Homeland – “There’s Something Else Going On”

Season Four, Episode Nine

Grade: A-

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Let’s just start immediately at the great scene of the episode, the prisoner exchange. This is simply Homeland at its finest. A suspenseful, edge-of-your-seat sequence of events that was impossible to have any idea how it was all going to end. I honestly didn’t think Saul was going to make it out alive. Because the exchange during Boardwalk Empire was still fresh in my mind, I expected something to go wrong, especially with Saul. Particularly when Carrie went to talk Saul into going through with the exchange and how she pocketed his glasses, I was almost certain that was the end of Saul. Not to mention the emotional conversation Carrie had with Mira a few minutes beforehand.

The boy with the bomb strapped to him was a thrilling detail that made my heart beat faster every second. It was like watching The Hurt Locker all over again! But in the end, Carrie was able to talk to Saul and convince him to come back home, despite his contempt for the exchange. But just as Saul was telling Mira that he’s safe and coming home, BOOM! Missiles hit the cars bringing them back to the embassy. I assume that the only car not to be directly hit by a missile was the one with Saul and Carrie in it, because I cannot imagine Homeland killing off two of its major characters out of nowhere. But this allows the big picture to come into play, which involves Haqqani and his men sneaking through the tunnels to access the embassy.

Aside from these heart-pounding moments, it was a very good episode all around. Carrie and her team presses Dennis Boyd really hard, though he doesn’t crack. Carrie certainly has a right to be pissed off at Dennis since he did drug her with 25i, which is apparently just a super-LSD drug, but Dennis plays everything really cool and denies it all. Even when the Ambassador comes into the holding cell to save her husband, you just knew she was playing him and so did Dennis. Not until the final moments of the episode does Dennis realize what the ISI really needed him for. After the missiles hit the cars, Lockhart sends ALL the marines to the site, leaving the embassy without any protection from Haqqani and his men sneaking in. Is it too late? Possibly. Maybe Quinn will just treat them as the bullies from the diner and take care of everything himself.

We have to wait two weeks until the next episode as Homeland is winding down. Will Saul be able to put himself together and possibly rejoin the CIA? Is he going to react to Mira the same way Brody did when he returned from being captive? What will Haqqani and his men do/demand once they breach the embassy? Is it just me or does Homeland have a video game feel to it lately? First with tracking the Taliban as they stormed the village looking for Saul. Now, watching Haqqani and his men sneaking into the embassy after Carrie’s attempted murder. How will the good guys get out of this one?!

Homeland – “Iron in the Fire”

Season Four, Episode Four

Grade: B+

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It seems pretty clear what the writers of the show are trying to do, showing Carrie as some kind of monster as she slowly comes back to being human as the season progresses. Right now, there isn’t a viewer in the world who should like Carrie. You could somewhat sympathize with her I guess, but at this early point in the fourth season, she has attempted to drown her baby, abandoned her baby and her family, ordered the drone strike that massacred a wedding, and now she has seduced a young man with empty promises and sex. That’s quite a laundry list of reasons why I should hate Carrie Mathison.

Despite how much of a jerk Carrie can be, this was still a very solid episode for Homeland. Let’s start with the aspect of the show that has always been done incredibly well: spying. Whether it’s Quinn breaking into the ISI agent’s apartment to bug his phone, or if it’s Fara and Max trailing Aayan, Homeland is always able to keep us at the edge of our seat during these suspenseful sequences. I particularly enjoyed Fara going on foot in pursuit of Aayan when he gives a young medical woman money in exchange for what we can only assume are the drugs that he lost. But the kicker throughout this chase is that his uncle, the main man Carrie and Sandy were targeting during the drone strike, is still alive!

Things are becoming clearer now. We also finally see Sandy’s source as Professor Dennis Boyd. How has he been able to leak sensitive, classified information? He’s married to Ambassador Martha Boyd, but now that Sandy is dead Dennis is the direct target. He gets blackmailed by a Pakistani agent (did they really need her to be so damn good looking? Everyone on the show is too pretty, imo) who promises him that if he goes through one more mission, he’ll finally be free. If not, he’ll be exposed to treason that will also bring down his wife. Oh the drama!

