Good news: Homeland (Channel 4, Sunday) is back. And the CIA – showing uncharacteristic openmindedness, or perhaps forgetfulness, or just simply foolishness – have put Carrie’s issues (mental health, drink, inappropriate affairs with possible spies) to one side and appointed her station chief in Kabul. The Drone Queen, her staff call her, which may sound like an apian anomaly, but what it means is that she has America’s kill list in one hand and a finger of the other on the button that launches a missile attack against the latest target. Then it (the hand) generally pours its owner a large glass of chilled chablis and Skypes her sister.
Intelligence arrives from Pakistan station chief Sandy Bachman about the whereabouts of Haissam Haqqani, this week’s No 4 on the hit list. “Send ’em in,” orders Carrie. And in they go, not drones this time, but (showing uncharacteristic bravery?) actual piloted F-15s, codenamed Smash 11 and Smash 12, to blow Haqqani’s farmhouse to kingdom come. Boom!
Oops, but what Sandy’s intel failed to mention was that there was a wedding party at the farmhouse, and 40 civilians have been killed as well as Haqqani. “Fuck you, too,” Carrie tells the television that delivers this news, before switching it off.
Daylight spy shots (I assume from a drone, bzzzz) confirm the news that dozens of bodies are laid out where the farmhouse used to be – women, children, wedding guests. An injured survivor, mourning his mother and sister, looks up at the drone camera. It’s a look that says he – medical student Aayan Ibrahim – might become a character and end up on that kill list, if he’s not careful.
It gets worse for Carrie. Ibrahim was filming the wedding on his phone at the time of the strike. The phone, though injured, survived, like its owner. It’s a hell of an advert for the phone (an iPhone 5, according to a high-ranking Guardian journalist, though I won’t reveal my source in case the intel proves to be wrong). Never mind bending in your pocket, as the iPhone 6 has been alleged to do – this one can survive a US missile attack.
Whatever, the footage, of a wedding so rudely interrupted, ends up on the internet, as footage tends to. Everyone is very cross with Carrie, even Smash 12, who delivered the hit. “Monsters, fucking monsters, all of you,” he tells her. “Get the fuck out of my face, Lieutenant,” she replies. “Yes ma’am,” he says, remembering himself.
Quinn, now in Islamabad, is also mad at her. “You know what Carrie, fuck you,” he tells her. “No really, fuck you,” he goes on, presumably just in case she thought he didn’t mean it first time. God, it’s turning into a bit of a theme. Poor Carrie, where’s Brody, her only true friend, when she needs him?
Nooooooo! Brody’s dead, remember? Hanged by the neck from a crane in Iran at the end of the last season. For going to a ladies’ volleyball match, was it? No, for treason. Surely even Brody can’t come back from a hanging, even if Damian Lewis was spotted (by plain old paps, not a drone this time) on set in South Africa.
He did leave a piece of himself behind – a new daughter, with Carrie, who, somewhat surprisingly, kept her, though she has been left behind in the US, of course (the fact that dependants aren’t invited was presumably one of the attractions of Kabul, along with the thrill). And Saul’s still around, struggling with the private sector. That’s good news: Homeland might have suffered from a double hit with the loss of two leading characters.
The further good news is that the show is bigger than the man. Maybe we’re not quite saying Nicholas Who? yet. But this is a fabulous episode, jam-packed with thrills and promise for the series. If in seasons two and three Homeland occasionally lost direction and momentum, it’s back with renewed purpose. And a bang.
The bang isn’t constant. That’s something Homeland has always done well: gone quiet between the loud bits. Like a well-performed symphony, the dynamics and contrasts are so important. The moments of thoughtfulness and quieter reflection, sometimes a whole episode or more, are just as important as the fortissimos, and make them – the bangs – louder and all the more thrilling. There are two in this opener, big ones, with F-15s, rockets, brass, timpani, the sticks of an angry mob, shock, awe, you got it, the lot. Firstly Carrie’s misjudged strike and its aftermath; and then, at the end, Sandy’s (end). Looks like Sandy won’t be a major new character. Ouch.
