So they drive down a bunch of back alleys. They switch out their plates. Uh, Rob is also in the back seat and he's bleeding out and they pass by the Lincoln Memorial. And there's debate between uh, Elizabeth and Philip over whether to save Rob by bringing to a hospital or making the drop. Speaker 2 00:05:42 Yeah. Nice moral dilemma though. They don't really spend a lot of time with it in the episode. It's not really what the show is about, but it seemed like the kind of thing they would cover in, um, fair play, which we'll be talking about more later, Speaker 0 00:05:57 What they end up doing is they bring Rob close to a hospital, but not all the way in. They get to the drop site, which is like a dock or something. The barge has already left. Speaker 2 00:06:08 Somebody says the mission comes first around it here. Mm-hmm Speaker 0 00:06:11 <affirmative> um, that was definitely Elizabeth. Speaker 2 00:06:14 Oh yeah. She's the killer. Speaker 0 00:06:16 So we go to FBI headquarters down on, was that E street Speaker 2 00:06:22 In DC? Uh, yeah. I, I think it's across from Penn social. Yeah. Which is also on E street. You know the E street cinema. Yeah. If it's the same one, Speaker 0 00:06:31 It is the same one. It's been the one. It's the one, the iconic one Speaker 2 00:06:35 Iconic do you mean? But ugly. Speaker 0 00:06:38 <laugh> I kinda like the design of it. Speaker 2 00:06:40 Well, nobody else dies. Speaker 0 00:06:41 <laugh> Speaker 2 00:06:42 That's Speaker 0 00:06:43 True. So we meet Stan Beman and he's meeting his new counter intelligence partner. Chris Amador. Who's played by Maximiliano Hernandez, who you might recognize as shield agent Japer Sitwell from a bunch of the Marvel movies. So the group goes hail Hydra to one of the other one to a Senator in winter soldier. And he's the one who like gets dropped off of the building nine ring bells. Speaker 2 00:07:07 Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah. I mean, that certainly sounds failure, but I didn't realize that was Sam, but then Stan, Noah Eich and he was in space force as one of the generals. Okay. Using the Truman show and the walking dead mm-hmm <affirmative> but I think space force is where I recognized him Speaker 0 00:07:23 From find out that they're all there for a briefing or a speech from Timo show, who is the guy who was kidnapped last night and he's late. We also find out this is the Reagan era. Tim Che is an X KGB Colonel who blew the whistle on directorate S undercover agents hiding all over the us. Speaker 2 00:07:41 Mm-hmm <affirmative> Speaker 0 00:07:42 Amador. Doesn't buy it. Uh, Stan is a little more curious about it. Speaker 2 00:07:47 Yeah. This part was interesting in a lot of ways, they were like directorate S agents. That sounds like something out of a Hollywood movie. And then also they're like, Tim Moche has never been more than 30 seconds late to anything. And we've known him for a long time. So I was like, oh, go to them to like catch onto that. Mm-hmm <affirmative>. Speaker 0 00:08:05 So we go to Tim ache, who is now gagged and tied up in the trunk of the car in the garage. Philip gives him something to drink. Tim ache tries to get Philip to turn him into the FBI for $3 million. Phillip reviews goes back to kitchen and tells the family that the car won't start. So they'll have to take the bus. And so him and Elizabeth have two kids, a girl who's 13, and I'm not how old the son is probably like 10 mm-hmm <affirmative> as the kids leave. She re she says that, you know, they need to get rid of Tim Shev. Elizabeth seems a bit more devoted to the cause than Philip. Speaker 2 00:08:39 Uh, yeah, you could say that again. So this was an interesting conflict. Again, it reminded me of Munich, even though nothing specifically, like this happened in Munich, it's like the same idea where they're on their own and a foreign land and they have a problem and it's not gonna resolve itself and they don't know what to Speaker 0 00:08:56 Do. So we next, see Phillip in a park. I think this is supposed to be near DuPont circle. So this would be, oh, I don't remember what that big park that's near. DuPont is calling anymore. I used to go there for lunch though, but no, not quite, no. Maybe Speaker 2 00:09:09 Also around here, somebody describes the directorate S agents as saying they're trained and ordered to only speak in English, which explains why when the parents are together, it's just the two of them. They speak in English, which is very helpful for the audience. Speaker 0 00:09:25 That's not too much later. Speaker 2 00:09:27 Well, that's where my note is Speaker 0 00:09:29 <laugh> I have, I have a whole bunch before we get to that. Speaker 2 00:09:33 Well, I think it was in the same conversation about director at S agents. Speaker 0 00:09:38 So we see Phillip in a park. He is, apparently this is supposed to be somewhere near DuPont circle. I think it's probably supposed to be the fart north park, which is near where I used to work. And I, when I, I used to have lunch there, sometimes there used to be a bunch of like food trucks that would surround it. So he's watching everyone as they're going around their bus, doing their business. He sees a couple cops who are like running around. And so he puts, as they're not watching, he puts very subtly, puts a Deadro underneath the bench, which I thought was great. Clever. Nice. Speaker 2 00:10:12 So does this park look like Fargate square? As far as you remember? Speaker 0 00:10:16 Vaguely. I don't think that they actually filmed in DC for this, but they made it, you know, close enough. Speaker 2 00:10:20 