What Carrie and Quinn are able to figure out is that since Haqqani is still alive, the whole thing was a setup to kill Sandy. But why? That’s the main question that Carrie and team will be facing. Meanwhile, it seems like Saul might be sticking around for a little longer, which is always a good thing. And it will be interesting to follow Dennis as he might be playing the Brody role as sneaking around offices and obeying orders from wherever this Pakistani woman comes from. Needless to say, it doesn’t look good for Dennis.

During all of what’s happening, it’s important to address what Carrie is doing to Aayan. She seems to have no concern at all that she’s lying to him about getting into medical school in London. She continues to feed him lies just so he can open up to her, and even though it’s working, it’s simply not working fast enough for Carrie and that’s why she seduces him. The scene before when she looks at herself in the mirror was brilliant. You know what’s about to happen, yet there is still that beating heart inside of Carrie that insists she isn’t a bad person. That voice inside of her is begging to break out, but she’s too ruthless to allow that conscious to take over. All I’m interested in right now is Quinn’s reaction when he finds out that Carrie and Aayan got hot and heavy. I hope he breaks someone else’s cheek bone in a diner (or whatever the equivalent is in Islamabad).

Homeland – “Shalwar Kameez”

Season Four, Episode Three

Grade: B

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I feel like this was a very polarizing episode, for good reasons, so let me start out with why this was a very solid episode of Homeland. First off, Homeland was always at its best when it dealt with the trauma of being in the CIA and the military and how it can affect your personal life. We’ve seen how it affected Carrie, Brody, Saul, etc. and now we’re seeing it affect Quinn. Plain and simple, Quinn has had enough. Everyone has a breaking point and he’s no different, but it’s not so easy to quit the CIA. And while the show obviously couldn’t allow Quinn to walk away from all the action, his story-line is what gives Homeland its depth and a character audiences can really support (because Carrie is too much of an asshole).

But then there’s the bad, which involves the writers of the show penning in some kind of Quinn/Carrie romance. I don’t know if this was a call from the producers, the writers, or some high executive at Showtime, but how could anyone think a Quinn/Carrie romance would be good for the show? Was there any person in the world who tuned into Homeland week-after-week for the Carrie/Brody romance? I was actually enjoying the way Carrie was looking at younger, handsome guys for a fix to keep her mind off of the job for at least a portion of her night. But Quinn? Is that really a story-line we want to see for the whole season?

Now I’m not saying that it’s completely unimaginable that Quinn could have a crush on Carrie, but it could’ve been done more subtlety and not so soon in this new reboot of a season. But back to the action, Carrie is in Islamabad because she hates her child and needs to boss people around. Her team doesn’t particularly like her yet (and they probably never will), especially the man who was supposed to replace Sandy until Carrie stole it. But there’s good news: Max and Fara are back! They use Fara to try and get to Aayan and even though the set-up fails, she immediately recognizes that something has spooked Aayan. The big guns come in (Carrie) and she gives him an offer: Tell them his story for a safe passage to America to continue medical school. It’s quite the offer, but I’m pretty sure he’ll need a bit more convincing.

Since the first episode, Homeland has certainly toned down its action and suspense. Saul comes back to make sure the transition between Carrie and her new boss runs smoothly (and so they have something to talk about: Saul and Boyd used to be engaged), and if Saul does indeed leave Islamabad I’ll be a bit sad because the chemistry between Claire Danes and Mandy Patinkin is spectacular. But we have two things happening thus far. First, the romantic link between Carrie and Quinn, which I assume won’t end well for Quinn (just saying). Then there’s the result from the drone strike and the repercussions within the country and the involvement from the CIA. Tensions are still high and a lot of people are trying to save their asses.

I can’t imagine Homeland toning down the story-line between Carrie and Quinn. If the past was any indication, they kept on pursuing terrible story-lines no matter how loudly I yelled at my television screen (I’m looking at you Dana Brody)! But for what it’s worth, it’ll be great to have Carrie and Quinn working together again, even if that means we won’t see Quinn and his building manager hanging out by the pool anymore. So long building manager. You were too good for Quinn, even though he did defend you by breaking a guy’s cheekbone at the diner.

