This was mostly just an okay episode for me, until the last few minutes kicked it up a notch with some great tension fueled suspense scenes. But once again, too much Dana, as always. We start off with Javadi, the Iranian guy that Saul wants captured and that presumably Carrie is set up to start meeting with, as he pulls into D.C. with no trouble from security. Then Quinn shows up at Saul's to ask him what's going on and Saul finally fills him in on the whole plot he and Carrie cooked up, officially bringing him into the operation. Quinn is stunned, and as we find out that this whole thing was planned from the moment Saul outed Carrie in front of Congress, so am I. And I have to call bullshit on that a little bit, because as you'll remember, we SAW Carrie's reaction to Saul throwing her under the bus- she was alone, and she was not being recorded as far as I could tell. So all that "acting" she was doing was for the benefit of whom? The audience only, apparently. That's a major error, and there were some other scenes like that too in the past few episodes, I'm sorry to say. Carrie couldn't be so into the ruse that she feels the need to fool even herself when she's alone, of all things. Sorry Homeland, but that's a pretty big screw-up.
Carrie is planning to be under full time surveillance by the CIA and the Iranians now, and it looks like she throws all her meds away again, which can't be a good idea. Then Javadi gets into a prepared car from his contact people and now, UGH- Dana and Leo on the run. Dana says they can start a new life someplace else, even get jobs, while Leo the possible murdering psychopath says no, they'll eventually catch us, just enjoy it while we can. Boring.
Back to Carrie, who is paid a visit by Jess of all people, begging Carrie to find Dana, saying that the police won't help and the FBI won't either. I'm not sure I buy that Jess would ever go to Carrie for anything, but of course Carrie promises to do what she can even as she's supposed to be prepping for her mission. After Jess leaves, Carrie calls the FBI agent in charge of monitoring the Brody family, who promptly blows her off, so then she calls Max (another returning cast member!) and tells him they're doing "the yoga play," so she can get in touch with the FBI and dodge her own surveillance. As she heads to the garage she runs into Quinn, who hilariously freaks her out as he casually walks into her from behind a pillar, but he's on her side and wants to help her find Dana. He's also impressed with what she put herself through (so am I, the level of commitment was frankly IMPOSSIBLE), but Carrie goes on her own to the so-called yoga class, with Quinn now keeping tabs on her, as per Saul's directions.
Meanwhile Saul's on a hunting retreat with members of the Senate intelligence committee, including Senator Lockhart (the guy who yelled at Carrie in the congressional hearings), and expecting to be nominated for CIA director soon, so he has to rub shoulders. Carrie goes into the yoga class where a colleague, Lisa, is ready to take her place so that she can sneak out the back way and meet up with Max and Virgil (yay!), who are both mad at her for risking their jobs. The three of them take off to "accidentally" bump into the FBI agent who dissed Carrie on the phone.
A quick cut to Javadi still on his day trip, taking a break to eat a burger and spill it on himself while he watches some woman play with her kid in the yard, but then back to Carrie, who confronts the FBI dude about Dana, telling him to find her or she'll make sure the whole world knows he lost the only person Brody would ever reach out to. Back at the yoga class, the Iranians are watching the building as Quinn watches them, and when he sees the guy starting to go in he tries to delay it by blocking his car- luckily Carrie makes it back literally at the last second so that the guy sees her in class for sure, and she knows she's not made.
Lockhart and Saul are out hunting geese, when Lockhart breaks the news to Saul that he's not going to be nominated CIA director after all, that the president is going to nominate him instead, and that will mean more military action in place of espionage activity. He tells him this is due to Saul's failure to catch Brody, while Saul is angry and disappointed at this turn of events. Understandably. Javadi finally shows up at his destination, where his first act is to change out of the shirt he mussed up, but all this Javadi stuff is still kind of a mystery at this point.
Dana meanwhile, walks into a gas station where she hears on the news that Leo may have killed his brother and royally freaks out, screaming at him to tell her the truth after everything she confessed to him. Leo denies it, only admitting that it happened in front of him, but Dana doesn't accept it and after nearly crashing their car, she says she can't have lies in her life and turns herself in to the police. Whatever.
Carrie's back at home now, while Quinn keeps watch outside, and Saul calls her to berate her for risking their operation by doing the favor for Jess. The Iranian watch seems to have been lifted and Saul's pissed that their efforts were all for nothing, but Carrie's confused and sure that she hadn't been made at the yoga class. Saul hangs up on her and goes to a reception with the politicians, where Lockhart is announced as the nominee in front of everyone and Saul remains upset. He makes his own announcement that he has to go back to work while he still has two weeks left with the agency in his charge and then hightails it out of there.
The FBI brings Dana back home, where she sullenly walks past Jess and Chris to go into her room while they stare at her (seriously, how many times have we seen this exact scene on this show?), and when she sits down on her bed Morgan Saylor reveals that she might possess the funniest cryface since Claire Danes herself. Yeah, it was bad.
Now for the best part of the episode. Quinn's still keeping watch as Carrie gets ready for bed, but he decides to call her and listen to her confess that even though this whole thing was a long shot, she still doesn't think she was made (which of course means she wasn't- we know by now if Carrie believes something, then it has to be true). But there's still no Iranian surveillance on her as she hangs up and goes to bed. Saul finally gets home to find Mira having dinner with a man she worked with in Mumbai, but he brushes right past her and walks upstairs, depressed as usual.
As Carrie's in bed, she suddenly hears people breaking in and rushes to her wall vault, but it's too late, as two of the Iranians catch her and hold her still, ordering her to strip off her clothes. Carrie's terrified and crying, but does it anyway as Quinn suspects something might be happening from outside. He calls Saul, who tells him not to move, but Quinn's unsure. Back inside, Carrie is ordered to put on the clothes they give her as they break her phone and prepare to haul her away. Quinn sees a guy outside the house now and ignores Saul's desist orders, getting out of the car to help Carrie, but he's too late, as they've already put a bag over her head and taken her. Quinn surveys the damage in the house and dejectedly tells Saul they've lost her, but Saul is convinced everything's good as long as they know who's got her. After all, he says, Carrie's been on her own before. The last scene is the two guys dragging Carrie to an unknown location and when they take the bag off her head, of course she's face to face with Javadi in an anonymous room.
That last segment was pretty heart-pounding, but all the Dana stuff in this episode was superfluous at best. Still, next week looks like it might be another bottle episode, with just Carrie and Javadi the whole time? Can't be sure, but we may just get lucky with a possible Dana-free hour, as her little Bonnie and Clyde storyline seems to have wrapped up. Until next time!
