S04.E12: Long Time Coming

[bunnyblue]

Like ALEXVILLAGE said according to Carrie, it had been 15 years since her mom left. Her mom also wasn't around for her bipolar episode when she was in 1st year university. So at best she was 19 when that happened I guess and 34 now (or younger). But then like you said 34 now means she was  21 when 9/11 happened. And like you said she must have been some super genius/prodigy to finish university early, and then get high enough up in the CIA where she actually could have had something come across her desk that she might have missed that might have prevented the attacks (instead of being the new girl who just gets coffee for people like Saul, or gets to be some station support at some non-important embassy). Then again I am probably thinking too much about this, although it bugs me that people who are paid to write for this show aren't thinking more.

 

If you guys are over thinking Carrie's age now and on 9/11, then so am I. Once she said she had her first bipolar incident during her 1st month of college (which I guess is no older than 18), I started doing the math and it just didn't make sense. She would be 33 now and 20 in 2001. And that's assuming her mother hadn't already been gone a year or two when she started college. I take Carrie's regret about not stopping 9/11 at face value (meaning she wasn't just a Girl Friday) until the show says otherwise, so I'm annoyed the writers totally muddled up Carrie's age by saying her mother had been gone 15 years after having Carrie previously say she missed the signs for 9/11. I would think someone in the writer's room would catch that.

 

Like others, I was paranoid someone was going to get shot, stabbed, blown up, run over, or kidnapped during all the quiet moments in this episode. I was okay with most of it until the final 2 minutes when we inexplicably watched Carrie drive around Dar Adal's neighborhood doing absolutely nothing but look pensive while jazz music played. Then I was like "WTF, that's it?! No drone missile to blow up her car?"

 

 

Vis a vis with Carrie being back in the US, at least Carrie has her baby, sister and nieces to go home to, even if she doesn't want to be with her sister for most of the time. Quinn has nobody, just an empty apartment...

 

Aw that makes even sadder for Quinn. Although he did have the apartment manager interested; he should have sought her out instead of going on a suicide mission. Please don't kill him, show.

 

 

Then again it was established  that Carrie also had an affair with the director of the CIA so that probably helped her career along.

 

I have some vague recollection of this. Was it David Estes? Maybe it was for the best she and Quinn didn't sleep together. For he'd surely be dead, just like her previous lovers. 

[Kel Varnsen]

I have some vague recollection of this. Was it David Estes? Maybe it was for the best she and Quinn didn't sleep together. For he'd surely be dead, just like her previous lovers. 

Yea it was Estes. I think it might have been suggested that his affair with Carrie broke up his marriage. Now that you mention it, Quinn is a smart guy. Maybe he realized that realized that suicide mission in Syria and relationship with Carrie weren't really opposite choices,  but they were actually the same choice, that could possibly have similar results for him.

[Loandbehold]

 

Maybe it was for the best she and Quinn didn't sleep together. For he'd surely be dead, just like her previous lovers.

Oh, come now. She isn't Jack Bauer. Yet.

[shapeshifter]

If you guys are over thinking Carrie's age now and on 9/11, then so am I. Once she said she had her first bipolar incident during her 1st month of college (which I guess is no older than 18)...

What would the timeline be if she worked for a couple of years after high school? Or maybe she attended two years of a community college first (while living at home) and then that "first month of college" referred to the first month away from home at a 4-year college (as a junior)?

[Kel Varnsen]

What would the timeline be if she worked for a couple of years after high school? Or maybe she attended two years of a community college first (while living at home) and then that "first month of college" referred to the first month away from home at a 4-year college (as a junior)?

The age thing I can buy, maybe. But it still doesn't explain how sometime less than 15 years ago she was starting college, but then sometime greater than 13 years ago she was working at the CIA. How do you finish university in 2 years, especially considering in the first year you would have been hospilatized for who knows how long because of her bi-polar episode? Especially since I never really bought Carrie as being very smart. Sure she knows a lot about her field. But you have to know a bunch about all kinds of different crap to get a degree (especially if you want to get it in 2 years). And looking at the CIA's website, minimum requirements for most jobs I could find are a bachelor's degree.

Edited December 27, 2014 by Kel Varnsen

[shapeshifter]

Yeah. Even if we accept that this episode happened in 2013 because that's when it was probably written, and if she joined the military after high school, went to the Middle East and got a couple of years of college in the process, then went to live in a college dorm 15 years ago, she would have been 20 when her mom "abandoned the family" in 1998.