Homeland – “Big Man in Tehran”

Season Three, Episode Eleven

Grade: B+

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Nicholas Brody has been a firecracker for Homeland. Ever since the first season where he was the U.S. Marine turned-into-terrorist, he’s been an extremely important character on this show. It made sense that soon he become the focal point, especially because Carrie became too whacky for her own good. Brody was absent during the beginning of the third season, for obvious reasons, but now he’s right back on the front line.

He meets with Javadi and everything is a go. Javadi has placed a meeting for Brody with Akbari and that’s when he’ll take him out. There’s a very shady extraction plan in the works as well, but that really seems like a long shot. If this was a cable show other than Homeland, I’d expect Brody to be killed off this episode, but I really doubt that Homeland wants to move on from the Carrie-Brody story.

That being said, Carrie’s involvement during this episode is pretty unrealistic. Why is she in Tehran again? She meets with Fara’s uncle to secure a phone to be the eyes on the street for the CIA, but I don’t understand why it HAD to be Carrie aside from the show possibly wanting one last Carrie-Brody moment. She’s too unpredictable and cannot be controlled by Saul or anyone else who has been working on this mission for months. The likelihood they would allow her to be in Tehran would be little to none, yet she’s in the middle of everything. Okay, I guess I’ll just have to live with that.

The meeting never happens, but Brody meets with Nazir’s wife. They share a brief moment with each other’s company and the dialogue is sweet and important. It establishes a close bond between the two when they talk about the difficulties of staying strong. She has lost her husband and Brody has lost his family. They both relate to these tough times and the main part about this scene is to establish doubt in your mind about Brody’s loyalties. Because as we remember, he’s not the most dependable person, bouncing back-and-forth from Marine to terrorist to CIA double-agent.

So what makes Brody click? What does he value? In the first season, his family is the thing that makes him snap out of his plan to wipe out many important people of the U.S. government (though he did press the clicker, it just malfunctioned). What’s going to make him come back from all of the hell he’s gone through? Is it another chance to see his family again? Another chance to prove to Dana he’s not a terrorist? To be with Carrie? For the record, Carrie hasn’t dropped the baby-bomb on Brody yet, so that’s not on his mind.

The episode engages us in the world of Tehran, and when Homeland does this it shows us why we loved this show from the beginning. There is an immediate urgency around every corner and not understanding the foreign culture enhances the intensity of every scene. In the end, Brody gets the job done. Inside Akbari’s office, Brody confesses that Javadi is working for the CIA and he also gives himself up that he was ordered to kill him. Akbari is surprisingly calm and interprets this as Brody’s allegiance. Hell, I sort of did too but something clicked in Brody’s mind that made him kill Akbari. Or was that his plan the whole time? You can never tell with him, but that’s what makes him such a unique weapon that Homeland has.

With only one episode left in the season, the big question seems to be whether or not Brody will make it out alive. I’m torn between this question. While Homeland isn’t the spy-suspense, CIA-procedure show it used to be in season one, they’ve done a decent job at exploring the Carrie-Brody plot. They’re really the only characters that you somewhat feel attached to, and for that reason alone I don’t think it’s going to be easy for the show to write Brody off, and in a way I don’t want to see him go. I want to see Brody succeed, I want to see his name to be cleared, and I want to see Carrie tell Brody that they have a baby.

But with all honesty, the show would most likely be better if they got rid of Brody and moved on. It’s something they should’ve done in season two when things just didn’t feel right. The whole conflict between Brody and Jessica felt natural in the first season when they dealt with the war hero coming home and dealing with the trauma. That turned into a lot of family drama with an increase role for Dana in the second and third season. I’m not blaming this entirely, but when you look at the big picture through Homeland’s three seasons, it’s the clear one you can immediately point out. So if Brody doesn’t make it out alive next week, I’ll be sad, but it’s for the show’s own good.

Homeland – “A Red Wheelbarrow”

Season Three, Episode Eight

Grade: B-

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Everyone’s story keeps on moving forward in Homeland, and for the most part it’s good. The Javadi plan is the big picture that Saul is in charge of, but the little pieces involved almost fall apart. Saul and Mira are trying to salvage their marriage, and Carrie’s 13 weeks pregnant and is advised to take things easy at her job (I chuckled when Carrie rolled her eyes with the “that’s impossible” expression). But it wouldn’t be Homeland without a mountain of glitches along the way.