Yeah. I remember thinking if it was supposed to be near DuPont circle really doesn't look like it, but that's fine. They tried. Speaker 0 00:10:26 Yeah. So Elizabeth goes to talk to Tim Moe in the garage and right before she opens the trunk, she looks at herself in the reflection of the rear window. And we go to a flashback mm-hmm <affirmative> uh, when we are in Guzo Soviet union, 1960, where Elizabeth is doing boxing training. Speaker 2 00:10:45 Yeah. And this reminds me and now for lost time of black widow. Speaker 0 00:10:49 Now this, you know what this reminded me of straight up is mission impossible three, because Ethan Hunt is having flashbacks of Lindsay also played by Carrie Russell doing her training. Speaker 2 00:10:58 Oh yes. She was played by Kerry Russ. That's right. Speaker 0 00:11:01 Yeah. Yeah. Tim Washa comes up. This is years ago. He's only a captain pins her to the ground and her trainer leaves and mm-hmm <affirmative> Tim, Michelle starts unbuckling his pan eraser. Speaker 2 00:11:13 I thought they were gonna cut before that, which I would've appreciated. So this is interesting, cuz this is the kind of thing you'd think they would reveal later in the series. I'm sure you probably heard the trope that unfortunately with women characters, something writers love to do is have them get pregnant or have them be assaulted like that. It's like character growth. So I was surprised to see it here. Speaker 0 00:11:37 All right. So back in the present, Elizabeth opens her trunk and says to Tim wase remember me in a threatening way. And then Elizabeth goes to talk to her kids after they get home, the daughter is doing a paper assigned by one of her teachers on how the Russians cheat on arms control. Speaker 2 00:11:53 Yeah. Which is definitely a product of the period. I don't think kids would be doing that today, even though it's still relevant today. Speaker 0 00:11:59 So they go and they get ice cream. They have what is called ice cream Olympics where they're supposed to be, you know, like catching the ice cream as Philip is moving it back and forth. Speaker 2 00:12:07 Yeah. It was cute. Family seeing Speaker 0 00:12:09 Tries to get Elizabeth in on it. And she like is mad when she shoves the ice cream in her face. Speaker 2 00:12:15 Yeah. You could definitely see which one is the more serious one and which one's the more fun one. Speaker 0 00:12:20 Yeah. So Philip has to go meet a client late, which is code for, he has to do some spy stuff. Yes. So he goes into a bathroom. He puts on a wig and glasses and meets Martha, who is a secretary at the FBI. Speaker 2 00:12:33 There's one other thing I wanted to mention actually I'm missed. Cause I went by so fast. One of the kids mentions a kid in her class. Oh yes. And the mom says, is that the kid with the hair lap? Speaker 0 00:12:43 And that was the teacher. Speaker 2 00:12:45 Oh, sorry, the teacher. Okay. Excuse me. Yeah. But the point is the kids get mad at her and it made me wonder. And I don't remember. Maybe you remember, did the Soviets have the same kind of views on people with disabilities as the Nazis did where they were like had to be purged Speaker 0 00:13:00 Don't know. I don't think so, but I could be completely wrong Speaker 2 00:13:04 Because I feel like there was a reason why that was there or maybe it was like a hint that the parents did not have the same sensibilities as the kids and it may be due to their Speaker 0 00:13:14 Background. That's definitely that. Yeah. I would say it's probably that Philip is claiming to be a counterintelligence agent looking for leaks in her office. So she's telling him everything that she knows mm-hmm <affirmative> she knows that a man was kidnapped. He asked about a centralized response. Apparently they've been on the vault all day. She doesn't have the access to get, go in there and find out what exactly was going on. But they did tie the kidnapping to a police report from last night and they have a vehicle description and description of the kidnappers vague enough that it's you, they won't immediately pinned to Philip and Elizabeth, but still close enough. I think the car description is a bit more concerning to them. Speaker 2 00:13:54 Yeah. And she just gives everything up, like immediately to him. Speaker 0 00:13:58 And so Martha also tells him that extras agents were sent to surveil the Soviet embassy and that the FBI thinks that the kidnappers will try to get, uh, the kidnapped person out of the country by any means. So back at home, Philip is putting his disguise elements back in the hiding spot behind the, what do you call this? The, the, where all the breakers are, Speaker 2 00:14:21 The fuse box Speaker 0 00:14:22 Fuse box. Thank you. I was like, what is that called? Not the breaker board something fuse box. Yeah. It's behind the fuse box. And he also sees the tape recording that Elizabeth made of the DOD guy from the beginning mm-hmm <affirmative> of her seducing him. And also how she got him to tell her all about Tim ache. Speaker 2 00:14:43 Yeah. It's basically a sex tape. I like the part where he fast forward. So he is like, I don't wanna hear this. Speaker 0 00:14:48 So we see a news broadcast about the Iran hostages, which made me think, all right. How long refresh memory back to Argo. How long were those hostages there? Speaker 2 00:14:57 Well, so the revolution took place in 1979 and they were imprisoned for at least 300 days. Speaker 0 00:15:05 Okay. So it's be 1980 Speaker 2 00:15:07 Then. So yeah. So it's like they're coming home. Okay. Or they should be soon. Speaker 0 00:15:11 So I was like, I remember Argo was in 