The Prestige TV Podcast - ‘The Agency’ Mid-Season Check-in: The Hole in the Boat

Episode Date: December 23, 2024

Jo and Rob look for a left-field lead to recap the third, fourth, and fifth episodes of ‘The Agency.’ They discuss the recent boom of spy shows this year, how the Showtime drama is balancing its several concurrent plotlines, and why Osman is a perfectly calibrated character (2:31). Along the way, they theorize who Martian is talking to in the flash-forward sequences and touch on Danny’s competence as a young spy (25:40). Later, they break down the decision to make the mystery around Coyote’s disappearance the season’s main through line (38:42). Email us! [e-mail] Subscribe to the Ringer TV YouTube channel here for full episodes of ‘The Prestige TV Podcast’ and so much more! Hosts: Joanna Robinson and Rob Mahoney Producers: Kai Grady and Donnie Beacham Jr. Additional Production Support: Justin Sayles Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up, guys, your boy Johnny Bananas here. The Challenge Season 40 Battle of the Eras is finally upon us. I'll be covering every episode with all your favorite challengers on my podcast, death taxes and bananas on the Ringer reality TV podcast feed, and on the brand new Ringer Reality TV YouTube channel, where you can find full video episodes all season long. So buckle up. Come along with me as we see who will be crowned winner of the Challenge Season 40 Battle of

the eras. Follow Ringer reality TV on Spotify and subscribe to us on YouTube. This episode is brought to you by Borishead. What if we told you the taste of deep fried turkey is now available at your local deli? Well, Borishead just did that. Bursting with flavor, perfectly seasoned with that indulgent taste that usually means planning your whole day around it. Presenting the friar's turkey breast only from Borershead. The backyard tradition now available behind the counter. Visit your local deli today. Discover the craftsmanship behind every bite. Boershead committed to craft since 1905. This episode is brought to by Whole Foods Market.

Spring is here, so celebrate it with fresh, juicy, seasonal produce and some very tasty limited time flavors. New Whole Foods, Market Peach, Apricot, Rose, Italian soda. Perfect for a picnic or brunch, as is their trending mango, Yuzu chantilly cake. But if you're on the go, new 365 strawberry pretzels make a great sweet snack. That sounds delicious. Get savings with yellow sale signs storewide and everyday low prices on 365 brand items. Enjoy the fresh flavors of spring. Save at Whole Foods Market. Prestige TV podcast feed. I'm Joanna Robinson. I'm Paul Lewis. Wait, Joe, who the fuck am I? I don't even know anymore.

Who will? Brandon, is that you? Hello. We're here to finally fulfill our promise to return to the TV series, The Agency. A wonderful television show. It's currently a wonderful show that surely if we could turn back time, we would figure out a way to do week to week. But we're doing these sporadic check-ins here at the end of the year. Rob and I may have like, we're pretty close to losing all of our marbles based on all of the pods we've had to do this week. Accurate. Rob does not get a break because he covers something called sports. And the sports continues on.

But this is my last podcast of 2024. What an occasion. here we are, get out the balloons and the streamers. We're here to talk about the agency. How are you feeling, Joe? With everything in the rear of your mirror, save for the rest of this podcast, what is your state of mind?

I feel a little exhilarated, but also just a little confused about my plan for what to say on this particular podcast. So we're all fine out together. Usually I come in a little bit more ship-shaped than I am today. So this is going to be a fun ride for all of us, please don't turn this podcast on. There's still time for this to go

fully off the rails, right? The drama does not stop with the agency. It continues into our agency coverage, clearly. Is this the pod that I get canceled on? Let's find out. No, probably not. We'll find out. Let's see what you have to say about Iranian tectonics.

No comment. Okay, so listen, we covered episodes one and two the Ben's and Wooden Duck. That already exists on the feed. You can go listen to it if you want Today we are here to talk to you about episode three, Hawk from a Handsaw, episode four, quarterback blitz, and episode five, Rat Trap. And then we'll be back in the new year to cover, you know, the back end of the season of agency. But this is a show we are absolutely loving.

Rob, is it the best show currently airing? I mean, it's like a slightly thin field, obviously, but like, what do you think? I think it has to be. But again, if you're into this sort of thing, it's not a show that you can, recommend to just anybody, but if this is your zone, I don't know why you wouldn't be thrilled with what we've been presented so far. Well, before we get into three episodes of a great television show that we're going to attempt to talk to about in under an hour, I would like to introduce you to a world of conspiracy

theories that I have stumbled into this week. I don't know what the liberal version of Q&ON is, but I suspect that that is what is happening at this very moment. Welcome to my TED Talk about TikToks. We are here to talk to you about a conspiracy theory that is cooking on TikTok that the current spate of espionage television. And that would be The Day of the Jackal, which is enormously popular, at least in the UK. I do not know what numbers it's doing here. Mr. and Mrs. Smith, which was a popular show this year, obviously.

Black Doves, which we talked about elsewhere on this particular feed, and the agency. Yeah. that all of those shows are being put forth into the world by the CIA themselves, in order to entice young people to apply to the CIA. That this is CIA, like the, whatever the CIA version of copaganda is. Interesting. Spiganda. I guess actually for the CIA, it's just actually propaganda.

