Spy/Master will be ending with a bang. Or at least that’s how it seems. A bomb in a Bonn synagogue, not a church, is sure to affect the Camp David peace talks. This will, in turn, affect President Carter’s decision to allow Victor’s defection. It is imperative that Frank find the bomb, or else Victor’s death will be inevitable, and what’s worse, so will the death of his daughter Ileana. The latter is something that President Ceausescu’s wife, Elena, desperately wants: to make Victor pay for his betrayal. Her words almost make her the Lady Macbeth to Nicolae’s Macbeth. He may be the king, but it is his queen who makes the crucial decision. On the other hand, a group of undercover agents, under orders from Carmen and Mircea, have made their way inside the American Embassy to take down Victor. Meanwhile, Adela has made her way inside a mental institution. What does she intend to do now? And where is Ileana? We have reached the last episode of Spy/Master Season 1.
Spoilers Ahead
Taken
The bomb is defused, and Omar is shot. Unfortunately, Jabare is missing, and Victor knows that he won’t give up that easily. Such guys always have a backup plan, which God knows Jabare has in mind. But that’s the least of Victor’s worries because he is being taken by Carmen’s men. But even before he is taken, it is how he is brought out of the room that gets us up on our feet. We know that Frank lied to him about the tape he wanted to send to his daughter. Now, if Victor finds that the tape is still in the logistics room (maybe Frank sent it there for safekeeping), he will snap at Frank. That doesn’t happen, and we see that it is Carmen’s plan to coerce Victor away from the others so that he can be taken. But Victor’s luck never runs out, even when there is a gun to his head. Carmen is shot by the Russians [General Shakarov], perks of being a double agent. Now it’s all about finding Jabare before another explosion occurs and kills even more people. Also, Victor needs to find Ingrid, who, as per Carmen, is dead. He doesn’t know what we know. Ingrid was shot. But is she dead?
Blown Cover
Ingrid is alive, but her Stasi cover is blown. Even though Victor offers to get her to safety, perhaps by taking her with him to America, she knows that it isn’t possible. At this point, it feels absurd that Victor is trying to convince Ingrid to join him, but he hasn’t asked Frank about his daughter’s whereabouts for quite some time. Is he really this insensitive? Has his agent nature overpowered his humane self? Be that as it may, escape is not really an option for Ingrid. All she can do is move on from Victor. And deep down, even Victor knows this. After getting Jabare’s warehouse address from Safiya, Victor and Frank arrive at the location and find a couple of Romanian passports for Omar and Jabare. Victor guesses that it must be a plot by Nicolae’s enemies to frame him for the now-averted bomb explosion.
30 Minutes
Somewhere else, Ileana is brought to General Shakarov, who informs her that she has no option but to make her way to America. Shakarov surely intends to use her as a mole, just like her father, transferring crucial intel from America to him. For Shakarov, both Victor and Ileana are mere means to serve his own purpose. When the time comes for him to not need their services anymore, or if they get compromised, he can just have them killed. But that time is still far away. For now, Ileana needs to go to the American Embassy. Unfortunately, she isn’t safe even there because, as Victor and Frank find out at Jabare’s warehouse, Jabare’s alternate target is a guy named Sacha Kenvin, who is a guest at a conference there. Unbeknownst to Frank and Victor, the countdown has already begun. And this time, Victor’s daughter, whom he so desperately wanted to be safe, is about to die in 30 minutes. Maybe it was just fate that brought Ileana to the Embassy at the same time that Jabare activated the bomb there.
Do Victor And Frank Find The Bomb?
The bomb has to be found, and before that, Ileana has to be taken to safety. The only person Victor wanted to be safe is now in the gravest danger. Frank and Victor rush back to the Embassy, which has already begun evacuation protocols. Now, it’s all about timing. In the final face-off, we find Frank and Victor staring at Jabare, who has a knife to Ileana’s throat as well as the bomb on him. Thankfully, Jabare is shot and wounded while the bomb is defused by John. But that’s not all. It is what comes after Victor catches up to a wounded Jabare that doubt creeps into our heads. Victor asks Jabare if it was Shakarov who ordered the bombing. If that’s the case, then why did he shake hands with Victor earlier, as well as with Ileana? Victor’s American dream isn’t cheap, after all. Shakarov was ready to blow up the American Embassy, and if two potential sources died, it didn’t matter. But he made sure he had a backup plan. The guy is really shrewd, perhaps even more so than Nicolae’s wife, Elena. Victor shoots Jabare dead. President Carter signs off on Victor’s defection. The storm is over. But is it?
As Victor, Frank, and Ileana are sitting on the stairs in front of the American Embassy, Ileana not only lies about Boris but also about the promise she made to General Shakarov. So even though both Victor and Ileana are going to America, there are dangers that will follow them, some of which Victor won’t be aware of. He knows that Nicolae won’t stop till he gets Victor killed, but what he doesn’t know is that his own daughter has become a potential mole for Shakarov. The whole point of him leaving Ileana was so that she could live a life free of secrets. And now she is way deeper into a world of secrets than he even expected. Episode 6, the season finale of Spy/Master, ends with Victor and Ileana going to America in a transport aircraft.
A new life awaits Victor and Ileana. But it doesn’t mean that they will be completely out of danger. Granted, they will be under the protection of the CIA, but the risk is never zero. That’s the thing with being an agent, especially a double one. And now, his daughter is also one. If Season 2 arrives, maybe we’ll get to see the father-and-daughter duo serving the American government. Or, more importantly, we will see them going against each other, with both of them out of choices. And how will Adela fit into all this? Will Shakarov use her and Ingrid as bait to get to Ileana and Victor, respectively? Or will it be Nicolae, or rather his wife Elena, who takes the necessary steps to get to Victor? And will Victor be able to protect Ileana if and when the time comes? Only season 2 can tell.