1979. So I was like, okay, let's that timeline lines up? So Philip tells Elizabeth what he learned. He says that they have to assume that the Soviets are in full operational stand down. Elizabeth wants Tim shov out of the house and Philip jokes about defecting for that 3 million Speaker 2 00:15:30 <laugh> yeah. You bring it up. Speaker 0 00:15:32 Elizabeth is pissed at him and just, and goes to bed. Speaker 2 00:15:36 Apparently they do go to bed angry. Speaker 0 00:15:38 <laugh> so next day Elizabeth is checking the mail and she sees that someone is across the street, moving in. Philip is taking the kids to the mall at the mall. Philip is looking at cowboy boots and he is overhearing some other conversations, sees a much older guy with a young girl and is suspicious about it. Speaker 2 00:15:55 Yeah. He's creepy. Also. I, I just wanna mention he has a little bit of line dancing. Speaker 0 00:15:59 Oh yeah. I, I don't do, I was about to get to the line dancing in the boots. Oh, okay. While, uh, his daughter whose name? I do not remember the kids' names, but his daughter is kind of embarrassed Speaker 2 00:16:10 As they would be at that age. Yeah. Speaker 0 00:16:13 As they're checking out the older man, the creepy older dude mm-hmm <affirmative> starts to hit on the daughter and Philip tries to confront him, but the guy is clearly much bigger than Philip. And just so he just sort of backs, backs down. Speaker 2 00:16:29 Philip says she's 13 about the daughter. Well actually, maybe she does like 13. I don't know. But yeah, Philip's 13, but I, I would say that they do have a confrontation and Errol, which is the guy's name, ultimately backs down. And, and Phillip says to the daughter, it's not worth fighting everybody, which it makes me wonder, like, has he gotten into fights before? Presumably not cuz he comes off as a very mild mannered guy, but then like I never saw my dad ever get into a fight growing up. So if it looked like he was gonna get in one, that would be a pretty big deal. Like I would remember that. Yeah. But the daughters, he was pretty unfazed pretty nonplused Speaker 0 00:17:08 There was a confrontation, but it wasn't, it didn't get physical. It was just more of a like sizing each other up kind of deal. Speaker 2 00:17:15 Yeah. Maybe describing it as they almost get into a fight. Isn't exactly accurate. Speaker 0 00:17:19 No. Yeah, no. Anyway, so back at home, Elizabeth is baking some brownies, which looked really good. She gets out a knife to cut the brownies and thinks about stabbing Tim a chef. Speaker 2 00:17:30 Yeah. That's clearly the implication. Once a character has a knife in their hand, in a show, you know, he is gonna be a problem. Speaker 0 00:17:37 So Philip gets home. Apparently Elizabeth met the new neighbor. She still has the knife in her hand. And she's like, don't worry. I didn't kill him. Mm-hmm <affirmative> Philip is trying to get romantic, but she's not into it. And she holds the knife at his throat. Speaker 2 00:17:52 Yeah. This is a total like black widow type thing. You could describe it as marital tension. Speaker 0 00:17:57 So the family goes over to see the new neighbors and surprise it's Stan, the FBI agent mm-hmm Speaker 2 00:18:03 <affirmative> blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, Speaker 0 00:18:05 Blah. So they ha their family has a son. Who's about the same age as Philip and Elizabeth's daughter. They're definitely making eyes at each other. Speaker 2 00:18:13 Oh Speaker 0 00:18:13 Yeah. We see Philip in the garage with Elizabeth. He's panicking. She's calm. She thinks it's all a coincidence, but Philip's like, or you know, this is the end game, Speaker 2 00:18:24 Which I gotta say, Phillip buddy, I'm now with you here. If they knew you guys were agents agency, would've just rolled up with a whole bunch of SWAT team people. They wouldn't move an FBI agent's family with an easy stabbing distance of the Russian agents. Speaker 0 00:18:40 I don't know. I don't know. I mean, I don't know that they would immediately go after them. I think they would tr want to learn as much as they could about them and see if they knew any of the other people in the, in the ring. Speaker 2 00:18:52 Well, if they were gonna do that, they would just could put people across the street in like a surveillance van rather than saying, hi, I'm an FBI agent. How are you? Speaker 0 00:19:01 Okay. That the fact that they did that that's yes. But if it was yeah. If they just moved someone across the street, that would make sense, but would not say that they FBI agent Speaker 2 00:19:10 He'd be undercover. He'd pretend to be literally anything else. Speaker 0 00:19:13 Yeah. But alright, but this is probably the closest they've gotten to anything. This is also, there's a big deal happening with Tim was chef. So he is understandably panicked. The fact that Tim was chef is in the house where their children live and sleep mm-hmm <affirmative> he's panicked. Speaker 2 00:19:29 Yep. Speaker 0 00:19:29 So she wants to get rid of Tim a chef tonight. He wants to think of something else. Maybe just, you know, live their lives as Philip and Elizabeth, turn themselves in and make a deal. And Elizabeth is incredulous. She's like, what about the kids? They would never, we swore that we would never tell them. And they would never, you know, they'd be normal for not trusting us. Yeah. Yeah. And also the KGB would find them. So they would always be on the run. Speaker 2 00:19:56 Yeah. It made me wonder, do they have families back in the old Soviet union? Presumably they do. Speaker 0 00:20:02 Yeah. Well maybe not like husband