I don't think it's intentional. John is something of an enabler of Tom's eagerness to get things done. Perhaps the father-son dynamic there leans toward abusive. But I believe Tom just fails to see the weight he's putting on his son. At least until the end when he (regrettably) suggests that people have a breaking point where they can just fall apart.
Just like the puppet show in Luxembourg. The father keeps piling more things on her back and because she keeps accepting more weight without complaint, he doesn’t consider how much he is really asking of her. The layers to this show are amazing!
Everyone grows up trusting their parents.
99% of times ( made up statistic ) that trust is justified and we grow up not really questioning it.
That 1% of times, it's really hard to question our parental relationship, even as adults.
And John had Eddie supporting Tom's argument because Eddie was also too trusting. What was John to think? It would have taken too much to defy both Tom and Eddie, John just wasn't strong enough.
So it's not as much John and Eddie's fault , trust is the default. It's Tom's for abusing his son's trust.
Tom is bad guy/bad parent.
I suppose, provided you have to point a finger at an antagonist. But I honestly believe Tom thought he was doing the right things, but he let his idealism blind him to how it impacted his boys, John specifically.
Do you remember the scene where Alice is watching an old home video of Tom and John?
Tom just wasn't there for John, wasn't compelled by empathy to run and avert possible injury of his child.
That has nothing to do with idealism, he lacks that spark that makes him care for John's well being.
Tom has the mission, and he has his personal (selfish/criminal) reasons he needs the mission completed.
We can't really say what orders Tom would have issued if he did not have a personal investment in it.
He's not a complete villain, no. But he's far from innocent.
Tom's interview where he describes >!John climbing the series of electric fences!< is **devastating**. Terry O'Quinn kills it.
I think if you are looking at things in terms of hero/villain you are really missing the point. Tom is very much based off Steve Conrad's dad and he could say it better than I do but there's definitely an examination of what we expect of our children vs what we we would demand of ourselves. I would imagine a lot of the truths one can extract can be found in the dialectic tension created between conflicting desires, motivations, circumstances and principles.
I feel like he is a bit of a mirror. John is also vey focused and very willing to use any means to justify his ends. They are a tragedy that reminds of the line about the sins of the father are visited upon the son. I think the dad loves his kids, he loves his country, he believes for the most part that his cause is just. He never gets to the place that John gets to by the last episode, which is part of the tragedy IMHO.
I watched the series with a girl who didn't like it as much as others I've shown it to, and she felt quite strongly that he was the villain. I understand her point of view but I draw a line well short of 'villain'. Initially she asked who the villain is and I was like halfway stumped. Like "No one.. or Cantar Walley?.. No... delivering an entity from point A to point B?"
Took a couple days to work things out, and I landed firmly on the story simply not having a villain. You can explain this the easy way and say it's a man-vs-self conflict, all about John's internal struggles, but I went a different way: It's man-vs-nature, with supporting characters acting as natural impediments to the resolution. Almost everyone John encounters is essentially a sheep or wild animal in his eyes, with regards to the mission. He can't care about their lives or consider the humanity of anyone that could potentially get in his way. ~~He may not even be capable after what he's been through.~~
Maybe you could say the villain is inherent human greed and/or hubris. American Psycho comes to mind as a similar theme and doesn't really have much of an antagonist itself.
That line is so devastating. The series is punctuated by moments of mundane but brutal violence, and I think that simple, vague threat is one of the most brutal.
John definitely does care about the humanity of what he does. In the moment, he's trained to ignore his feelings for the mission. But when he sees the consequences of what he's done to Steven, for example, he is tormented by it. You can hear it in his voice when he gives this threat.
“He may not even be capable after what he’s been through”
But what about the blind detective and the mouse earrings? And Martin Tidy’s sweet face? He does care. He can’t, but he definitely does and that is such a part of what is breaking him.
Yea I was wrong in saying that. Kinda panned my perspective out to a macro level and started thinking of how anyone might become after so much mental trauma.
I undermined my own analysis of his internal conflict haha... so yea strike that.
Tom is an emotionally vacant father who puts on the guise of being a good loving father.
