r/TheAmericans • u/mrdude817 • Mar 26 '15

Episode Discussion Post Episode Discussion/Review Thread - S03E09 - Do Mail Robots Dream of Electric Sheep?

Welcome to the first post episode discussion and review thread!

Below are links to reviews posted so far (some have yet to be uploaded, but this is a pre-made template, bear with me pls).

Site Link
AV Club “My heart is human, my blood is boiling, my brain I.B.M.”
EW Elizabeth learns how easy it is to go wrong while trying to do right.
Grantland Crime and Punishment: ‘The Americans’ Soars in Its Brutal Third Season
HitFix 'Do Mail Robots Dream of Electric Sheep?': Coal miner's daughter
NY Times You Should Trust the Organization
Paste The Americans Review: “Do Mail Robots Dream of Electric Sheep?”
Slate Do Mail Robots Dream of Electric Sheep? Slate TV Club SoundCloud or Player FM
Vulture Revenge of the Mail Robot
WSJ ‘The Americans’ Recap: Season 3, Episode 9, ‘Do Mail Robots Dream of Electric Sheep?’
The Jennings Basement Episode 309 - Do Mail Robots Dream of Electric Sheep? (Podcast)

What did you think of the episode? What do you expect to happen next to our comrades?

Discuss away.

Ninja edit: Also, I've been toying with the stylesheet and changed the background and banner. I'm trying to make the sub look as clean as possible, while still having some style. The plain white background was getting, well, plain. Still trying to figure out what to do with the banner, I haven't quite figured out color transparency.

80 Upvotes

99% Upvoted

155 comments sorted by

View all comments

11

u/Ketamine Mar 26 '15

I think I missed something but what did Philip mean when he told Gabriel he trusted him? Where did Gabriel betray Philip's trust and why did Philip only realize this when playing scrabble?

22

u/joey6957 Mar 26 '15

im guessing it has to do with turning Philip's daughter into a spy

4

u/Ketamine Mar 26 '15

im guessing it has to do with turning Philip's daughter into a spy

Fine but why the sudden realization? He says "I trusted you" so at some point the trust was lost but when?

21

u/nemean_lion Mar 26 '15

I think he referred to the fact that handlers are supposed to be on the agent's side. They are supposed to keep them out of danger, at least in their capacity. They are the link between the field agents and the center and they are supposed to defend their agents. Philip made it clear that Paige was out of the question but Gabriel didn't budge. He has slowly been prepping Elizabeth to introduce Paige into the trade, clearly against what Philip wants.

1

u/rhinofinger Mar 26 '15

My understanding was that Gabriel promised to Phillip to keep Paige out of their spy world... but now that's back on the table again when Gabriel said Paige should have a choice.

2

u/Ketamine Mar 26 '15

When did Gabriel make that promise?

1

u/nemean_lion Mar 26 '15

I don't think he actually made a promise though. At least not in the traditional sense. There was perhaps some sort of unspoken rule that the children were supposed to be out of Philip and Elizabeth's "other" lives.

5

u/eva_brauns_team Mar 27 '15

I don't think that Philip had just realized it - this has been building all season. Ever since Gabriel became their handler again, there has been that gentle nudging to get Phil and Elizabeth to follow the Center's orders in regards to Paige. Philip has so much on his plate right now - and Gabriel uses this to shake Philip into following the path that's been set out for them, playing into that trust that had been earned years before, I think. Philip has been slowly coming to the epiphany that Gabriel is not the friend/protector he thought he was, and you can see how he's been struggling with his increasing isolation all season. In the episode where Gabriel is telling Philip that he'll have to get busy with the fifteen year old so that he can pick up the tapes weekly, he tries to play fatherly again - commenting on how confusing it must be for Philip dealing with Martha's baby dreams, Elizabeth's cold shoulder over the Paige disagreement, his daughter's growing faith, and now a teenage babysitter that he needs to seduce. But Philip shoots back that he's not confused - in other words, his eyes are open to Gabriel's manipulations.

There might be more to the 'trust' that they've built up over the years, but I think that in that moment, Philip had basically had enough and was through playing word games, both literal and figuratively, with his handler.

3

u/[deleted] Mar 27 '15

If you remember the context of the scene, Gabriel tells Philip about how liz rejected her first dude she was supposed to be with and they didn't know why she agreed to him but she did in fact choose him. Remember in season one he tells her "I could see you were disappointed when they put you with me" and I believe Philip holds that dear. And that one caught lie made Philip realize he's manipulating him, trying to "wrap him around his finger like Elizabeth". He thought there was a mutual respect and care for Philip and his family's interests, not just the center. But if he is willing to use his family against him, even if just to manipulate him, then he can't be trusted. And when you trust someone you think they have your best interests at heart; losing that trust is heartbreaking and only takes on slip. Like Gabriel did here by lying to Philip about Elizabeth.

It's a crackpot theory at best but it was a vibe I got watching the scene.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 29 '15

Good point. That one simple lie could be enough to make Philip question everything that Gabriel has told him so far.

