Ponies Recap Season 1 Episode 2 ‘Hanging on the Telephone’: Honey Trap

What do we know so far about Andrei Vasiliev? Well, he seemed to be a high ranking KGB officer. He had a table at that pub that Twila figured was important because it had, on its window, an illustration of a winged horse on top of the world – the very words someone had written on a card Bea found in her husband Chris’s jacket. He was a killer; he likely killed that British agent in the first episode, and here he strangled and stabbed the woman he sent to honey trap a Coca Cola executive, George Tallman. Dane Walter could not have known that Bea’s chance encounter with him at the pub where she met CK Solar, also known as Sasha, would lead to an interest from Andrei toward a woman he knew as Nadiya the schoolteacher. But, a cover needed to be thorough, and when the paper trail he laid out for Bea’s alias that included a phone number led to Andrei reaching out and asking for a date, well, the intelligence agent in Walter has got to be pleased. Bea, however, more civilian than spy at this point, was rightfully freaked out. I can’t judge Walter for doing his job here, but when Bush said last episode that they were sending these girls to their deaths, that seemed almost prophetic now that Bea was in the radar of a known killer.

Let’s back up a bit. Bea and Twila’s first mission as spies got off to a rough start when Andrei walked into the pub where Bea and Sasha were meeting. Twila tried to warn Bea, but it was too late. With no other way out of there, Twila walked in, used a lighter to start a fire in the bar, which led to one of the patrons’ coats catching fire. Andrei tried to get Bea to leave with him out the back door, but Bea ran to the front and got away with Twila. Walter decided that they needed training which, well, Walter really should have thought of this before sending them in without backup. Perhaps Walter was testing them?

Walter introduced Bea’s training officer as Emile, supposedly from French intelligence, but this cover did not even last a minute when Bea switched to French and he could not respond in kind. Emile took Bea to an apartment complex, gave her a gun, and told her to enter one of the flats – which turned out to be Sasha’s. I appreciate that the show was not content with us viewers knowing Sasha was cute, we had to have confirmation that he was hot, too, but the purpose of making Bea break into his flat was not yet clear. It was only the overflowing bathwater that saved Bea from getting found by Sasha, and she had to jump from his balcony and into a garbage bin to escape. 

Twila, on the other hand, was worried over why only Bea was given a training officer. She told Walter that she would rather die in Russia than go back to the US. Walter told her that whilst Bea was emotional and needed to shut her emotions off, Twila needed to open up and find her soft side. She had good instincts, but no one liked her. Her training, according to Walter, was to make her boss Shep’s friend George Tallman like her.

Because Twila was not exactly paying attention to office things, Cheryl had to bring her the cash she needed to pay for dinner with George. When Cheryl spotted that George was not unattractive, she decided to stay. Twila did not hide her dislike of Cheryl, and with her at the lavatory, she and George had a quick bonding conversation. Like George, her husband was a pilot. Twila co-opted Bea and Chris’s love story, and told George that she and Tom met whilst she was at Wellesley and he was at Harvard. George liked Twila, which so amazed her, as she told Bea the next day.

But, Bea wanted to go home to the US. She was frightened. She said that Chris would not have wanted her to die trying to find out how he died. Twila, however, convinced her to do one more assignment, one dead drop.

The book that Bea handed Sasha in the pub contained not just a page with instructions (Sasha swallowed this), but also, a hidden compartment with a small camera. Sasha used this to take photos of what looked like plans whilst he was at work, then left the camera at a towel bin in a bathhouse for men. Bea had to interrupt Twila’s second night out with George (they went to a night club recommended by the girl at the market) and left him with Cheryl.

The camera, however, did not work, and Walter sent Twila (to notify Sasha of the meet) and Bea back in to give Sasha a second camera. Bea gave Sasha the new camera and updated instructions, then asked him if he ever met someone else at the pub. She described Chris, the other man must have been Tom, but she was surprised when Sasha mentioned a woman. Their conversation had to end when a couple of policemen walked by. Sasha mentioned how someone was at his flat the other night, and that he could not do this unless he was protected. 

Back in their building, Twila told Bea how she found a tape in her apartment that could either be broadcasting a code, or someone making someone think that Tom was broadcasting flight plans. Twila already got George, a licensed pilot, to tell Bea that every flight had a paper trail. Between the two women, Bea has been the one more outwardly interested in finding out what happened to their husbands; perhaps Twila wanted to know, too, or she was finding out a way to persuade Bea to stay in Moscow, fully aware that her current assignment was contingent on being Bea’s partner in espionage. Whatever her primary motivation was, Bea had already decided to stay. When Andrei called for a date, she said yes.

Rating: A-

Strays

🐎Emilia Clarke spoke High Valyrian and Dothraki in Game of Thrones, and here so far we have heard her speak Russian and French. Our multilingual queen. 

🐎CK Solar/ Sasha was Snowshoe’s recruit. Tom and a yet to be identified woman met with him at a pub. Chris whispered something to him before they left.

🐎After the fire at the pub, Andre stopped Sasha and checked his ID.

🐎With Twila’s prodding, George said that he has gone on spontaneous flights, but at some point, you need to broadcast your plans – to land, you need lighting, runways, a place to put the plane. These were basic information that Twila and Bea could follow to investigate the alleged plane crash that killed their husbands.  

🐎George initially refused the lady Sveta’s offer to dine with him, but they ended up in bed together. There was a camera in the clock in his room. Somewhere, there was a man watching multiple cameras, all of them of couples in compromising positions. In the same office, there were men loading boxes into a truck.

Episode Title: Hanging on the Telephone

Episode Writers: Susanna Fogel and David Iserson

Episode Director: Susanna Fogel

Original Release Date: January 15, 2026

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