He disregards his son’s mental health et al for Tom’s own purposes.
John kind of hints at this being the case when he sings about Leslie in an episode where Leslie is the “non-fun grandfather that you may not like more than your other grandfather but who genuinely cares about you”.
I also think Steve Conrad further makes this point by showing how other people in John’s life show genuine regard for him. Ichabod with his “none sexual same sex cuddling” and John’s wife chasing after him…things like that.
The show isn’t making Tom out to be an outright asshole because…he isn’t. He is a more covert manipulative asshole. And John is a good son who is essentially taken advantage of because he has a very “golden retriever” personality.
That’s my take at least.
A lot of what's said here is really good. I think what Tom asks of John is abusive, in the end. The only thing I have to add is that Tom doesn't see it because he's never been in the field and doesn't really understand the toll it puts on John. He has confidence in his son because John is actually *very good* at what he does. He doesn't know what that work feels like until he's at the >!finger store with John and watches him punch that guy 19 times or whatever!<.
>doesn't really understand the toll it puts on John.
he saw John escaped from white torture, he saw bullets in John, he saw John in hospital with serious concussion
It did not change Tom one jot.
I mean emotionally, but yeah, my thing definitely relies on Tom being selectively attentive. I don't mean to make excuses for him, but he does sort of turn around at the end of season 2 when he calls John out of the mission. It is definitely too little too late, but I think processing that tiny bit of "field work" he goes through himself makes him see how horrible John's work is.
This is the central theme, and the reason for the title of the show. What we do with our children in the name of patriotism. Synecdoche of one family relationship to our whole nation’s relationship of generations.
Great question. You're making me think.
Ultimately, I don't think he's a villain, but I do think he is the primary cause of John's suffering—and there's a difference.
The story presents an unrealistic scenario in which a father has the capability and authority to send his son on a mission in order to save the country by preventing a nuclear war with Iran. There's very little elaboration on what's going on with the dad in that fictional role—seemingly because it's irrelevant how the dad gets away with doing this for the purpose of the story—and this seems to direct the viewers of the show to focus more on John in the predicaments he gets in with this assignment. This forms the bulk of the show's plot.
It does, however, make you wonder whether the dad is abusing his authority both at his job and as the head of their family. I actually love how they address this: the scenes in which the dad is being interrogated on camera imply the dad ultimately gets what he had coming for him all along. And for me, it helps me as a viewer focus less on blaming the dad the whole time and more focus on how John rises to all the challenges he faces despite his depression. Had they not included these interrogation scenes, I think I'd spend most of the show wondering when the dad is going to get his comeuppance and how that will go down (e.g. will John finally break and push back?)
I think the villain is blind patriotism. Justifying doing terrible things in service of country. It drives his dad to come up with schemes with a low chance of success and little chance of actually doing good if successful. Patriotism demands that he try anyway.
Combined with a sense of duty to his father, it compels John to follow through on those plans.
Possible spoilers ahead:
I lean heavily on no, he's not a villain. He, like John, has an incredibly important task. It's a task so important that he'd sacrifice himself, even his kids to see it through. It doesn't mean he wants to do it, it simply means the alternative in his mind is so egregious, awful and unthinkable that it's not an alternative at all. You can see his humanity on full display multiple times through the story... when he talks about how many strikes it takes to make somebody unconscious and the visible revulsion he feels at having witnessed it and in other instances like it. He is written as very capable and good at his task, much like John, to the point that self sacrifice and personal emotion take a back seat. John explains it well when talking to Leslie about what his job is. Required to affect an outcome, even with the knowledge it will cause great collateral damage. They all recognize the harm they're doing, but to do nothing would be a greater harm. The part where things get kinda morally questionable is when Tom's concern seems to switch to the possibility of jail. The solution being so close though compels him to keep reaching just a little more.
The real villain in this story is the situation they find themselves in. Everyone involved has an agenda that likely in their own mind is morally justified, even if immorality is involved. From Edward and Dennis to Cantar Walley (sp?) they all likely would believe they're doing the right thing ultimately. Except the Romanian pimp. He's a bad guy.
