Homeland: New show on Showtime

what a horrible conclusion to a show that started out amazing. incredibly silly and going nowhere. the lack of story written for brody finished by his exit was offensive to me as a viewer.

i have no desire to see where the adventures of salieri and angela chase go next.

 

I like slow-building dramas and was a big fan of such things as Rubicon and the opening 30 minutes or so of Inglorious Basterds. So I liked this ending for the most part. If for no other reason than the writers felt free to try the novel approach of not cramming all kinds of action in for action's sake. Kept me wondering what was the big surprise that was surely coming. Unfortunately, there was no big surprise at the end, except now we know Carrie will be head in Istanbul next season. What bothered me was the extent to which they dwelled on the hanging. I mean like I kept thinking "ok, we get the idea". It's like on at least one level, they think the audience is a bunch of 13 year old boys who love that stuff.

I was glad to see that Carrie was realistic about the child and plans to give it up for adoption. She'd be a terrible mother and she was realistic in recognizing that. The family members trying to talk her into keeping it were deluded. I just hope that next season doesn't begin in Istanbul with Carrie taking care of her baby. I hope she sticks to her guns and doesn't let her family guilt her into keeping that baby.

 

Kind of a letdown. They just kill off Brody, last year's ending, way better.

 

A pretty scathing review here:
http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/news/homeland-finale-recap-left-hanging-20131216

 

Yeah, I kept saying, "OK, where's the shocking twist?" Nothin'.

I thought it sucked, being way too much "on the nose" for me -- too ordinary, too predictable, too expected. I also thought it would've been nice if the U.S. government had made a statement to the effect that Brody did not blow up the CIA building.

My take is that they'll start a completely new story next season, but I'm with a lot of bloggers and armchair critics who are saying if they don't hook me in immediately from the first episode, I'm out.

The moment she realized she was pregnant, I thought, "oh, that kid's gonna be stable... from a mother who's getting drunk and taking three or four different kinds of anti-depressants and mood-stabilizing drugs. Yeah, that'll work out fine."

Somebody like that will either grow up to be the greatest rock musician of their time or Charlie Manson... or maybe both.

 

I think they had to do a reset, there wasn't much left to milk out of the Carrie/Brody story.

 

That's my take on the series as well. I assumed Brody would be killed off since he was in so few episodes this season. The producers had intended to kill him off in the second season but then Damien Lewis got an Emmy nomination.

 

I enjoyed them playing with my expectations for a bigger bang of a finale. I thought it was interesting how resigned Brody was at the end.

Still am having a hard time imagining next season, but I bet by the time I rewatch this on disc I'll have an idea and be interested in seeing what they present.

 

Why would they do this? That's the kind of thing that might be revealed in de-classified documents 30-40 years down the road, if ever. No way would they do anything that might compromise the placement of the guy now at the head of Iranian's intelligence services.

You thought it was predictable that Brody was going to be killed off? I didn't expect that. But I'm sooooooooooo glad it wasn't part of some fake-out "he's not really dead" twist.

There was nothing else to do with the character. There was no way he was going to be publicly exonerated. No way he could have a life with Carrie, unless the two of them went into some witness protection changed identity life WAY off the grid, and that probably wouldn't work anyway.

 

i thought it was very well done. did i particularly like it, no, kind of boring after iran, but i believe they are setting up a whole new storyline, which they almost had to do as they played this one out as long as they could.

i trust that the writers for this show, who have been just excellent up to now, will get it back on track with next season, and a whole new storyline will capture us once again.

 

I disagree. There should have been at least a brief scene where Carrie, Saul Berenson, Quinn, Dar Adal, Senator Lockhart or someone else from the CIA went to Brody's family home and told Jessica, Dana, Chris, and Mike, that Brody did not bomb Langley. There are now secondary and tertiary characters in Homeland that have all but disappeared.

I was disappointed that Homeland was shut out of the Golden Globe awards. Claire Daines and Mandy Patinkin should have received nominations as should have the show.

Great actress. She was good as Anna in V.

 

i hope quinn is back next year, his character is very good.

 

Yes.

 

Why do you think they should do this, or that it is the lest bit realistic that they would? Should they also tell his family he strapped on a bomb and took it into the vice presidents bunker with the intention of blowing up all those people, but didn't because his bomb malfunctioned? That's the story he gave, right? I don't think he's ever admitted to anyone he just changed his mind, though he did then later kill the V.P. Does even Carrie know he did that? I can't remember.

 

I agree. Last year kept me wanting to see what happened next. This year just feels like it is over.

 

I wonder if Quinn will have a bigger role next season and Carrie, being in Turkey, will become a secondary character.

Chad

 

I did think it was interesting to have Carrie become a NW lumberjack at the end - I didn't see that one coming.

 

Does anyone else think that four months later coda was recently filmed? The reason I ask is I believe the recent events in Iran with the nuclear treaty did not occur until after the show began airing it's current season. At that point I figured the rest of the series was already in the can. Didn't they make reference in the coda that Saul was instrumental in setting up what we been seeing in the real world news lately? If that is the case, I wonder what changed from whatever what was originally filmed?

 

I don't know about Carrie becoming a secondary character, but I I'll bet they find a way to get Quinn involved. Though he did say he was getting out. I like his character a lot too. Has he hever told Carried that David Estes (sp?) ordered him to kill her?

 

Conflicted about the demise of Brody. It made sense given the endgame of the mission, but it was still somewhat of a shock. Part of me kept expecting someone to step in and extract him. I do agree that his character had played out, and there was not to be a happy ending somewhere with Carrie.

I'm in for next season to see where it leads. The cast is top notch and I'm interested to see where Saul is heading now that he's out of the company.

 

I think that was part of the videotaped confession he made prior to the bomb incident that he backed out of. And I think the daughter also figured it out.

One interesting loose end: the show never revealed what Brody did with the unused bomb jacket. I bet he coulda gotten $50 for it on eBay Iran. "Slightly unused bomb jacket! Like new! Complete with remote control! Just add batteries, and you can take out up to 20 government officials in a bunker! As seen on TV!"

 

and then having the screen just go black!

 

What I don't get is why did they focus so intently on the Brody family in the first half of the season only to totally abandon them in the final episode ? That made no sense to me.

 

I think they were planning to do more, but actress Morena Baccarin wound up getting pregnant in real-life, which made it difficult to have her in the show.

 

Yeah, for all the talk of disappointment in the way Brody was handled in the finale, Dana is the real puzzle. I mean, they wasted an incredible amount of airtime this season on her...with absolutely ZERO payoff. Not even if I am incredibly generous can I come up with a reason for wasting all that screen time on her story.