The Americans S4 E7: Travel Agents

It’s a testament to Alison Wright’s superlative performance and to the writing and directing that I don’t think I’ve ever been more concerned over the fate of a television character. The Americans is walking on a high wire with this Martha story and “Travel Agents” was one of the series’ best episodes yet. 

Wright brings increasing gravitas to her situation, especially during that gut-wrenching goodbye phone call to her parents. Her options are to turn herself in to the FBI and either get arrested or have to testify against her husband, go on the lam and get killed by the KGB, or start a new life in the USSR. All of those are horrible and I really felt the pain and claustrophobia of Martha’s situation. I had no idea which option the show would pick and it was hair-raising.

I needed a defibrillator after those scenes of Martha in Rock Creek Park. I didn’t think a show could get so much suspense out of someone on a payphone but there she was, starting to tell Philip where she was, then almost hanging up, then finally telling him. Elizabeth trying to get Martha to come back to the safe house was ridiculously tense. Never has the show come that close to shattering. The FBI is trailing Martha and is so close to capturing the Jenningses and meanwhile, Elizabeth has something ominous in her pocket for Martha. I couldn’t even.

Giving us a short breather was the domestic scene as the Beeman and Jennings kids drink beer underage while their parents play a cat-and-mouse game with international-incident implications. I don’t think, after the day they had, that the parents would be too upset to come home to such petty law-breaking.

Pity poor Agent Gaad, who is increasingly shell-shocked about the role he unwittingly played in the Soviets infiltrating the bureau. “They seduced and married my secretary,” he says of the KGB. “I’m in charge of FBI counterintelligence and my secretary married a KGB operative.” He might as well tell off the deputy attorney general because his career is over. Stan will know how he feels if he ever realizes those KGB agents are his next-door neighbors.

And to think all of this started with a pen and some photocopies.

This episode made everybody unguardedly emotional. Philip actually tells Martha his real name is Mischa, a secret Elizabeth had to wait 20 years of marriage to hear. He knows he’ll never see Martha again so he might as well tell her. I’m guessing he ignores Elizabeth’s advice to pretend he is coming to the USSR because he thinks it would be less cruel to be honest.

Elizabeth is increasingly vulnerable, too. In a stunning exchange, she asks if Philip would run away with Martha if the kids were grown. “I’d understand” if he did, she says.

It was a mild shock to see him react not with opaque declarations of faithfulness but with an honest “Get out of town”-type response. That “I love you” was probably a first between the two on this show and Elizabeth’s tears were her response. This is the culmination of the entire series to this point and I wonder if it will finally cement the two together in their battle against the Americans and the Soviet bureaucracy.

Martha finally realizes Philip will not be coming with her. He tells her the Soviets will know of her sacrifice and greet her as a hero but of course, she never wanted any of that. She believed the lie that the sacrifices she were making were for her own country. As all the illusions fall away, her face goes from turmoil to a horrifying resignation. She will go to a strange country and be alone again, just as she was before she met Clark. For her, that fate might be worse than death.

Game of Thrones S6 E1: The Red Woman

Oh, what the hell: I’m reviewing season six of Game of Thrones. I came to the show late and binge-watched it over the last year. I never thought I’d like it because I’m not so into those fantasy type shows but I am really enjoying all the politics and scheming. I haven’t read the books.

The season six premiere was mostly about table setting and letting us all remind ourselves what was going on with all the main characters. Jon Snow is possibly/definitely dead for the moment/forever. I laughed at the mental gymnastics Ser Alliser had to do to convince himself he was loyal because he never disobeyed an order, even though he killed his commanding officer. True, Jon never ordered anybody not to kill him but I inferred the order was implied.

Meanwhile, Sansa and Theon are on the run through a frigid river (I couldn’t blame Sansa for not wanting to wade through; I am more dramatic about jumping into a slightly chilly pool) and finally get a break from danger in the form of a thrilling rescue from Brienne and Podrick. There was a momentary hesitation when Brienne offered her services to Lady Catelyn’s daughter and at home, I helpfully suggested, “Yes, you’ll want to stick with the badass blonde amazon” to the TV. I liked Sansa’s ritual acceptance of Brienne’s services, which promises that she will be more commanding and powerful from here on out.

Meanwhile, in Winterfell, Ramsay realizes he will actually need Sansa and her child to maintain the throne. He eulogizes the kennel master’s daughter as fierce but she actually went over that balcony and fell to her death pretty easily last season. Then Ramsay feeds her “good meat” to the hounds, just to re-re-emphasize that he’s a bastard.

