PONIES TV Review: Emilia Clarke and Haley Lu Richardson are persons of no interest in this period thriller

Plot: Moscow, 1977. Two “PONIES” (“persons of no interest” in intelligence speak) work anonymously as secretaries in the American Embassy. That is, until their husbands are killed under mysterious circumstances in the USSR, and the pair become CIA operatives. Bea is an over-educated, Russian-speaking child of Soviet immigrants. Her cohort, Twila, is a small-town girl who is as abrasive as she is fearless. Together, they work to uncover a vast Cold War conspiracy and solve the mystery that led to their widows’ status in the first place.

Review: Before you groan about yet another spy show, I want you to give PONIES a shot. Set during the height of the Cold War, PONIES could have easily been a throwaway comedy or a lightweight time-waster. I went into the series expecting another formulaic espionage story, but found myself charmed by this series far more than I expected. Much of the credit goes to Emilia Clarke and Haley Lu Richardson, who play very different characters who share a Starsky & Hutch-type chemistry. Watching them portray women posing as secretaries to covertly perform missions for the CIA, Clarke and Richardson bring a sense of fun to the intense stakes of PONIES. With a solid supporting cast including Adrian Lester and Vic Michaelis, PONIES is a blast of Soviet-era entertainment.

Initially, PONIES evokes a Soviet-era variation on Mad Men. Bea (Emilia Clarke) and Twila (Haley Lu Richardson) meet in a market and discover they are both married to covert CIA agents working in Moscow. While Bea is college-educated and speaks fluent Russian, Twila is more street smart and unpolished compared to the other American wives working as secretaries. Very early, both women are informed by Dane Walter (Adrian Lester) that their husbands have died in a small plane crash, and the women return home to America. Not comfortable with the unknown, both Bea and Twila lobby Dane to become operatives in Moscow so they can try to discover what happened to their spouses. After lobbying, the CIA director, George H.W. Bush (Patrick Fabian), and the two women return to the U.S.S.R. and receive a crash course in how to be spies.

The eight-episode first season of PONIES is a well-crafted spy story that showcases how both Bea and Twila evolve in their friendship and as operatives in the complex and intricate world of the Cold War. The pair works together and on their own throughout the season to utilize their contact, Sasha (Petro Ninovskyi), and stay ahead of the deadly KGB agent Andrei Vasiliev (Artjom Gilz). As Dane works with his colleague, Ray (Nicholas Podany), to keep the CIA ahead of the KGB, Bea and Twila learn more about their husbands than they had bargained for. They also must contend with their fellow wife/secretary, Cheryl (Vic Michaelis), and maintain their cover. Both women are talented in their own right, and seeing civilians without espionage training pick up the skills of seasoned spies in a short amount of time does require some suspension of disbelief, but the presence that Emilia Clarke and Haley Lu Richardson carry on screen makes it easy to forgive any of the unrealistic parts of the show. Clarke is far removed from her Game of Thrones role and plays Bea as a smart yet emotionally driven character. Haley Lu Richardson, best known for her season two role on The White Lotus, is a confident and cool woman in Twila, playing her as both funny and layered.

While Emilia Clarke and Haley Lu Richardson are the central highlights of PONIES, the supporting cast is all great additions to the series. Adrian Lester plays Dane Walter as a no-nonsense veteran boss, making for an intriguing balance between the CIA’s standard operating procedures and this risky new approach with Bea and Twila. Equally good is Artjom Gilz as the series’ main antagonist. Gilz plays Andrei as a menacing figure who kills with ease and comes across like a Russian variation on Christoph Waltz’s Hans Landa in Inglourious Basterds. John Macmillan and Louis Boyer, and good as the late husbands Tom Hasbeck and Chris Grant, while Nicholas Podany’s Ray and Harriet Walter’s Manya are solid. The scene-stealer in PONIES is Vic Michaelis, best known as the host of the web series Very Important People, who plays rival secretary Cheryl as a twist on Christina Hendricks’ Joan from Mad Men. Michaelis has impeccable comic timing that adds to Cheryl’s mean-girl demeanor, but her dramatic work here is so good that I am glad this character is as significant to this series as it is.

Cat Person and The Spy Who Dumped Me director Susanna Fogel co-created PONIES with David Iserson (Mad Men, Mr. Robot). The pair has created a world that pulls from their experience writing comedic projects as well as thrillers and drama. The layered genre elements in this series give PONIES an eclectic feel that is both funny and intense, without easily fitting into just one genre or another. The directing team also includes Viet Nguyen and Ally Pankiw, with writers Carolyn Cicalese, Amalia Mathewson, and Jordan J. Riggs working on a solid serialized story that flows from one hour-long episode to the next without missing a beat. The plot developments are solid and circle back to crumbs laid down in early episodes, giving me the desire to rewatch those early episodes to see if I missed any clues along the way. The late 1970s setting lends a nice analog sensibility to the production values, which are chock-full of pop culture references to films and music that will give any viewer a feeling of nostalgia without alienating younger audiences.

PONIES is one of the better series from Peacock in a long time and shows how a unique twist on the espionage format can be a differentiator, something that the streaming service did not find with The Copenhagen Test. PONIES works because of its multi-genre approach to storytelling, which stays true to the technological and logistical challenges of 1970s Soviet Russia. It also hinges on the presence and chemistry shared by Emilia Clarke and Haley Lu Richardson, who elevate this series on their performances alone. With all eight episodes debuting at once, audiences will get a chance to binge this show and experience all of the twists and cliffhangers in store. I just hope that this story connects enough to garner another season, as I cannot wait to see what Bea and Twila get into next. A nice blend of funny and intense with a fair amount of violence, PONIES is worth checking out.

PONIES premieres on January 15th on Peacock.