(Spoiler alert: Do not read on if you have not yet seen Sunday’s Season 4 finale of Showtime’s “Homeland” entitled “Long Time Coming” and don’t want to know what happened.)
As she loses one parent, another steps back into the life of Claire Danes‘ Carrie Matheson on the fourth season finale of Showtime’s “Homeland.” After a 15-year absence, Carrie and Maggie Mathison’s (Amy Hargreaves) mother (Victoria Clark) simply strolled back into her life.
As we expected, Carrie didn’t take this very well at all, lashing out at her mother and kicking her out of the house. If only Carrie were someone who could embrace potential joy in her life, her road would be so much easier. We can, though, give her a slight emotional pass because she was mourning her father and felt betrayed by her mother for 15 years.
Still, Carrie not only pushed away her estranged mother, but Quinn (Rupert Friend) also. Struggling with the work that he does for the CIA, he desperately wants to quit, but doesn’t think he can do it without Carrie. After a passionate kiss, though, Carrie did her thing.
She told Quinn she’s toxic in relationships, and after three seasons of Damian Lewis‘ Brody, it’s hard to argue with her. Still, wouldn’t it be nice to see Carrie find some happiness in her life? While she seems to find fulfillment in her work for the government, it’s more a way to fill the emptiness she feels and it’s temporary at best.
Things are looking up on the Saul (Mandy Patinkin) side of things, though, as he’s got an eye on the director’s seat of the CIA, and Dar Adal (F. Murray Abraham) seems keen to have him sit there.
But because this is “Homeland” and Carrie can never be happy, she confronts her mother about why she left the family only to learn a horrible truth. It had nothing to do with her father’s bipolar disorder, but rather her mother’s own problems.
As Carrie’s own bipolar condition is always on her mind when thinking about her own relationships, she realized she needed to talk to Quinn.
But, it was too late. Without her there for him, Quinn took on a dangerous assignment in Syria and can’t be reached. And, after finding out that Saul knows about a deal Dar Adal made with Haqqani, despite their massive losses at his hands, she once again feels betrayed by her mentor.
And so another season of “Homeland” ends with Carrie alone and broken.
Showtime has renewed “Homeland” for a fifth season, which is likely to premiere in the fall of 2015.