Meanwhile, in King’s Landing, Cersei looks forward to reuniting with Myrcella only for brother/lover Jamie to tell her the girl is dead, with her coffin returning draped in gold, as the fortune teller said it would. “She was good,” the queen regent says of her daughter. “From her first breath she was so sweet. I don’t know where she came from. She was nothing like me.” I know the Lannisters are the worst and Cersei earned her comeuppance with that walk of shame but I do feel for her, with two kids dead. At least it will be highly entertaining to see her revenge.

Meanwhile, in prison, the world’s must fun nun tries to get Margaery to confess.

Meanwhile, in Dorne, Ellaria and the Sand Snakes take over, assassinating the Doran regime. This has been boiling ever since Oberyn died, with Ellaria noting that Doran did nothing to avenge that or her sister’s death.

Meanwhile, Arya is living on the streets as a blind beggar. The Waif (like Stick to Daredevil) attacks Arya and teaches her to defend herself.

Meanwhile, Daenerys ends up with her old in-laws, the Dothraki. She asserts her power enough to escape assault and rape but it turns out they still want her to live in an old widow’s home. I liked her line about only submitting “when the sun rises in the west and sets in the east,” a callback to the witch who turned Khal Drogo into a vegetable. I hope Daenerys will soon actually get to Westeros. Also, Jorah somehow, in the middle of that massive green field, finds the ring she left as a breadcrumb. I know her had the trampled grass to use as a bullseye but come on. Or maybe Jorrah’s eyes are just that good; after all, he was the only one who spotted the attack on his queen in the fighting pits.

Meanwhile, in Meereen, the dynamic duo of Tyrion and Varys sees the city in flames and decides maybe the mhysa’s reign isn’t going over very well.

Meanwhile, Melisandre is secretly an old woman, appearing young due to her magic and the ruby she wears around her neck. It was a surprising reveal but it makes sense that she’s old because she never really carried herself like a young woman; she had more gravitas than that. I didn’t know how to read the fact that she let her guard down and appeared old again. She looked so defeated when she went to bed and maybe she is just tired of all the prophecies that have failed. I guess it’s deflating when you realize you manipulated a man into burning his daughter at the stake for no real reason. Or maybe giving up the artifice of youth will allow her to make her own sacrifice and give life back to Jon Snow.

It was an OK episode, mostly checking in on everyone. I didn’t mind that part of it but look forward to spending more time in fewer locations.

The Americans S4 E6: The Rat

For awhile now, I’ve been wondering about Martha’s ultimate fate. There will come a point at which the situation would be too untenable for her to keep living. I don’t want her to hang too long and wear out her welcome but Alison Wright has been so great and her character has added so much to the show that I don’t want her to leave. I think they’d have to save her death for the end of the show, because if she gets killed, I think that would wreck Philip and sort of be the end of all of it.

After last week’s episode, I am wondering exactly where they’re going with this whole Martha thing. I was sure she was very dead at the end of season three when Clark took off his wig. I thought she got a reprieve earlier this season. Now I’m waiting for her to walk the gallows after the visit with Clark, Jennifer and Gabriel in the safe house.

Martha’s life is unraveling faster and faster and even with the help of Valium, she can't deal with it. After finally asking the question of who Clark works for, she gets her answer: The KGB. Her sister-in-law is in on it and is actually her husband’s other wife. She fantasizes that she can just go back to work like nothing happened but the FBI suspects she’s a spy. (Stan and Aderholt prove their investigative skills but the fallout is sure to be terrible. Gaad is flabbergasted that his own secretary planted the bug in his pen, knowing that his career and credibility will be severely damaged.)

Worst of all, she’s seen Philip’s true face so if the Americans interrogate her, there is no plausible deniability that she doesn't know who he really is. No matter how much mercy they might want to show, the Soviets can’t get around the hard fact that Martha can identify her so they may have to kill her or send her to the USSR. The be-wigging is a double danger for Elizabeth: It puts her family in danger since the FBI could identify them and also endangers her relationship with Philip, who may have unmasked himself due to a real bond with Martha. He doesn’t really answer his Soviet wife when she asks him if he wanted Martha to see his real appearance. Philip not only betrayed the protocol of a spy but he betrayed Elizabeth by actually being truly vulnerable with Martha.

In contrast to the Technicolor sex between Philip and Elizabeth last week, his sex with Martha was bleak and very sad. She clings to him because he’s the only thing left that she can cling to, not realizing the heartbreaking fact that he will not be able to follow her wherever she goes. Is Philip having sex with her because he wants one last time for himself or because he’s doing her one last kindness before she faces exile or death? As with everything on The Americans, I’m sure the answer is “a little from column A, a little from column B.” 

The scene where Philip takes the gun away from a sleeping, vulnerable Martha was unbearably sad. What followed was thrilling: Martha, even knowing she’s doomed, taking control and threatening to scream “KGB!” on the street at Gabriel. The covers of both sides have never been closer to getting blown open. Martha at once has the potential for great power but she’s also never been closer to death. I have no idea what’s coming next but I’m sure it will be heartbreaking.

