Homeland Season 1 (1 Viewer)

[Patrick Sun]

Gives Brody access to intelligence if he served on the right committees, or simply be used to get close to the President, or blow up key people during a Presidential speech in the Congress.

 

[mattCR]

It's not often that a show gets this far into a season and totally baffles me with happenings. Apparently, (and who knows, I could be wrong) Brody running for office is just so he gets close enough to the now VP in a public place to blow the guy up... or a whole bunch of people up in a major public display.
But what got me most was Carrie's storyline - how her break from the event sent her on a manic spiral she couldn't get out of; Saul's fear that he had caused it not getting her help.. Brodie, playing the final card.... this is a show that this season has burned every possible bridge to how you handle ongoing seasons. But it's ruthless handling of the characters has been edge of the seat entertainment through it all.

Carrie's now completely "on the outs" and I have NO idea how this thing plays out from here.. NONE. And I have to admit, that complete doubt of how this shakes out is fantastic for a show this well done.

 

[Yee-Ming]

I agree this show has been absolutely brilliant. Brody was quite obviously 'saying goodbye' to his kids, and in a way at Gettysburg to his country.

One point though: Carrie's manic spiral would have ended once the meds had fully kicked in (per her sister's explanation to Saul). Had she listened to her father (whom I think possibly is also bipolar, like her), and not called Brody, she would have been back to 'normal', and back at her desk at Langley. But by going her own way, she's sealed her own fate, or at least her exit from the CIA (for now?)

If I had to guess how this ends, she manages to foil Brody's plot, and a grateful VP -- POTUS by the next season -- orders her reinstatement to the CIA despite her illness.

 

[Charlie Campisi]

Carrie's now completely "on the outs" and I have NO idea how this thing plays out from here.. NONE.  And I have to admit, that complete doubt of how this shakes out is fantastic for a show this well done.

Agree on just a phenomenal set up to the final couple of eps. I don't compare [m]any shows to The Wire, but the pacing of Homeland has been very reminiscent of the superb work in the first four seasons of The Wire. Create a difficult situation early on; the good guys gain ground and are on the verge of "winning" and then with two eps left, everything comes crashing down and things are more bleak than ever. Just brilliant. I hope that they are able to get Carrie back at CIA for next season in a credible way. Even if Brody is caught, everything he told David about Carrie is still true.

 

[Joe_H]

I have to agree. There have been times throughout this season where I had no idea how they'll continue next year (and then times where it seemed pretty obvious what they'd do), but have never quite felt as unsure about it as I am now.
I mean last week, it seemed like they could go with Carrie stopping the short term plan with Walker, and then further develop the long game with Brody. That seems to have been thrown entirely out the window now though.
One thing though that I hope sometime soon they answer the mystery of why the wife calls her husband not by his first name, but by the last name that they presumably both share. Obviously it makes sense for his military buddies to call him Brody, but his wife? Really?

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

It's not often that a show gets this far into a season and totally baffles me with happenings. Apparently, (and who knows, I could be wrong) Brody running for office is just so he gets close enough to the now VP in a public place to blow the guy up... or a whole bunch of people up in a major public display.

I think it has to be bigger than that. Until the preview for next week clued me into the extremely short timeline, I had assumed that Brody was becoming a Congressman in order to use the vest during a joint session of Congress. Take out the entire government in one fell swoop. Now I think it's got to be something else. Perhaps a meeting of the president, vice president and speaker of the House.
Either way, the trip to Gettysburg (aside from being logistically necessary to get a hold of the suicide vest) was about justifying to his children whatever he is about to do. Telling them he was Joshua Chamberlain. Trying to explain to them how he could take from his own children their father, and completely destroy their lives, to avenge the death of a child he barely knew a couple of months.

But what got me most was Carrie's storyline - how her break from the event sent her on a manic spiral she couldn't get out of; Saul's fear that he had caused it not getting her help.. Brodie, playing the final card.... this is a show that this season has burned every possible bridge to how you handle ongoing seasons. But it's ruthless handling of the characters has been edge of the seat entertainment through it all.

The sick thing is that, as Yee Ming said, she was already coming down off her manic spiral. In a week or so, she would have been fine. Her problem was not that she spiraled out, but that she got too close to the truth. Brody knew exactly what she was asking, and why. He could tell she was manic over the phone, but that's not why he threw her under the bus. It was because she was right.

Carrie's now completely "on the outs" and I have NO idea how this thing plays out from here.. NONE. And I have to admit, that complete doubt of how this shakes out is fantastic for a show this well done.

