Homeland succeeds in its fifth season because for the first time, the human relationships portrayed in it are grown up and believable, like Carrie Mathieson herself.
When Homeland’s first season premiered in October 2011, it made tidal waves in the television industry with its extreme, hawkish politics in regard to dealing with terrorists and protecting the United States (note the name of the series), the unexpected investment in a brilliant, abrasive, female main character, the mentally unstable CIA agent Carrie Mathieson (Claire Danes), and the dramatic story arches that, incredibly, in today’s times, are probably pretty close to reality – at least in terms of portraying the extremism that has manifested in multiple terrorist attacks across the globe.
Over multiple seasons the plotlines of Homeland became increasingly hysterical, an ill-thought out development that was embodied by the histrionics of Carrie Mathieson herself, a troubling, complex character who portrays her struggle with bipolar disorder (also a rare thing in mainstream television) with great sensitivity, but suffers from repeating plots and triggers that make her travails ever so slightly exasperating; Carrie’s mental illness elicits empathy with her character but her manifest personality even while she is taking her medication, is written, purposefully, to be harsh.
This combination of violence, imminent gunfire and explosions, difficult characters, and Machiavellian CIA tradecraft made it difficult to continue watching subsequent seasons of Homeland without having nightmares. Curiosity at the resilience of a show that was founded on an initially facile premise, but is now in its fifth season, compelled me to pick up watching the show again to see if anything had changed.
Tankfully, and wisely, both Homeland and Carrie Mathieson have evolved for the better. Set now in a contemporary Berlin, Carrie has left the CIA, to the great disappointment of her mentor Saul Berenson (Mandy Patinkin) and is consulting as a security expert for the enigmatic Otto Düring (Sebastian Koch), an extremely wealthy German philanthropist who runs his own foundation. Carrie has a child, a little girl, she is in a stable relationship with Jonas Hollander (Alexander Fehling), a human rights lawyer for the Düring Foundation, and her world appears, finally, to be giving her the positive reinforcement and stability that she has lacked her entire life.
Unfortunately, a chillingly prescient terrorism plot (in light of recent events in Europe) draws Carrie into a convoluted world of former CIA colleagues with opaque intentions. Peter Quinn (Rupert Friend), another agent from her past, re-enters her life, and the nightmare begins again, but with higher stakes.
Full of surprises, good and bad, with two additional strong female characters in lead roles, several twisty plotlines that are, even with minimal hyperbole, hair-raising, and no less than four unconventional love stories that are absolutely captivating, Homeland succeeds in its fifth season because for the first time, the human relationships portrayed in it are grown up and believable, like Carrie Mathieson herself.