So let's leave aside the fact that a lot of these shows are about international intelligence agencies. Like that's just, that's not even something we need to worry about it. Here's my question for you. This is a conspiracy theory. A, how much merit do you find in it? Oh, let me stop you there. None. But if it is true, I find, you know, some solace in the fact that our government is actually supporting the arts for once, you know? The money's getting chopped for PBS,

but we're funneling it into spy shows. So this is going somewhere. FU Sesame Street, but Fassbender, he's staying paid. Follow question for you. Yes. If you were watching these shows, would you be enticed

to the world of SpyCraft? And follow up to the follow-up, and I'll take my answers off air, which of these shows would be the most enticing to you to join a life of espionage. I think if you're going to pick one that feels somewhat enticing, it's probably more the Black Doves variety where you get to have cheeky banter and, you know, at the end of the day, you know, your contained family life and your figgy puddings, like, that seems

nice and quaint. I would not want to be working for the agency and the agency. It seems terrible. Seems pretty tough. In fact, we get a big speech from Michael Fosbender in this episode about how to do do this, you have to be a completely insane person. Not come to work and shoot everybody insane, but just insane enough, basically. We're all in therapy, and that's fine.

You make a compelling point about the cheeky bans in Black Doves. I think it's either that or it's Mr. and Mrs. Smith, because if it's Mr. and Mrs. Smith, you get like a sick house, like a really nice house, and they only have to go kill people. I think it's like every couple months. It's like pretty rare. But the cheeky banter still applies, I would say just maybe even a little bit more sexually charged, right? Like there's a little bit more of a chemistry.

Like I can see the pitch of Mr. Mrs. Smith. Yeah. That's also a show about how if you sign up to do this, you are being exploited by the gig economy. So I don't know that it's a straight commercial. I'm giving it to Mr. and Mrs. Smith. with love and respect to the figgy pudding,

I'm taking the... You're hitting the slopes. I'm done. I am. I'm taking the multi-story townhouse in New York. That's what I'm doing. Okay. So now that we've cracked that,

you know, shady operation wide open, let's talk about the agency. What I appreciate about this show, among many other things, is when we first entered into this, it seemed like we were just sprawling out. There's just a bunch of threads going this way and that.

And now we've like really narrowed down to I would say five plots with the resolution-ish of Charlie Operation Felix. I would say four plots. Is that resolved, would you say? I said resolution-ish. So I'm just going to, I'm going to put a pin in Operation Felix right now. That's fair. Michael Fosbender's Martian's life is a dad, right? we've got his really messy love life

that is its own international subplot certainly is we've got the search for coyote and then we've got our girl Danny going into the field right? These are our main plots and some of them are tangling and what I do like

is that Fosbender is across all of them you know in some ways more meaningfully than others but the fact that he's like weighing in on what's happening with Danny or you know is involved in the coyote plotline while he's untangling what's happening with Sami, what's happening with his daughter. And the Poppy story is, of course, being sucked into the Sami story as well. So which of those do you want to talk about first? Let's start with the Martian Sammy stuff first. I feel like that is a natural kind of cohesive point of a lot of these plots, as you said.

things are getting pulled in that direction. And overall, like, I am interested in and charmed by and ultimately pulled into the story of trying to understand, in particular, when Martian is being Martian and when he is being Paul Lewis and what the difference between those things even are anymore. Like, I was curious to get your take, Joe, we get this scene with them in the restaurant where Sammy tries to basically finally tell Martian face-to-face, or I guess, as she knows, and Paul Lewis face-to-face. I want to tell you what I'm really doing here in London.

And by stopping her short, is that someone who is in love with her, who is actually worried about the threat to her safety? Or is that him pretending to be Paul Lewis and pretending not to care so that he can kind of follow the rest of that threat? What was your read on that scene? I think he is almost entirely motivated by his love for her. And I would say that is Martian or his real name is Brandon. I mean, we can call it Martian, Martian or Brandon, if you prefer. Brandon I like even more because Brandon is like a step away from work. Martian is his like work name.

Brandon is like who he is. Does he seem like a Brandon to you though? He doesn't, no. Which maybe is the point, but. Here's my question to you. Okay. And it is possible that you were able to watch these episodes a bit more closely than I was. But do you think there's a world in which Sami knows

that Paul isn't what he says he is. She's clearly skeptical. This is mostly motivated by the avocado pit incident, is what I'm calling it, when he pulls her out of the protest, pulls her into a room and is like BRB, I'm going to fight us a way out, and then pulls her out down the hallway

and past some dead bodies. Yeah. And she seems, you know, just clearly in a state of shock throughout. So there's a possibility that she was like in such a state of shock. She didn't really register it was going on. She's listening a bit, but not like, you know, entirely and something like that. I will just say that I wouldn't be surprised if we get to the end of all of this.

And she's like, of course, I know that you are a spy and murder people. Yeah. Right? Like the only thing that I guess I would push, would push back on in that regard is when she's being questioned. like to reveal, by Osman, to reveal his name, and she gives up Paul Lewis, that does seem like a moment of genuine, like, I've given up a truth sort of moment. I don't know.

I just have some questions, because I feel like we've zigged in zagged. There was a zig of, oh, my God, she wasn't really here for a conference. What is she doing here? And then it's like, well, actually, she's tried you broker piece in a war-torn nation. and so I don't think she's there for like some sneaky

but I wouldn't mind if there's just like one more turn on her character do you know what I mean? Yeah, she also doesn't seem naive and clearly isn't dumb like this is an incredibly educated woman who has not only that like a good scholastic sense but a sense of the world and how political actors operate and how people manipulate each other and like she's an expert in the social dynamics of basically an entire region of people and by extension every like foreign enterprise that has come into it.