Maybe the viewers are supposed watch while under the influence of whatever Carrie was dosed with a few episodes back.

[gallimaufry]

I've been a bit sad to see the negative reaction to this episode in the press -- I really enjoyed it.  

 

Yes, it was slow -- a coda rather than a climax -- and the plot with Carrie's mother was ostensibly out of left field (although thematically it makes perfect sense).  But I liked that the suspense was purely psychological.  I loved that they really captured the quiet of returning to life after the dirty, mucky and horrific world of the CIA.  I liked how it repositioned Carrie, Quinn and Saul in interesting ways relative to each other.  

 

The Carrie/Quinn romance, which I feared would come across as forced, now feels totally earned to me.

 

I also liked that, after last season's great success, the show had an unambiguous loss.  And for the first time since the loss of Abu Nazir, we have a masterful enemy for Carrie in Haqqani.  

I'm giving the Dar Adal and Saul plot a bye to see how it plays out.  Frankly, the idea of trusting a murderous terrorist not to release a video like that is preposterous -- they'd just wait until releasing it did more damage.  But I would guess that Saul would have a long game and thought through that eventuality - Dar too, perhaps.  Although I'm not sure I want to see Saul back in charge -- Season 3 was wonderful for this and Season 4 wisely went a completely different route with Saul.  But we'll see.

[Occasional Hope]

I was underwhelmed by the episode after such a great season.  I hope Quinn is back, and I expect him to be, although possibly not right away.

 

But I'm wondering something about why Saul (who I always want to call Sol because that's how it sounds to a British listener) took Dar Adal's offer.  What it reminded me of was an incident in one of Lois McMaster Bujold's SF novels (anyone else read them?) in which the protagonist is offered a job he desperately wants back - and realises that offer is a sign that the person offering it is dirty.  Is it at all possible that DA is not just Black Ops but a mole, and/or thatSaul accepted as away to keep an eye on him?  That could be an interesting way to go next season.

[Kerrey92]

Maybe they are basing the Carrie character on the woman who got Bin Laden who entered the CIA right from high school?  So maybe Carrie only had a year or two of college before getting an analyst job with the CIA?

 

And for those of you here who haven't seen the Israeli version of this show, it is amazing and available on Hulu.  The focus of the first season is totally on the prisoners and what happens to them when they come home.  There really isn't a Carrie character per se.  The representative from the Israeli CIA is a man and focuses much more prominently in Season 2.  The show is so different from the American version in some ways, but similar in others.  It's so, so good! 

 

Anyway, thought the finale was just fine.  Didn't love it as much as I had other episodes, but I didn't hate it either. 

[gracory]

Thought the idea of this episode was to give a proper goodbye to Carrie's father, out of respect to the actor (James Rebhorn I think) who died this year.  While they were at it, why not work in some explanation for what happened to Carrie's mother.  Saw it primarily as set up for next year, but I think that is not new; that a number of shows pack most of their action into the episodes leading up to the season finale (e.g. Game of Thrones) and use the final episode of the season to set up for the next year.  Do hope that Pakistan is out there to be revisited as it feels incomplete and the idea that getting Saul back into the agency was worth working with Haqquani came across as offensive.  

[tvfanatic13]

So, we never did find out (a) what happened to the Ambassador and Duck, (b) what Tasneem was holding over Duck's head, and never had any real closure with Tasneem and Kahn. That is going to bother me- I hope that they revisit some of this next season. All in all one of the better seasons though- imo- because of the lack of Brody and his family.

[Kel Varnsen]

The ambassador and Duck I think it is pretty safe to assume he is in federal prison and her career is dead. Still don't know why Sandy needed Duck and what the Taliban's original plan was. For that matter why did Sandy reveal Duck as his source. Isn't he supposed to be a secret agent?

[Bcharmer]

I wanted to know what was in it for Duck in the first place. That was never clear to me. Did I miss something?  Basically, I felt a bit cheated by the abrupt change in location at the start of this episode. To go from Carrie spotting Dar Adal in the car, to the calm preparations for her father's funeral, felt so abrupt. I wanted to be shown, and not merely told, what happened between Adal and Haqqani in Islamabad, and get a bit more closure on Tasneem and Kahn, too. Some say this was a very needed change of pace, but I cannot fully agree. It felt like they went too far in slowing things down, and jumping suddenly back to DC after such an intense ending the week before. 