First, the immediate plot-line where Carrie is meeting with Franklin to expose the person who exploded the bomb (and possibly constructed) at the Langley bombing. Everything goes according to plan and just as it looks like Brody would be exonerated, Franklin is seen holding a gun with intention to kill the bomber hiding in his hotel room. Naturally (in crazy Carrie world) she abondons the mission, disregards her orders and attempts to stop the assassination. This would ruin everything the CIA has been working on for months and reveal the play with Javadi. But Carrie doesn’t care because she wants nothing more than to have Brody return to her as a free man.

I mean, come on now! I get how Carrie’s bi-polar and how she’s been dealing with a lot of craziness throughout the series, but without even blinking her eyes she decides that it’s worth ruining the entire mission? Why do they even keep Carrie involved if she keeps pulling these stunts. After repeated warnings, Quinn shoots Carrie in the shoulder and Franklin kills the bomber. So on top of taking lithium, drinking heavily, and being as a stressful job, Carrie puts the baby through the trauma of almost being shot. Yeah, Carrie’s got issues.

I wonder how Saul would’ve reacted to Carrie’s shenanigans. Instead he was too busy traveling to Caracas where he pays $10 million for Brody. The look Brody gives Saul when he sees him is priceless. But more importantly, what’s the play here? What could Saul possibly want or need Brody for? Is it related to the Javadi plan? You just know that Carrie is not going to like Saul going behind her back like this, though I’m sure Saul isn’t going to be happy when he hears that Carrie almost blew their cover and had to be freaking shot to be stopped.

One small element about the episode that I did like was the inside look of Fara’s home and the reason why she hasn’t told her ailing father that she works for the CIA. But after she misses two days of work, she gets a visit by an agent who reminds her that she has work to do. The conversation is overheard by her father and we discover the family still has ties to Tehran and if her identity is revealed then those family members’ lives are in danger. This was indeed a great little bit of information to share about Fara. She’s a new agent and it makes sense that she feels the way she does, and how she’s already getting sick with the way things are being run. It’s believable, much more than when Quinn wanted to quit.

For the most part, there are more good things that are happening that outweigh the bad, the bad being Carrie’s pregnancy. Seriously, is anyone interested in that at all? But Homeland has presented us with many questions that need to be answered, and it’s something worth sticking with for the time being. Can Saul really pull this off? Homeland seems to paint this portrait of Super-Saul, the pure CIA agent who is always right. They could really knock him down a handful of pegs if this all blows up in his face, that is if Carrie doesn’t ruin it for him.

Homeland – “Gerontion”

Season Three, Episode Seven

Grade: B

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Remember when the first season was all suspense and action and the second season was a confused state of action and slow psychological explanations? Well, this is the third season and we’re getting a lot of slow psychological explanations from our characters. Saul is still at the center of attention here and he’s got a lot on his plate. He’s being replaced by Lockhart in ten days (I’m sure of this because they repeatedly said it), he wants revenge on Javadi, his relationship with Mira has fallen apart (though he doesn’t know it yet), yet him and Carrie are carrying out the plan because it’s the right play. Good for Saul. He’s been a favorite character throughout the years on the show, to the point where you can’t even dispute what he says or thinks anymore. Remember when we thought it was cruel for him for doing what he did to Carrie? Gotcha! It was all a part of the plan. How could you ever doubt Saul again?

But Homeland is attempting to plant seeds of doubt in your mind, because that’s what it does. You’re never supposed to be sure about anything here. Remember when Carrie and Brody snuck off to make out when the bomb went off at Langley? It couldn’t have been Brody, but just like that Javadi is stirring that pot again, enough to have Saul and Carrie question him. So we’re supposed to ask ourselves again: was Brody involved? Who did he hand the car keys to? And was he tipped to what was going to happen? Wasn’t it Carrie’s idea to sneak off in the first place? The Langley bombing was certainly a powerful and memorable moment in Homeland, but instead of moving forward from it the show is still stuck, stuck trying to somehow wind the story back to Brody.