And so, yeah, the idea that this guy she's seeing could be more than he lets on, I think she tips her hand as to that. Like, she kind of puts it to Brandon, if we want to call him that, I guess Paul Lewis, if we really want to call him that,

that the way he questions her is very similar to the way that Osman questions them and questions specifically Paul Lewis, right? There is something that is information gathering about the Paul Lewis she knows. And there is something fishy about the guy with a flat

she's never seen, with a daughter she's never met, with a book that she's never read, with a teaching job, but doesn't teach, right? Like, everything that Osman is saying about Paul Lewis makes sense. Honestly, I think he's given pretty good advice under the circumstances in saying stay away from this guy. Like, it's probably in her best interest to do that.

But she has to know that something is up in the same way that Marcia knew that something was up, that she was not all that she was projecting to be. These are two incredibly intelligent people. Yes. Who care by each other and pay close attention to each other. But I don't know if you've heard this joke. Love is blindness, you know? They're being, just blotting out all of this information.

I want to shout out, so speaking of Osman, I want to shout out the actor who's playing Osmond, who plays Grandmaster Orwell on House of the Dragon, was also in a real pain and chaos this year. It's just like really having a year. Oh, yeah. Um, did you, you've seen a real pain? Have you seen that yet? Not yet. He is so good in a real pain and playing just the complete opposite of this, just like someone who's very like kind and curious and gentle. And then in House of the Dragon is some sort of like combination of the two. I did not watch chaos. But like, um, he's like a sneaky MVP of the year for me. Like in terms of the range he has shown across these various projects. And I really love him in this because he is both quite menacing.

And then as you put it, often just quite right about, you know, the state of things. And obviously, like, he's an antagonist to our protagonist. So we are meant to put him in a villain bucket. But it's that kind of villain bucket that I love the best, which is just sort of like a villain with a point. A villain who might be right at the end of the day. what do you want to say about Osmond and the way he's been rolled out in the show? I mean, I think that's a key part of it too

is not just the character that he portrays and the sort of menace you're feeling from him following people and lurking on the edge of the frame and also like comedy, right? There's the scene with Brandon and his daughter in the mall and they're trying to ditch him, you know, store to store, cafe to cafe

that I thought was great. But the gradual rollout of, we don't know who this guy is, right? Is he a competing spy from another country? Is he, is he Sammy's husband

or working for her husband? Like we have no idea like what his relationship is to her at all if there is a preexisting one until we start seeing them in scenes together. And I think when you get them

in the same room, at first he gets even more frightening, right? Like the tension and the aggression and the potential for violence gets ratcheted up and then the more they spend time together

and the more that he's trying to convince her that Paul Lewis is bad news, I think the more and more empathetic he feels. And the more you get the sense of like, this is a guy who has been delegated to keep a very fragile peace process together.

And he sees this complete wildcard who's acting contrary to everyone's best interests and trying to rein it in. And I'm sympathetic to his perspective. I think it's incredibly well-acted and that he can be that sort of dangerous and that sort of sensible at the same time. It's just a great character for a show like this. I agree. I agree. And every time we meet another character on the show, because there are just like a ton of, you know, Islands in the Fire here, it's a character

with dimensionality. You know, it's someone who's interrogating Danny, but then also flirting with Danny. It's like, you know, there's like, there are multiple uses for all of these various characters. I want to talk about Hugh Bonneville shows up as

James Richardson, a British intelligence agent, a friend of Martian Branden's. And they have this sort of like, you know, sidebar at the apartment to talk about put together the pieces of what's going on here. And just how big it is.

Are you a Downton Abbey fan? How much does it matter to you when Hugh Bonneville shows up in a property? Are you like Lord Grantham at last week again? Or how do you feel about it? I am not Downton inclined per se. You're a Paddington, bro, though. I mean, who isn't?

Yeah. Like, ultimately. I'm glad to see him here. I can't say I was like jumping out of my seat per se. The way you did when Dominic West showed up and you were like, my guy is here. That was just full like Leo pointing at the screen. Like that's my moment. I love Hugh Bonneville.

And I think he's so good at he's played like jovial quite often. But there's something about his depiction here of like a. this just feels like a bad move, honestly. And Martian is... In terms of sharing this information. Yeah. Anytime you share information with people, you leave yourself vulnerable

in a game of intelligence, right? And so I just think it's... You know, Martian is prone to making bad moves across the board. He's not like a slow horse level operator, but he certainly commits his share of blunders. No, I mean, he's great. He can slip a lead and not slip a lead or, you know, this, that, and the other thing.

But, like, he also makes, yes, strange errors. And this feels like one of them. I just, I would not tell an intelligence, you know, operative from another agency. Nope. This kind of information and expose yourself that way. Especially when the whole thread of these, like this string of episodes is trying to figure out, like, Where has our information line been compromised, right? Like, what have coyotes operations have we lost track of?

