Brigette Watches Homeland, S4/Ep6: "From A to B and Back Again"

Woaaaahhh Homeland. Woah.

Things we learned:

1) Aayan fell in love with Carrie (or thought he did).
2) Carrie staged her own kidnapping, which resulted in a bloody nose (which by now I feel she deserves).

3) The one guy who's name I still don't know who took pictures of Carrie's stuff with the sound of his phone on is still spying on Carrie.
4) Aayan's uncle is holding Saul hostage. SAUUULL!

Okay, I feel like the moment at the end of the episode overshadows anything else that happened, so let's focus on that. Carrie's plan for Aayan to lead her right to his uncle worked-- not without roadblocks, but still. The drone followed Aayan on his journey, leading directly to Mr. Terrorist. (What's his name?)

But Mister Terrorist KNEW who Carrie was and knew what she was up to. (How? Is it because of Loud Camera guy?) Mister Terrorist also knew that a drone was following them, which leads me to question #1: okay, I've never been followed by a drone, nor have I even seen one, but wouldn't you notice something following you? Even if it were in the sky above you, wouldn't you catch it out of the corner of your eye? I mean, it's a flying object. It's not invisible. Duh, Aayan, there's a drone on your back.

Poor Aayan. I guess he really was just as innocent as he seemed after all. His uncle, who Ayan thought was actually a good guy despite what Carrie said, put a bullet in the poor kid's head. I guess family isn't the most important thing when your safety has been compromised. It was painful, wasn't it, just watching Aayan's face as he tried to put it all together? Carrie was who? She did what? Saul was who? Was his uncle mad? The kiss on the cheek was a nice thing to do. I take solace in knowing that it honestly didn't seem to register that he was going to die until he was already dead. But it was still upsetting.

What was up with Carrie's reaction? I kind of thought that before she saw Saul that she was perfectly comfortable having the drone kill Uncle and take out whoever was near him-- including Aayan. Can a drone kill just one person in a crowd of people? Or was she just planning on blowing up his car once they drove away? I don't know, but her reaction to Aayan's death was so strong that I got the impression that maybe she thought he was going to live through all of this. Was this explained and I missed it? Probably.

Regardless, her plan was screwed up, and nothing upsets Carrie more than the injustice of her plans being screwed up. All that work, all that screwing, for nothing! She was going to get Mr. Terrorist, and he beat her at her own game. He knew she was watching, showed her Saul, and said, "Whatchoo gonna do 'bout it?"

If Carrie was unlikeable a few episodes ago, she was surely unlikable in this moment. Even if she was upset for Aayan, that emotion wasn't enough to forgive her for demanding to take Mr. Terrorist out, immediately, killing Saul with him! Saul is basically Carrie's father. Maybe she knows it's a hopeless situation and she knows Saul knows that, but it still doesn't excuse her for demanding that Saul be blown up immediately.

Themes: Did anyone notice that part in the drone room when Carrie was told to "lie down and get some rest"? Again, there was a scene of Carrie sleeping and being woken up. I'm telling you, this is on purpose! There's gonna be some grand awakening on the horizon.

If Carrie sleeps with a terrorist sympathizer, he will die. Is this Carrie's lesson? Is this the terrorist's lesson? Is this just the audience's lesson? We know now that if Carrie makes eyes at another terrorist affiliate, he's got no chance.

Are you glad Aayan's gone, or do you feel like "why did we spend so much time with this kid if he was gonna die"? Is Saul gonna die? Is Carrie going to redeem herself? Can this season redeem itself?