Prince Rogers Nelson

This one hurts. We’re barely done mourning Bowie and now the spectacularly bad music year of 2016 sends another of my icons off into the purple rain.

Prince was in the stratosphere of my very favorite artists (he was number 2 just below Madonna, to give you an idea of how big a fan I was and am). I have loved his music since the ‘80s and he was one of the first musicians I really got into. I just got done listening to all the Prince in my collection again. After getting a new laptop, I lost all the play counts in iTunes so I figured it would be fun to listen to all of my music again and I took some time just to play all the Prince.

And I have a lot of it. With as vast a discography as Prince has, you can’t ever say you have everything, but I have all the official albums, standalone singles, most of the B-sides and a lot of the remixes. I have almost everything you can get legally and there’s still more out there. I was just last week lamenting that there are a few stray tracks and bootlegged albums I don’t have (look up “List of unreleased Prince projects” on Wikipedia and weep at a world that might have been) and I was wondering how best to get those, just to get my collection as complete as possible.

Listening to all that music again recently, it was overwhelming to me to hear the breadth of his accomplishments. Prince could play pretty much every instrument. He teamed up with amazing bands such as the Revolution, the NPG and 3^rd Eye Girl but so much of those albums were all him. Everytime I bought a Prince album, I would see this familiar credit in the liner notes: “Produced, arranged, composed and performed by Prince.”

There was so much music that it’s hard to know where to start a eulogy but you have to start with Purple Rain. The album is just about perfect, nine lean-and-mean tracks without an ounce of fat on them. My favorite Prince song, “When Doves Cry” is, I think, still one of the most bizarre songs ever to become a hit. It’s a dance song without a bassline, cold but erotic, a psychological minefield. Album opener “Let’s Go Crazy” starts with a church sermon and ends with an avalanche of apocalyptic guitars. I still get goosebumps to this day when I hear Prince shriek “Baby baby baby I want you” at the end of “The Beautiful Ones.” “Darling Nikki” is raunchy and “I Would Die 4 U” is beatific. And of course, there’s the title track. “Purple Rain,” recorded live in one take, still destroys me whenever I hear it, all the anguish and catharsis in the song melting into the strings in the coda and a gorgeous sense of letting go.

Prince was on such a torrid streak in the ‘80s that Purple Rain was just the centerpiece of an amazing stretch of albums, each different from the last, from R&B ballads to funk to rock to new wave to psychedelia. It astounds me to think he released this murderers row of albums back to back: Dirty Mind, Controversy, 1999, Purple Rain, Around the World in a Day, Parade, Sign ‘o’ the Times, Lovesexy. And those are just the albums. No collection would be complete without the B-sides of that era, like “Irresistible Bitch,” “17 Days,” “Shockadelica,” “She’s Always in My Hair,” “How Come U Don’t Call Me Anymore” and more, sometimes just as good as the A-sides. He was on such a hot streak in 1984 that he could afford to throw the brilliant “Erotic City,” which many other artists could have hung a career on, onto a B-side.

It’s difficult for me to rank Prince albums but my second favorite would have to be 1999. It’s a fever dream of an album, so smutty and murky that the sound of it feels like sweating in a dark bedroom. It not only has hits like “1999” and “Little Red Corvette” but amazing, bizarrely erotic album tracks like “Automatic,” “Let’s Pretend We’re Married” and “Something in the Water (Does Not Compute).” Then there’s the messy double album Sign ‘o’ the Times, another of my favorites. Prince recorded the whole thing by himself, yielding the stark title track, the guitar-fueled “U Got the Look,” the head trip “If I Was Your Girlfriend” and his most underrated single, the most joyous brush-off in a bar in history, “I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man.”

Those three albums don’t even include some stone-cold classic singles and album tracks from the era: “Raspberry Beret,” “Kiss,” “Head,” “Gett Off,” “Alphabet St.,” “Controversy,” “Thieves in the Temple,” “Sexy MF,” “Sometimes It Snows in April,” “Crucial,” “Batdance,” “Annie Christian,” “Pop Life,” “Uptown,” “7,” etc.

Then there was the sex. Robert Christgau’s review of Dirty Mind was so impressed with Prince’s sexual charisma that he concluded that “Mick Jagger should fold up his penis and go home.” We have Prince to thank for parental warning stickers on albums, after Tipper Gore heard her kids listening to “Darling Nikki” and flipped out. I always thought it was funny that it was that song she objected to when Prince’s earlier work was really filthy.