and wife, but their parents and whatnot. Speaker 2 00:20:07 Presumably. Yeah. So at this point I was like, uhoh is this gonna be the show? Speaker 0 00:20:14 <laugh> Speaker 2 00:20:14 Is this gonna be the show them arguing about whether or not to defect? Speaker 0 00:20:19 I don't know. Speaker 2 00:20:20 Well, we'll get to that more later. Speaker 0 00:20:22 So Philip goes for a run and he has a flashback to Moscow in 1962. We see him in KGB offices. He's got a photo of a different girl. That's clearly not Elizabeth mm-hmm <affirmative> and there's a door. And as the door opens, he, you know, tears up the photo and puts in the trash. Speaker 2 00:20:39 Oh, it's so symbolic. Speaker 0 00:20:41 And he's meeting Elizabeth for the first time. The Colonel who's there leaves them to discuss their new lives and they're never to speak of who they were before. That way it makes it easy. So they don't have to think of two identities in their mind. They'll only ever know that person is Philip and is Elizabeth Speaker 2 00:20:57 That's easy and convenient for the audience. They don't call 'em by different names Speaker 0 00:21:02 On his run. Philip goes to a payphone and calls the hospital about Rob, the guy who got stabbed. He poses it a sheriff. I'm very impressed by how quickly he's able to just come up with these identities. Speaker 2 00:21:15 That's part of that fictional spy training where they can do anything. But yeah, that was a good part. I am kind of surprised that they weren't like, oh, that's private information or whatever. Well Speaker 0 00:21:25 As a sheriff. Speaker 2 00:21:26 Yeah. And I guess since he's a drifter Speaker 0 00:21:28 That might, and he's a John DOE, so Speaker 2 00:21:30 Yeah. Yeah. That's all good. Speaker 0 00:21:32 But we find out that he died. So that's one, uh, you know, one Speaker 2 00:21:37 Rob Speaker 0 00:21:37 String, Speaker 2 00:21:38 We barely knew him. Speaker 0 00:21:39 So Philip gets back from his run and he sees Stan outside who needs some jumper cables for his wife's car. So Phillip says, oh sure. And brings him into the house, brings him into the garage, has to get the jumper cables out of the car. Right. Or of the trunked specifically without, without having pretty being detected. And it's all very tense scene. We have Stan asking about the car, which Stan knows is the same make and model as the car that apparently drove, you know, drove away and was involved with the kidnapping. Speaker 2 00:22:12 Yeah. And Philip knows that he knows. Speaker 0 00:22:14 Yep. Speaker 2 00:22:15 So initially I was like, why did Philip just lied and say he didn't have any jumper cables. But then I was like, well, maybe that's more suspicious. Mm-hmm <affirmative> like, what? Good 1980s, man. Doesn't have jumper cables ready to go at a set moments notice. But then for the second time I was like, is this gonna be the show? Like, is it just gonna be them narrowly avoiding detection by FBI agents? Probably for six seasons. Speaker 0 00:22:41 I mean, I'm assuming it progressed from there, but I feel like to some degree it's probably that, but they do get out of it eventually. And he's able to get the jumper cables and give them to stand. Speaker 2 00:22:52 Yes. There's also a conversation that Dan was undercover in the past. Mm-hmm Speaker 0 00:22:57 <affirmative> yeah. So this is at FBI headquarters, right? Stan and his partner, Chris are meeting with agent God, is that how you pronounce that? G a a D Speaker 2 00:23:08 Yep. I think that's right. Speaker 0 00:23:10 Who is detailed to a CIA counter intelligence task force. We find out that's yeah, here that Stan used to be undercover with a white supremacist group for three years. Is that, is that Speaker 2 00:23:19 Right? I think so. And they kind of wanna know more about it. They're like, what'd you do would just say D ain't talking Speaker 0 00:23:26 Understandably. So he seems not wanna talk about it, but is able to get into that mindset of someone who's undercover. I like that they acknowledge that they're talking, just talking in the hallway because there's someone who goes up to the vending machine and they're like stick glaring at HIMS. Like, no, this is a private conversation getaway. So like the guy backs away <laugh> yeah. But they are still just talking in a hallway. I mean, she sure it's FBI headquarters, so it's kind of secure, but still, Speaker 2 00:23:52 Apparently not that secure there's secretaries naing on them all everywhere. Speaker 0 00:23:57 <laugh> right. But so he says that, all right, thinking in that undercover mindset, they wouldn't keep Tim chef at the embassy or on the street. What they would probably do is keep him in the house. And that way they'll probably never find them. Speaker 2 00:24:12 Yeah. I gotta say it's a little bit of a stretch that they would want to torture him forever. I'm like, I don't know. But when they say bring it back to the house, it's like, I assume they don't mean literally a house. They just mean a safe house. Not like a house in the suburbs. Speaker 0 00:24:31 No. And I think that, I think he means that because they know. So they already know about these directored S uh, sleeper agents who are living as Americans Speaker 2 00:24:41 Uhhuh <affirmative> well, Speaker 0 00:24:42 Again, that's what they assume. Uh, Speaker 2 00:24:44 Well, it's a logical leap that S director agents exist. Ergo. They must have been the ones who did it. Speaker 0 00:24:50 Well, the fact that Tim ache is the one who whistle blew about these, uh, directorate S sleep agents in the first place kind of leads to assume cell Speaker 2 00:25:00 