Peacock’s new period spy drama Ponies isn’t exactly convincing, so won’t be a perfect fit for certain “serious” aficionados of the genre. But it fills its niche nicely, a colorful, polished, and entertaining adventure that sifts situational comedy into its staid genre tropes. The result is a refreshing, feminist buddy comedy.
In the show’s spy lingo, “ponies” are “persons of no interest,” which is the nomeclature used to describe its unlikely protagonist duo, Beatrice Grant (Emilia Clarke) and Twila Hasbeck (Haley Lu Richardson). In mid-1970s Moscow, the two women are the wives of CIA officers Chris (Louis Boyer) and Tom (John Macmillan). Bea has a secretarial job at the U.S. Embassy, while Twila is a kooky layabout, but their lives are turned upside when Chris and Tom suddenly perish in a plane crash. Initially sent back to the States, Bea and Twila ultimately reconnect to learn more about the mysterious circumstances that took their partners. To that end, they corner the Moscow head of station, Dane Walter (Adrian Lester), and volunteer to go back to the Russia. The idea? They’ll step into their husbands’ shoes, serving as clandestine assets. They may be untrained and inexperienced, but they’re motivated, Bea speaks fluent Russian, Twila is recklessly fearless, and they’re both “ponies,” which makes them unlikely to attract KGB surveillance. Reluctantly, Dane greenlights their recruitment, bringing them back to Moscow under ambassadorial cover. Their mission thrusts Bea into a flirtation with local asset Sasha (Petro Ninovskyi), pits them against ambitious KGB officer Andrei Vasiliev (Artjom Gilz), and embroils them in a dangerous web of intrigue. Developing under fire, their odd-couple friendship places them on a collision course with their pasts, even as they attempt to chart a new path forward in their lives.
Ponies was created by Susanna Fogel, who delivered a similar vibe in The Spy Who Dumped Me. That film, benefiting from the comic chemistry of Mila Kunis and Kate McKinnon, managed to make sense of the tonal clash at its core: that its deadly serious scenario was invaded by a pair of clueless, zany fish out of water. Ponies may take itself a little to seriously to pull of the same trick quite as deftly, so the plot machinations feel more and more unrealistic with each twist. But with Bea and Twila, it has a similarly winning friendship, with Clarke especially good selling Bea’s resourceful, more buttoned-down heroism, while Richardson mugs playfully as the fearless, free-spirited Twila. Clarke and Ninovskyi have genuine onscreen chemistry, Gilz makes for a formidable antagonist, and Lester deadpans Naked Gun-style through both his unlikely mentorship of the assets and the darker elements of his character. The suspension of disbelief requires a bridge twice the length of the Golden Gate, especially given how the premise of the show is undermined by how conspicuous its plot increasingly makes the heroes. However, since the show’s focus is more about the emotional details — the people, the era, the relationships, the sociopolitics — it’s easy enough to deactivate that inner spy-genre critic and accept the unlikely framework for what it is: a colorful, enjoyable field upon which to maneuver the players. In the end, this isn’t top-tier TV for me, but its Minx-like period stylings and likable central partnership make it well worth watching for those in search of an energetic diversion.
