Amazon & Netflix got together and gave me an early March present in the form of new episodes of The Americans and House of Cards.
I’m sure it goes without saying that I wrote about these two shows together because I watched them within the same week, but I think there are interesting parallels between the two. Political partnerships, marriages based on convenience and arrangement, dealings with Russia, spies, backchannels, data mining and listening in, election rigging, and general national outcry and hand-wringing for a so-called “better” time.
Some spoilers within for House of Cards season 4 & The Americans season 3.
I suspect it’s a certain kind of nostalgia that makes The Americans work so well. We collectively yearn for a time when our enemies were known and for the naive belief that we could uproot them from within our own sphere. Whatever makes an enemy is still a mystery to me, though, because I’ve just finished season 3 of this remarkable FX show (available on Amazon Prime streaming) and thanks to the narrative of storytelling, I constantly expect to see Elizabeth & Philip extracted from danger, even though they’re the enemy. A spy show set in the 1980s engenders a different vibe than one set in 2016; you have more intrigue and disguises, fewer discussions of the “dark web” and “hacking.” In a way, the digitally naive world becomes more interesting to watch, not because it’s naive but because it’s a reminder of exactly how we used to live not that long ago. The political maneuvering is omnipresent by all characters but their every word is not captured and debated ad nauseum on a scrolling social media feed. Each of the Jennings (well, specifically Philip, Elizabeth & Paige) has a political goal, but so do the FBI and the KGB and the individual players within each of these spheres. This is a thriller overlaid on a frame of governmental bargaining and posturing. Consider all the times that Reagan is mentioned, and how even with a known quantity of his actions, we still watch through this with a sense of anticipation of how those politics might play out. Certainly the end of season 3 brought with it a tremendous opportunity to create additional family and interpersonal drama but it also conjures up discussions of the rhetoric underlaid in it.
And just for fun now, let me present you with the top three cringeworthy moments of season 3:
- Philip performing dental surgery on Elizabeth. I found this to be a creepily loving gesture. He’s taking care of her even as he uses a pair of pliers on her face. There silence of this moment, the head gestures and eerie comfort and relief taken away are at once horrifying and touching. As such, my entire body had no clue how to react.
- When the Jennings helped Yusef to dispose of Annelise’s body. The sound of her dead bones cracking and breaking as they stuffed her in a suitcase. I might be having nightmares about that one for years to come. Treating it so clinically wasn’t the issue (that’s what they do) but the amplified sound of the act for viewers at home.
- Death by gasoline fire on a tire. It seems more action film oriented than the other two scenes, which convey a sense of the sensual and seedy spy motif, but it’s still ultimately cringeworthy because it’s done with such malice and without consideration for the aftermath.
But we move on, we ride forward into the 2016 election. Not our real one but the one that the Underwoods craftily maintain. (There is something seriously wrong when I watch House of Cards and think “Man, this election seems dignified and ethical relative to the one I’m watching on CNN.” Please consider yourselves, fellow Americans.) Unlike season 3, this series flew by with constant action. Last year, after my season 3 binge watch, I noted that it felt like an interlude and one cannot judge an interlude without knowing what follows. In context, now, I’d say that season 3 represents Frank at his weakest, a man devoid of ambition and powerless to act, being unable to draw on the strength of his partner or on his position. Here, in season 4, even as he lies in the hospital swimming in hallucination, he is not that weak. He fights. He schemes. His abject terror inside his waking nightmares is a tribute to his plotting a return. If anything, the assassination attempt builds him back to being who he was. A magic bullet, if you will. (Please don’t; that was terrible.)
To consider deeper, the ironic contrast of an open delegation to its use as a scheme provides a sickening thought about how much of the show is entirely a lie and unknown even to the actors. While not surprising, pretty much only a handful off the top ever recognize that the performance is a performance. I thank the show for bringing back Lucas Goodwin, Zoe Barnes, Peter Russo, Walker, and for continuing to use Tom Hammerschmidt as a vehicle for crossing Frank Underwood with Jackie & Remy in his notepad. I lament the killing off of Edward, even if earlier in the show, he swore he’d “take a bullet” for Frank, which I suppose he did. His death ushered in more of Tom, though, and this is less about “what will happen” and more about “what has happened,” because Tom sees inside both Frank & Claire with a stunning lack of ambiguity. In a way, he’s the interpreter for the audience but I see this as an unnecessary step to the show. I already see Frank and Claire; I don’t need someone to explain this to me. After season 3, people were very quick to say “Oh obviously Frank’s gay! That’s why he can’t sleep with Claire while looking at her face! Because gay!” I saw this as being very lowest common denominator thinking, and I was vindicated in season 4, because the issue is Frank’s weakness and his clipping rage as a result of his impotence, not his sexual interest or lack thereof in Claire’s physical body. Frank comes back from the valley in season 4, and his demonstrably stronger decisions actually do allow them to partner up again, since both pretty much always use the term “partner” when talking.
The concoction of the ending, which is basically a “We Are The Ones Who Knock!” fourth wall break, is pretty in-keeping with their character development here. They create the terror, and they sustain it. There are no flinching Frank moments (as he did in season 3 in the Jordan Valley) and no deep Claire moral dilemmas (as she experienced after visiting Russian prison)– only two partners who sit side-by-side and watch, clean, distanced, and unwavering as a man’s head is removed in front of them.
Dumpster Jedi 