In the Hollywood world, everything kind of lines up very nice and neatly. Speaker 0 00:25:04 Yeah. We have Philip going to an event at his son's school, which is like Fairfax, middle school or something like that. I was like, oh, Fairfax. I know where that is. Speaker 2 00:25:12 <laugh> yeah. Speaker 0 00:25:13 And it's, uh, an event honoring astronaut staffer. There's a lot of Americana imagery. Mm-hmm <affirmative> flags, the Anthem there, or was it the Anthem or was it like something Speaker 2 00:25:25 Else? Yeah, I think it was, Speaker 0 00:25:27 Yeah, I was, it was either in my mind, it was either the Anthem or America, the beautiful one of the two mm-hmm <affirmative>. And as this he's listening to all of this, you can see on his face, that Philip is starting to have doubts Speaker 2 00:25:38 Again, this is the show, sorry. I'll stop Speaker 0 00:25:41 For now. <laugh>. After the event, Philip goes to the garage, he starts untying Tim ache removes. The gag says that he wants to make a deal. Speaker 2 00:25:51 Yeah. All by himself. Doesn't talk to his wife about it. His fake wife Speaker 0 00:25:55 And Elizabeth comes down to see him releasing Tim. She, he says that he's gonna give timish she to Stan, uh, Tim shove and Elizabeth have a fight, a big fight. Yeah. It seemed to be kind of equal. Elizabeth get, you know, starts beating the crap out of him. But then Tim chef throws Elizabeth into the wall, Philip tries to intervene. And then Elizabeth shout attempt to back off at which point Elizabeth like beats the crap out of Tim Asha, puts his head through the dry wall and picks up a tire iron mm-hmm <affirmative> and it looks like he's gonna, she's just gonna bash his head in. Speaker 2 00:26:31 Fortunately, nobody hears the fight in this quiet subpar in the middle of the night. You don't hear all the crashing around <laugh> Speaker 0 00:26:39 The kids are heavy sleepers or they had the, the garage soundproofed. Speaker 2 00:26:45 Oh, actually they would do that. Speaker 0 00:26:47 Yeah. Especially if they're gonna be leaving in the middle of the night and such, oh Speaker 2 00:26:50 Yeah. Constantly doing spy stuff. Speaker 0 00:26:53 Anyway. So at this point, when she has the tire iron, Tim Che apologizes says that, you know, it was a perk of his position that he could do whatever he wanted to, to the cadets and Philip demands to know what he's talking about. At this point, Elizabeth drops a tire iron and says to Philip, you know, do what you want with him. If you, you wanna give him to a stand, fine, give a stand. So Philip picks up Tim aha, throws him against the wall and breaks his neck. Speaker 2 00:27:20 What we get from this is Philip loves Elizabeth. Speaker 0 00:27:23 He does. Speaker 2 00:27:24 He loves her. And Speaker 0 00:27:25 He may not care about the mission, but he cares about her. Speaker 2 00:27:29 Not so much. Yeah. Cuz he was willing to let it go until he found out that he hurt Elizabeth. And then he got into a murderous rage. Speaker 0 00:27:37 Mm-hmm <affirmative> they are driving their car together. This amazing song in the air tonight by Phil Collins. You I'm assuming, you know it. Speaker 2 00:27:47 Yes. Speaker 0 00:27:48 For me. Uh, the first time I heard it was in risky business, uh, with Tom cruise, Speaker 2 00:27:53 Starring Tom cruise. Of course, Speaker 0 00:27:54 Of course. Yes. But just in general, just such a great song. So it plays over this whole scene. As they're covering, they bring his body to random place near the water. <laugh> not sure where it was supposed to be. They like douse his body with chemicals to assume to make it unrecognizable. Mm-hmm <affirmative> zip up the body bag and throw it into that whatever body of water that is. And then they go back into the car at which point Elizabeth comes over to Philip and they kissed there's a definite release of tension between the two and they ha end up having sex in the backseat. Speaker 2 00:28:29 Nothing turns around like disposing of a dead body. Speaker 0 00:28:32 I don't know. I think it was more of the fact that what, what he did for her, you know, a fact that you know, this man hurt her in the past and he gave away all of his thoughts of defecting and getting that $3 million because of her Speaker 2 00:28:46 That's some of that, or it also might be the release of tension. Now that they've gotten rid of him Speaker 0 00:28:51 That too, the dangers, all of the above. Yeah. So back at home, they are applying makeup to hide some scars. Apparently there's some cuts or wounds. Speaker 2 00:29:03 Evidence of the fight. Yeah. Speaker 0 00:29:04 Yeah. Too obvious to cover up with makeup on Phillips. So he has to put some bandages on and say that he cut his symptom himself shaving mm-hmm <affirmative> and they're having family breakfast, but Elizabeth gets a phone call. She's looking very concerned outside. Sit, stand, sees Philip and the son driving off, but notices the cuts on his neck. Elizabeth is at home cleaning the trunk where the daughter ask to go to the drug store. I thought there was gonna be more from this, like the way she looks Uhhuh. I thought it was like her getting her first period or something. Speaker 2 00:29:39 Yeah. Maybe they're setting it up for future episodes. Speaker 0 00:29:42 Just the way she's like, can we go to the drugstore please? I was like, oh, she's got her first period or something. <laugh> Stan is at his home talking to his wife, says that he likes Philip, but notices that there's something off about him. Uh, and Stan's wife is mocking him about bringing the job home with him and saying, you know, this is the most