PONIES Review: Spies Like Us, Coming in From the Cold

No, they are not slow horses, but two 'Persons of No Interest.'

PONIES
All eight episodes debut Thursday, January 15, exclusively on Peacock TV.

Apparently, it's always spy season on streaming services.

In recent times, Peacock TV debuted The Copenhagen Test at the end of December, followed by Apple TV unveiling Tehran, Season 3, for global audiences, and now Peacock TV returns with yet another spy series. Of course, this follows decades of spy shows on TV, dating back to the 1960s, following on the heels of the James Bond film series, which sparked decades of spy movies.

For streaming services, the appeal is that, even without a recognizable franchise, the sub-genre itself, mixing mystery, action, and suspense, is quite flexible, able to embrace various measures of comedy, romance, and even science fiction -- James Bond went to space in Moonraker (1979), after all -- as well as taking place in different periods of history. Based on its name alone, PONIES invites comparison to Apple TV's excellent spy series Slow Horses, and, as it happens, there is a similarity in its theme too, since no one in the British secret service (as a whole) expects anything out of the agents who are derisively called Slow Horses. Likewise, in PONIES, no one expects anything out of Bea (Emilia Clarke) and Twila (Haley Lu Richardson).

Bea and Twila are in Moscow in 1977 because they have accompanied their husbands, who work for the U.S. government. The highly-educated Bea is biding her time, having agreed to put her career on hold for a few years, in favor of her beloved husband's highly-secretive work. Then it'll be her turn to star. Recently arrived in Moscow, she is content to work as a secretary in the American Embassy and comfortably speak her native Russian in the streets of the city.

Hailing from Middle America, Twila is a more rough and tumble type of person. After numerous tours of duty in other countries, she has been in Russia for a few months. Yet, she is still unsettled, declining a job at the agency, and passing the time, rather aimlessly. She doesn't speak Russian and doesn't get along with her husband anymore, either, so when she meets Bea, it's 'hello and see you later,' in effect, as she wanders on her way to nowhere.

Before the first episode concludes, however, Bea and Twila are united in tragedy when they are informed by an embassy official, Dane (Adrian Lester), that their husbands have been killed in a plane crash. Both women know that their husbands were involved in covert operations for the CIA, without knowing any specifics. The more worldly and jaded Twila is not surprised that the agency declines to disclose any details about the death of their husbands, while the more trusting Bea is truly unsettled by the tragedy.

Returning to the U.S., they are expected to rebuild their lives and carry on. Yet Bea simply must know what happened to her beloved husband. She convinces Twila to go along with her to make their case to Dane and the CIA: they must get back in the U.S.S.R. in order to uncover the truth.

To accomplish their seemingly impossible mission, Bea and Twila accept what Dane offers: by day, working as secretaries at the American Embassy; by night, carrying out routine, minor tasks to help the CIA. The reasoning is that the Russians, who mistrust everyone, would never in a million years think that weak women would be used to do anything important.

Naturally, we expect the minor tasks to elevate steadily into much more perilous assignments because this is a spy series, and that's what they do.

Created by Susanna Fogel (The Flight Attendant, The Spy Who Dumped Me) and David Iserson (Mr. Robot, New Girl), who also wrote multiple episodes together, with Iserson and Mike Daniels serving as showrunners, PONIES quickly takes flight, initially due to the combustible chemistry between Emilia Clarke as Bea and Haley Lou Richardson as Twila, which soon develops into a trustworthy friendship that feels entirely authentic.

As a prototypical odd couple, Bea is neat and Twila is sloppy; Bea is cautious and Twila is fearless. They complement one another; as their trust in each other grows, that trust becomes something they have in common, along with their burning desire to take action, not just sit around and wait for someone else to tell them what to do. They laugh, they cry, they grieve, they bond, they kick butt.

Fogel creates a visual template in tone, pacing, and atmosphere by directing four episodes, while the other four are directed by Viet Nguyen and Ally Pankiw, keeping a similar style and pace. The show reflects, refracts, and refines two of Fogel's many credits: it's mysterious and slippery like The Flight Attendant and is also action-filled like The Spy Who Dumped Me, while tamping down the latter's silliness in favor of grounded, infrequent humor.

The series revolves around Clarke and Richardson, who consistently buoy the series with their good humor and clever actions, though attention must also be paid to Adrian Lester, who imbues the thankless role of a CIA station chief with polite, yet absolute authority, even when he has to deal with his outgoing boss, CIA head George Bush (Patrick Fabian in a funny take on the future U.S. President).

Easy to binge, PONIES only stumbles a bit in the rather rushed, overly busy concluding episode. Otherwise, it's an enjoyable trip back to a profanity-laced 1977 -- which is the only point that consistently reminded me that the writers were obviously born much later than the period depicted -- and a refreshing addition to the spy series canon.