On a positive note, the Brody family isn’t in the episode (Hallelujah!) and because of that everything flowed better than usual. Saul tells Javadi the plan of going back to Iran and theoretically working for the CIA. This pisses off Fara (enough to clench a pair of scissors!), but there is something else the crew has to deal with immediately. During the investigation of the murders of Javadi’s former family, Quinn is spotted on the neighbor’s security tapes (not Carrie or Javadi, but only Quinn). So the local police are on his ass, but they cannot compromise the plan they have going.

To further jeopardize the mission, Lockhart and Dar question the whereabouts of Saul. He’s forced to fully reveal what he’s been up to and while Lockhart and Dar are surprised, Dar sides with Saul in the end going against Lockhart’s wish to shut the plan down and bring Javadi to justice in America. The episode is filled with really good scenes and really good acting, something you can expect from Homeland every week. But what it’s lacking is a clear direction. Sure, Homeland needs to continue its misdirection to keep the audience on its toes and to keep surprising us, but at this point it’s not even necessary. What the show needs is to ground itself with a focused objective and to play it out event-by-event, situation-by-situation. Instead, we’re getting a lot of sad faces from Quinn expressing how he wants to quit, and uncertainty from Carrie about Brody’s involvement on the bombing.

So what’s next? We watch Javadi play out in Iran. Then we get more of the Carrie/Quinn team that is keeping this season alive as she searches for more answers about the Langely bombing and how Brody was or wasn’t a part of it. Then we watch Saul fight with Lockhart more, which by the way, Lockhart is a ridiculous character on this show. He’s as two-dimensional as they come and just because he brings up some decent concerns at how improbable Saul’s plan might seem, this is Saul we’re talking about. In the world of Homeland, you never doubt Saul! If only he could get his personal life together.

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Last but not least:

• So Quinn sort of turned his back on the CIA pretty quickly. From bad-ass to softie within a few episodes doesn’t really work for me.
• Carrie’s pregnant, but not much here about it. Sure we’ll get more soon enough.
• Mira shacked up with Alain. How does Saul not have hidden cameras all over his house? Or I guess that would be too much.
• It’s funny how I was enjoying this Brody-less season to the point I forgot he’s still supposed to be relevant, and then that went out the window.

Homeland – “Still Positive”

Season Three, Episode Six

Grade: B+

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With all the silliness that Homeland has been getting into (notably, every single story-line involving Dana), Homeland as a whole is still positive (just like the title!). We get some nice CIA procedure suspense here with Carrie dangling like a pinata right in front of Javadi. She fails the truth test but is able to get the plan rolling once she’s alone with him. Still, having no eyes on Carrie throughout the operation is scary as hell, like how Carrie reacted when Saul casually asked her where she was taken. Would stuff like that really fly in the CIA? Probably not, but we have a very desperate Saul trying to bring the CIA back from the dust (while seeking revenge that we learn later about).

We get a lot of Saul in “Still Positive” and that’s always a good thing for Homeland. His morning conversation with Mira is tough to watch. She tries to calm him down by telling him nothing happened between her and her male-guest from the night before. Alain is just a guy that makes her laugh and feel good throughout the day, but Saul suspects she’s in love with him (which may or may not be true). Either way, what she wants from Saul is to just show any kind of reaction from all of this. “Get mad! Get mad at me!” she pleads, but Saul shrugs it off as if it means nothing to him. It’s something he’s been doing since day one and something everyone in the CIA is used to, but it’s certainly not something that goes over well in a relationship. It’s tough to see Mira and Saul in such a rocky situation.

Javadi ends up driving to his ex-wife’s house and murdering her before Carrie and Quinn bust through. They take Javadi away but leave the baby behind, which hurts Carrie very particularly. Why is that? Because she’s pregnant! Say what? Is this going to be the boiling point to where Homeland goes down the wrong street and gets lost forever? I sure hope not, but I’m not looking forward to exploring that story-line.

Talking about story-lines I hate, Dana gets some sort of goodbye here. After changing her name, she leaves with her friend without giving a heads up to her family. Is this the lack of responsibility she has and the selfishness she possesses? Or maybe just the understanding that her mom would never let her leave unless she simply just leaves. Either way, it’s a tearful scene when Dana says goodbye, but if this is the potential of writing her off the show for an extended period of time, then I’m still doing fist pumps.