[tvfanatic13]

The ambassador and Duck I think it is pretty safe to assume he is in federal prison and her career is dead. Still don't know why Sandy needed Duck and what the Taliban's original plan was. For that matter why did Sandy reveal Duck as his source. Isn't he supposed to be a secret agent?

I didn't think that Sandy needed Duck; rather, Duck was Sandy's replacement as a spy for Tasneem. She said that she would keep Duck's "secret" safe in exchange for his cooperation, yet we never learned what the "secret" was, if I am remembering correctly.

[allthatglitters]

.......

 

-When Haqqani kidnapped Saul, he made a video showing the world he had a former CIA director in his hands.

-It's extremely important this video doesn't go viral, because Saul has been unofficially chosen (as per Dar Adal info) as next director of the CIA and a director cannot be someone who has just been kidnapped by some sort fo Bin Laden.

-Dar Adal went to Pakistan and made a deal with Haqqani in exchange of Saul's video.

-Saul can now become next CIA director.

 

Now, who decided to make a deal with Haqqani? US President? Dar Adal is Black Ops, therefore he does all the dirty work (like in this case) but he still receives orders from someone, it's not like he took the initiative, is that correct? If that's the case, basically they want Saul to be next director SO BAD to make deals with such a terrorist? If so, why? Is there anybody else? I mean, I know that from a storyline POV it's more compelling if it's Saul, but I can't believe there's no one else (like they did with Lockhart) who can be director without sharing similar burdens. Or, at the very least, without "forcing" a government to negotiate with the chief of Tabilan terrorists. So please, can someone explain this to me?

 

What a weak kneed government of the USA. Laughable. So this no. 1 terrorist in their sights even before he kidnapped Saul, and after he blew up a motorcade with Saul and Carrie while also invading the US embassy and slaughtering 30 something Americans and is in the possession of all your covert contacts in his country.  So because you'd really really really like this other certain person to land a certain job in the intelligence community, who coincidently happens to be the same poor shluf that the terrorists kidnapped and videotaped and gosh darn, that video would be so embarrassing to explain if it was out there, .... you ask for a digital copy of that video from the terrorists that they swear on their relatives graves is the only copy (!). In exchange you will not take any action against him or his ruthless gang of murderous thugs for their carnage. You'll just, nudge nudge wink wink, tell the relatives of those slaughtered American workers that you're looking hard for their killers, including the parents of the woman that was gutted like a fish in front of her peers. Its all worth it to re-hire someone you let go of already once before for this really cool and important job.

 

I wanted to know what was in it for Duck in the first place. That was never clear to me. Did I miss something?  Basically, I felt a bit cheated by the abrupt change in location at the start of this episode. To go from Carrie spotting Dar Adal in the car, to the calm preparations for her father's funeral, felt so abrupt. I wanted to be shown, and not merely told, what happened between Adal and Haqqani in Islamabad, and get a bit more closure on Tasneem and Kahn, too. Some say this was a very needed change of pace, but I cannot fully agree. It felt like they went too far in slowing things down, and jumping suddenly back to DC after such an intense ending the week before. 

 

Threw me off too. But then the whole last of season arch has thrown me off.  What happened to the Carrie that was almost possessed with desire to "not let it happen again" to hunt down those nasty terrorists till the end.  Suddenly she just gives up. She doesn't want to give any support to Quinn, even though it would help with extraction if she did. She purposely wades into the crowd to thwort his bombing plans...why?  Because he may get caught? After all these episodes through the years when Carrie goes against all advice and puts herself in very dangerous situations, her character has suddenly been neutered? Who says the crafty Quinn couldn't hop  some roofs and escape?  Why would she thwart that plan which if Quinn escapes cannot be pinned on any country or individual, she   then decides shooting him right up close with witnesses, and evidence, causing herself to be killed or imprisoned in Pakistan and her country left in a diplomatic mess.

 

And yeah that leap to civilization was jarring. I kept waiting for Carrie to find some reason to go back to Pakistan and her and Quinn finish the job on Haqqani and while they're at it take out Tasneem. As someone up thread said, it just kind of morphed into an episode of My So Called Life.