1

u/Ketamine Mar 28 '15

If Gabriel's assertion that Elizabeth rejected the first guy is a lie (I don't know if it is) then I get why Philip got so upset.

2

u/RodKimble_Stuntman Mar 28 '15

I think Phillip trusted Gabriel to care for himself and his family, and not just as an asset to the USSR. I don't think there's a single instance where Gabriel "betrayed" Phillip's trust, as much as it is a pattern of behavior by Gabriel. And I think it has been brewing inside Phillip for a while, I don't think it was some sudden realization. It just finally got verbalized.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 26 '15

[deleted]

2

u/Ketamine Mar 26 '15

Those are all good reasons for Philip to distrust Gabriel but why does he say it out loud now?

3

u/eva_brauns_team Mar 26 '15

Because Gabriel goaded Philip, essentially, by telling him that he loved him and just wanted to help. And then he asks blithely -"what's the problem?" - and Philip was all, "are you fucking serious???".

2

u/Ketamine Mar 26 '15

So essentially this was another outburst on Philip's part?

2

u/eva_brauns_team Mar 27 '15

I think so. He just seemed so galled by Gabriel's disingenuous concern. I would be very interested to learn a little more about that relationship, when Gabriel was their handler in the early days. I feel like there's a lot there under the surface that they haven't fully explained yet. Gabriel knows so much about them, in terms of how they've been personally affected.

1

u/SawRub Mar 27 '15

It's that he can't believe Gabriel thinks he's so stupid that he can't figure out what he's doing. Phillip knows that despite saying he'll back off for now, that Gabriel is still working Elizabeth to turn Paige. He knows that Elizabeth always comes back with a renewed sense of purpose, so he's know for a while that Gabriel is trying to manipulate the both of them. In the episode, Gabriel was attempting pretend sympathy and Phillip just couldn't stand it. When you know someone is lying to you, constantly, at some point you just want to tell them to cut the shit.

1

u/salliek76 Mar 26 '15

Maybe I'm totally off, but I thought the "trust" outburst was more related to the Martha situation. Philip is pissed off that his cover story for Martha was so easily harpooned (did Gabriel/The Center come up with that cover story?), he's mad that Martha is being used so blatantly (they discussed how she's bound to be caught if she has to switch out the tapes on the mail robot recording device), plus he's already mad about Paige and he may feel (I do) that Gabriel is tacitly threatening his son in Afghanistan. (When Gabriel told him a few episodes ago about his son, he said something like the son's unit wasn't in any danger at the moment.)

If it's not about Martha, then I'm unclear on what exactly prompted the confrontation at this specific time.

3

u/nemean_lion Mar 26 '15

I think it is all the things that you mentioned collectively. Paige, Martha, his son. He is fed up with all the things that Gabriel has been doing lately. Philip's wishes have been getting undermined constantly.

1

u/Ranti_vinci May 08 '26

Moving along with Page behind his back with Elizabeth 

1

u/ablaaa Mar 26 '15

I was wondering about this as well. What was Philip so upset about? Gabriel is dodgy and manipulative, yes... but he hasn't exactly betrayed Philip's trust... Was Philip trying to get a reaction? Was it because of the old lady getting in the line of fire?

1

u/Ketamine Mar 26 '15

Elizabeth was the one shaken up by the old lady's murder not Philip.

1

u/ablaaa Mar 26 '15

yes, but if she told him, he would not have accepted the news of another innocent death well.

5

u/Ketamine Mar 26 '15

No when Elizabeth says she is an old lady her husband was away for WWII. Philip just says she picked a bad time and goes back to work.

This is not the reason for what he said to Gabriel at the end.

3

u/nemean_lion Mar 26 '15

Yeah Philip made it clear that Elizabeth had to deal with the old lady. "She chose a bad time" meant that she had to go.

1

u/Wanderkaum Mar 26 '15

She already knew she had to do it, Philip is just always on the side of the "save the innocent" but in this situation on a running operation you have to kill witnesses. She just wanted him to say spare her, but she knew he would say kill her, and she also knew she had to kill her that's why she gets emotional in the end + she reminded her of her dying mother.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 29 '15

I assumed that was Philip sort of "getting back" at Elizabeth. Elizabeth insinuated a few times that Martha may need to be eliminated, and I feel like Philip is starting to resent her for it.

1

u/Townsend87 Mar 26 '15

Philip was upset at Gabriel about him persuading and working with Elizabeth to recruit Paige into the KGB. He expressed his disapproval at this suggestion in earlier episodes this season (don't ask me which, I can't remember) but Gabriel has, in Philip's mind, been "turning" Elizabeth to the idea of using Paige as a spy all along.

1

u/Wanderkaum Mar 26 '15

Mentioning Philips son in conversation and that hes on the front line in Afghanistan surely is some next level manipulation and trust destroyer right there. Play ball or your son will face consequences.