boring normal neighborhood that we will ever see. Speaker 2 00:30:06 Yeah. I like the, the wife making fun of him. Oh Speaker 0 00:30:09 Yeah. Yeah. Philip in a disguise finds the creepy older guy from the mall. Beats the crap out of him and stabs him in the hand with cooking fork. Speaker 2 00:30:19 Yeah. This was very taken ask Speaker 0 00:30:23 <laugh> Speaker 2 00:30:24 Or like, I don't even know about that. Just what other stuff that we watched where the spies are vigilantes too. Like, I dunno, burn notice. I know we haven't watched that yet, but that is one. Speaker 0 00:30:35 Yeah. Yeah. But yeah. And he says, no Morgan little girls, or I'll come back and I'm gonna, I'll stab you in the heart next time. So this, this suffers from the, the return of the king effect, cuz I, there were like five times where I thought it was the end. Speaker 2 00:30:49 You're not even close to the end. Really? Speaker 0 00:30:50 No, no. I was like, oh this is wait. How was there still 20 minutes left? And the KGB safe house in Bethesda, Maryland, which I would love to know where this is. <laugh> Elizabeth enter. She meets general Zov who wants to know where Tim Che is? Elizabeth says that Tim Che tried to escape. So they killed him. Apparently the center is concerned. Reagan is in power now and the cold war is not so cold anymore. Elizabeth apparently had reported on Philip having doubts before. And Zov wants to know if he can be trusted. But Elizabeth covers for him says it was actually her fault that this happened. The general says that he can't protect her all the time. And that he's fighting against comrades who are acting like they were in their darkest days and that the mission is gonna change. It's gonna be more dangerous and uglier. Speaker 2 00:31:40 In other words, they're gonna have to actually do stuff because it's a TV show and they need to do stuff though. I gotta say, this is a little bit implausible that they're so deep, undercover that they've been there for 20 years, but then they can just go and meet <laugh> a general. Speaker 0 00:31:57 Yeah. I dunno, whatever. I mean, they do need to talk to them somehow. Speaker 2 00:32:01 But I actually did like the, in part with the KGB politics when they were like, Reagan says he's an evil empire and for him, this is like an existential conflict and he wants us gone and that makes us defensive. Mm-hmm <affirmative> I I like that. Yeah. Yeah. Speaker 0 00:32:16 Yeah. So back at FBI HQ, they're trying to track down the identity of the deceased John DOE, who we know is Rob mm-hmm. <affirmative> deputy attorney general arrives in the meeting and says that Reagan has authorized top secret authorization, 2, 5 79, which gives the FBI counterintelligence office all necessary measures to dismantle directorate S sleeper agents and get rid of all Speaker 2 00:32:39 Of them. Yeah. So I guess they believe that they're real. Speaker 0 00:32:42 Yep. And that there's a war coming basically. Speaker 2 00:32:45 Mm-hmm <affirmative> Speaker 0 00:32:47 So Philip and Elizabeth are in bed. He asks her why she never told him about Tim AE. She says that it was her other life and they were never supposed to talk about it. Right. She tells him that it's gonna get uglier and more dangerous, but Philip thinks they'll be fine. They've been at this a long time. And this is where Elizabeth breaks the rules, Uhhuh and starts telling Philip about her life before she was born in molens. Do you remember where we've heard about molens before? Speaker 2 00:33:16 It was probably like the man from uncle or something like that. Speaker 0 00:33:19 It was get smart. Speaker 2 00:33:21 Yeah. One of Speaker 0 00:33:21 Those they stop in Smolen and the, their cafe Minsk in Smolensk Speaker 2 00:33:27 Nice. So yeah. Elizabeth is not as perfect of a rule follower as she seems. Speaker 0 00:33:33 No, you apparently her father died in Stalingrad in world war II. Her mother was a bookkeeper for the local party committee mm-hmm <affirmative> and we find out what her former name was, which was NAIA. And now we go to another flashback of Northern Virginia in August of 1965, PHY and Elizabeth have just arrived in a hotel room. They're marveling at the air conditioner. Speaker 2 00:33:56 Yep. Speaker 0 00:33:57 Philip tries to start something romantic, but Olivia says she's not ready yet. So he rightfully just like, doesn't like, doesn't push it. Speaker 2 00:34:04 Yeah. But also Philip is ready to defect. Like as soon as he gets off the plane, he's like, this is really nice. Look how nice this country is. It's Speaker 0 00:34:13 Hilarious. Well, Elizabeth is like, I sense a weakness in the people mm-hmm <affirmative> back in the present day stand is walking around the neighborhood. He goes to their garage, picks the lock breaks in is inspecting. Their plates walks around the entire car looks around, goes to the trunk, picks the lock. And as I he's doing this, I notice he does not have any gloves on. Come on, stand. Speaker 2 00:34:37 Well, an ordinary business insurance guy would not be fingerprinting his own house. Why would he, Speaker 0 00:34:46 I don't know. That's it's just still, anytime that they're doing it going around like this and they don't have the gloves on really Speaker 2 00:34:53 Come on. Is Stan doing anything illegal? Cuz they said you can use all available entering you can use all available means to cash director at S agents. Speaker 0 00:35:01 All right. Speaker 2 00:35:02 Alright. I bet. If he got caught his agency would've covered for him. Speaker 0 00:35:05 True. Maybe. So he opens the trunk. Doesn't find anything in their