[Milburn Stone]

As to Duck's motivation, I "filled in the blanks" satisfactorily for myself by saying here was a guy who had no self-esteem left, felt completely useless and impotent, and was easy prey for someone promising to give him a reason for his existence that didn't depend on his wife. Somehow I think that whatever that first errand was, Tasneem was able to convince him that it was in support of the Pakistani-American alliance. (I don't think he knowingly would have committed treason in that first step.) He may have even had fantasies that he was doing his part for the American cause just as his wife was doing hers, and that she would be proud of him if she only knew.

[Kel Varnsen]

As to Duck's motivation, I "filled in the blanks" satisfactorily for myself by saying here was a guy who had no self-esteem left, felt completely useless and impotent, and was easy prey for someone promising to give him a reason for his existence that didn't depend on his wife. Somehow I think that whatever that first errand was, Tasneem was able to convince him that it was in support of the Pakistani-American alliance. (I don't think he knowingly would have committed treason in that first step.) He may have even had fantasies that he was doing his part for the American cause just as his wife was doing hers, and that she would be proud of him if she only knew.

Fair enough, but did Duck have any contact with Tasneem before Sandy's death? If Duck was feeding Sandy intel from his wife's desk or computer why didn't Sandy do a better job keeping his source protected?

[jjj]

No, Duck seemed totally taken aback when Tasmeen approached him in the classroom early in the season.  "No, you must be thinking of someone else" (who did errands for Sandy).  But did we ever learn exactly why they killed Sandy?  And the off-the-books terrorist guy from the video, whom we last saw in Quinn's chamber o'torture, saws, and duct tape -- are we supposed to assume he was killed after providing Quinn with whatever intel he had?

 

And what about the list of CIA assets that Haqqani took from the embassy?  So many people died for that, and we never hear about it again? 

 

Count me totally disappointed in the finale, especially after the astonishing finales of the first three seasons.  I kept waiting for the twist or disaster, especially after the breathtaking events and tension of the past three episodes.

[slowpoked]

 

She said that she would keep Duck's "secret" safe in exchange for his cooperation, yet we never learned what the "secret" was

 

I think the secret was that Duck was getting confidential files from his wife's computer to give to Sandy, which Sandy then gives to Tasneem, in exchange for people on the kill list. That was how Tasneem was able to blackmail Duck into becoming a spy for her, because if he doesn't go through with it, the FBI would receive copies of the files that Duck was stealing from the Ambassador's computer from the Taliban, so the treason would be out in the open and his wife's career is over.

 

So Tasneem and the Taliban most probably sacrificed some of their own people so Haqqani could put his master plan in motion. During the first episode, Sandy said his "asset" has always been correct regarding the locations of the terrorist and that's why he gave Carrie the OK to strike that compound because Haqqani was supposedly there.

 

 

wanted to be shown, and not merely told, what happened between Adal and Haqqani in Islamabad, and get a bit more closure on Tasneem and Kahn, too.

I don't think we're ever gonna get any kind of closure regarding the Pakistanis - the writers have said they are no longer going back to Pakistan in S5. So I guess Tasneem and Haqqani won this round in the Homeland world. Which is just as well, since the Homeland CIA had been very incompetent this season, and I wouldn't feel that a US win in the end is earned, no matter how I want to have them kill Tasneem and give justice to Fara and the rest.

Edited January 5, 2015 by slowpoked

[Kel Varnsen]

I don't think we're ever gonna get any kind of closure regarding the Pakistanis - the writers have said they are no longer going back to Pakistan in S5. So I guess Tasneem and Haqqani won this round in the Homeland world. Which is just as well, since the Homeland CIA had been very incompetent this season, and I wouldn't feel that a US win in the end is earned, no matter how I want to have them kill Tasneem and give justice to Fara and the rest.

That is kind of annoying that they won't be going back to Pakistan. Although not surprising since I don't think there was a single mention of Iran this season. I would go as far as saying that the CIA has been pretty incompetent for the entire series. I mean in season 1 two POW's come back and they are both sleeper agents who attacked a bunch of politician, then there is a suicide bombing in Washington DC, and terrorists getting into shootouts with the CIA (and winning) in Gettysburg. Season 2 we had the car bombing at CIA HQ and then Abu Nazeer sneaks into the US. I would love to know what presidential elections are like because it must be brutal. 

[WearyTraveler]

Sandy had to be killed because the drone bombing that supposedly took out Haqqani was done on a wedding and dozens of innocents died.  The fall out from that was getting pretty serious and Sandy was under pressure to reveal his source (at least internally, to the CIA).  That's reason number one.