Prince was also not stingy with writing songs for other artists. He famously wrote “Nothing Compares 2 U” for Sinead O’Connor (originally for the Family), “I Feel for You” for Chaka Khan, “Manic Monday” for the Bangles, “The Glamorous Life” and “A Love Bizarre” for Sheila E, “Love … Thy Will Be Done” for Martika and (oh God) “Sugar Walls” for Sheena Easton. Closest to my heart, he dueted with Madonna on “Love Song” and played guitar on “Like a Prayer.”

I stuck with Prince long after he became O{—> and while you weren’t guaranteed a front-to-back classic album anymore, there was still plenty to love on albums like The Gold Experience and Emancipation. I even bought The Rainbow Children — hated it but still bought it. I enjoyed some of his more recent stuff, like MPLSound, LotusFlow3r, Art Official Age and PlectrumElectrum. He had released some good standalone singles in the last few years like the hilarious “Breakfast Can Wait” (good-naturedly playing off the “skirts vs. blouses” skit by Dave Chappelle), “Groovy Potential” and “Ain’t Gonna Miss U When Ur Gone.” I had just gotten his last album from late last year, Hitnrun Phase 2. The last thing he released during his lifetime, as far as I can tell, was the recent single “Free Urself,” which is kind of bouncy and ‘80s. When I heard it, I thought, “If this is what we’re doing now, I could get used to this sound.”

No, I never did get to see him live. There was always some reason why I couldn’t go or there was no publicity and I missed the show. There’s no excuse and I’ll always regret missing him. Like Bowie, I half-thought he would live forever, or at least his death would be going up in a spaceship in a glamorous cacophony of purple velvet and gold glitter to the sound of crying doves.

The one advantage when an artist you love dies is that you already have all the music so you don’t have to acquire anything; you can just hit play. So that’s what I’m doing now: reliving almost 40 years of music for the umpteenth time, the incendiary, maddening, jaw-dropping genius of Prince.

May U live 2 see the Dawn.

A tiny amount of interest in a tiny house

I will never live in a tiny house. I lived in small apartments and I feel like I did my time and now I’d like to live somewhere more spacious. When we were looking for our current house, it was my goal not to buy anything anyone could describe as “cute” when walking through the door because in real estate, “cute” means “small.” I don’t need a McMansion but I’m never living in 200 square feet unless I absolutely have to.

We were watching HGTV when there was an ad for some kind of tiny house show. The couple on it said, “We’re redefining success.” That’s a bit of self-regard, don’t you think? You’re changing the definition of success just because you live in a dollhouse? I’m pretty sure a generally accepted definition of success is not having to cook dinner on a hotplate while pooping in the toilet next to the Murphy bed.

I don’t mean to make light of people who have no choice but to live in a small area. But when I see these tiny house people on TV, I don’t see some couple down on their luck who have to live in a cramped tenement and are just getting by. These people seem almost like austerity tourists, people who have had the big house and now want to live somewhere adorable so they can spend the rest of their money traveling the world, whereas people who can’t afford a huge living space don’t have the disposable cash for the extracurricular activities.

These people also said, “Spend less time working and more time living.” Yes, but living where? I understand that we should spend some time smelling the roses but I personally don’t mind working if it will buy me a decent house. I also understand the idea of spending money on experiences and not things but I don’t share it. Maybe I’m too much a part of my generation and hanging onto tangible possessions.

You know an experience I enjoy? Coming home from working a 40-hour week and jumping in the pool. It’s a lot of work and expense to maintain a pool and a yard but I don’t mind because the reward is getting to have a pool and a yard. My time at work gives me money to do all that and facilitate living.

Acquiring things is certainly not the goal in life but I still like having things. I could go to the library for all my books but it took me decades to acquire my own library and I like to have my own books to reread when I want. I also get some pleasure looking at the bookshelves in our house. I’m glad Steve finally moved that piano to our house so he can start playing and that piano would not have fit into a tiny house.

We saw the tiny house commercial during Love It or List It, which is on the opposite spectrum where some of the residents seem so spoiled. It’s fun to watch and love or hate the homeowners. One person found an absolutely perfect house but it was just slightly outside the ideal neighborhood near work and I thought of my hour commute and wanted to throw something at the screen. Then there are the couples who have a fit when they can’t have a hot tub in their unfinished attic or a moat or something. I know it’s all staged but it’s still amusing. I guess the lesson is that you can’t have it all but you can have enough. 

So today I’ve criticized people whose houses are too small and people who are unsatisfied with their huge castles. There is no pleasing me.

A Little Corner of Life

Once we finally become parents, our lives will change profoundly. Evenings of idly watching prestige TV will give way to corralling the entropy of scattered toys. I say bring it on. It will not be a walk in the park and I’m nervous but I am ready to take on the challenges. 

