Register a SA Forums Account here!
JOINING THE SA FORUMS WILL REMOVE THIS BIG AD, THE ANNOYING UNDERLINED ADS, AND STUPID INTERSTITIAL ADS!!!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
 
  • Locked thread
Tortolia
Dec 29, 2005

Hindustan Electronics Employee of the Month, July 2008
Grimey Drawer
I kinda feel bad for Quayle. I can't tell if he's actually good at his job or not but he seems like he's trying to do things right.

joe football posted:

Laughed out loud at the sci fi polygraph scene

Interrogators: Tell us your secrets :mad:
dumbass nice guy Howard: I dunno :confused:
Interrogators: Oh my god he's more devious then ever :ohdear:

Yeah, and him sprinkling in just enough belligerance for authenticity was great.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Trabant
Nov 26, 2011

All systems nominal.
My wife noticed the rectangular mug ("What the hell kind of cup is that?") just before it turned out to be The Clue, so now we have Chekov's mug.

Blind Rasputin
Nov 25, 2002

Farewell, good Hunter. May you find your worth in the waking world.

Chekov’s mug is a nuclear wessel in Alameda.

algebra testes
Mar 5, 2011


Lipstick Apathy
That twist was the plot of a LeCarre novel A Call For the Dead smiley works out it wasn't the dude but the dudes wife who is the spy

Unrelated to actual spoilers but the coffee cup staining things so you know it is yours is mentioned in a Len Deighton novel but it is probably a coincidence.

joe football posted:

Laughed out loud at the sci fi polygraph scene

Interrogators: Tell us your secrets :mad:
dumbass nice guy Howard: I dunno :confused:
Interrogators: Oh my god he's more devious then ever :ohdear:

I loving loved this

algebra testes fucked around with this message at 13:14 on Feb 27, 2018

unlawfulsoup
May 12, 2001

Welcome home boys!
My one sort of problem so far is, how are the prime side getting so many agents over? Let alone building some kind of large sleeper network? The show has gone out of its way to show that things going from side to side are REALLY regulated. To be honest everything we have seen suggests there is essentially no reason to have anyone outside of the building. If the only purpose is sharing tech and 'surveillance' the majority could just be done inter building like Howard was originally sort of doing.

Open Source Idiom
Jan 4, 2013

unlawfulsoup posted:

My one sort of problem so far is, how are the prime side getting so many agents over? Let alone building some kind of large sleeper network? The show has gone out of its way to show that things going from side to side are REALLY regulated. To be honest everything we have seen suggests there is essentially no reason to have anyone outside of the building. If the only purpose is sharing tech and 'surveillance' the majority could just be done inter building like Howard was originally sort of doing.

They're getting in by getting cover jobs working for the Prime embassy.

I mean, that doesn't explain how Claire could possibly get through -- not only is her Other married to Quayle, but she's also the daughter of our Earth's ambassador (AKA Richard Schiff's character).

And doesn't one of the Lotte Verbeeks also work for our side's office? She's Richard Schiff's secretary, while Prime Verbeek is one of the assassins from episode six.

You'd think they'd be a moratorium on high ranked Others being sent over, though I suppose it's in everyone's favour for this not to be the case. Cause, you know, spy poo poo.

Open Source Idiom fucked around with this message at 08:37 on Feb 28, 2018

Tiggum
Oct 24, 2007

Your life and your quest end here.


unlawfulsoup posted:

My one sort of problem so far is, how are the prime side getting so many agents over?
I've been assuming that there's another way through that isn't widely known about and is possibly entirely in the control of the mysterious faction infiltrating both sides.

Chubby Henparty
Aug 13, 2007


Be interesting to find out that say, all the contractors doing plastering at the Bulgarian embassy in Washington in 1986, were all extremely attractive men and women of military age.

