One more time, I am late to the party.
I had never watched “Homeland” in its first season on Showtime. Not sure why, but I lumped it in with all those programs on Showtime that I don’t watch. “Dexter.” “Weeds.” “The Borgias.” Except for “Nurse Jackie,” I find them all way too quirky.
So, I am watching the Emmys in September and “Showtime” cleans up. Hmmm. What really sent me off the edge was when I noticed that Howard Gordon was one of the showrunners. He did “24,” one of my true favorites. At the very least, I needed to take a quick look.
Of course, at this juncture, I’m already behind a whole season. And their second season was beginning the following Sunday. What’s a hopefully engaged TV viewer to do?
Well, in 2012, it is ridiculously easy to catch up on a television show. You go “on demand.” Showtime had the entire first season of “Homeland” available on their Direct TV portal. So, I began to watch.
And go a little bit crazy. There were twelve episodes of “Homeland” in its first season. I watched them all in one week. A very intense indoctrination. Storylines blurred together. With no time to rest or think, I lost track of one or two supporting characters. Oh, wait, those two are related?? How did I miss that?
Despite the frantic confusion, I can tell you that I was completely hooked by the end of Episode #1. “Homeland” is dynamite television. And, if you’re still lamenting that Jack Bauer is still a man without a country and wandering around the world someplace, this is the show that will be the ideal replacement for you.
Indeed, the hero (well, heroine) at the center of “Homeland” is as complex and intriguing a character as Jack. Carrie Mathison is a CIA agent just back from some cesspool in the Middle East and she believes that a recently-released-from-captivity Marine might have been brainwashed enough to be a terrorist hellbent on causing some mayhem in America. But, the problem with Carrie is that she’s clinically bi-polar. And, if she goes off her meds, well, she resembles somebody who has really gone off her meds. And you know damn well that she will in the course of the first season.
So, Marine Nick Brody is viewed as a hero and has an idyllic home life. Except Carrie thinks he’s evil. Is she right? Did she screw up her dosage? What’s next? You never really know. Their relationship, with lots of delicious twists and turns, is the centerpiece of “Homeland.”
As the leads, both Claire Danes and Damian Lewis are luminous and well deserving of the Emmys they got a while back. Danes, in particular, burns a hole in the screen with every scene she’s in. You really feel her anguish, her pain, and her mental condition.
An even bigger surprise for yours truly is Mandy Patinkin in a supporting role as Carrie’s seemingly one lone ally at the CIA. Patinkin, who normally sucks the air completely out of any production he appears in on either television or the Broadway stage, is incredibly understated and…gasp, likeable. If a TV show can actually make me accept a weekly visit from this usual blowhard, you know they’re doing good work.
The best thing about watching the first season cliffhanging finale of “Homeland” is that I didn’t have to wait long for Season 2. It had already begun recording on my DVR. Now I’m completely caught up and invite you to join us. It’s a thrill ride you don’t want to miss.
And, heck, how else were you going to spend twelve hours of TV watching time in one week.
Dinner last night: Chicken apple sausage, sauerkraut, and corn.
I had never watched “Homeland” in its first season on Showtime. Not sure why, but I lumped it in with all those programs on Showtime that I don’t watch. “Dexter.” “Weeds.” “The Borgias.” Except for “Nurse Jackie,” I find them all way too quirky.
So, I am watching the Emmys in September and “Showtime” cleans up. Hmmm. What really sent me off the edge was when I noticed that Howard Gordon was one of the showrunners. He did “24,” one of my true favorites. At the very least, I needed to take a quick look.
Of course, at this juncture, I’m already behind a whole season. And their second season was beginning the following Sunday. What’s a hopefully engaged TV viewer to do?
Well, in 2012, it is ridiculously easy to catch up on a television show. You go “on demand.” Showtime had the entire first season of “Homeland” available on their Direct TV portal. So, I began to watch.
And go a little bit crazy. There were twelve episodes of “Homeland” in its first season. I watched them all in one week. A very intense indoctrination. Storylines blurred together. With no time to rest or think, I lost track of one or two supporting characters. Oh, wait, those two are related?? How did I miss that?
Despite the frantic confusion, I can tell you that I was completely hooked by the end of Episode #1. “Homeland” is dynamite television. And, if you’re still lamenting that Jack Bauer is still a man without a country and wandering around the world someplace, this is the show that will be the ideal replacement for you.
Indeed, the hero (well, heroine) at the center of “Homeland” is as complex and intriguing a character as Jack. Carrie Mathison is a CIA agent just back from some cesspool in the Middle East and she believes that a recently-released-from-captivity Marine might have been brainwashed enough to be a terrorist hellbent on causing some mayhem in America. But, the problem with Carrie is that she’s clinically bi-polar. And, if she goes off her meds, well, she resembles somebody who has really gone off her meds. And you know damn well that she will in the course of the first season.
So, Marine Nick Brody is viewed as a hero and has an idyllic home life. Except Carrie thinks he’s evil. Is she right? Did she screw up her dosage? What’s next? You never really know. Their relationship, with lots of delicious twists and turns, is the centerpiece of “Homeland.”
As the leads, both Claire Danes and Damian Lewis are luminous and well deserving of the Emmys they got a while back. Danes, in particular, burns a hole in the screen with every scene she’s in. You really feel her anguish, her pain, and her mental condition.
An even bigger surprise for yours truly is Mandy Patinkin in a supporting role as Carrie’s seemingly one lone ally at the CIA. Patinkin, who normally sucks the air completely out of any production he appears in on either television or the Broadway stage, is incredibly understated and…gasp, likeable. If a TV show can actually make me accept a weekly visit from this usual blowhard, you know they’re doing good work.
The best thing about watching the first season cliffhanging finale of “Homeland” is that I didn’t have to wait long for Season 2. It had already begun recording on my DVR. Now I’m completely caught up and invite you to join us. It’s a thrill ride you don’t want to miss.
And, heck, how else were you going to spend twelve hours of TV watching time in one week.
Dinner last night: Chicken apple sausage, sauerkraut, and corn.
1 comment:
We had the same experience as you did it by getting hooked with episode season 1.just finished watching the seventh episode of season 1 and should be caught up in a couple of weeks. Previously used the turbo catch up method to fly through two seasons of Boardwalk Empire.
15Thavebud
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