What I am wondering about is how much I am going to be able to continue writing. I just read two articles with opposing viewpoints; one said having a baby kills creativity and the other says parenthood spurs creativity. It won’t be a question of material. I’m sure having a child in our lives will inspire me greatly and make for plenty of fodder for stories, blogs and poems. Fatherhood has already inspired me and it’s not even here yet.

The question here is when do I do all that writing? I must sound so spoiled: “Oh, woe is me, when will I be able to write my Great American Novel?” But I know that while our child will rapidly climb the Billboard Hot 100 of our priorities (debuting at #1 with a bullet), I also know about the importance of keeping myself balanced and saving a little corner of life for myself. I think that little break can lead to a saner parent and thus, a better-adjusted child.

I’ve done some of my best work on the fly, like writing a poem while bored at a conference or coming up with an idea for a blog on my way to work and throwing it together in five minutes before posting. I work quickly without revisions (which has positives and apparent negatives, given my very low publishing rate). I’d like to think that I’m somebody who could write with my right hand while using my left hand to change a diaper or fold laundry.

But who knows what the practical reality will be once we have a child in our lives. One thing I’m sure of about parenting is that I won’t know what it’s really like until I know what it’s really like.

Maybe there’s something too egocentric in continuing to write about TV shows and bad grammar and the weather as a metaphor for whatever bloviating topic when there are so many other important things to do. Maybe there’s too much “I” in my writing when I’d really like to escape ego at this point in my life and expand my forcefield to take in someone new to nurture and love and guide.

I want to continue writing whenever possible, though. I want to snatch whatever seconds from the day and scraps of paper from the detritus of my new life as I can and fill them with something. I want to at least try to instill in our child a love of the arts, of music and books and paintings and TV and movies. Even if he doesn’t take to any of those things, I want our child to see that I’m still writing and even if I never get anything published, that at least I tried.

The Americans S4 E5: Clark's Place

Scene by scene, Oleg is becoming increasingly disillusioned. He cries at his brother’s funeral but his brother can’t be buried with full military honors. Nina doesn’t even get a funeral, dying a traitor where Yevgeny died a hero. Oleg’s father could not save her and bitterly tells his son to go back to America, not really making a case for staying in the Soviet Union, a country he thinks is going to hell anyway.

So Oleg goes back to the Rezidentura and minute by minute, you can almost see him crack. Arkady mourns Nina too but hammers it home that she was a traitor and they don’t usually execute people for no reason. The Soviets disposed of Nina’s body with no fanfare but I like how she still haunts the cast and that her life and motivations were much more complicated than anybody could know.  

Martha is also losing her illusions, increasingly distressed by Clark’s absence. He was trying to protect his wife when he left the apartment after Hans tipped him off to Aderholt’s presence, but she doesn’t know that. (By the way, Hans is like the barber college of spies. This is the downside of using a trainee in a life or death situation: It’s very risky to learn on the job.)

Clark tells Martha he loves her and while he does care for her, you have to wonder how much he’s working her and how much he really is concerned for her safety. That’s what makes the Jenningses great spies, as Gabriel says in a backhanded compliment: They care about people. Clearly Elizabeth sees something genuine in Philip’s affection for Martha; that was a hard stare at him during the phone call.

I had to laugh at Elizabeth and Philip talking to Pastor Tim and Helen Lovejoy because it seemed like such a PR move, bringing in that El Salvadoran “priest” to gain the sympathy of the pastor and his wife and highlight the abuses of the Americans in Central America. “You think that guy was really a priest?” Philip says later, highlighting the infomercial fake-ness of it all. I loved Elizabeth’s indifferently mumbled answer.

In this week’s irony alert, Elizabeth, possibly tipsy after a night with Young-hee, laughs at Ronald Reagan on TV saying, “Young people have a whole new attitude about serving their country.” Paige is watching and who knows which country she will ultimately serve?

The screws are tightening on all our characters. Oleg will probably do something drastic after Nina’s death. Stan is closing in on Martha. The Jenningses are walking a fine line with the pastor. Elizabeth is worried to recognize Aderholt outside their house as he got a good look at her during their street fight in season three.

To illustrate all that, this week’s music choice of Queen and David Bowie’s “Under Pressure” was way on target. So many lyrics can apply to this story, like “Can’t we give love one more chance?” and “It’s the terror of knowing what this world is about.” The editing award has to go for dropping in the line “Sat on a fence but it don’t work” in the Jennings bedroom, applying to Philip’s delicate dance with his two wives and the couple’s balancing act with Paige and Pastor Tim.

When the pressure gets to be too much, sometimes all you can do is have raunchy, toe-curling spy sex. 