 

Reason number two is that once the objective of having the world believe Haqqani is dead is achieved, one presumes Tasneem is done giving out targets for Sandy to drone.  Sandy will suspect something is up (or some other spy in the CIA will) because suddenly there are no more targets.  This could potentially lead to the US eventually finding out the long con of giving targets to the CIA so that they would believe they eventually killed Haqqani.

 

Once their plan was accomplished, Tasneem and the Taliban had no choice but to have Sandy killed.  They could not just do it themselves, hence the plan to incite a mob to kill him.

[jjj]

Sandy had to be killed because the drone bombing that supposedly took out Haqqani was done on a wedding and dozens of innocents died.  The fall out from that was getting pretty serious and Sandy was under pressure to reveal his source (at least internally, to the CIA).  That's reason number one.

 

Reason number two is that once the objective of having the world believe Haqqani is dead is achieved, one presumes Tasneem is done giving out targets for Sandy to drone.  Sandy will suspect something is up (or some other spy in the CIA will) because suddenly there are no more targets.  This could potentially lead to the US eventually finding out the long con of giving targets to the CIA so that they would believe they eventually killed Haqqani.

 

Once their plan was accomplished, Tasneem and the Taliban had no choice but to have Sandy killed.  They could not just do it themselves, hence the plan to incite a mob to kill him.

Thanks, Weary Traveler!  I would have thought they could have figured out the tunnel access long ago because of the apparent frequency that Sandy used it.  So the long game all along was to attack the embassy and get the list of assets -- and if Quinn had not noticed the earpiece on the video, or if Saul had left on his original flight, the whole prisoner exchange plot would not have occurred, but the attack still eventually would have happened.  But this put Saul in a place of wanting redemption and revenge. 

 

I am devoutly spoiler-free while the series is running, but yesterday enjoyed reading the speculation about whose funeral had been filmed at a church on location in Africa.

 

I'll be fine if next season is Quinn-in-peril, but I will be very disappointed if Quinn is eliminated, even if the actor wants out. 

[kakiphony]

I'm sort of surprised that they won't be going to Pakistan. They clearly left threads dangling with Khan and Haqqani. My speculation was that part of the reason Dar Adal could have made a deal with Haqqani was that he and the CIA had been instrumental in originally training Haqqani during the Russian occupation of Afghanistan. The lingering effects of the US's off-book efforts to train freedom fighters (in Afghanistan, Central America, etc) and how those fighters' allegiances shifted with time would have been a really compelling topic to explore.

[Roseanna]

On ‎22‎.‎12‎.‎2014 at 8:01 PM, slowpoked said:

Yeah, this is my main problem with what Dar did. Like someone else posted, there's no way he's doing this on his own - he has orders from above, most probably connected to what Lockhart said in the previous episode that there's been a lot of hush-hush meetings. But Haqqani isn't just your "normal" terrorist. He breached the embassy, shut down a CIA station and killed Americans, which I would assume is huge worldwide news. He should be on TOP of the kill list, not negotiating to be off of it. That's like Bin Laden saying he'll never do 9/11 again as long as the US promises to stop hunting him. Or to stay in the Homeland world, just like finishing the prisoner exchange thinking all is well and Saul will go home peacefully only to have the CIA convoy be shot by snipers. Why is Dar Adal so confident that these MF'ers aren't going to stab you in the back, again, like what Lockhart told the Ambassador when she was still trying to make peaceful negotiations with the ISI? So say they release the video despite the pinkie swear - what happens next? Haqqani goes back on the kill list, but yeah, good luck finding him especially now that he enjoys full protection of the Pakistan government

And why is it that Saul seems to be the only person qualified to be the next director that Dar had to make a deal with the devil for it to happen? Lockhart came out of nowhere last season to be the director. And I assume there are still a lot of high-ranking officials left in the agency despite the car bomb in S2. 

In Saul's case, I understand there is a lot of conflict going on. On the surface it looked like he became suddenly power-hungry and has shed all of his integral beliefs in exchange for that power. But earlier in the episode, he said "I want to make this right". Could be a classic case of the means don't justify the end, but the end is all that matters. Saul accepts the position despite knowing what it took to get there, then proceeds to kill Haqqani and Tasneem anyway...Or I can only hope that is what will happen and all will be right between Carrie and Saul forever.

