Sure, she may be a little off her head from time to time, but you’ve got to hand it to Carrie Mathison for having a pretty good sense about men.
Her hunch about Nicholas Brody being a turned prisoner of war was the vindication of the season. But Sunday, her suspicion about a second man in her orbit turned out to be equally true.
It was a few episodes back that Carrie had her suspicions about the hotheaded new CIA analyst suddenly running the Brody case, Peter Quinn, who stabbed Brody while impatiently interrogating him. Carrie had asked Virgil to check him out.
But it wasn’t until Sunday’s episode that he Max finally got around to doing so. They broke into his apartment and found him to be living in some spartan existence with just one personal effect: A picture of a woman and her newborn, whom Saul goes out and investigates immediately. It turned out she’s a cop in Philly and her baby daddy had a different name. Back in D.C., Max followed Quinn when he took a run out and indeed did a couple of suspicious things, including switching buses to talk to a mysterious man.
Mysterious indeed: It was F. Murray Abraham, prominently named as guest star in the episode, making his only appearance, as the bus rode by. I’m thinking it was the biggest credit for the least amount of time of any guest star in a major TV show episode.
It was not until the preview for next week that we saw this character, Dar Adul, identified as an “off the book black ops guy” to whom Quinn is reporting. So suddenly, just when the series really needed it, there was a new layer of paranoia and coverup to consider: David Estes doesn’t trust the Saul and Carrie operation so a second shadowy agency was also involved.
We need this new storyline because some of the other secondary storylines have expired. The whole weird Dana hit and run story that seemed like it would upend the main plot was suddenly not an issue at all. Certainly, it was never mentioned at all. On the other hand Jess rekindled her affair with Mike rather spectacularly, slipping off her nightgown before him while he’s staying in a safe-house hotel with him and the kids.
And just as there was a hint of sex, there was a hint of violence.
“Homeland” is good at packing action in every episode, so there was a whole terrorist strike thing that was foiled and interrupted before it could get to the bigger intentional event: blowing up a homecoming ceremony for 700 returning special forces, an event where the vice president and Brody will both be present. It was also the event Brody was told about when he saw Abu Nazir face to face last week.
It is the TV reporter Roya who was going to be the trigger person, apparently. Not only that, but it was stated she “intends to broadcast the blast worldwide.” As if other press outlets on hand wouldn’t be doing the same.
It’s no secret that “Homeland” actually shoots in Charlotte, N.C., instead of Washington, D.C., which explains the Blue Line buses and buildings that are way too tall. But here was something of a Charlotte landmark — Zack’s Hamburgers — as site for the showdown.
Carrie finds that Nazir is not the unidentified man sitting in the SUV (and why would the mastermind have to be present for the plot to unfold anyway?) and before they talk about the foiled terror plot, or how Brody’s cover has been blown, suddenly Brody is being picked up by Quinn pretending to be a limo driver and seconds away from assassinating the Congressman.
It’s not until a last minute order from Estes to stand down (becuse Nazir has not been found) that he puts the gun down; he tells Brody he’s there to protect him.
Saul wondered why Quinn left the headquarters in the middle of everything. Estes told him it’s because he’s being a liaison with the FBI. An analyst is being a liaison? Saul asked. “He’s wearing two hats,” Estes said.
The episode is also named “Two Hats,” and it likely refers to this double status — and maybe Brody’s too. But it could also represent the newsboys caps worn outdoors by both Saul and Dar Adul: Two weird, funky old man hats.