DentArthurDent
Aug 3, 2010

Diddums
I'm really enjoying the show, and perhaps the best thing about it is that while there are mysteries and twists, the show does not seem built around them. Unlike Lost, Westworld, or even Star Trek Discovery, it does not seem like everything in the plot is designed to lead up to the next shocking twist without much meat in-between. Sure, there are mysteries to discover, and lots of elements of the worlds they are living in are parceled out slowly, but the character stuff seems more important than anything else. A welcome change from many TV shows these days.

A very minor issue: in the first episode, we saw the convoluted and complicated system they have in place to exchange information between the worlds, using complex codes, Orwellian security systems, and multiple layers of people to keep the information isolated. However, in later episodes it seems people travel between the worlds fairly frequently. There are line-ups of people crossing over, they have embassies in each other's reality, and they meet their counterparts (!) over lunch to talk about trade deals. I'm not saying it's a plot hole or anything, the two things are not mutually exclusive, it just makes the convoluted security procedures from episode one seem a bit much.

CeeJee
Dec 4, 2001
Oven Wrangler
Oh Germany, once again you go all Dolchstoßlegende and start planning a ruthless genocide of 'the others'.

joe football
Dec 22, 2012
They called the illness the München Virus in that episode, so I think it's fair to say it originated in Germany. That explains why Berlin was especially deserted and also why it's fair to suspect that it was brought there by the other world, although Munich is 300 some miles from the crossing in Berlin

mcbexx
Jul 4, 2004

British dentistry is
not on trial here!



I wonder if a child born to parents from each side has any ramifications ...

Tortolia
Dec 29, 2005

Hindustan Electronics Employee of the Month, July 2008
Grimey Drawer
Quayle, man, you have a really lovely poker face

Edit: I'm going to be fascinated to see what kind of espionage indoctrination programs the "main" side has going on because no loving way is the other side the only one playing this game.

claw game handjob
Mar 27, 2007

pinch pinch scrape pinch
ow ow fuck it's caught
i'm bleeding
JESUS TURN IT OFF
WHY ARE YOU STILL SMILING
Was there an episode tonight? My guide didn't show one at all, leaving my DVR barren.

HanabaL03
Nov 12, 2003

We're spread, we're spread, we're spreading our.... wings! :v:

END ME SCOOB posted:

Was there an episode tonight? My guide didn't show one at all, leaving my DVR barren.

Yes there was. And it was fantastic.

Blind Rasputin
Nov 25, 2002

Farewell, good Hunter. May you find your worth in the waking world.

HanabaL03 posted:

Yes there was. And it was fantastic.

My girlfriend and I haven’t watched it yet. Can someone itt post all the spoilers so when we watch it I can act like I know what’s about to happen? She loves how smart I am

Rocksicles
Oct 19, 2012

by Nyc_Tattoo
It's was primarily a backstory episode for spy boss homeboy's not-wife.

Other than that it was a slow burn bbq, good poo poo though.

Tiggum
Oct 24, 2007

Your life and your quest end here.


Blind Rasputin posted:

My girlfriend and I haven’t watched it yet. Can someone itt post all the spoilers so when we watch it I can act like I know what’s about to happen? She loves how smart I am

Turns out Howard's wife is behind everything and Howard was in on it the whole time. The milquetoast personality was just an act and his low-level, dead-end job is the perfect cover. When she got put into a coma he initiated a plan to switch places with his counterpart and is right where he wants to be.

Rocksicles
Oct 19, 2012

by Nyc_Tattoo
Plus all that stuff ^^

Sekenr
Dec 12, 2013




Open Source Idiom posted:

They're getting in by getting cover jobs working for the Prime embassy.

I mean, that doesn't explain how Claire could possibly get through -- not only is her Other married to Quayle, but she's also the daughter of our Earth's ambassador (AKA Richard Schiff's character).

And doesn't one of the Lotte Verbeeks also work for our side's office? She's Richard Schiff's secretary, while Prime Verbeek is one of the assassins from episode six.