 

On ‎23‎.‎12‎.‎2014 at 3:01 AM, Pallas said:

Your recap is pretty much how I see it.  Adal was working on orders: for all his dark proficiency, he is not in charge of the kill list, and Haqqani would know that.  The top-level national security meetings and negotiations with Pakistan that Lockhart referred to in his call to Carrie in ep 9 seem to have been the churn kicked up by that operation.  

The US broke relations with Pakistan, and has put out the story that Haqqani made his way back to the tribal region where he is protected by Pakistan.  Meanwhile, the actual deal is that Haqqani has agreed to lie low and turn over the damning video, in return for his personal safety.  I'm guessing that Pakistan may continue to receive at least some US aid covertly, through the CIA. 

In return for offering Haqqani by-gones for the raid on the Embassy, the US gets to keep to itself that its former CIA director was abducted by the ISI/Afghani Taliban, and that five high-level terrorist prisoners were then exchanged for him.  That this leaves Saul in a position to resume command of the CIA is merely a by-product of the deal, though maybe the most important element in Adal's eyes.  

For Adal, Saul proved himself an able chief when he outflanked Congress, gained support from the White House and successfully effected the plan to abduct and re-insert Javadi as head of Iranian security.  In the eyes of the powers that be, this briefly redeemed the CIA that was blown up under Saul's predecessor, and left the by-then-already departed Saul in fairly good aroma. He's looking especially terrific in comparison to Lockhart, though only as long as Saul is not seen, throughout the world, bound and bullied and on his knees in front of a makeshift Taliban step-and-repeat. 

 

On ‎5‎.‎1‎.‎2015 at 11:49 AM, allthatglitters said:

What a weak kneed government of the USA. Laughable. So this no. 1 terrorist in their sights even before he kidnapped Saul, and after he blew up a motorcade with Saul and Carrie while also invading the US embassy and slaughtering 30 something Americans and is in the possession of all your covert contacts in his country.  So because you'd really really really like this other certain person to land a certain job in the intelligence community, who coincidently happens to be the same poor shluf that the terrorists kidnapped and videotaped and gosh darn, that video would be so embarrassing to explain if it was out there, .... you ask for a digital copy of that video from the terrorists that they swear on their relatives graves is the only copy (!). In exchange you will not take any action against him or his ruthless gang of murderous thugs for their carnage. You'll just, nudge nudge wink wink, tell the relatives of those slaughtered American workers that you're looking hard for their killers, including the parents of the woman that was gutted like a fish in front of her peers. Its all worth it to re-hire someone you let go of already once before for this really cool and important job.

Threw me off too. But then the whole last of season arch has thrown me off.  What happened to the Carrie that was almost possessed with desire to "not let it happen again" to hunt down those nasty terrorists till the end.  Suddenly she just gives up. She doesn't want to give any support to Quinn, even though it would help with extraction if she did. She purposely wades into the crowd to thwort his bombing plans...why?  Because he may get caught? After all these episodes through the years when Carrie goes against all advice and puts herself in very dangerous situations, her character has suddenly been neutered? Who says the crafty Quinn couldn't hop  some roofs and escape?  Why would she thwart that plan which if Quinn escapes cannot be pinned on any country or individual, she   then decides shooting him right up close with witnesses, and evidence, causing herself to be killed or imprisoned in Pakistan and her country left in a diplomatic mess.

And yeah that leap to civilization was jarring. I kept waiting for Carrie to find some reason to go back to Pakistan and her and Quinn finish the job on Haqqani and while they're at it take out Tasneem. As someone up thread said, it just kind of morphed into an episode of My So Called Life.

I could believe that the US made a deal with the terrorists because, just as Dar said, also Begin was a former terrorist. After all, it's like it's said in Shakespeare's play, "treason doesn't prosper, if it does, none dare call it treason". If the "traitors" or "terrorists" win power, others deal with them if it's useful. 

But in this case the problem is that I don't see that the US had any use for the deal with Haggani. The video about Saul would only be a nine day's wonder and no responsible government would rather abandon all its strategical interests in a foreign country, in order to protect the reputation, not even the life, of a senior member of the intelligence community.

So, I think that writers have done that only in order to cause a rift between Carrie and Saul.

