Previously, on Homeland . . . Hearing that simple phrase in the dulcet tones of Mandy Patinkin can make me as twitchy and shifty-eyed as Nick Brody after a video chat with Abu Nazir. I mean, okay, Im still on board with the mission, but its murder on my nerves and sometimes I wish I could just hide in a cabin somewhere, you know?
This week, those three little words gave me a very different feeling. After all, previously on Homeland we got the game-changing revelation that the entire season so far that Carrie had gone off her meds and started leaking to the press, that Saul sold her out to the Senate and approved Dar Adals plan to have her involuntarily committed, that ultimately Carrie was willing to betray CIA secrets to Iranian agents in exchange for freedom from the mental hospital had been a ruse cooked up by Carrie and Saul to lure the mastermind of the Langley bombing out into the open. As divisive as it was daring, the twist made both logistical and emotional sense to me, and was the kind of deep-cover mindgame that drove the show back in its Nick-and-Carrie cat-and-mouse glory days. Now my only worry as that previously on montage played was whether this weeks episode would screw it up.
Seven Ways to Save Homeland
For the most part, it didnt. Named after the bit of spycraft that served as its centerpiece, The Yoga Play played it relatively cool, allowing the major players to deal with the new status quo in ways that coaxed out their character and advanced the plot step by step. Saul, Carrie, Quinn, Dana, Jessica, even returning (and sorely missed) supporting spies Virgil and Max made moves that made sense and paid dramatic dividends.
Sauls subplot was the standout, revealing a man in way over his head as he tries to singlehandedly hold the CIA together, and hold the people who nearly killed it responsible. Ironically, its that latter goal where hes having the most success, in precisely the capacity for which he holds his job in the first place. His scheme with Carrie worked (and if youve got problems with its plausibility, Ill simply direct you to Breaking Bads entire fifth season; youre entitled to coast on lucky coincidences as long as your material is making your exploration of your characters and themes stronger instead of sillier), and involving Quinn in its continued execution was a smart way of taking a loose cannon and pointing it in Sauls preferred direction. Sauls a brilliant spy.
Hes just not much of a politician. Perhaps because hes so laser-focused on Carrie and his new nemesis, Majid Javadi, he completely whiffs on the breaking news that hes lost his bid for becoming the CIAs permanent director to his primary political adversary, showboating Senator Andrew Lockhart. Homeland staged Sauls humiliation in the oddly intimate setting of a goose-hunting blind, then made the move official during an evening cook-out in which the after-dark lighting was hilariously, unnecessarily sinister some of the shows cleverest staging in some time. And if that werent intelligence failure enough, Saul comes home early from his bad trip to discover his wife Mira wining and dining a handsome Frenchman at his own dinnertable.
Piling screw-up after screw-up on the guy even as his big plan with Carrie continues to roll on unimpeded was as bleakly funny as Homeland has gotten since Brodys black-comedy forest follies with the suicide-bomb tailor back in Season Two. Indeed, Sauls scenes were studded with laugh lines, from Quinns conversation with Mira about Sauls duck-hunting get-up Sauls just getting dressed. What as? to Sauls own sardonic assessment of his evening with the White House chief of staff Mike Higgins (played by the amazing William Sadler) Thought youd run out on me. While Im having so much fun? Just watching Saul slumping around his house in full sad-sack mode following the guess-whos-coming-to-dinner bit with Mira was a hoot.
Carries material was more methodical, a one-foot-in-front-of-the-other attempt to keep herself in play with her target while still having the freedom to go off script in this case, to help locate the missing Dana Brody. Calling on her fretful but capable sidekicks Virgil and Max, Carrie fakes a yoga appointment and sneaks out the back door to rendezvous with an FBI frienemy who can help locate Dana while avoiding Javadis mercenaries. Besides being an effective little mini-thriller, the sequence made the uncomfortable suggestion that Carrie was only able to pull her plan off thanks to the clear-eyed confidence she gained from going off her meds. Homelands suspense setpieces work best when they skip the action-movie theatrics and focus more on how everyday activities can be used as the cloak in cloak-and-dagger, and thats why the yoga play played so successfully. Compare and contrast with the rote home-invasion and so, we meet at last supervillainy that ended the episode.
Yes, the weakest part of Carries storyline, unsurprisingly, is the part involving Javadi himself. Another worlds-most-wanted terrorist mastermind traipses right into the United States undetected to oversee his plans personally; another highly trained, completely indistinguishable terrorist goon squad inexplicably roams Washington, bigfooting our counterintelligence agents with impunity. Homelands portrayal of terrorists as unstoppable geniuses and super-soldiers able to strike anywhere at will has long been its weakest point, in terms not only of plausibility but politics. If these guys really do have tentacles everywhere, then is any surveillance-state overreach unjustified in response? (Thats to say nothing of the idea that Iran would be willing and able to team up with al-Qaeda and have someone on its government payroll bankroll and execute a massive attack on the American homeland a Dick Cheney fever dream that thoroughly otherizes a complex country.)
But at least Carries side mission of intervening in the hunt for Dana paid off by helping to curtail that goofy-ass storyline. (Admittedly, having the star of Romeo + Juliet talk about Romeo & Juliet was pretty funny.) At long last, Dana wised up that her psych-ward dreamboat was just another in a long line of men willing to lie to her to stay in her good graces, from the vice-presidents odious hit-and-run son to her own turncoat father. Watching her dress down, freak out on, and run away from that kid was a deeply satisfying payoff to a subplot that was more perplexing than engrossing up until that point. So too was watching Jessica personally plead to Carrie for help: Between the affair and the mania and the multiple cover-ups, we in the audience may have forgotten that Carrie was the lone voice in the wilderness crying out to Jessica that something was wrong with her husband, but Jessica herself sure hasnt, and watching her sincerely thank Carrie was gut-wrenching.
So what will we get after the next Previously, on Homeland clips wrap up? Im hoping the nonsense with Javadi is kept to a minimum and the triangulation between Saul, Carrie, and Quinn gets cranked to eleven. Carrie and Quinn have a connection thats at least as magnetic as Carrie and Brody, since theyre not just driven and broken by their work, theyre actually working on the same side. Two dynamite exchanges spell out the emotional stakes here, first between Carrie and Quinn Im not sure I like being watched over by you, Quinn. Im at a safe distance. then between Quinn and Saul Shes on her own, Saul. Shes always been on her own. Deepening the relationship between these complicated characters could give Homeland a genuine second wind that will last long past the twists last gasps.
Last Week: Carrie That Weight