And have we completely lost the thread as to what is valuable and what is not? Like, I think they give some percentage, like, about like 60 or 80% of whatever of the intel coming out of Ukraine might be just like total bogus at this point. And meanwhile, back, you know, back near base, Martian is just out here like trying to like barter information or not even barter. He's just like giving it away to get someone's opinion. I will say a lot of that is because he is. so inside something he is not supposed to be doing and so isolated from the natural chain of command. We also get a big kind of architecture through these episodes of he and Henry's relationship and the kind of wording off of these putting the personal before the professional or putting

the personal before the goals of the agency blunders that now both of them have made. And because he is so boxed in with that stuff at work, he can't really take these concerns to anyone at the office until it becomes so big that he has to go to the China desk basically to get like a global perspective on it. And that takes us back to where we started with when Coyote goes missing. And, you know, one of the various handlers, you know, who played by Alex Jennings, like, tries to cover up the fact that he like, based on their own experiences with. sobriety, skip some steps in the processing of coyote.

And it's just sort of like that as an early example of the secrets will out eventually in one way or another inside of this agency. And so you can be an incredibly smart and capable agent and you cannot keep a lid on something like this indefinitely. With Henry, Jeffrey Wright's character, when, you know, the lie that he is fed is like, oh, I'm having sex with a married woman and that's why this, that of the other thing. At one point, he says, it's just a fuck. What are you doing?

Right? And it was like, it was like, I felt like slapped by that because I have been so, he doesn't, he's working with a certain set of information. And I have been sold this love story, this like, like, magnetism between these two actors. And I'm like, to hear it summed up like that again, he's working with limited information. To hear it some of it, I'm like, sir. You know, and to watch... Haven't you been watching the first three episodes?

Come over, I will pop some popcorn. And to watch Brandon, A.K. Martian, absorb that as passively as he does. I thought it was a really fascinating moment. I think watching Brandon try to parse out all of these different versions of himself has been one of the joys of the season so far, and specifically these three episodes. There's some great shots of him in session with Dr. Blake of it's like him in the mirror, in the mirror, in the mirror. As he's talking about who Paul Lewis is, right, like trying to explain the differences between these two people.

I thought the sequence in which he has to learn how to fight like Paul Lewis is just exceptional spy shit. And most of that is like how you get your ass kicked and not fight back effectively and not look competent. All of that stuff is really, really working for me. And his relationship with Henry, I think is really, really work. for me. There's some great navigation of their shared history of what's clearly a trust. They run this like, we don't even have

to really say what we're doing one to op on the Belarusians as they're trying to like figure out how to back channel and get all these negotiations. These are two people who clearly know how to work together and there's a lot that doesn't have to be said. There's even apologies that don't really have to be

said between them. But there's also a lot that's going unsaid because it would get somebody fired or somebody in trouble or in this case, maybe jeopardize a very delicate peace process or blow up relations to China or whatever kind of finger you want to put over which particular button. Ultimately,

I get why Henry is so exasperated with Paul in the same way that Olseman is so exasperated. These are people who are trying to give good advice and ultimately are not being heard because two people are in love and they're acting like people in love. Are you saying love is blindness? Is that the point you're trying to make?

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what does Paul Lewis mean to Martian as like a windshield? It can protect against bugs, but anything hard would break it. I really love this. This is really good shit. There's so great speechifying in this set of episodes in particular. Richard Gere does a big one that's like straight out of a few good men basically about the number of words in the English language that are pruned every year. Just fantastic stuff.

I love that element of the show right now. We talked a bit about bringing in a therapist character and how this can, you know, often. This is a Dr. Blake as operating in a couple of other. One, there was the way in which she operated to ask the questions that we at home might be asking about the way things work inside of this organization. But also, this is just like a very classic prestige TV device of like we had to cut to a therapy session. These are better than that device usually is. This is used quite well, I think, with apologies to big little lies. Any others you want to call out while we're here?

maybe over time, but what do you think makes it feel different or better or not seem just like a narrative crutch to you? I think part of the problem with some of those other shows is it's like the therapy session is the space for usually the main character, usually the main male character, to go into therapy and to say the things

that they won't say to anybody else and to give us a sense of their interiority and to vent out some of the natural emotional frustration in a show. This is a therapy session in a room with one, glass and a camera. And so it's not in complete privacy. It itself is a kind of performance by both of them.

And I think in particular, Brandon's like hyper awareness of the fact that he is being observed and recorded and very, very seen is something he's like wielding against Dr. Blake and challenging her version of this performance. And it makes it just like another battleground. This is another form of counterintelligence within the show. And it's him trying to hide everything. that is actually bothering him and everything he's actually doing from the people who are hiring

him to do other clandestine shit. And so, like, running the interference through therapy, I think just makes it more constructive and useful than, oh, let's just put a voice to the stuff that you were wondering about. And I think what's interesting is, like, to your point about sort of this is a way to get around doing a voiceover while also doing voiceover, but the show has voiceover. We're hearing him. We get this introduction of this other element of the plot, which is, like, at some point in the near future, Paul will get the ever-loving shit kicked out of him and is telling a story about that.

And we don't know who he's talking to. If you had to bet, who do you think he's talking to? His publisher for not getting the pages on the Red River in in time. Those deadlines are no fucking joke. You think you could put them off, but then somebody shows up at your door. I don't know. I've pushed a few deadlines in my day. Do you think it's Dr. Blake that he's talking to in the future? Do you think it's Henry? I don't think it's Dr. Blake that he's talking to in the future. This is what is wonderful about the show for me right now

is I have genuinely no idea who he's talking to in the same way that when Danny gets taken and interrogated, I'm like, is this the Americans who have taken her again? Yeah. I felt so sure it was, but also was ready to be wrong. Yeah. I didn't. feel that way, in part because the rules for that interrogation were so different

from when they were interrogating I'm playing on the guy's name, but coyote's like asset, right? When they were trying to figure out if he could be Alika, Alexi. Like, they weren't physical with him in the same way that they were with Danny, right? They weren't hitting him in the same way that they were her.

