On the court in 2017, the new cold war is in full swing. While the West it wins. Us sanctions to ruin Russia. However, the case takes an unexpected turn. The Russians have developed a new technology of gas production that can provide them with the economic recovery and to hit the positions of the West. In this regard, the CIA sends the President Donald Trump a letter, which sets out a cunning plan. It’s going to immediately send to Russia one of his best spies to ferret out the details.
So begins “Adaptation” is the story of Menchov Oleg, the hapless but perfectly speak Russian American spy (played by famous Russian actor Leonid Bichevin), sent to infiltrate the Russian state gas company Gazprom. It is poorly understood in Russian life, so he has to go to understand the local formations, in particular in endemic Russian corruption — that
very amused by his supposed compatriots.
The TV series, which coincided with the increasing tension in us-Russian relations, calling the talk of a new cold war, has quickly become a hit. His first season ended this month, delighted the audience and received excellent press. As reported by the TNT channel on which it is broadcast, watched it in Russia every seventh. Russians call the “Adaptation” with his answer “Americans”. The truth is “Americans” built on farce, satire and stereotypes (both Russian and American). Each episode begins theme music from films about James bond. In the Intro Oleg, gun at the ready steals for mount Rushmore, the White house is transformed into an Orthodox Cathedral with three domes, and the bald eagle from the coat of arms of the CIA becoming a Russian double-headed eagle.
The story of the Russian triumph over well-meaning, but limited Americans, like the Russian public, enjoying military success in Syria and difficulties in administration of the tramp, which is buried in Russia-related scandals. The first two episodes of “Adaptation” has overtaken competitors from other channels on views from 20 to 21 hours on weekdays — that is, in Prime time, ‘ says the chief piarschitsa TNT Julia Talanova.
The subtext of “Adaptation” is quite obvious: the Russian power based on the rich natural resources of Russia. Oleg sent to the cold of the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug, located in the world’s largest oil-bearing basin of the city of Noyabrsk. There he began to work in Gazprom, which may well be considered a continuation of the Russian state. Tower of Gazprom in Noyabrsk is a giant maze with shiny elevators and a variety of portraits of President Vladimir Putin in different moments of life. (It should be noted that the TNT channel owned by “Gazprom-Media” media unit, a gas colossus.)
With all the admiration of the Russian victories and mysterious realm of the gas companies, intelligence and counterintelligence “Adaptation” (this name can also be translated as “Integration”) — is, ultimately, a story about the collision of two worlds, making fun of both Russia and the United States. See, as an honest and simple-minded Texan trying to settle down in a cynical, harsh and untamed Russia really funny.
The jokes in the series usually beat the stereotypes. Russian characters, including women, always ready to drink — even from a lid of a thermos.
Men in Russia are aggressive and fight a lot, women are voluptuous and seductive, and spies I love chess. The Western characters to the naivety of the politically correct. When Marina, next girlfriend Oleg begins to flirt with him, he’s trying to get rid of her, saying that he’s gay. “Maybe you just neat?” — a serious tone she says. On his American face emerges puzzled expression. A visitor from America is depicted brandishing a Bible a pastor in a baseball cap with the words “Stop racism.” No cost business and no joke the former President Barack Obama.
Chiefs Oleg CIA played in two TV series an American actor. “My agent was supposed to be human and somewhat comical, not formulaic tough scout,” says Peter Jacobson’s (Peter Jacobson), known to American audiences for “Dr. house”. (Jacobson also played a CIA agent in the fourth series of “American”.) His character, Doyle Brunson, tired from work and wants to go with his family to Hawaii at the time, as his Russian colleagues, in contrast, are enjoying their espionage activities and enthusiastically do it. Although Brunson does not know Russian from the very beginning are on the trail of Oleg. He barely avoids being caught, and the tension continues to build.
TNT claims that his show is not a remake of “Americans”, but many of the moves he’s clearly borrowed. At the end of the first episode, Oleg learns that his new Russian friend, an officer of the FSB, the successor to the KGB (in the pilot episode of “the Americans” couple of Soviet spies realizes that their neighbor Stan works for the FBI). As in “Americans”, we see Shakespeare’s double dressing: Russian, pretending to be Americans pretending to be Russian. (Bichevin, who had never been in the United States, however, speaks better English than actors in “the Americans” in Russian).
“Adaptation” continues a series of cultural artifacts that shed light on how they look, from the Russian point of view, talk of a “new cold war”. Basically, they, of course, draw a simple picture with a sinister West and the newly emerging Russia. Well-known journalist Igor Prokopenko in his book “the Confrontation with America,” compares the United States with the Soviet Union and writes that the American prison system is not inferior to Soviet camps. “[Americans] are accustomed to have in their own country of real rights. They try to teach us tolerance!” — he resents. In the new detective and former KGB agent Alexander Polukhov called “Kremlin endgame” US intelligence and Saudi Arabia are plotting against Russia and its President, able to bring down the world order. Fortunately for all of us makes a world of a terminally ill Russian spy.
In “Adaptation” a lot realistic (Russia is a harsh place with corrupt officials) and autopanogiga. However, this does not prevent her to be sort of a lightweight form of propaganda — and its serious message is very close to the surface. “Ridiculing the sanctions, the series shows how powerful the Russians want to look like. In fact, it follows the propaganda line,” says Russian journalist Alexei Kovalev, the founder engaged in media monitoring site “Lapshennikova”.
Although Putin would have welcomed the lifting of the sanctions imposed three years ago by the United States and the European Union in connection with the involvement of the Kremlin to the Ukrainian crisis, some Russian officials argue that the current situation is to the benefit of Russian business. However, in reality, the sanctions have led to a number of projects for exploration and production of oil and gas — including an ambitious plan for oil production on the Arctic shelf jointly with ExxonMobil.
Often “Adapting” paint too rosy a picture of life in Russia. In several episodes of the series featured the Nenets are nomadic animists for centuries lived in the region. Like all other characters of the series, they are shown almost caricatured shaman, strapaese hypnotics, reindeer, wailing fires. It is shown how the representatives of Gazprom successfully negotiate with the elders of the Nenets. It all looks very funny, but not true. The Germans for many years, complain that the tendency of Russian energy companies to mine on their lands oil and gas threatens their way of life. They argue that their interests are not taken into account when we are talking about large transactions.
However, the series to the end does not lose self-critical notes. In the last episode of the season, we learn that the identity and objectives of the Oleg was discovered. However, the head of the local branch of the FSB Evgeny Evdokimov, trying to deceive the Americans and to convince him that he can still get out, expresses a desire to work in Washington. Persuading Oleg, he quotes the Russian thinker of the early XX century (as in the text — approx. transl.) Nikolai Karamzin. “Asked how business in Russia, and he said one word, — says Oleg counterintelligence. — You know what? Steal”.