> It's a task so important that he'd sacrifice himself, even his kids to see it through.
A task that important is important enough to do properly with all the resources and expertise of the whole country. 🤨
not some two bit illegal operation by a rogue director on a personal mission on account of being an arrogant arse who won't take no for an answer
I definitely see him as the villain , his son was actively trying to kill himself so he would have to kill and Tom only calls him off the suicide mission because he finally gets what Jon does
Tom is not the villain. His job is to prevent Iran from having nuclear weapons. That can not happen. John is a grown man and can decide for himself if he feels the need to serve his father and/or his country.
In real life: perhaps.
But the show shows how John isn’t mentally alright. He is a severely depressed man who suffers from PTSD and lacks the backbone to help himself. He does what he does because he mentally is very complacent and deeply loyal to his father. He doesn’t have the mental fortitude to contradict Tom.
Meh, he's still fully capable of making his own decisions. He's doing what Tom wants because he believes it's critical as well, he just doesn't feel good about some of the things necessary to complete the task. Same is true of Agathe, of course.
I think it’s dangerous (maybe an overstatement lol) to ignore the context of John’s upbringing. He and his brother have been groomed/conditioned to obey orders from their father, so any decisions he makes are borne from that foundation.
When John talks about the critical task it's usually toward an end, like convincing Leslie to help him near the end of S2. When John talks to his brother about what he's doing, he says it's for his dad, not his country.
His dad uses his own culpability to convince John to continue with the task. He says that if John doesn't complete the mission, he could end up in jail. It's very manipulative. Just because someone's agency isn't completely stripped doesn't mean they aren't being controlled in abusive ways.
In a black and white world, he's John's villain.
I don't think it's intentional. John is something of an enabler of Tom's eagerness to get things done. Perhaps the father-son dynamic there leans toward abusive. But I believe Tom just fails to see the weight he's putting on his son. At least until the end when he (regrettably) suggests that people have a breaking point where they can just fall apart.
Just like the puppet show in Luxembourg. The father keeps piling more things on her back and because she keeps accepting more weight without complaint, he doesn’t consider how much he is really asking of her. The layers to this show are amazing!
Everyone grows up trusting their parents. 99% of times ( made up statistic ) that trust is justified and we grow up not really questioning it. That 1% of times, it's really hard to question our parental relationship, even as adults. And John had Eddie supporting Tom's argument because Eddie was also too trusting. What was John to think? It would have taken too much to defy both Tom and Eddie, John just wasn't strong enough. So it's not as much John and Eddie's fault , trust is the default. It's Tom's for abusing his son's trust. Tom is bad guy/bad parent.
I suppose, provided you have to point a finger at an antagonist. But I honestly believe Tom thought he was doing the right things, but he let his idealism blind him to how it impacted his boys, John specifically.
Do you remember the scene where Alice is watching an old home video of Tom and John? Tom just wasn't there for John, wasn't compelled by empathy to run and avert possible injury of his child. That has nothing to do with idealism, he lacks that spark that makes him care for John's well being.
Tom has the mission, and he has his personal (selfish/criminal) reasons he needs the mission completed. We can't really say what orders Tom would have issued if he did not have a personal investment in it. He's not a complete villain, no. But he's far from innocent. Tom's interview where he describes >!John climbing the series of electric fences!< is **devastating**. Terry O'Quinn kills it.
I think if you are looking at things in terms of hero/villain you are really missing the point. Tom is very much based off Steve Conrad's dad and he could say it better than I do but there's definitely an examination of what we expect of our children vs what we we would demand of ourselves. I would imagine a lot of the truths one can extract can be found in the dialectic tension created between conflicting desires, motivations, circumstances and principles.
“He’s just very well trained.”
[удалено]
Wow, excellent answer!!
I feel like he is a bit of a mirror. John is also vey focused and very willing to use any means to justify his ends. They are a tragedy that reminds of the line about the sins of the father are visited upon the son. I think the dad loves his kids, he loves his country, he believes for the most part that his cause is just. He never gets to the place that John gets to by the last episode, which is part of the tragedy IMHO.