NATIONAL Weather service

WE WILL REGALE FUTURE GENERATIONS WITH STORIES OF THOSE HYSTERICAL DAYS. THE SKY WOULD DARKEN AND THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE WOULD CATERWAUL ITS DIRE WARNINGS. SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WARNING UNTIL 5:15 P.M. FOR THE FOLLOWING COUNTIES. BLIZZARD WATCH IN EFFECT UNTIL THURSDAY NIGHT. HEAT WAVE IN THE TRI-COUNTY AREA. HAIL POSSIBLE. LIGHTNING PROBABLE. LOWER LYING AREAS MAY FLOOD. IN COURIER FONT THE WARNINGS WOULD SHRIEK FROM WEB PAGES AND PHONES. IT NEVER SEEMED TO HAVE AN INSIDE VOICE. A HIGH TIDE WAS AS URGENT AS A TORNADO.

Things are cooler now, like the first evening breeze after the cold front has stomped through in a blast of thunder. Now we get our warnings with a measured caution. Be vigilant but no need to panic. Watch the skies. Cover plants or move them indoors. Drink plenty of fluids. Head for the basement.

i wonder soon

if it will all turn to some

avant garde poetry

if the nws will forget the

shift key forever

and warn us

like e.e. cummings

if cold fronts will

anthropomorphize

if every lightning strike

will be a stab of irony

if every falling leaf

will symbolize

loneliness

#problematic Words

It’s time for another semi-regular scolding for the incorrect use of words. This is just my opinion but I hear the following words and phrases used and it just feels incorrect to me.

“Problematic” is the go-to phrase for anything in our culture that we deem offensive. It’s useful to have a shorthand for something like this but sometimes I feel like people call something problematic so they don’t have to explain why there is a problem with something. Tell me the TV show is sexist or racist and maybe explain why. I wonder if people stamp “problematic” along with that hashtag because they really can’t explain why something is offensive. And don’t tell me, “It’s so obvious I shouldn’t have to explain it.” If it’s that obvious, it will be a snap for you to explain. The word just opens the door to laziness.

“Witch hunt” is a phrase people seem to use in the incorrect context. For something to be a witch hunt, I think it should consist of looking at a broad category of people and picking out the traitors. The Salem witch hunt was a witch hunt because the Puritans were picking out witches from the general populace and McCarthyism was a witch hunt because Congress was picking out Communists from people in the government. In contrast is Christine O’Donnell. She’s under investigation for falsely reporting her campaign headquarters as her residence and labeled it a witch hunt. It’s not a witch hunt if it’s just one person under investigation. Don’t try to graft some false nobility onto your mistakes; you are not Joseph Nye Welch telling Joe McCarthy “Have you no sense of decency?” (It’s especially amusing because O’Donnell campaigned by telling people she wasn’t a witch.)

“Healthful” may not trigger spell check but it really doesn’t seem like a legitimate word and sounds stupid. Just say “healthy.” Also, never say “more healthful.” Just say “healthier.” It’s always grammatically wrong to add “more” onto an adjective when that adjective has an “er” suffix.

“Actively” can be clarifying but sometimes we don’t need it. If I leave a book out on the table, it’s helpful to say that I’m passively reading it off and on but I’m not actively reading it right now. But to say “It’s actively raining” is ridiculous. It’s either raining or it’s not. It doesn’t rain passively. If you mean “It’s raining heavily,” then say that.

The Americans S4 E4: Chloramphenicol

What a cruel thing to do to an audience and a character. It was pretty clear that the end was near for Nina Sergeevna Krilova but I didn’t expect it to happen a split second after the KGB sentenced her.

I give credit to the show for deftly executing (sorry!) this development. Nina has been a dead woman walking for several seasons so if they killed her with a long scene before a firing squad, it would have seemed kind of obvious. The way they did it, with the fake-out plan to free her and the heartbreaking scene of putting her dead body in a sack, left us gasping and shell-shocked.

Of course, there were some signs, like the walk through the bleak dungeon that looked more like a walk to the gallows than a walk to freedom. I was pretty sure the scene with Nina walking into the snow with Anton was a dream, since it looked too much like An Officer and a Gentleman, but it increased the cruelty. And the cruelest cut of all was the plan to free Nina, with the order from Oleg’s father coming just a little too late. (When they find out, Stan and Oleg are going to go on a rampage in the USSR, right?) But really, would Nina have been happy owing her life to yet another person and having to play chess piece again?