And just based on the line of questioning and the situation that she finds herself, and I'm like, is this British intelligence running this? Is this Iranian intelligence running this, trying to vet whether she should be allowed to come to Tehran or not because she's actually working for some competing agency. There's enough of these threads, as you said, where some of them have been resolved, but there's still so much in play that I feel like Martian could be talking to anybody by the end.

Yeah, yeah. I felt like it was, yeah, I'm very curious how much, if at all, Danny's storyline is going to, like, further bleed into, you know, the main storylines here. Because, again, Martian is sort of, like, tangentially connected to her, but, like how much will, I don't know, Iranian nuclear engineers have to do with what's I got to do with the price of tea in China and Sudan? Who's to say? Who's to say? I felt like I felt reasonably certain that this was interior interrogation and that, but not like a hundred percent certain.

And I think, let's talk about Danny for a second. you know, Danny goes to her new job and meets her mark. And he, Reza, and he invites her to this black tie event and says, you know, you're going to give this presentation. Here's what I love about this show. Danny, who we both, like, sort of singled out as someone we thought was really compelling in the first couple episodes. someone who I think of as incredibly competent, but new. Yeah. You know, she's brand new.

She's competent, but she's brand new. We saw her, like, you know, when Marsha was running her through that training of like, you know, if you're going to honey trap someone, you got to, there are consequences to that. So how are you going to use this out of the other thing? And so when she's in the car with him and he, you know, starts putting his moves on her, and she stops him, I couldn't tell, because I don't know about you, Rob, but I'm not a spy. I couldn't tell if she was doing a good job or a bad job.

And it wasn't until she got out of the car and smirked that I was like, okay, I mean, I knew she was like, she definitely wanted out of this presentation because the battery has died on her phone and she has not memorized all of her. Danny, why aren't we plugging our phone in as we're trying to speed memorize the content? I don't know what your reaction was in real time to that joke but like espionage is a high stakes intense profession my secondhand anxiety was highest

when she had to memorize a textbook on her phone in like two hours and I'm just like I am sweating bullets watching her try to retain this information while also putting an outfit together that's the added layer of bullshit you know if you wanted your first sign that Morda Zvi was bad news like telling someone come to this black tie event in three hours is demented behavior. Demented is the precise word for that is simply a no for me.

Absolutely insane. She gets herself out of the car, out of the event, but also seems to have like planted a seed that she thinks will bloom for her inside of a rejection of someone that like, you know, from a certain point of view, you might be like, oh, she fucked it. You know what I mean? Like, this is her way in. And, you know, she, in order to get out of the short term, she fucked her long term plan.

But she seems incredibly satisfied with what she's done here. Yes. What do you want to say about that? I want to kind of break this into two parts, because one, I completely agree on a tactical level. This is working out very well for her. And I think she has effectively, like, started to shift the power dynamic between them.

This was a person who she came in needing to stand out to and impressed in order to get this, assignment to Tehran. Now she has him nervous and maybe even like a little grateful that she didn't report him. That's something she can clearly use to her advantage. And I think we see kind of a version of that with her and the interrogator too. I think like that that dynamic was so interesting when she gets out. And she does like I would say a bare minimum flirtation with him. And he takes the hook so quickly. So fast. That it's like on the one hand felt like a power play from her. And on the other hand,

felt like another one of these sorts of inversions, right? It's another situation where she's trying to turn the tables and if anything, like practice turning the tables in that particular way. Like, that guy falls into bed with her, falls into a chair with her so quickly. Like, she has this power. And she has this power over certain men she is coming into contact with, even ones in this case who are like fellow CIA operatives.

And it is so extremely believable from, like, you know, she's a beautiful woman, but she's not. like, you know, like an obvious seductress. And so she has like an allure and intelligence, a ferocity, a commitment. And that makes her just a far more fascinating version of a character that we've seen before. Again, I feel like I'm throwing a number of people under the bus. But with love and respect to Scarlett Johansson, this is not Natasha Romanov's sort of behavior. This is something else entirely, and that is the economy of it, too.

Yeah. She gets out of that interrogation room with, like, a couple bites of a chicken Caesar wrap, and, like, just a handful of words. Yeah. And it's done. And we know what's going on. And they know what's going on. And that's the magic of performance and the magic of writing as well. So that economy works very, very well.

the one thing on the show I have bumped on so far, I would say is not the substance of Danny's interactions with Dr. Morda Zvi, but like the speed of it, how quickly things accelerated once they get in the car. It's clear that this guy is kind of targeting her in a way and has paid attention to her. And then he makes his moves very quickly. I believe like this person in a predatory position could move that fast. and could try to pull someone into kind of his orbit that just like with that kind of speed I buy.

Yeah. It's the things that he says and the way he makes that move where it's been like, I've been watching you all this time. And it's like you've had two conversations with this woman. Do we know how much time has passed that she's been in there? Well, we, so here's the thing is like they could be doing the TV version of like these two timelines are operating at different speeds. Yeah. But our other timelines are like day to day hour to hour.

