Episode Title: “Tin Man Is Down”
Writers: Alex Gansa & Barbara Hall
Director: Lesli Linka Glatter
Previously on “Homeland”:
It’s disconcerting that there are so many “Homeland” fans online that seem to believe that Saul Berenson (Mandy Patinkin) is some kind of terrorist spy. I believe that theory caught on when Saul said a prayer for the dead in the second season finale and some ignorant people couldn’t tell the difference between Hebrew and Arabic.
Now every gesture Saul makes is under intense fan scrutiny and his every grimace is seen as confirmation of his true loyalties to the enemy.
Really?
I can’t put it past the creative team of “Homeland” to go for that plotline, but it would mean that everything we’ve learned about Saul during the first two seasons is a lie. A carefully orchestrated deception designed for him to spend decades working his way up in the CIA before taking the reigns of the agency after most of the command hierarchy was killed in a freak terrorist attack.
Fortunately, that seems to be more of a fan theory than anything laid out by the “Homeland” creative team. But you may not like Saul at the end of this episode. He may not be a terrorist, but he pulls a huge dick move to provide cover for himself and the CIA.
There are full spoilers ahead for the third season premiere of “Homeland,” so you should probably skip this review if you missed the episode or else Carrie is gonna go off her meds again.
Whoops… too late. Carrie (Claire Danes) and sanity seem to have parted ways again. All because she thinks that her prescriptions held her back from doing her job. Even fully medicated Carrie has problems with her mental stability. Without her meds, Carrie is a barely restrained time bomb.
Carrie is also a very convenient scapegoat for the CIA attacks. Someone within the agency is leaking details about her romantic involvement with Nicholas Brody (Damian Lewis) and the immunity agreement he signed to help the agency bring down Abu Nazir
The truth is very damaging to Carrie. Everything she’s being accused of, she did. That doesn’t excuse Saul for throwing Carrie under the bus at the Congressional hearing, but nothing he said wasn’t true. Maybe Carrie shouldn’t be trusted with anything national security related.
During her own testimony before the committee, Carrie does herself no favors by blurting out her insistence that Brody is innocent and perjuring herself in obvious ways. “Homeland” is actually bringing up an interesting dilemma: can Carrie return to her job at the CIA when all of her indiscretions are exposed? And should she?
True to form, Carrie goes out of her way to make an enemy out of Saul’s new right hand man, Dar Adal (F. Murray Abraham) and she creates an embarrassing situation for her colleagues when she confronts them in public. Carrie’s intelligence instincts are usually right and she accused Adal of being the leak. In response, Adal unconvincingly told Saul that he wasn’t leaking the info even though the tactics were right out of his ‘playbook.”
Saul is under tremendous pressure to find the men that planned the 12/12 attack and eliminate them. The CIA itself is supposedly being pressed for results as well with a possible revocation of its charter by an angry Congress.
When given the chance to kill six high ranking members of the terrorist network that planned the attack, Saul hesitates. Not because he wants to spare the terrorists. Saul simply doesn’t know what the best course of action is. Saul may not be suited for leadership and he knows it.
One other thing that Saul doesn’t know is where he stands with his wife, Mira (Sarita Choudhury). She came back from India after the attacks out of concern for Saul. But they live like roommates rather than man and wife. When pressed for a conversation about their relationship, Saul demurs and not-so-subtly hints that he’d like to share his bed with his wife again. Assuming they ever shared a bed. Saul’s marriage seems joyless and lifeless. He may love Mira, but she has yet to show any deep romantic attachment to Saul.
Brody was oddly absent from the episode, although he was heavily referenced as being the most wanted fugitive in the world. In Brody’s absence, “Homeland” checked back in with his family some time after Dana (Morgan Saylor) attempted suicide. In group therapy, Dana seems to have figured out just what to say in order to be released. But her mother, Jessica (Morena Baccarin) apparently had to take out a second mortgage in order to afford her treatment.
It was necessary to keep the Brody family around and explore their reaction to living in a world where they are hounded by the press and persecuted over Brody’s actions. However, the episode dragged in most of their scenes and it was the least rewarding subplot of the hour. The only thing I was interested in learning was why Mike (Diego Klattenhoff) was no longer with the family. Klattenhoff is co-starring on “The Blacklist,” so that’s the real world explanation. Mike’s absence really needs to be addressed on the show. I have a hard time believing that Mike would simply abandon the family after trying so hard to replace Brody for years.
Peter Quinn (Rupert Friend) also resurfaces this week and he carries most of the action during Saul’s simultaneous strike on six terrorist targets. Last season, Quinn was depicted as a killer with a conscience. Quinn lives up to that rep again as he nearly derails the entire mission because he refused to execute the target while his son was in the car with him. One Jack Bauer-esque action sequence later, Quinn killed his man. But then he accidentally shot and killed the kid that he was trying to spare.
This could be an interesting character arc for Quinn. With Brody MIA, Saul stuck back in CIA headquarters and Carrie unraveling by the minute, Quinn may be the only character who can currently take meaningful action out in the field. And it’s doubtful that he’ll simply shrug off his incidental murder of a child. But a conflicted Peter Quinn has great dramatic potential.
Aside from too much screentime for the Brody family, this was a fairly solid season opener for “Homeland.” This is a show that usually takes a while to get its story in gear. This is also the first full season produced after it won the Emmy for Best Drama in 2012. I don’t know if “Homeland” can ever live up to that award again, but I’d certainly like to see that happen.