You'd think they'd be a moratorium on high ranked Others being sent over, though I suppose it's in everyone's favour for this not to be the case. Cause, you know, spy poo poo.

Yeah, I have to say its getting harder and harder to buy this stuff. Especially the wife switching, both sides have pictures of her coming in and never coming back. When Quayle got the job and they vetted him it should have been a dead giveaway. And yeah, daughter of diplomacy director, double vetted. It't not like it never occured to anyone on our side that "they" can try to replace important people.

Party Plane Jones
Jul 1, 2007

by Reene
Fun Shoe

Sekenr posted:

Yeah, I have to say its getting harder and harder to buy this stuff. Especially the wife switching, both sides have pictures of her coming in and never coming back. When Quayle got the job and they vetted him it should have been a dead giveaway. And yeah, daughter of diplomacy director, double vetted. It't not like it never occured to anyone on our side that "they" can try to replace important people.

Wouldn't the most obvious answer be that they have control over the border crossing guards so they can destroy transport documents and photos without being detected? The show already showed Ian interrogating guards and sentencing them to '3 months in the hole' for the Prince album and that's just on the Prime side. If they have people on the Alpha side the sky is the limit, essentially.

Sekenr
Dec 12, 2013




Party Plane Jones posted:

If they have people on the Alpha side the sky is the limit, essentially.

Well, yeah, that would explain it except if they control both sides of the border what does our (and their) counterintelligence even doing.

Ian (I think) is not part of the conspiracy, I think its his job to stop all unauthorised bullshit from happening.

unlawfulsoup
May 12, 2001

Welcome home boys!
The prime people aren't coming off looking particularly good here. The whole sleeper agent thing was truly horrendous. It is based on what? If one side was trying to wipe out the other, why would they release one pathogen that doesn't even have a particularly high death rate. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying it wasn't horrible, but if your goal is manufactured genocide you are going to do a lot better than a sub 10% killer of the population disease.

Party Plane Jones
Jul 1, 2007

by Reene
Fun Shoe

unlawfulsoup posted:

The prime people aren't coming off looking particularly good here. The whole sleeper agent thing was truly horrendous. It is based on what? If one side was trying to wipe out the other, why would they release one pathogen that doesn't even have a particularly high death rate. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying it wasn't horrible, but if your goal is manufactured genocide you are going to do a lot better than a sub 10% killer of the population disease.

It's not logical because the people involved are not logical. They're not (necessarily) the leaders or higher ups in Prime universe, they're fanatics who have accumulated power, money and influence. They're essentially the Fulcrum (to borrow a Chuck reference) of Prime: people who believe so strongly in defending their world/universe against the opposing side that they're going to co-opt and infect existing structures and people towards their end. They're going to retaliate in any way that can make a substantive effect on the other side and drat whatever consequences there are. If one side is sinking, you can bet that they're looking for the nearest cinderblock to weigh the other down with so at least they're drowning together.

joe football
Dec 22, 2012
So if we assume the other world people are not just crackpots about the disease, I think the rationale behind why it happened is something like: some extremely amoral, powerful guy in the prime universe with knowledge of the other side decides that while this alternate universe is really neat, they're not really doing anything for us(me) and thus decides to throw a massive divergence their way in the form of the virus to get them doing wildly different things so the Prime world can then trade with them. Probably while saying that actually this is in the long-term benefit of both worlds because they can get our cool phones in exchange for their medical miracles(borne from 500 million corpses) and everyone ends up with more stuff

Tortolia
Dec 29, 2005

Hindustan Electronics Employee of the Month, July 2008
Grimey Drawer
It makes sense to me that attacking under the guise of an animal flu would be perfectly reasonable if you were going for casualties, disruption and panic but weren't aiming for complete eradication of the populace. Even if you were, a 7% mortality rate on a global scale is astronomical if it's something you can't directly control like a virus. And if your goal was to directly cripple population centers to get an upper hand in a cold war type scenario, there you go.

