Alla’s Betrayal
Episode 6 of Better Than Us begins with Gleb meeting with The Liquidators and discussing next steps, revealing he’s actually undercover at Cronos and not actually working for them, while Detective Varlamov continues to investigate the case. Viktor comes under fire from Lasov regarding Arisa and contemplates their new adverts, which specifically showcase Georgy and his family with Arisa. After being snubbed by The Liquidators, Egor deliberates over what to do next while Arisa continues to inadvertently stir up trouble, telling Georgy that Alla is intoxicated and lying during their conversations. Putting this out of his mind, he heads out for a morning run and tries to convince Alla to go with him. She refuses though and instead Georgy finds himself confronted by a woman who asks about Varlamov’s investigation, telling him about bot children and abductions that have taken place in the past. She tells him to talk to Pavel and in doing so, he may just save the livelihood of his kids. Meanwhile, a power play grips Cronos as Svetlana tries to convince Igor to work against Viktor. Given he’s sleeping with her behind his back, she makes a solid case and they discuss plans together. As he approaches Vik, he laments him talking to his wife and instead, comes under fire from Georgy who approaches Viktor over his use of the family in their advertisement. Georgy manages to strike up a deal with him and Viktor agrees to remove the cameras from his house. As Egor heads back to the underground group, Jeanna embraces him and Bars apologises for the early hostility. He tells him he only did that because he needed to check if he was undercover or not. During a seemingly harmless conversation at the bar, Egor is coerced into bringing Arisa there to prove whether she really is as intelligent as he’s making her out to be. Interestingly Maslovsky’s assistant Kate happens to be in a relationship with Bars and he heads to see her, where he’s fed information about Arisa. Back home, Alla comes under fire with Leo whom she speaks to on the phone. He gives her an ultimatum regarding traveling to Australia and she makes her mind up, packing her things and intent on heading out with the kids. Lying to Georgy about where she’s going, Arisa chirps up and tells him she’s lying but he lets her leave nonetheless. A belated email sends him on the war-path though as he realizes she’s left to go to Australia without telling him. As he tries to leave, she prevents him from doing so and eventually informs him that the flight has already left. Fruitlessly, he drives to the airport and looks set to commit suicide when he realizes they’re gone, only for Arisa to choke him out and knock him unconscious. As a transitional episode, Better Than Us does well to continue the characterisation and plot gripping the characters. The power play at Cronos involving Egor and Viktor is certainly interesting and quite where this is likely to go in the future remains to be seen. The door is left wide open here though for what’s to follow and the climactic finale certainly leaves things hanging in the balance here.