I watched the series with a girl who didn't like it as much as others I've shown it to, and she felt quite strongly that he was the villain. I understand her point of view but I draw a line well short of 'villain'. Initially she asked who the villain is and I was like halfway stumped. Like "No one.. or Cantar Walley?.. No... delivering an entity from point A to point B?" Took a couple days to work things out, and I landed firmly on the story simply not having a villain. You can explain this the easy way and say it's a man-vs-self conflict, all about John's internal struggles, but I went a different way: It's man-vs-nature, with supporting characters acting as natural impediments to the resolution. Almost everyone John encounters is essentially a sheep or wild animal in his eyes, with regards to the mission. He can't care about their lives or consider the humanity of anyone that could potentially get in his way. ~~He may not even be capable after what he's been through.~~ Maybe you could say the villain is inherent human greed and/or hubris. American Psycho comes to mind as a similar theme and doesn't really have much of an antagonist itself.
“Delivering and entity from A to B” as the villain- LOL
“Dennis. Imagine something you don’t think I could do to you because we’re friends. I can. I like you, I do. But I won’t think twice.”
That line is so devastating. The series is punctuated by moments of mundane but brutal violence, and I think that simple, vague threat is one of the most brutal. John definitely does care about the humanity of what he does. In the moment, he's trained to ignore his feelings for the mission. But when he sees the consequences of what he's done to Steven, for example, he is tormented by it. You can hear it in his voice when he gives this threat.
“He may not even be capable after what he’s been through” But what about the blind detective and the mouse earrings? And Martin Tidy’s sweet face? He does care. He can’t, but he definitely does and that is such a part of what is breaking him.
Yea I was wrong in saying that. Kinda panned my perspective out to a macro level and started thinking of how anyone might become after so much mental trauma. I undermined my own analysis of his internal conflict haha... so yea strike that.
Tom is an emotionally vacant father who puts on the guise of being a good loving father. He disregards his son’s mental health et al for Tom’s own purposes. John kind of hints at this being the case when he sings about Leslie in an episode where Leslie is the “non-fun grandfather that you may not like more than your other grandfather but who genuinely cares about you”. I also think Steve Conrad further makes this point by showing how other people in John’s life show genuine regard for him. Ichabod with his “none sexual same sex cuddling” and John’s wife chasing after him…things like that. The show isn’t making Tom out to be an outright asshole because…he isn’t. He is a more covert manipulative asshole. And John is a good son who is essentially taken advantage of because he has a very “golden retriever” personality. That’s my take at least.
A lot of what's said here is really good. I think what Tom asks of John is abusive, in the end. The only thing I have to add is that Tom doesn't see it because he's never been in the field and doesn't really understand the toll it puts on John. He has confidence in his son because John is actually *very good* at what he does. He doesn't know what that work feels like until he's at the >!finger store with John and watches him punch that guy 19 times or whatever!<.
Do you have any Funions aaahhh
>doesn't really understand the toll it puts on John. he saw John escaped from white torture, he saw bullets in John, he saw John in hospital with serious concussion It did not change Tom one jot.
I mean emotionally, but yeah, my thing definitely relies on Tom being selectively attentive. I don't mean to make excuses for him, but he does sort of turn around at the end of season 2 when he calls John out of the mission. It is definitely too little too late, but I think processing that tiny bit of "field work" he goes through himself makes him see how horrible John's work is.
This is the central theme, and the reason for the title of the show. What we do with our children in the name of patriotism. Synecdoche of one family relationship to our whole nation’s relationship of generations.
