7.2 [re-watch]

[Silktie]

Hee, I think Harry speaks for most of us when he asks Malcolm: "And am I going to understand the next bit?" The technical stuff in this episode is above my comprehension, so I just go with it.

What I enjoy most about this episode is the parallel between Harry and Kachimov. Both are masterful players of the spying game, and here they are not only playing for the loyalty of Lucas, but also for the interests of their respective countries. It's top class Cold War stuff, and I love it. It's interesting how both of them are trying to understand the emotional and intellectual make-up of the other, and how both are using Lucas to do it. Like Harry says, they want the smell of each other.

Kachimov's use of Elizabetha to be Lucas' handler is a masterstroke, but perhaps also shows that, like Harry, he isn't sure that he has Lucas' loyalty, hence the emotional blackmail of involving his ex-wife. Perhaps he hopes that Lucas' need to have a connection with Elizabetha will keep him in line?

In my view, Harry is correct to wait until Lucas has been debriefed before trusting him. As the leader it is his responsibility to ensure that Lucas is still loyal, and he cannot afford to go on emotion and welcome him back with open arms until he is certain of this. Count me in the camp of not quite understanding Lucas' strategy - for someone who is so eager to have Harry's trust, it seems unlikely that he would not have gone to him and come clean as a way to get that trust instead of lying to him and playing a high risk game that could have backfired.

I agree with A Cousin that Harry should have forced Lucas to have that debriefing after all, but I think Harry after Adam's death is somewhat unbalanced and emotionally vulnerable, and perhaps makes the decision to allow Lucas back on the team for those reasons rather than intellectually. I like that for once we get to see the impact of losing one of his officers on him, as well as on Malcolm for that matter. Malcolm calling Adam 'admirable' was wonderful - in that one comment we get to see how much he meant to Malcolm.

Re Harry shooting Kachimov, it is a morally indefensible act, and purely based on the desire for revenge in my view. We know that Harry has never shied away from the darker parts of the job - in season 1 he is established as someone who will order the assassination of others (Helen's deep-fry killer), and as someone who has done it himself (he blew up a car to kill Johnny Marks but killed his brother instead). Also, he is very eager to kill Patrick McCann all through episode 1.6. The difference is that this time there is really no operational justification for the killing. My impression is that he hadn't intended to do it until Kachimov started sprouting that stuff about how Adam was only a resource that can be replaced, and Harry snapped. Despite all this, I may have cheered a little bit when he did it, because like the team, I am in deep mourning about Adam's death and wanted to see Kachimov get what was coming to him.