Like many people I'm sure, coming back to the fourth season of Homeland was something done slowly and with caution. The third season had been pretty weak for the majority, and then asked a lot of belief suspension towards the end; it also had a conclusion which could easily have been taken as the end point of the show if you were looking to stop watching, since it ends the Brody storyline. The fourth season does manage to pick things up pretty well though, relocated to Pakistan for the most part, and it reboots itself with the original characters and some good additions.
The story draws heavily on topical subjects, and as such it adds weight to the drama; this is necessary because it also then makes the viewer forget that essentially we are now watching 24, and it does this by virtue of wearing big boy clothes so that the twists and turns maybe do not seem as absurd as they otherwise might. They do work though, and in particular the season does a good job of mixing the character-driven threads, while also building good tension with all the main characters involved. Not all of it works and not all of it is as smart as it thinks it is, but it consistently engages throughout. It seems to forget what it is doing in the final episode of the season though. Part of it is an attempt to be more low-key and serious, which I was okay with, but the family issues were too prominent, and the potential "dirty business" of the spy world was left very late in the episode where it didn't do as much as it should.
The cast do well throughout. Danes puts a lot into her performance and mostly it works; I will say she has to fight the writing which doesn't give her a great deal of help to justify why Carrie's history still allows her to hold the position and influence she does, but on a scene-by-scene basis she is mostly good, with only a few places where she overacts. Patinkin is reliable as ever and support is generally good – in particular Friend's Quinn steps up a lot. Jaffrey, Acar, Boniadi, Kaur, and others are all engaging and deliver as required.
It is an arresting season, and a strong one despite the requirement to suspend belief, and a fairly misjudged season finale. The base of topical relevance and patient drama, allows the viewer to go with the more "24-esque" moments and get caught up in a quite thrilling and dramatic season.
The story draws heavily on topical subjects, and as such it adds weight to the drama; this is necessary because it also then makes the viewer forget that essentially we are now watching 24, and it does this by virtue of wearing big boy clothes so that the twists and turns maybe do not seem as absurd as they otherwise might. They do work though, and in particular the season does a good job of mixing the character-driven threads, while also building good tension with all the main characters involved. Not all of it works and not all of it is as smart as it thinks it is, but it consistently engages throughout. It seems to forget what it is doing in the final episode of the season though. Part of it is an attempt to be more low-key and serious, which I was okay with, but the family issues were too prominent, and the potential "dirty business" of the spy world was left very late in the episode where it didn't do as much as it should.
The cast do well throughout. Danes puts a lot into her performance and mostly it works; I will say she has to fight the writing which doesn't give her a great deal of help to justify why Carrie's history still allows her to hold the position and influence she does, but on a scene-by-scene basis she is mostly good, with only a few places where she overacts. Patinkin is reliable as ever and support is generally good – in particular Friend's Quinn steps up a lot. Jaffrey, Acar, Boniadi, Kaur, and others are all engaging and deliver as required.
It is an arresting season, and a strong one despite the requirement to suspend belief, and a fairly misjudged season finale. The base of topical relevance and patient drama, allows the viewer to go with the more "24-esque" moments and get caught up in a quite thrilling and dramatic season.