I think one thing we can count on is that Saul will have David Estes's balls for lunch when the shit hits the fan. The vice president wanted a sacrificial lamb, and David gave him one. He won't fry because his actions were wrong -- from the outside looking in, he protected the Agency from a mentally ill woman who crossed multiple ethical boundaries. He was completely justified, especially because he didn't know the whole story. But when it comes out that he fired the only analyst who had a serious lead on the events about to transpire, he'll be the sacrificial lamb. In that field, success and failure are the final arbiters.

Had she listened to her father (whom I think possibly is also bipolar, like her), and not called Brody, she would have been back to 'normal', and back at her desk at Langley. But by going her own way, she's sealed her own fate, or at least her exit from the CIA (for now?)

It was concretely stated in one of the early episodes that her father is bipolar. It's a disease with a strong genetic component to it.
The only way I see Carrie getting back into the CIA is by lying through her ass about her relationship with Brody. Right now he's a decorated war hero, former POW and future congressman. His word is unimpeachable. But if he goes through with whatever he's planning, suddenly he's the most infamous terrorist since Osama bin Laden. Suddenly his word doesn't mean shit. At that point it'd be easy for Carrie to say that Brody made the entire affair up to burn her when she was getting too close. The only people who've seen her manic behavior up close are Saul, who'd cover for her if it's still a possibility, and David -- who's probably going to be out on his ass very soon. If she's able to put the pieces together in time, it becomes easier for a lot of things to be overlooked.

I don't compare [m]any shows to The Wire, but the pacing of Homeland has been very reminiscent of the superb work in the first four seasons of The Wire. Create a difficult situation early on; the good guys gain ground and are on the verge of "winning" and then with two eps left, everything comes crashing down and things are more bleak than ever. Just brilliant.

That's one thing I've really loved about this show. Each episode ramps up the tension and pacing a little more than the last. The pacing in the early episodes was leisurely. I have a feeling that next week's 90 minute finale is going to feel like an episode of "24."

One thing though that I hope sometime soon they answer the mystery of why the wife calls her husband not by his first name, but by the last name that they presumably both share. Obviously it makes sense for his military buddies to call him Brody, but his wife? Really?

It's a military wife thing. I don't think it's super common (although lots of military spouses refer to their significant other's friends by last name, because that's how their spouse talks about them) but it's definitely not unheard of.

 

[MarkMel]

This show is heartbreaking. As Adam said, the whole trip to Gettysburg so that he can justify what he's about to do to his family killed me. To do that to his family is so unconscionable, he'll be dead while his family will have to deal with his decision until the end of their days. So very selfish.
I understand why he turned, 8 years is a long time to be under the torture and pressure to bend and he has bent. And the time he has been back hasn't turned him around enough to change his new way of thinking.
I kept hoping he would change - glad he didn't though because that would've been too easy to go for the "happy" ending like so many 'American' show/movies do. Makes sense since this was adapted from an Israeli series.
Truly a great show with fantastic acting all around.

 

[Paul D G]

I really hope we don't get a cliffhanger and next season continues on from the same point...

 

[David S. Peterson]

I had the same thought... that they take it right up to where Brody is ready to push the button and then we get a 'to be continued'.

 

[Charlie Campisi]

I had the same thought... that they take it right up to where Brody is ready to push the button and then we get a 'to be continued'.

I'm guessing (hoping) not. A blatant cliffhanger and unresolved storyline is so ... "network" TV. Showtime and HBO have been much better about resolving major questions in the finale and then setting up new issues for next season. They do a much better job of preserving discrete season story lines.

 

[Yee-Ming]

Originally Posted by David S. Peterson /t/315194/homeland-season-1/60#post_3879979
I had the same thought... that they take it right up to where Brody is ready to push the button and then we get a 'to be continued'.

Which would be sort-of what happened with Criminal Minds: Suspect Behaviour...

 

[David S. Peterson]

Did not watch the CM- SB.
But I was really annoyed at the The Killing when thay left that one hanging.

 

[mattCR]

Wow.

Just Wow.
I'll have to think on that tonight, but that scene at the end "Issa.."

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

What a brutal ending. Just absolutely brutal. Even if Carrie can remember after she recovers from the shock therapy, she's in no position to do anything about it. She's persona non grata at the CIA, and even the people who like her would discount it as part of her Brody obsession -- the boy who cried wolf. Saul's got enough dirt to bring down the vice president's candidacy, and Estes career besides. That gives him leverage, but it also makes him a dangerous person to keep around. I hope he took steps to ensure that that information doesn't die with him.
Who knows the truth about Brody:
- Brody himself.
- Brody's daughter Dana, even if she doesn't want to admit it to herself.
- Carrie, if she can remember it
- Abu Nazir.
- Whoever has the flash card. Wouldn't it be a hoot if it was on Walker's person when the police find the body?
It's incredibly risky having a finale in which all the wrong people not only succeed, even flourish, but all the right people suffer devastating consequences. It creates a certain nihilism that's sure to turn off a segment of the audience. I know I don't need to see a season of Carrie being humiliated.

