“[“Cardinal”] is well-crafted but mostly expository, slowly moving the pieces towards an endgame that won’t arrive for some time.” —Robert Gifford
One of the issues with writing weekly recaps of serialized television is that you’re critiquing something incomplete. It’s like reviewing each chapter of a novel without knowing where it’s all heading. Some chapters are explosive and exciting. Others are more deliberate, focused on laying the groundwork for later payoff.
“Cardinal” is the latter type of episode. It’s well-crafted but mostly expository, slowly moving the pieces towards an endgame that won’t arrive for some time. This is essential to the long-term narrative – a strong payoff needs a strong setup – but “Cardinals” rarely rises above mere functionality. In short, it’s a “B” episode of an “A” show.
Most of the episode is spent busily introducing new characters. There’s Bruce Dameran, a World Bank employee who walks into the Soviet embassy and says he wants to offer information. (He’s a dedicated but clumsy spy – it takes Stan all of a day to figure out he’s the informant.) There’s a Costa Rican agent, high on crack she smoked with an overdosing congressional aide, that Elizabeth has to bail out. This subplot is the most out-of-place. It has nothing to do with the rest of the episode and is clearly there to introduce a character who will only become important later on. And to force Elizabeth to abandon her kids once again, this time at Raiders of the Lost Ark.
And there’s Lockheed employee Fred, who we briefly met last week as he handed Philip the intel Leah and Emmet were (presumably) killed for. We first see him bugging out, stuffing his suitcase full of emergency cash and shouting code words into a phone with no agent on the other end. His is the most interesting introduction by far, both because his importance to the narrative is immediately obvious and because of the strange bond he had with Emmet. Most of the sources we’ve met on this show are motivated either by politics or, in the case of someone like Sanford, money and a desperate need to survive. Fred, on the other hand, seems to have had a deep and genuine bond with Emmet. He has a closet full of toys meant as gifts for Emmet’s kids and breaks down crying when he hears Emmet’s dead. The Americans is very good at hinting at the deeper bonds between people without forcing subtext to the surface, a skill it ably deploys here. There was clearly something meaningful between Fred and Emmet, but it never gives us more than a vague sense of what that something might have been.
There’s no action in “Cardinals,” which is perhaps why it feels so much like setup. In season one, The Americans would balance its season-long plot with mission-of-the-week capers. This time around, the show seems much more interested in the long game. There’s no gunplay, but there is a sense that things could get very bad, very quickly. For the first time, Philip and Elizabeth are doubting not only their own safety but the safety of their kids. Even the Russians seem like they could turn on Paige and Henry if things go wrong – Philip’s promise to Fred that the KGB will “take care of” Leah and Emmet’s son is dangerously ambiguous. For now, there’s an uneasy quiet, but we’re left feeling like Elizabeth, staring warily out a window and waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Tidbits:
· We learn a bit more about Fred’s intel – it has something to do with propellers. Maybe it’s some kind of The Hunt for Red October-style stealth submarine drive, only in the hands of the Americans rather than the Soviets.
· Martha wants to buy a gun. Chekhov fans, take note.
· Thanks to the bug in Gaad’s office, Nina now knows Stan killed Vlad. There are no meaningless deaths on this show. Vlad, like Leah and Emmet, wasn’t much of a character, but his absence continues to echo through the show because he mattered to the people around him.
· The dry, bureaucratic language Nina uses in the report on her meeting with Stan (“I serviced him orally before I allowed him to penetrate me”) is chilling. The show is great at implying characters’ emotions – in this case, Nina’s discomfort at using sex for espionage – without making them explicit.
· The use of little details – like the impatient drip of the sink as Stan waits for Nina – is masterful. The show knows how to craft a scene, even if it’s not exactly clear what all of them add up to yet.
· Signs of the times: Fred has a model Star Wars AT-AT in his closet and a Bo Derek Playboy issue in his sock drawer.
· Oleg enjoys new wave, dancing and Blondie. Hopefully the show will continue to update us on his musical tastes.
· Speaking of music, we still don’t get any pop music this week.
· “Your revolution is beautiful.” – Elizabeth to the Costa Rican agent.
· “I REALLY ENJOYED OUR DINNER. THE STEAK WAS EXCELLENT.”