trunk. And as he's leaving, we see a silhouette of Philip hiding in the dark with a silence gun, ready to shoot Stan as Stan leaves. That was great. He leaves. And with that credits roll. Yeah. Speaker 2 00:35:23 The image of him with the gun was real. I good. A, a good way Speaker 0 00:35:27 To end that. Yeah. I was surprised by that. That was good. Speaker 2 00:35:29 All right. So that is the episode ready for some spy fact versus fiction. Speaker 0 00:35:34 Sure. What do you got Speaker 2 00:35:35 Again? This is a high profile enough show that the mass media has done a little bit of my work for me. <laugh> so we have a Washington post article by Catherine Brodsky called what's real and fake in the Americans according to real life spies. Speaker 0 00:35:48 All Speaker 2 00:35:48 Right. And a lot of quotes is by Emily Brandy. Who's a former CA officer in LA who had to maintain a cover identity for her friends and dated fellow CAA officers. So she knows what's going on. She said the reality of espionage is it can be exciting, but it could also be a very dark and lonely job when you're trained to be a professional liar. And you're dealing with other trained liars. It's very bizarre. She liked the disguises. She says, it's never a joke. It's really a part of how the characters pull off their operations, but the show doesn't get everything right. She said, quote, the murder in mayhem on the show is probably more the Hollywood part of it. Violence leaves, forensic information can be seen by witnesses increases the risk of detection. It's great for the storyline, but would never happen so frequently to such valuable assets as these two illegals in the real world. If you get involved in a violent incident, you are likely on the first plane home, which actually makes total sense, right? Yep. Yep. Speaker 0 00:36:43 Yeah. Speaker 2 00:36:44 It reminded me of the guy from bridge of spys, where he lived in the us for a long time. But all he ever did was read the newspaper also from fair play by James M. Olson, our favorite book, he said the CIA of the FBI do not use sexual entrapment, but the KGB made an art form of it while it was still around a couple other things. The conversation that he has, the debrief with the secretary that would take place in what's called a skiff, which stands for a sensitive compartmented information facility used to process sensitive information, limited to people with the appropriate clearance and prevents the use of recording devices, photographic devices, and so on. It wouldn't happen in somebody's living room right after you're talking about something sensitive. And then the last point I have is when they're talking about the old mobile, they say it has a bumper sticker on it. Yeah. Now I did not go back and watch to see if their car has a bumper sticker on it. Speaker 0 00:37:40 I don't Speaker 2 00:37:40 Remember, but if it does, that's a big mistake. Okay. Like no real world spy would ever have a bumper sticker on the car. Cause that makes it very easy to identify mm-hmm <affirmative> unless they had a, like a removable magnetic one to throw people off, Speaker 0 00:37:55 Which would be pretty, I think that was a thing at that time. Speaker 2 00:37:58 Hey, maybe the spies have it. There you go. Um, also just, just a general tip for any listeners, people say, and I'm inclined to agree. You don't want to have bumper stickers on your car that contain identifiable information. Like the classic example is my kid is an honor roll student at blo blah, middle school. It's like broadcasting to the world. I have a kid in middle school in my car, follow me home. So that's all I have for spy fact versus fiction. Speaker 0 00:38:27 All right. I've got a few things. So I don't know the exact timeline of when this show was created, but it came out in 2013 and in 2010, just, you know, three years beforehand. So it had to have been around that time is when we had the, uh, revelation of the Russian 10, the illegals program, where there was a bunch of Russian sleeper agents undercover. There is a great exhibit on them in this international spy museum. They have all of the handcuffs of, of all 10 that they were all arrested in the most infamous of the Russian 10 would be Anna Chapman. Um, mm-hmm, <affirmative> mostly because of her looks, but she was actually pretty unsuccessful in actually getting any information. But there were others who were actual couples who may have been more in the vein of what we see in the Americans Speaker 2 00:39:21 And a ticket. They didn't kill anybody Speaker 0 00:39:23 To my mal knowledge. No, mm-hmm <affirmative> I don't know if we've ever actually talked about, but we did just sort of like maybe we talked about it back in breach, but a dead drop is a method of espionage trade craft used to pass information or items between two individuals using a secret location by avoiding direct meetings. Individuals can maintain operational security. This method stands in contrast to the live drop. So called because two people meet to exchange items or information in person mm-hmm <affirmative>. And so yeah, the method that he used is, you know, hiding under a bench, generally, when you're doing a dead drop, you also have a way to signal the person, whether that's, uh, chalk on a mailbox or tape on a telephone pole or something. Mm-hmm <affirmative> lastly, the astronaut that was honored in the event at the son's middle school was Thomas P. Stafford. Speaker 0 00:40:16 He's an American former air force officer and test pilot. And one of the 24 people who flew to the moon now what's notable about him is that he was the