“Chloramphenicol” was full of some masterful, subtle misdirection. Despite the bleakness of what the characters are dealing with, there were some notes of hope, like flowers starting to poke through the ground after a brutal winter. Despite mourning for his brother, it looked like Oleg would get a win-win by going home and reuniting with Nina. Despite Stan’s aimless post-divorce life, Matthew was going to start living with him part-time and he never seems happier or looser than when he is with Henry (which is kind of heartwarming but mostly sad if you think about it). Despite the glanders scare, there was some hope when Phillip and Elizabeth decided not to kill Pastor Tim and Alice but try to work them, and the morning after seemed like the dawning of a more hopeful era. Then the Jenningses went bowling (I loved Elizabeth’s “Very important part of training” to Paige in an exaggerated Russian accent). Those hints of hope made Nina’s death even more horrible.

The glanders stuff was pretty rough for awhile but in the end, Elizabeth never actually had the disease at all. I appreciated the flashback to Nadezhda’s mother’s illness and the parallel that Elizabeth was unable to tell her daughter what to do in the event of her death, plus the amazing admission that she would want Phillip to raise the kids as Americans. It was unsettling seeing a delirious Elizabeth so vulnerable and this is the first time she’s really come unraveled like that. The instructions to Phillip to blame a dead Elizabeth for Pastor Tim and Alice’s deaths were chilling. That long, teary hug between her and Paige showed that this put a scare in Elizabeth like nothing else has.

Martha knows something’s up. There was a neat contrast between her clumsy code when leaving a message for Clark and Elizabeth’s more practiced code on the phone to the Jane Fonda workout-loving operator when calling off the assassinations. The scene with Martha opening up to Aderholt while Stan ransacked her apartment was very effective, with the character going vulnerable on a level she chose and a level she didn’t. Even Phillip was letting himself be vulnerable this episode, revealing the existence of his children to William. It looked like they all might be dying anyway, so why not open up? William (who better be in every episode) envies the Jenningses because they have each other to confide in but Phillip is going through some things he really can’t tell anybody.

I was fascinated by Martha opening up to Aderholt about seeing a married man. I’m not quite sure how to read it, though. On some level, does Martha know Clark has another family? She must at least suspect that he would have some kind of cover identity and a fake family. That monologue was a stunner.

What a cruel episode. More, please.

Don't Split My Infinitive

The irony of it is the mistake hinged on the incorrect placement of “correctly.” The word invaded the middle of the headline, tragically split apart from its other infinitive half. I, of course, had placed it at the end of things where it belonged and where a generation ago, the nuns had taught me it belonged.

“Don’t split the infinitive” was the ancient lesson. I heeded it then and these days, when I barely remember what I walked upstairs for, I still hang onto that correct syntax. I am annoying in my insistence.

So, zeroing in past the bigger questions of clinical accuracy and professional relevance, I unite “to” with the straggler “correctly” as nature and those nuns decreed, almost pathetically proud of my vigilance.

The power above me breaks the iron-clad laws of grammar and divorces my verb from its infinitive form. We let it slide for Star Trek going boldly but I thought we had higher standards here.

Call me late. Call me lazy. Call me out. But please don't split my infinitive.

The Walking Dead S6 E16: Last Day on Earth

Was it Glenn? Was it Abraham? Was it Darryl? Was it Patrice/Ruth/Siobhan? Was it Maggie? Was it Carl? Was it Eugene? Was it Sasha? Was it Michonne? Was it Rick?

Was it an hour and 20 minutes of bullshit followed by 10 minutes of tension ending in inconclusive action?

Cutting to black just as Negan brought down Lucille on somebody’s head was amateur hour. I assume the creators of The Walking Dead wanted the ending to have a cliffhanger effect and have us all guessing who was dead all spring and summer but personally, I don’t really care. They’ll reveal it and it will be sad but I probably won’t even think about it much until season seven starts. I can’t believe I stayed up for that on a school night. I was looking at the clock and saw it was 10:29 and thought “wrap it up, guys.”

I did like the actual confrontation in the woods once they got to it, with the creepy Mockingjay whistle. Rick’s slow-motion breakdown was unsettling with a great Andrew Lincoln performance. It started subtly once they found Michonne’s hair pinned to that zombie and by the time they were all kneeling in a circle, it was distressing to watch him out of control with no ideas for escape. Negan certainly was a dick, making Maggie kneel when she was already laid out on a stretcher having a miscarriage/major health problem.

To play devil’s advocate, do you think most of the people in that circle would kind of deserve being hit with a barbed wire bat? Rick and his people did kill a bunch of them unprovoked and getting hit with Lucille isn’t too much more brutal then getting stabbed in the face in your sleep. Also, how much of this predicament is due to the group making really terrible decisions? If they’d just stayed in Alexandria, they might have been alright and if the Saviors came for them, they would have been in a more defensible position at home. I know there was the issue of needing to be less isolationist due to the food supply and all that. I’m not saying I’m right about any of this but it would be good to have a debate, either in the fandom or on the show itself.

