Homeland - The Vest

As requested and better late than never.

If this was the penultimate episode, we are anxious to see the finale. Brody, you rat fink! You told! It was the smart move for him, with Carrie closing in on the truth. We finally got to see manic Carrie, since she was off her meds, and she is so much crazier than regular Carrie. We loved it! Obviously great acting from Claire Danes, which is something we feel dumb saying, because who needs to even say that anymore? Her quest for the green pen had us laughing so much. Of course Carrie would throw out a Shakespeare reference when she was losing it.

Saul showed up at the hospital and saw Carrie working, as usual, but acting absolutely insane, which was less usual. He quickly found out about her condition when Maggie showed up with drugs. They took Carrie home. Carrie continues to work, and she’s like a dangerous savant, because she’s right about everything she’s working on. She puts a puzzle together for Saul to figure out, and he does, which made us love him a little more. Carrie’s craziness was never too much. It was perfect.

Carrie plots Nazir’s movements, actions, and state of mind. She figures out that there was a turning point for Nazir, and that he wants revenge for something. We know it’s the death of his son, but Carrie doesn’t know that. Carrie also shoots down the theory that there is only one sniper, because Abu Nazir doesn’t work like that. He does things bigger and gets lots of people both involved and dead.

Do you guys think that Brody’s daughter will be the one in his family to first find out that he’s a terrorist in training? We always prefer Carrie’s scenes to Brody’s, because they are usually more interesting and Claire brings a certain intensity. Even when Brody is confronting Nazir or doing something equally interesting, it just can’t top Carrie doing … anything. This episode was the same way. Whenever we get to Brody, it’s like “break time” from being completely sucked into the show. We kind of need those breaks.

This week, Brody took his family to Gettysburg and told the story of deeply religious men who held the line of battle in the face of greater numbers. We actually liked the way he told the story. Brody goes and picks up a bomb while he is there, and his daughter notices him acting very strangely and putting something in the car. Brody and Jessica are about to have sex like normal people too, so it’s kind of sad that things are getting so great for this family when things are really, really bad underneath.

Carrie calls Brody and asks him what Nazir is angry about. Brody has had enough of Carrie’s digging and figuring things out, so he calls Carrie’s boss and tells him that Carrie has been harassing him, bugging his house, and sleeping with him. Estes comes to Carrie’s house with agents and takes everything (all her intelligence that Saul organized) away.

This was a good episode of the best new show of the fall. Once Upon a Time is a close second though.

Episode grade: A-