We know D.C. Get our free newsletter to stay in the know.
In last night’s Homeland, Saul is tying the laces on a pair of sturdy duck boots because the president’s chief of staff has invited him hunting to talk about a permanent position as the head of the CIA. Peter Quinn stops by and Saul confirms that dangling Carrie in front of a vicious Senate hearing, throwing her under a bus, and committing her to a mental institution was “all an act, part of the plan.” How easily it all slides away with one quick twist.
Meanwhile, a mysterious figure drives over the border from Canada. He’s heading to America for business. What sort of business?, ask you and the officer checking IDs. Oh just paper products, he answers. The spooky music suggests otherwise.
Also driving through the American landscape are Dana and her (potentially psychopathic) boyfriend Leo. Having escaped their parents, the two are running out of money. But the sun is shining onto their golden, youthful faces as they act out a John Mellencamp song.
After leaving the mental institution, Carrie’s back in her bathroom, staring at her twisted face in a mirror and fiddling with a pill bottle—-basically the position in which we always leave her. But Jessica Brody shows up at her house, begging Carrie to locate Dana. Jessica nearly apologizes for her rude treatment to Carrie regarding Brody’s terroristic intentions.
Carrie calls Matt to enact “The Yoga Play,” which is the name of the episode (and also probably a one-woman theatrical piece that you’re Facebook-invited to by an aunt). Is Carrie acting now? No, she’s just risking her operation in favor of locating Brody’s daughter.
She pretends to attend a yoga class and run out the back exit. She insists that an FBI officer locate Dana. He tries to calm her down, saying they’re just playing out a little teen runaway fantasy, just like Romeo and Juliet. Carrie (remembering Claire Danes’ performance in Romeo + Juliet?) yelled at him because that story doesn’t end well so that’s a terrible analogy.
Though their relationship doesn’t end in that much tragedy, Dana breaks up with Leo as soon as she finds out that he lied to her about his brother’s death. The police arrive, and Dana returns to her home, betrayed and distraught, a totally new mood for Homeland, Season 3.
At the duck hunt, Saul finds out that he wasn’t going to be nominated at all. His rival, Senator Andrew Lockhart, is up for the job. So Saul gives a veiled criticism of Lockhart, using a hunting analogy, which he presumably thought about all day in his duck boots.
Back at Carrie’s, the terrorism team that she’s attempting to investigate barges into her apartment and strip-searches her, apparently to prepare her for a meeting with this terrorist operative/mysterious man driving down from Canada. She’s brought to meet him. He greets her by saying, “You’re in good shape… must be all that yoga.” Does he know about the yoga play?
Photo via Showtime