So we get the face-to-face moment between Saul and Javadi, and it doesn’t disappoint. Saul hits Javadi down leaving him with a bloody nose as Saul stands over him, showing his dominant position. The episode also did a good job showing why tracking Javadi down means a lot to Saul, in addition to being responsible for the Langely bombing. It’s the Saul show ladies and gentlemen and it’s a breath of fresh air to be removed from Carrie’s madness and Brody’s loyalties for once. With Saul, we get a man who wants to get the job done, one who is under-appreciated within the agency, and one who is conflicted just as much as anyone else. If he leads the rest of the season, I don’t see too many people that should have a problem with that.

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Last but not least:

• Quinn and Carrie on the mission was really fun to watch. Too bad they didn’t get to kick some ass on the way of tracking down Javadi.
• When does Carrie stop taking pregnancy tests, since she’s apparently taken them 50 times and still isn’t convinced.
• I wish we got a little more interaction between Nora and Max. Those two could definitely have a few scene stealing moments if they just wrote them in.
• The arc involving Senator Lockhart and Dar Adal in the CIA is just beginning.

Homeland – “The Yoga Play”

Season Three, Episode Five

Grade: B-

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Last week we find out that Carrie being called out by Saul and then staying at the psych ward was all a plan to extract the Magician from wherever he’s been staying. This week we get a closer glance at what kind role Carrie’s playing, and it’s a lot of fun.

Carrie’s being watched by Javadi’s men, plus Quinn who’s just trying to keep her safe. By the way, Quinn’s reaction when Saul tells him about Carrie is priceless. For the most part, Carrie’s half of the episode was real good. She’s obviously still going through all the mental trauma of the psych ward, but she’s also doing her best to prepare herself for when she’s going to be face-to-face with the man they suspect to be in charge with the Langley bombing. She’s distracted though, by Jessica Brody knocking on her door asking her to help find Dana. Did you roll your eyes as well?

While it’s believable that Carrie would go out of her way to help Jessica find her daughter, like Quinn and Saul commented it simply put the mission at such an unnecessary risk. The only good part about this was seeing Virgil and his brother again. What this also meant was that we’d be spending more time with Dana and Leo as they cruised to nowhere. The two teens in love hit a major roadblock when Dana hears about Leo’s suspected homicide of his brother at a gas station. Like typical dramatic Dana style, she blows up on Leo, jumps out of the car at an intersection, and thinks her life has just hit rock bottom. Do I feel bad for Dana? A bit, but not when she’s her whiny, teenage self like she’s been displaying all season.

So with Dana finally reunited with her family at home, Carrie can worry about her own misfortune of possibly tipping off the guys who were tagging her from Javadi. What ends up happening is she’s stripped and searched for wires, then bagged and transported to meat with Javadi. Dramatic, yes… but it makes for good television and I enjoyed it thoroughly. There was also a story-line that involved Saul going geese-hunting only to find out he won’t become the new director of the CIA. Tough one for Saul, but he doesn’t have time to sulk because he’s got some Magician-hunting to do!

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Last but not least:

• Is this the last we’re going to see from Leo? I sure hope so.
• And once again, Mike is absent from the show. Where does he stand with the whole Brody family? They spend enough time with Dana’s terrible choices and situations, why not just explore Mike and Jessica’s?
• Quinn’s still bad-ass, but he’s letting his emotions run a lot higher than he showed last season. For one who doesn’t express any emotion on his face, he sure does feel a lot.
• How terrible was Saul’s speech? Awful.

Homeland – “Game On”

Season Three, Episode Four

Grade: B+

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For all the frustration that existed in the first three episodes of Homeland, we finally get a pay-off and an end to Carrie’s residency at the psych ward. In the end, it was all a plan to attract the man behind the Langley bombing. Just wow. I didn’t see that coming and that is due to Claire Danes’ convincing performance as a woman under attack and betrayed by her own friends and agency. She is still the center of the series and shows exactly why. We walked in Carrie’s shoes and we’ve felt her pain, but in the end we finally have light on the one relationship that we truly want to see remain intact: Carrie and Saul.

