Written for television by Park Chan-wook, Don McKellar, and Anchuli Felicia King, The Sympathizer Episode 6, “The Oriental Mode of Destruction,” is directed by Marc Munden. With a near-chaotic split from the tone of the first half of the season, the HBO limited series has found its footing. Episode 6 of The Sympathizer captures the themes of the previous episodes by allowing the Captain (Hoa Xuande) to break, finally. As the penultimate episode of the limited series based on Viet Thanh Nguyen‘s novel of the same name, The Sympathizer Episode 6 has a lot to do.
Forced to work under an idiot General (Toan Le) has finally taken its toll when a new military campaign against the Viet Cong puts Bon (Fred Nguyen Khan) on a trip back home. Assured that it will be an absolute failure, the Captain can’t stand to lose his best friend, his brother. But Bon is attempting to make himself whole after the death of his wife and child. Only despite reaching out to Man (Duy Nguyen), he doesn’t get the greenlight.
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The Sympathizer Episode 6 puts the Captain on his second assassination mission and centers the political scene in Los Angeles with Ned Goodwin (Robert Downey Jr.) and the racism reverberating throughout it. However, the mission breaks the Captain in a way others haven’t. He tells it all to Sonny (Alan Trong) a gun hidden. The Captain spilled that he is a part of an anti-anti-revolutionary strategy. He has been playing both sides and ultimately is a communist.
It’s a moment of desperation that Xuande plays in an excruciatingly empathetic way. The camera pans in on his face, and his tears brim his eyes. If he has to keep killing and has to keep following Man’s orders, losing pieces of himself in the process he can let the mask slip just once. Only Sonny first thinks it is a joke and his laughs make the Captain’s anguish even more potent.
There is a lot happening in The Sympathizer Episode 6, but the humor and the darkness are perfectly paired. While the episode captures just about everything the Captain has been feeling over the course of the series, it’s the moment of Sonny’s murder that pulls it all into focus.
As the Captain shoots through a soda can used as a makeshift silencer, everything slows down, the weight crashes on Sonny, and the jazz score erupts. A kinetic moment, the completion of this assassination assignment solidifies the chaos that is engulfing the Captain. His uncertainty mixed with his fear and the desperate need for some semblance of light at the end of the tunnel. Everything is volatile, and this moment captures it all with the best use of music in the entire limited series so far.
The Sympathizer Episode 6 solidly takes the reigns back of the narrative with its end, moving it from disjointed to connected with ease. Bon and the Captain on a plane, the latter’s ghosts in toe, The Sympathizer’s dark wit and large political commentary are expertly capitalized on. With the Captain on a plane to Vietnam, we’re approaching the series’ end and, with it, understanding why our lead is detailing this story from prison.
The Sympathizer Episode 6 is streaming now on MAX (HBO MAX), with new episodes every Sunday.
The Sympathizer Episode 6 — "The Oriental Mode of Destruction"
- Rating - 8.5/108.5/10
TL;DR
The Sympathizer Episode 6 solidly takes the reigns back of the narrative with its end, moving it from disjointed to connected with ease. Bon and the Captain on a plane, the latter’s ghosts in toe, The Sympathizer’s dark wit and large political commentary are expertly capitalized on.