Yeah. You're right. And he's commenting on, Martian is commenting on, like, her interrogation. Her progress, right? We can't be speeding too far ahead of, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I think there is some of that. And like, clearly, like, there are some jumps in her process, right? Like, she's teaching a class now, which, God, I can't even imagine having to fake your way through that process.

But yeah, there was just something about the things he was saying that were like, this feels, this feels extreme, not in terms of the behavior, but the way he is portraying his interest. I think that's worth watching if that is going to wind up feeling like a consistent character trait or something that's plot convenient Rob if you were asked

to go undercover and teach a course on a certain subject what do you think you could bullshit your way through? Philosophy, easy. Can you? Yeah. Have you taken philosophy classes or you just feel like philosophy is bullshit enough that you could just like say something

to get away with it? I've taken like intro level philosophy courses. And I mean no disrespect to the overall profession or endeavor. Just that when the whole point is constructing the asking of questions, I can just, I can facilitate Socratic discussion in class and sit back and throw on a video at every other class and we're going to be fine. Okay. So just to sum up on this podcast here at the end of the year, we have tossed Big Little Lies, Black Widow, and Philosophy on the on the fire. Just the greater school of Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, great. Sounds good.

Socrates eat shit. Eat shit, Socrates. All right, I want to talk about Naomi. Catherine Waterson is playing Naomi, who is, you know, Danny's case officer at CIA. I'm kind of obsessed with this performance because it's a minimal role so far. We'll see how much more Naomi gets to do. I just love what, like, an unrelenting asshole. She's just

There's no warmth from her and I love it See I don't entirely agree with that I think she is that way with Danny But she is also like quite protective of Martian I would say Well that's that's the thing is like I think she has Like a schoolgirl crush on him That was my interpretation of the way that she greeted him on his return

Interesting Where she was like flustered Man love really is black We're doing our best here. Okay. You invoked the slow horses before. If anyone is a slow horse here, it has to be our guy Owen, right? Here's the thing.

Did his overall operation into the field go well? No, Joe, it did not. I would not tell you that it did. No. That said, were I in his position? Yeah. I think the only thing is, like, I think you've got to put that secretary in the closet faster.

First. It felt so clear that he was being played. And frankly, I'm not ruling out the fact that he was being played. Even though everyone else seems very cavalier about this situation, my eyebrows were raised. It was just a very suspicious sequence of events. From the moment you see the cat she's going in the closet, or like, do we get a drink at least in first?

Certainly no one-night stand pre-cloth. pre-closet. It's the minute you see condensation on the shower, you're like, we're done here. What do you make of, I mean, it was just so delightfully inept, and John McGarrow is just wonderful. Any thoughts or feelings about Valhalla

written on the mirror? Oh, yeah, I have no idea where that's pointed. We haven't heard any or seen any Valhalla or Valhalla adjacent code. code names, imagery. This is a group of people who loves a cutesy code name. We have learned that.

But I don't know. I have no sense of what Vahala is or could be. Do you feel like the secretary definitely run it? I'm just like, I'm trying to figure out who that would be for. Not to typecast

people based on their physical appearance, but like that doesn't look like that woman's handwriting. Oh, okay. But it's finger on a mirror. Like, you know, it's not. But it still reflects your penmanship, I think. Do you feel like your mirror finger writing,

and I don't know the last time you had to leave a message on a steamy mirror, but do you feel like that writing is reflective of your handwriting? 100%. Interesting. Okay. It may be a little looser, but it's ultimately going to be your stylistic fingerprint. What more do you want to say about the coyote operation? You already invoked this Belarusian, you know, gam.

Like the coyote thing is the, we are constantly zes. zigging and zagging down alleyways and actively working the case on this. And this is where we see the most, the most levels of spycraft, I would say, is, is involved in this storyline. And it's funny because, like, I didn't realize when it first happens, I don't know that I pegged it as, like, the season-long hunt. And yet here, here we are. Where is Coyote and what is he said?

What is he leaked? And I love this. And I am having a really good time with it. What has been your favorite aspect of this? Is it bike for sale? Is it, I've lost a bike? What do you think? The bike for sale is good.

The hidden kebab shop phone, I think, is pretty good. Honestly, even the fact that, frankly, Owen, as Martian tells us, bungled every part of this there was to bungle, but fell ass backwards into some really important potential intel in the combination of the fact that Coyote had been seeing some kind of psychiatrist who had been prescribing him all these drugs. Sure sounds like a potential leak as far as all of this stuff goes.

And then also, I think overall, like, the game of this is so long. And there are so many open threads that you can see a way for the Coyote plot to very easily intersect with whoever the target is for Felix, for example. There are ways in which this stuff starts pointing in the direction of each other. I don't think a show that's this sprawling is going to get to one final. Like, oh my God, all five plots have converged.

Danny, come on in. Charlie, what are you doing here? Direct flight from Tehran to Minsk. Like, that is not going to happen. But enough of these are going to have to. Like, there's going to be more for Charlie to do. And we should at least brush on the fact that he is now, he and his, his Ukrainian bros?

Are those guys Ukrainian? Well, they were definitely pretending to be. I said, I called them the trio of hot doctors without borders, right? Isn't that we were calling them? I call, since he's Charlie, I've been calling them Linus and Lucy in my notes and just going with that.