As for the fanaticism of the School itself...well, look at how crazy America got over the 9/11 attacks and that was only around 3000 people dead. If you believe that a pandemic that killed nearly half a billion people was an intentional attack there really is no limit to what you might actually do in retaliation.

Rocksicles
Oct 19, 2012

by Nyc_Tattoo
There is no prime universe.

Prime universe is a past event. When you have a branch off, both become something new.

Gonz
Dec 22, 2009

"Jesus, did I say that? Or just think it? Was I talking? Did they hear me?"
Turns out our universe’s Howard moonlights as a spokesman for State Farm Insurance.

Sio
Jan 20, 2007

better red than dead

Rocksicles posted:

There is no prime universe.

Prime universe is a past event. When you have a branch off, both become something new.

Not in the traditional sense, but the second Howard is designated as Prime within the show’s subtitles.

I don’t think it’s been used in the subtitles but apparently internally the writers use “Alpha” to refer to the universe that more closely resembles ours.

CeeJee
Dec 4, 2001
Oven Wrangler
I wonder if any powerful people who lost a young child in the plague had their counterpart grabbed and brought over. The Walter Bishop method.

mobby_6kl
Aug 9, 2009

Sekenr posted:

Yeah, I have to say its getting harder and harder to buy this stuff. Especially the wife switching, both sides have pictures of her coming in and never coming back. When Quayle got the job and they vetted him it should have been a dead giveaway. And yeah, daughter of diplomacy director, double vetted. It't not like it never occured to anyone on our side that "they" can try to replace important people.
I loved the episode, it's basically the new Americans now, but that did bother me a bit. Especially since I think they could've had a plausible solution by having the real Clare have "an accident" somewhere and say that she was actually the diplomat one from the other side.

E: On the other hand this might bring more attention to her/other Clare I suppose

I'm curious how this now goes for her. It's quite possible that she's really into her new identity and loves the child and even him, but she did still supply the information. Badass Howard knows so either she flips or he takes her out, would be my guess.

mobby_6kl fucked around with this message at 01:16 on Mar 8, 2018

Trabant
Nov 26, 2011

All systems nominal.
She's also actively coordinating whatever special ops / terrorist plan the three recently arrived Prime agents are putting in motion, had the butcher butchered, and is once again allowing Baldwin to follow through with the (now freelance?) assassination of coma-Emily. I'd say that whole "Having a child changed everything" thing is completely bogus.

mobby_6kl
Aug 9, 2009

Oh yeah I forgot that's her. Yeah she's playing this dumbass like a fiddle.

Junkenstein
Oct 22, 2003

I dunno. Devoting an episode to her backstory like that might mean there's more to her. We'll see. It's not like Howard is going to believe anything she says.

unlawfulsoup
May 12, 2001

Welcome home boys!
There maybe more to her, but she is still playing Quayle like a fiddle. She is scrambling to at least temporarily cover for herself and the greater plan. I could see her killing Quayle IF the time was right.

Ora Tzo
Feb 26, 2016

HEEEERES TONYYYY
Quayle you stupid fool..

joe football
Dec 22, 2012
The kids born after the flu divergence aren't really likely to have counterparts are they? At this point the x number of years of training and brainwashing is more to create fanatics then replacements

Tortolia
Dec 29, 2005

Hindustan Electronics Employee of the Month, July 2008
Grimey Drawer

joe football posted:

The kids born after the flu divergence aren't really likely to have counterparts are they? At this point the x number of years of training and brainwashing is more to create fanatics then replacements

Yeah, I imagine the number of actual Clare style counterpart replacements was fairly limited due to the complexity of such an operation and the limited shelf life of a plan due to time progression. I have to assume the main focus was always just building fanatical sleeper agents for use on both sides of the crossing.

Caufman
May 7, 2007
Every time a tv show references 9/11, this is in my mind:

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Party Plane Jones
Jul 1, 2007

by Reene
Fun Shoe
That last minute swerve was great.

  • Locked thread