I’ll admit that when Carrie ends up at Saul’s house I had no clue what to expect, but that scene unraveled so quickly until finally they embrace each other with a hug. I was also worried when thinking about the possibility of Carrie being a double-agent, simply because I didn’t like that possibility at all, but kudos to the writers for throwing a twist that I just didn’t see coming. The next step is having Carrie face-to-face with the Magician and then bringing him down. There’s still a lot of fun left in Homeland’s third season.

That was the good of the episode. Unfortunately, Dana’s back and she’s still stirring up more shit than she can handle (and apparently doesn’t even know it). She’s all ga-ga over Leo and helps him escape the containment he’s in. The two drive away smiling like they’ve just robbed a bank, and to continue being slick Leo throws Dana’s phone out the window (to make it difficult to be tracked), and even trades in Jessica’s car for what looks like a piece of junk. Whether it’s the Vice President’s son or this Leo guy, I just cannot understand why Dana is such a main character in Homeland. I’m way more invested in Jessica and Mike’s relationship than the whining, brat child that Dana is. By the way, welcome back Mike! The Blacklist got a full season extension and now he’s back as Mike Faber, Jessica’s “friend.” Diego Klattenhoff is doing quite well for himself.

If this wasn’t enough, we find out from some research on Mike’s part, that Leo possibly killed his brother and that’s why he was in the suicide prevention facility. Sure, it’s a minor twist and we’re supposed to feel like Dana’s in trouble, but at this point I doubt that many people care. The audience for Homeland isn’t interested in a teenage romance between an alleged terrorist’s daughter and a possible teenage murderer. That sounds like an episode of Revenge. And the most important question about this part of the episode is: what the hell does Brody and his family still have to do with what’s going on with the rest of the plot? I seriously have no idea.

Homeland – “Tower of David”

Season Three, Episode Three

Grade: B

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This is certainly not the episode anyone was anticipating from Homeland. Known for its high-tension and fast-moving pace, Homeland has dramatically slowed down its third season and “Tower of David” is the most memorable thus far. We finally see Nicholas Brody and for the first half of the episode, that is all we see (out of the main cast). He’s in Caracas and is treated for a bullet wound by a very creepy doctor who wants Brody to be addicted to heroin. He’s healed back to health and has some conflicts with El Nino, the one who says knows Carrie and insists Brody stays in the tower. None of this is what Brody wants, but he soon realized he doesn’t have a choice.

It’s noteworthy that this small arc with Brody doesn’t make for great television. But it’s an approach that Homeland has apparently decided to take on this season. First, the tedious depositions against Carrie, then the concern for Dana with suicidal tendencies, and now Brody who is the most wanted terrorist on the planet. This intrigues me because of the obvious reason: where else does Brody go from here? When Brody escapes with the help of Esme (though that was a bit of a stretch), I figured this was the start to Brody on the run, something we could tune into every week and see how he’ll somehow become relevant again. But he’s captured and thrown into a cell with the doctor leaving him heroin and a needle. Is this the end of the line for Brody?

Interesting enough, we get some Carrie during the episode as well. She’s just as captive as Brody is in her psych ward and is desperate to break out (or at least talk to Saul, whom she claims is visiting her). But she’s just as hopeless as Brody, still loyal to Saul but still relentlessly passionate to get back to work. The cuts between Brody and Carrie are carefully executed such as the two of them seated on the floor in the dark of their loneliness and hopelessness. While Brody’s on heroin, Carrie’s on her meds. This is where the bombing has taken them to. Are we supposed to be rooting for them to one day meet again? Because if there is any sense of realism, that seems impossible.

The plus side from this episode is that we didn’t get to see Dana this week (score!). But we also didn’t get to see Saul and Quinn. I honestly don’t know where Homeland is going to go from here, and that’s a good thing. Will Homeland introduce new characters while leaving Carrie and Brody behind? It’s doubtful. But Homeland is one show that seems the most reluctant to expand its cast of main characters. While I actually liked this episode, I’m not sure how many more of these episodes I can actually take. Is the mystery of why El Nino isn’t collecting the reward for having Brody good? Yeah, but not good enough for me to be invested in when there are better story-lines on the homeland security front.