 

[Patrick Sun]

I had always thought they'd go the Manchurian Candidate route early on in this series, but they spent so much set-up on the revenge side before moving on to a more grander plan that rolls into next season.

 

[mattCR]

Why kill a man when you can kill an idea?
That seems to be the thing that Brody has bought into. He wants the war as a whole to end.
The one thing that surprised me though was when he killed Walker, I was waiting for him to frame it in such a way he could say "I found Walker, he called me, we met, there was a scuffle.. I killed him" It would have added to his Hero stance.. but I also can understand why he didn't.

The Carrie storyline is so complicated... it went in a very surprising direction. But the performance by Danes was outstanding.. outside of the police station, when she told her sister "to the hospital" I thought: such a major retreat for that character, an admission of her problem.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Why kill a man when you can kill an idea? That seems to be the thing that Brody has bought into.

What surprised me is that everything leading up to pressing the button in the bunker was a very specific sort of vengeance; he wasn't after hitting the United States as a whole, he wanted very specifically to hit the Vice President and his inner circle for this one act that they'd committed and then covered up. It was about avenging Issa, not about buying into Abu Nazir's larger ideology.

The Carrie storyline is so complicated... it went in a very surprising direction.   But the performance by Danes was outstanding.. outside of the police station, when she told her sister "to the hospital" I thought: such a major retreat for that character, an admission of her problem.

I don't think she's ever had an issue admitting her problem. She was always conscientious about sticking to her medicinal regimen, and she flat out told Saul that she'd been this way since college. What I saw was a woman driven to a desperate act because she's been misled under false circumstances. Brody needed to say what he did to keep her away from his family and away from his secrets, but it was a spectacularly ungrateful way to treat the woman who just saved your life.
The showrunners are veterans of "24", and they've already said in interviews that they have a "unique" way to bring Carrie back in from the wilderness, much like every season opened with Jack Bauer isolated in some way.

 

[Joe_H]

I'm honestly shocked at how well they were able to pull off that ending and yet still have something remaining for next year.
I'm reading elsewhere that people are upset with the wire coming loose, and upset with the electro-shock thing.
I can sort of understand how the wire coming loose would seem like a fakeout, but to me I was just stunned that he was actually ready to flick the switch. I think they sort of needed that in order to show how dedicated he was to it before the daughter called him and convinced him to come home (without really knowing it). I mean, all along I thought that there was no way they could actually have him go through with it, and then he flicked the switch, as if to prove me wrong, demonstrate he was fully willing to do it even at the very last minute.
As for the electro-shock, yeah, it does seem convenient that she remembers such an important point right before she's going to lose her short-term memory, but to me that just made the moment even more important. I mean, here is someone who has been 100% right for the majority of the season. Not only has she been right, but she's the only person who actually was right, and yet because of everyone being convinced that she's crazy, she's pushing herself for drastic treatment. The fact that in her last moments before going under the anesthesia she realized that something was up only adds to the drama there, and I really liked the direction they went there.
I mean, the fact she won't remember it could seem like a cheat for next year, but watching her getting so beaten down while still being right and preventing the major damage from the attack that she felt she needed to do this felt more important in the moment than anything involving next year.
Really, I was on the edge of my seat the whole episode.

 

[MarkMel]

I don't think this series has had a single misstep. I think it was that perfect and I was happily along for the ride.
I think the vest malfunction showed a much more common real life occurrence than we will know. We don't hear about the malfunctions, we only know about the successes. I'm sure they don't boast a 100% success rate.
And the drama that the malfunction created - excellent.
Shock therapy is also really being brought back. I have read a few articles in the recent past about the resurgence of this therapy. So I didn't think it was out of the ordinary.

 

[mattCR]

I had no problem with the jacket malfunctioning, considering how hustled he was about getting it on and together in the house with his daughter pressing him.. more then that, he had to shuffle it around a few times in the car when he reached for his badge, etc.

I didn't think that was cheap at all. ElectroShock therapy is definitely making a comeback. Places like the Mayo Clinic and others expound on it's usage for treatment of some conditions.
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/electroconvulsive-therapy/MY00129