Charlie's Angels, love it. I mean, it's just like, we need something in order to signify those guys. But they have found their way to a kind of safety and they are back in the field, still pursuing whoever their target is going to be, which we don't know, but we do know it's important enough

that the president is looped in on that decision, which says it's probably a pretty high-level target. We also don't know what target means for Operation Felix. Is that an abduction target? Is that an assassination target? Is that an extraction target? I have no fucking idea. But I like having no fucking idea at this point in the show.

The myriad of ways this show has figured out how to entangle people emotionally inside of their high level of operations. And by high level, I mean, like, they aren't bunglers. They are really good at their jobs until something bleeds in and they aren't. And that is, you know,

something hard and fast hits the windshield. And that is, to be able to see it, there's a worst version of this show where this is just, Martians Achilles heel. This is just one spy has a foible and we're going to watch people exploit it or it destroy him or something like that. But this is how do you as a person?

And again, as you pointed out, we've heard a number of different versions of speeches around this. How do you as a person do this job? Especially as it asks you to dissolve your own personality into something else. Yeah. But then also use, you're asked to assume, you know, a costume, a mask, and identity, but also you're asked to use aspects of your own personal life or history or personality.

Right. You know, like the most convincing lie is a lie that has some truth to it. So like, you remind me of my father. Like, you know, if there is a part of your own life that you can. can use to help orchestrate these lies, these gambits, all the better, but all the more dangerous at the end of the day in terms of keeping those things either separate or organically blended. And that's where we're seeing some of these start to come together. You know, Osman is, or not Osmond, but one of the guys working with them has found now Poppy's

ID card. What was her ID card doing in his jacket? I don't remember. I have no memory. Actually, you know what it was? There was a line when they went shopping, when they did like their little re-examined. retail therapy session about how she had some kind of student discount. Yeah.

Okay. So it must be because of the student discount. She's like, here, use my card or some, you know, I'm just yada, yada, yada, use my card and he just put it in his jacket instead of giving it back to her. But that seems so sloppy. Like if he knew, like he goes to the police station, he, he's prepared enough that he is prepared to learn how to fight like Paul rather than himself. Yes.

Right. but he's got this very incriminating piece of evidence in his jacket. It is confusing, but also at this point in the game, he is that sloppy. He has rocked off his access to the point that even Poppy is like finding his secret stash within the flat. Right. Clearly, this is not a guy who's operating at the absolute pinnacle of how discreet and intelligent and resourceful he can be. He's still making some very calculated moves. He's obviously has enough at his disposal to dodge the tails that the CIA have put on him. But he's still stepping in shit everywhere.

And in particular, I think, like, the fact that Poppy can get the edge on him so easily, that all it takes is like a little bit of searching around the apartment to find the Paul Lewis ID he's not supposed to have anymore. Not great. This reminds me of a Dune prophecy plotline and frankly, how dare you make me think about Dune prophecy? Sorry, I apologize. At the end of the year. We did get an email. You can email us.

PressCTV at Spotify.com or it's Tip Top and the Pink at Gmail.com. We'll forward to press cTV at Spotify.com. So, and we have heard from people that they would like us to continue our show specific emails. We probably will. But no matter what, press chtonv at Spotify.com, you can reach us. Talking about the architecture, the literal architecture of the show. and the way in which there are scenes with Henry in his office. I haven't seen the behind the scenes on this particular show,

but to me it looks like perhaps green screen windows, and then they're like foggy day in Londontown, you know, dot JPEG in the background or whatever. But there are definitely scenes where they're running through, they're definitely in London. And it looks great. And there is a, you know, obviously like the, the smoky cityscapes is part of our opening credits in the show. But there is like a almost brutalist sort of a lot of concrete vibe,

which invokes Cold War. Yeah, security state. Yeah, yeah, sort of stuff. What do you think about sort of those visuals inside of the show? I love those visual trappings. I have especially loved the way they play out with Martian at home. on his balcony, right? This is like the one space that he has identified that might not be bugable effectively

just because I assume there's so much background noise. But it is that sort of very concrete, very brutalist angular style. And the fact that it is him kind of like overlooking the city as he is trying to figure out like literally what to do on a day-to-day basis to keep all of these balls in the air that he has in his life. I think that's just one of my favorite like vistas on the show right now, which is a crazy thing to say when, as you mentioned, like it is gray and foggy. Most of the time, like, it's not super pleasant to look at, but it feels ominous.

And it feels, I think, like a man grasping for control. Like, that's what it feels like when I see him up there. And that's exactly where Martian is right now. I think what I love about Foss Bender, we talked about this in this role. And we talked about this in the first couple episodes is like he's such like a ship sharp, like, contained, like the sharpness of his jaw and the narrowness of his hips and just like the way that he just like looks like he should be in control at all times. Yes. And often when he's panicking, which we see him, it's not big panic. And we might be building to big panic.

But it is not, we saw some of it like when he sees Osman at Sami's door. And he's like, oh, that's the person that was tailing me. Like he thought it was CIA. It turns out was him. So like we see medium. I would say medium panic in that moment. But I don't think we've gotten to full-blown big panic yet. And I like that because it gives us something to build towards.

but it's also like there's a version of the show that is like more frenetic or you know like a sort of uncut gems like jangly koki sort of energy and I like that this is a steady build to something. Oster PJ is the one who wrote in about the architecture and this is what he said which I thought was interesting. He says, has any TV show found such interesting, cool sets and shot architecture so well? It makes it feel like it's set in just a slight. different universe. And I like that.