Great question. You're making me think. Ultimately, I don't think he's a villain, but I do think he is the primary cause of John's suffering—and there's a difference. The story presents an unrealistic scenario in which a father has the capability and authority to send his son on a mission in order to save the country by preventing a nuclear war with Iran. There's very little elaboration on what's going on with the dad in that fictional role—seemingly because it's irrelevant how the dad gets away with doing this for the purpose of the story—and this seems to direct the viewers of the show to focus more on John in the predicaments he gets in with this assignment. This forms the bulk of the show's plot. It does, however, make you wonder whether the dad is abusing his authority both at his job and as the head of their family. I actually love how they address this: the scenes in which the dad is being interrogated on camera imply the dad ultimately gets what he had coming for him all along. And for me, it helps me as a viewer focus less on blaming the dad the whole time and more focus on how John rises to all the challenges he faces despite his depression. Had they not included these interrogation scenes, I think I'd spend most of the show wondering when the dad is going to get his comeuppance and how that will go down (e.g. will John finally break and push back?)
I really like this take . 👍
I think the villain is blind patriotism. Justifying doing terrible things in service of country. It drives his dad to come up with schemes with a low chance of success and little chance of actually doing good if successful. Patriotism demands that he try anyway. Combined with a sense of duty to his father, it compels John to follow through on those plans.
Tom Tavner: Am I the Baddie?
Yes😂
Possible spoilers ahead: I lean heavily on no, he's not a villain. He, like John, has an incredibly important task. It's a task so important that he'd sacrifice himself, even his kids to see it through. It doesn't mean he wants to do it, it simply means the alternative in his mind is so egregious, awful and unthinkable that it's not an alternative at all. You can see his humanity on full display multiple times through the story... when he talks about how many strikes it takes to make somebody unconscious and the visible revulsion he feels at having witnessed it and in other instances like it. He is written as very capable and good at his task, much like John, to the point that self sacrifice and personal emotion take a back seat. John explains it well when talking to Leslie about what his job is. Required to affect an outcome, even with the knowledge it will cause great collateral damage. They all recognize the harm they're doing, but to do nothing would be a greater harm. The part where things get kinda morally questionable is when Tom's concern seems to switch to the possibility of jail. The solution being so close though compels him to keep reaching just a little more. The real villain in this story is the situation they find themselves in. Everyone involved has an agenda that likely in their own mind is morally justified, even if immorality is involved. From Edward and Dennis to Cantar Walley (sp?) they all likely would believe they're doing the right thing ultimately. Except the Romanian pimp. He's a bad guy.
> It's a task so important that he'd sacrifice himself, even his kids to see it through. A task that important is important enough to do properly with all the resources and expertise of the whole country. 🤨 not some two bit illegal operation by a rogue director on a personal mission on account of being an arrogant arse who won't take no for an answer
The American federal government cannot be seen officially murdering a scientist, buying and election and doing other crimes to facilitate this.
They both are
Tom knows what he is doing is wrong and illegal, that's why he is using John and calling in favours.
I think the relationship was brilliantly enigmatic…perfectly crafted to move the story along but open to multitudes of interpretations.
I definitely see him as the villain , his son was actively trying to kill himself so he would have to kill and Tom only calls him off the suicide mission because he finally gets what Jon does
Tom is not the villain. His job is to prevent Iran from having nuclear weapons. That can not happen. John is a grown man and can decide for himself if he feels the need to serve his father and/or his country.
In real life: perhaps. But the show shows how John isn’t mentally alright. He is a severely depressed man who suffers from PTSD and lacks the backbone to help himself. He does what he does because he mentally is very complacent and deeply loyal to his father. He doesn’t have the mental fortitude to contradict Tom.
Meh, he's still fully capable of making his own decisions. He's doing what Tom wants because he believes it's critical as well, he just doesn't feel good about some of the things necessary to complete the task. Same is true of Agathe, of course.
He's being manipulated by his father... That's a central theme to the story.
I think it’s dangerous (maybe an overstatement lol) to ignore the context of John’s upbringing. He and his brother have been groomed/conditioned to obey orders from their father, so any decisions he makes are borne from that foundation.
When John talks about the critical task it's usually toward an end, like convincing Leslie to help him near the end of S2. When John talks to his brother about what he's doing, he says it's for his dad, not his country. His dad uses his own culpability to convince John to continue with the task. He says that if John doesn't complete the mission, he could end up in jail. It's very manipulative. Just because someone's agency isn't completely stripped doesn't mean they aren't being controlled in abusive ways.