Gathering most of the cast like that for a last stand was so primal that it felt like Carol should have been there, rather than sidelined and saved by a knight in a shining bulletproof vest on a white horse. However, I did appreciate the introduction of another group of people who do want to help. It can’t be just a bunch of Negans out there.

But that first hour or so was such an aggravating slog and it was amusing how the cast was literally going nowhere in that RV. There really was a way to expedite that and drive home the point that they had no way out without turning it into an extended tapdance interspersed with commercials. It’s easy for shows to have an extended running time and screw it up by adding a bunch of padding. If I read any interview today with the writers saying anything like, “We realized we had a story that was too big for an hour-long episode,” I’m going to buy some tomatoes on my lunch break and throw them at my monitor because it’s unadulterated horseshit.

The Walking Dead is not some avant garde play that runs as long as it needs to tell its story; it’s commercial TV. I assume television works like magazine publishing in which the number of ads we can sell determines the amount of space for content, not the other way around. AMC knew it could sell a bunch of extra commercials for the season finale so they had the writers come up with a longer episode. So because Disney ponied up some money to run a trailer for Captain America: Civil War, we had to watch that RV hitting roadblocks.

Despite my negative tone, I did enjoy season six overall but it was frustratingly uneven. They run a fantastic episode like “JSS” (probably my favorite of the series) with the breathtaking sequence of Carol putting on a mask and shooting the Wolves but then follow it up with Morgan’s origin story with embarrassing dialogue (“the door was always open”) then follow that up with the meaty, nightmarish raid on the prison and mind games of Carol and Maggie held captive and then we literally drive around in circles in the woods. I’ll spend my off season not worrying too much about who Negan killed and staying as far away as possible from Fear the Walking Dead.

The Americans S4 E3: Experimental Prototype City of Tomorrow

Isn’t that always the way? You’re looking forward to a fun trip to Orlando with the family. You’re envisioning repeated rides on Spaceship Earth and the People Mover, winding down the day with dinner in Italy and a beer in England. Then your stupid boss comes down with a case of the glanders and he’s coughing up blood and it turns out you might have it too so you chase down the bioweapons guy and spit in his face to make sure he has to give you the vaccine and then you have to be quarantined for 36 hours.

“I guess we’re not going to EPCOT,” Philip pouts.

It didn’t take long for Chekov’s bioweapon to explode and the Jenningses came perilously close to death as the cap could easily have come undone in their garage. I’m guessing Claudia will again become the handler because it looks like Gabriel is about to die. After all, William told them they should have wrapped his body in plastic and burned it. William, by the way, is fascinating so I hope they keep him around. He’s allergic to dust, butter, sausage and candy. He has no sense of smell and his body produces no natural lubricants.

I am curious why Elizabeth is working that woman from the Mary Kay group. “You don’t have to look like a Martian. We’re all Americans now,” she says in the latest bit of loaded dialogue for this show. “That’s Americans for you,” Elizabeth tells her fellow immigrant about the toys kids throw away when they’re done with them, offering an inadvertent revelation of how she, Nadezhda, feels about the spoiled Americans.

It’s interesting to see that Elizabeth, with a much stronger connection to Russia, doesn’t want to return home (though I did like her wistfulness when she talks about living by the sea in Odessa, a retirement dream that will probably never come true), while Philip, who is enjoying life in America, is ready to run. I hope they do get to go to EPCOT, since the fake American family wandering around a theme park with fake countries would be thematically rich.

The choices are exfiltration or killing Pastor Tim and Alice, but as everyone notes, there is no good choice. This was bound to happen one way or another. Gabriel feels it was a mistake to bring Paige into the fold but she would have found out anyway due to her natural curiosity. Philip is already getting her to work as a spy and work the pastor and his wife.

I was surprised everyone took such an open tack to this dilemma, with Philip and Elizabeth actually talking to Tim before doing anything. I liked Paige taking initiative and trying to reason with her pastor. She seemed offended by his suggestion that her parents might hurt people in their spy work but Pastor Tim’s comments did pique her curiosity, leading her to ask her parents more questions (and have them lie their faces off again about not hurting anybody).

I’m guessing this may be the last we see of Nina alive. I wonder if they will execute her off-screen and that dream was a symbolic afterlife for her. She took some satisfaction in what Anton wrote to mitigate her sentence. I think she’s just done with being a victim and even if she gets killed for it, her actions have given her a form of control.

Meanwhile, the Mail Robot is back! Yay! It delivers a message about feelings. Gaad gets pissy about the unlogged copies and OH MY GOD STAN TOTALLY KNOWS MARTHA DID IT.

The first three episodes have been good but a little quiet. With the glanders quarantine and Martha’s surveillance, I think things will really ramp up soon.