Copyright The Daily Beast
(Warning: Spoilers ahead.) Even Alex Levy (Jennifer Aniston) knows how preposterous the events of the penultimate episode of The Morning Show’s fourth season are. Making a secret deal with an ex-boyfriend and a sanctioned Russian oligarch to save a frenemy coworker from a Minsk jail sounds like TV Mad Libs. Throwing in a night at the opera as the choice of setting for the clandestine negotiation only adds to the outlandish scenario. It is also The Morning Show at its most chaotically entertaining. Let this show cook! There is never a dull moment on the Apple TV drama, what with corporate coverups, confessions, public breakdowns, and Oscar-winning actors cranking up the villain dial to max (looking at you, Marion Cotillard). After last week’s more sedate outing focused on Alex and Cory’s (Billy Crudup) parental traumas—highlighting that TMS can sell raw emotions too—it is back to the silly and sublime with a dollop of a precarious international incident thrown into the mix. All season long, Bradley Jackson (Reese Witherspoon) has been investigating whether UBA (now UBN) knowingly buried a story about a chemical company contamination that led to multiple deaths. Work relationships have been destroyed, including Yanko (Nestor Carbonell) telling Bradley he would never sit next to her on TMS again. Be careful what you wish for, Yanko, because Bradley has been detained at an airport in Minsk after meeting with a whistleblower. Securing Bradley’s release before she gets charged with a crime is imperative—as we are reminded multiple times—and putting a ticking clock on this task is the cherry on top of a top-tier TMS crisis. I love nothing more than a race against time with a covert operation thrown into the mix. Alex will do anything to get Bradley back because she blames herself for this situation. Alex should feel partially responsible because she refused to sign the paperwork that would give Bradley safe passage—Bradley shouldn’t have gone on this trip without this, so she is also at fault. Fueled by guilt, Alex becomes extra jumpy, but Aniston still works her A-plus comedy timing when she realizes who possesses the get-out-of-jail-free card. Sometimes the TMS plotting requires characters to lose all their intelligence. Case in point, when Chip (Mark Duplass) ponders aloud to Alex who they could turn to to interface with a power broker in Minsk. Of course, there is one very obvious answer, but it requires Alex to say “F--- me” when she remembers who has business dealings with oligarchs. Enter Paul Marks (Jon Hamm). Alas, he cannot get involved because the U.S. government has sanctioned the man they need. Paul thinks Bradley will be fine; she is an on-air talent and has the backing of Celine Dumont’s (Cottilard) powerful family. Little do they know that Celine would like nothing more than for Bradley to rot in a foreign prison. After getting pummeled in the face by apocalyptically bad TV writing last week, it is a joy to watch a series that knows how and when to go heavy on exposition dumps. Alex spells out that the professionals are not handling it, so she has to go through this personal humiliation with her ex to get s--t done. Of course, Paul ignores the advice of his chief of staff, Amanda (Tig Notaro), not to get involved with Alex’s amateur John le Carré scheme because Paul is not like those other tech bros. He is a tech bro with a heart. Or at least this is the case with Alex. Paul provides a helpful rundown of Dimitri Ivanov (Costa Ronin), including how to woo the billionaire. Important things to note: He is a piece of work, has real influence in Minsk, had a big deal that fell through (we already know this, but repeating this info emphasizes its significance), his Russian mistress is an actress whose show is on permanent hiatus due to the war, and he loves Puccini. “As it so happens, an acclaimed soprano is doing a series of recitals here in New York,” says Paul. You don’t say! Hamm being able to say this with a straight face and 100 percent sincerity is why he has an Emmy; I burst out laughing that the creative arts stars had aligned for this unique set of circumstances. The whole operation is top secret because what they are doing is, at the bare minimum, a PR disaster, so Alex and Paul sit in boxes on either side of the stage. Mia (Karen Pittman), who is brought into the fold by Chip—the smartest thing he did all episode—is Alex’s equally glamorous date. Everything about this scenario is screaming James Bond or Mission: Impossible (minus the guns, gadgets, and lifelike mask technology). Bathing the audience in red light really cranks up the tension, as does the eye-banging between Paul and Alex. However, there are more pressing issues than their libidos, and Ivanov finally arrives. Casting an actor from The Americans as Ivanov also adds to the spy atmosphere, even if nothing else matches the FX spy series—Elizabeth Jennings would never. Considering that no one can know what they are doing, it is incredibly sloppy that they stand chatting with Ivanov for several minutes within view of the entire audience. Ain’t no way someone isn’t snapping a pic of Alex with her ex, then sending it to Page Six. While Alex and Paul make poor covert operatives, Mia is a surveillance MVP, eavesdropping on Ivanov (she can understand Russian) and clocking that Ivanov can assist their Bradley scheme—despite his claims to the contrary. It all goes back to AI, if you’re wondering who the real villain is this season (okay, Celine owns that title, but AI is a close second). Alex wants to find a workaround to license Paul’s software for UBN, which is entirely plausible, given that Stella’s AI project flamed out very publicly. The plan is going to work because no one inside Paul’s operation will alert Celine, right?