That it gives like a bit of seriality to it. If you go down that brutalist sort of pipeline, you can get to like something like Brazil or something like that that's like sort of slightly fantastical. And I was thinking

about that question and I was like, well, something like Westworld did this really well where they found, when they moved into modern day storylines, they found buildings that look like they're from the future, even though they do exist. in our world. But it is a true accomplishment

to not make us feel like we're not in London, but to make us feel like we're in just like a different London. I don't know perfectly how to encapsulate. And at the risk of putting a very Western lens on this experience, I think the idea of a CIA station in London, there's a version of that kind of setting and placement

that could feel like, oh, this is very friendly soil. This is like the ally, ship at work between the two nations could feel protective and to puncture that with a real sense of danger and a real sense that like not just oh you could lose this woman you love oh your daughter could be in danger it's like if you fuck up in the wrong way like there are real geopolitical consequences and you haven't even really left station soil or like 50 square miles around it right that's quite a feat right like i think managing to pull off a a spy show that granted is not in america but like as close to america as a

CIA show can basically get, that's something that I think is really impressive about the overall stakes and the way that they're escalating and the way that it's not just us, you know, from our perspective, juggling these five or six plot lines who have a grasp of what's going on here. The fact that Martian now

does too, I think, is going to ratchet up the process you're talking about. Like that unraveling, the moment of Fosmender breaking and screaming at somebody is coming. Like, that has to be coming. Something's going to result in his beautiful face getting beaten to a pulp.

Okay. Ramahoney, anything else you want to say about these episodes of The Agency? I have one more thing to say, and it ties into, you know, as you talked about earlier, Joe, we covered Black Doves recently. We sure did.

This also happened in Black Doves, two spy shows, two shows in which people need to be having private conversations and duck into, of all places, a rep theater, to have these covert conversations as a movie is playing out in front of them.

I want to make this very, very clear to anyone who's listening in the intelligence community. That space is not for you. That is for us sickos. There is no talking in any movie theater, but especially not fucking there. These are the real movie nerds. If you're seeing Catch 22 in a weeknight,

I don't want to hear about what's going on with your fake girlfriend in Sudanese politics. I don't want to know. Please respect Rob. Please. He's real serious about this. Rob, when Rob goes, when you go to LA, you're like, the first thing you do is check out the rep theater or schedule, right?

Got to. Like, you got to check the schedule. You got to see what's playing. Do you have a favorite rep theater that the CIA should make sure to avoid in particular? I'm so sorry, let's just not limit it to the CIA. All intelligence agencies that are definitely listening to us talk about the agency. Rob, if you could pick one theater to keep as your very own, what would it be? You refuse to choose.

I refuse your question. not only is it not about one theater, I don't want you going to AMC or Cinemark. Like, I want to be able to go see Mufasa in fucking peace. That's not where I would hold the line personally at Mufasa, but you do you, is nothing sacred. All right, well, that's it. We did it.

We talked about the agency. We put out Rob's job application to be a fake philosophy professor. Yep. We have protected... Office hours or on Thursdays. Come on in. We have protected all... movie theaters everywhere.

It's a sacred experience. I'm, you know, I'm with you. I saw a show last night in Services Go where, and this happened. When I saw Wicked in Oakland, this woman sitting behind me, I swear to God, she was eating cellophane. She was just chewing cellophane the whole movie. It was just like crinkle city constantly behind me. And the same thing happened in a show I saw in Services Go last night.

And I'm like, people, I'm sorry, leave your conversation. and, crucially, your cellophane food that you're chewing, I don't know what it is, leave it at home. I don't want to figure that out. I'm pro snack for the record, but you have to do it tastefully. And I think most importantly, like, you can sense when the volume is about to spike in a movie. Just like, just wait to eat your M&Ms. It's not a huge deal. Yeah, and this was no M&M bag situation, by the way, because, like, an Eminem bag, you can

navigate that, like, fairly soundlessly. Yes. is like super that clear, crunchy, like what is in that kind of bag? I don't know. I don't know. They must have smuggled. That doesn't sound like something they would be selling at the theater. And listen, I don't mind a smuggle.

I love a smuggle. You smuggle a snack any day, but just like, you know, and to do it for so long, okay, I'm done. I'm done. This is my last part of the year. Smuggle responsibly. Smuggle responsibly. Hire Rob and come back and join.

us in 2025 as we just spend time together with shows like severance, we'll be wrapping up our squid game coverage. Rob's about to get a crash course in the charms of Noah Wiley on the pit. I can't wait. That's coming. So we've got a lot going on White Lotus,

all this sort of stuff in the new year. So we'll see you then. Thanks for hanging out with us. And thanks to Kai Grady, as always. Always. What a year for Kai Grady, 2024? Oh, my God. Hi, doing one million hours of pods alone. He's the best.

Thanks to Justin Sales for joining the prestige team and helping oversee everything that we do. Thank you to all of you, our listeners. I don't know if every single one of you is listening to this episode about the agency in particular, but we've really, really enjoyed getting to do this show. It's like such a tree for us to get to do this show. Without a doubt, 100%.

To hear from you guys that you're picking shows to watch, because you can then listen to us, like, chatter about it. Just very... You're going to love the pit. Noah Wiley is going to... I think it's his year. I really do. All right, I'll stop...

I'll stop hammering. We'll see you guys next year. Bye!