Allthatglittrers, this season shows clearly what happened to Carrie. After Brody's death, she buried her sorrow and changed it to rage. That made her make pursue her goal without taking to account how many "collateral damages" it caused. She was even willing to offer Saul until Quinn stopped her. Then, after becoming delusional by drugs and getting new medicines she changed: first she lied to Saul to save his life, and then she refused to accept Saul's decision to die and, perhaps even more, get the boy with bomb belt to die.

She said her motive staightly: if they let a child die, they had become just like their opponents.

Of course that scene was highly hypocritical. Carrie, just like Lockhardt, had been quite willing to give orders to kill afar and see civilians as "collateral damages", but seeing one offer, moreover a child and a woman,  face to face was too much for them which was clearly meant to show how "human" they were, unlike Haqqani who could offer a child of his own side, just as he had formerly had been willing to offer the wedding quests in order to feign his death (still, although it was Haqqani's trap, it was Carrie who gave the order without checking first).  

But taking that hypocrisy aside, Carrie's question is valid. Just as refusing ever to do anything evil can cause more evil, there is also a point where using evil methods for a good goal can poison the goal. You continue to fight until you destoy the very things that you originally began to fight for.

[Roseanna]

On ‎22‎.‎12‎.‎2014 at 2:51 PM, ElectricBoogaloo said:

I was so happy to see Quinn show up at the funeral just because I wanted proof that he was still alive. Normally we see him and Carrie in high stress situations so it was nice to see them interacting as friends instead of coworkers with the weight of the world on their shoulders.

I can see why the situation really made Quinn think about quitting and living a normal life because this wasthe most normal time he and Carrie have had - talking about her dad, surrounded by her family and friends, no imminent death or destruction for the evening. But to me, it was the equivalent of being on vacation. They had a day where they got to leave all those other things behind and pretend that this was what life could be like for them every day.

The problem is that Quinn is ready to live life as a civilian but Carrie is not. Despite what she said about not leaving Franny again, I don't think she is ready to give up the mission or the adrenaline.

I knew Quinn was going on that mission when Carrie told him that they would talk when she got back from Missouri. The look on his face was utter heartbreak and defeat. He just gave up.

 

On ‎22‎.‎12‎.‎2014 at 6:21 PM, izabella said:

I didn't mind the slower, low-key episode after all the drama in the last few.  I was underwhelmed with most of the content, though.  Carrie's mother...I know why she was in the episode, but Quinn and Carrie were always doomed, IMO, so the mom plot seemed superfluous.  Carrie now realizes she can have a real relationship...yay?  She needs to learn how to actually have a normal relationship, so the mom revelation wasn't a watershed moment as far as I'm concerned.

Of course, Quinn will go on to whatever next Black Ops mission his colleagues or Dar Adal pull him into.  Was there ever a doubt?  He's never getting out, as the German lady said.  He has these moments where he quits, but always jumps back in.

 

On ‎25‎.‎12‎.‎2014 at 5:15 PM, Milburn Stone said:

But like the episode or not (and I did like it, tremendously), there's no question that the showrunners knew what they were doing. That is, they didn't simply "forget" to put in a lot of action; they deliberately changed things up and quieted things down, to create a whole new kind of suspense, to create intrigue (the story of Dar Adal and Saul's alliance with him), and to explore the tragedy of Quinn, which was almost Shakespearean. If only Carrie had come to her epiphany about half a day sooner, Quinn would have made a choice that led to happiness rather than his potential destruction.

I disagree with Milburn's concept of the Shakespeare's tragedy. Only in Romeo and Juliet one can speak of "if only", but behind the outer coincidences (Romeo believes that Juliet is dead and commits suicide) there is the enmity between two families which forces the couple to marry in secret. And although Romeo wanted to be friends with Juliet's cousin, honor dictated that he had to fight with him after he had killed his friend.

In other plays, it's the protagonist's character that decides his fate: Macbeth and his wife's ambition made him murder his king, Othello's weak self-confidence as a Moor made him to believe that his wife could be unfaithtful, Hamlet couldn't decide whether to revenge on his uncle for murdering his father and marrying his mother.

Similarly, if Quinn had had different character and background, he would have given Carrie time to ponder. Quinn abandoned too easily because in his heart he couldn't really believe in their future together.

Remember, Astrid told Carrie that Quinn had many times said that he wanted to quit, but he never make true of his words.

Actually, perhaps Quinn was near of quitting after Sandy was killed, but Carrie persuaded him not to.