Some reveals were jaw-dropping, and that’s not an overexaggeration. There are a ton of unanswered questions and mysteries. Ultimately, the ending of season 1 primes us for a second season, and Peacock would be foolish not to renew Ponies because they’ve created a unique and utterly irresistible spy show.

Plot happens, but the pleasure of the show is in the deepening friendship between the women. Maybe it shouldn’t work but it does. It’s a mashup of genres and tropes, but it is its own thing too – and an unexpected treat at that.

The platonic chemistry between Clarke and Richardson is the glue that binds the whole enterprise together.

Ponies is zippy, fluffy, and a little vacuous, but when it mines the tension between two women learning to make themselves invisible to succeed at work and simultaneously feeling seen and understood within their growing friendship, the show reaches an elemental truth that has nothing to do with American or Soviet aggression.

It’s a wildly entertaining rollercoaster that will have you rooting for the complex characters, questioning who you can trust, and reexamining your own biases in a way that doesn’t feel derivative.

While it lacks the gimmicks and the flash or the pure sex appeal of recent breakout shows, it is rich with warmth, good storytelling and magnetic actors.

Ponies, starring Emilia Clarke and Haley Lu Richardson, has moments of dazzle. But with neither enough depth to leave a lasting impression nor enough entertainment to make up for that, the drama winds up little more than a forgettable distraction.