Is this the real beginning
of Paige’s indoctrination? Being introduced to Gabriel was sort of jaw-dropping
and means she’s in it deep now, having met someone from the Center. The whole
end scene had the feel of “You are finally ready.”
Paige’s readiness to be
brought into some aspect of the spy life also comes from her reading of Das Kapital, as she identifies with a
lot of Karl Marx’s arguments (except on religion). Elizabeth points out the
capitalist exploitation of the worker but does not seem to realize she’s been
exploited her whole life for a cause that will, though she cannot know it,
ultimately fail. And she’s the lucky one—look at William, who had no kind of
life for himself and died for essentially no reason. Elizabeth isn’t even aware
of the exploitation happening in her estranged home country, where Oleg plays
along reluctantly, throwing the grocery profiteer in prison.
Why exactly is Gabriel
leaving? Is he just tired, as he says? Is lying to Philip just too unbearable? Is
his throwaway line to Philip and Elizabeth, that they’ve seen too much and done
too much, a hint of something darker to come? Does he see the end of the USSR
in sight? (There was a hint of this in his lines: “He was a nobody. We were all
nobodies. It’s been over for a long time.”)
Gabriel seemed to have a
profound experience at the Lincoln Memorial, a beautifully shot scene. It
seemed like a twisted mirror of Jimmy Stewart-eqsue movies in which a
disillusioned American goes to the memorial to let the sight of Lincoln
reaffirm his belief. For a Soviet, maybe a visit to the memorial is something
demoralizing that makes one abandon the cause.
Lying to Philip about his
son and his father have taken their toll on Gabriel. Philip finds out that his
father was not exactly a logger, as he’d always heard, but a guard at a logging
camp. (The word “camp” is never anything good in this type of context.) It
sinks in for Philip that his capacity for coldness and cruelty must be in his
blood, and it makes him unravel a little bit more. There is also a parallel
between him and Mischa, since Mischa’s father only knows Philip is a travel
agent in America, which is about as technically true as Philip’s father being a
logger. He reflects that his family used to have nothing, but “now we have
everything. It feels strange sometimes.” I thought that line was haunting and I’m
not sure why. As usual, Matthew Rhys knocks himself out with that performance.
As usual, Keri Russell
does, too, balancing a range of subtle emotions. At first it seemed like she
really needed to unburden herself while casing the psychiatrist’s office and
telling him about the mugging, but her eye roll subverted that. It would have
seemed too close to the EST storyline if she’d really needed some help, and we
know Elizabeth doesn’t go for that kind of therapy (although she did seem to
react positively to the tai chi).
Still, Elizabeth does need
some sort of outlet for traumas like her abandonment of Young-Hee. I loved the
mix of sorrow and anger when the Mary Kay saleswoman came to the door and reminded
Elizabeth of her former friend. She stakes out Young-Hee and Don’s home but a
year after the betrayal, another family has moved in. They could have patched
things up and just moved, but they could also have divorced and sold the house.
If Elizabeth was seeking some sort of confirmation that her actions didn’t
permanently damage her friends’ marriage, and that the couple is doing OK, she’s
not going to get it, and that must eat away at her.
I assume we’ll soon find
out where certain vague plotlines are going, like Stan and Aderholt meeting
that Russian woman in the park, Elizabeth stealing files from the psychiatrist,
and Philip staking out a woman at work. Meanwhile, with Gabriel telling Paige
about her real background, next week looks to be meaty as hell.
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