commander of the Apollo soya test project, which was the first us and Soviet joint space mission. Huh? They had to create a module that would on one end fit a soya capsule and the other would dock with an Apollo. So they could, you know, actually meet, make up. And there was, I know, just from my knowledge, you know, my love of space travel that the language barrier was actually overcome by having the American astronauts speak in Russian and the Soviet Cosmo nots speak in English back to each other so that they could, rather than everyone speaking one language or ever speaking another language, they all spoke the opposite language. So it was a really, you know, revolutionary project at the time, especially it was 1975, still height of the cold war. Speaker 2 00:41:12 Yeah. They didn't really do a lot with that. Astronaut. That one part, Speaker 0 00:41:16 I think it was really just to, uh, have an excuse to have all that Americana around so that Phillip could start feeling doubts again. All right. But that's what I've got for spy fact for spy fiction. Speaker 2 00:41:27 All right. So next we have our favorite quotes. Should you like to go first? Speaker 0 00:41:31 Sure. I've just got one Speaker 2 00:41:32 Few. Okay. Speaker 0 00:41:33 And it's from, uh, Chris, the, uh, KA agent Sitwell who says someone's being reading too many spy novels. We're talking figment of the imagination here. Speaker 2 00:41:43 <laugh> nice. Well, I've actually got a few. I did like, there's a weakness in the people. There's a part where they're walking to the school and one of the kids says, why didn't mom come? And Phillip says she doesn't like new things. Speaker 0 00:41:58 <laugh> Speaker 2 00:41:59 Yeah. I like how subtle that was. Phillip's like saying to Stan, we gotta watch out for the Russians. They're bad news. Aren't they? And Stan says they certainly are Philip. They certainly are in a somewhat condescending manner. Speaker 0 00:42:12 Alrighty. So shall we get to our ratings? Speaker 2 00:42:15 Yeah. So on a scale of one to 10 martinis, one being Avengers, 1997 and 10 being even better than taken, how would we rate the pilot of the Americans? I can go first. So I gotta say I wasn't overly impressed by this and I may have been influenced by a, my dad hyping it up. Right. And B watching the rest of the next few episodes. Speaker 0 00:42:39 Okay. Speaker 2 00:42:40 So the thing is, I asked my dad is this the show Philip and Elizabeth arguing over whether the defect do Philip and Elizabeth Love each other will Philip and Elizabeth get caught. Will it just be those three conflicts repeating over and over? And he said, spoiler alert. Yes <laugh>. So it's like this supernatural effect where it's the same thing over and over and over. And nothing really changes. Speaker 0 00:43:04 Interesting. All Speaker 2 00:43:05 This episode was an okay premise for the show, but it, it didn't make me want to come back and, and watch more cuz I know it's just gonna be more the same forever. <laugh> so, and, and the characters were okay, but they didn't grab me. So I'm gonna give it a four and a half out of 10. Speaker 0 00:43:22 Wow. All right. So I had the op well maybe cuz I didn't know all of that Uhhuh, but I had the opposite effect where this did make me wanna watch more of this show. And I thought like the spy action here was done. It was much more realistic than some of the other things we've watched, obviously not Speaker 2 00:43:41 To respond your Speaker 0 00:43:42 Real word. Yeah. Yes. Hours or Archer for that matter. But even though it is spy fiction, it sort of, you know, went to that side of like Munich and other things that you mentioned, actions seemed much more realistic. I did like that still had some good spy fights. You know, the, I thought the fight choreography was pretty good. Mm-hmm <affirmative> and I liked the carriers. What this made me think of is that had Carrie Russell not been killed off so early in mission, impossible three, she could have had a great role in the coming movies, which is a shame. Um, yeah, but I, I really enjoyed this and just judging just on this episode, I'm gonna give this a seven, a seven out of 10. All Speaker 2 00:44:25 Right. Perfectly enjoyable. All right. Well thank you for joining us for the pilot of the Americans. See you next time for our rerun summer. You can find us on social media at the Spotify guys on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram until next time I'm Zach Speaker 0 00:44:41 And I'm Christian Speaker 2 00:44:42 And we are the Spotify guys signing off. Speaker 0 00:44:48 Thank you for listening to the Spotify guys. If you enjoyed our podcast, please be sure to give us a five star rating on iTunes. The theme song from this podcast is mistake the getaway by Kevin MCLE from incompetent.com licensed under creative comments by attribution 3.0 films, books and television shows reviewed by our podcast are the intellectual property of their respective copyright holders. And no refrigerant is intended. Speaker 2 00:45:15 This is a personal podcast. Any views, statements or opinions expressed in this podcast are personal and belong solely to the participants. They do not represent those. The people, institutions, or organizations that the participants may or may not be associated with in a professional or personal capacity, unless explicitly stated any views or opinions are not intended to mine. Any religion, ethnic group club, organization, company, or individual, Speaker 0 00:45:40 You can find our podcast on social media at the Spotify guys on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.