‘Homeland,’ Season 6, Episode 3: Quinn and Carrie, Please Work Out Your Issues

I predict- Peter Quinn will be the hero of this season! Wait and see! His instincts about the guy across the street from Carrie were spot on. Quinn may be down, but he's not out!

I think Max might be this season's unsung hero? What is his back story and why is he so loyal to Carrie? I love his gift for rolling with the crapola that comes with ties to Carrie. I would really like to see him and Quinn in more scenes like the bodega "business manager" scene. Some comic relief in an often humorless show.

Was Homeland not on last night, 2/5/17? Cannot find the recap.

Cannot miss any show with Mandy Patinkin that has the line, "As you wish".

How does it all play out in the end. The plausibility of Carrie running back to the CIA every time she feels compelled is becoming absurd, and how many people are going to put their careers on the line to help her out for digging out of positions she puts herself in. So, does this faze out Carrie in the future (and Peter as is currently constituted) and become more focused on Saul, Dar, and maybe any other characters they can develop? Or, just running the normal course of a television show's lifetime.

The pack of cigarettes belonged to the Iranian. He was walked out by the mossad guy. When Saul found the pack in the trash it meant the mossad guy and the Iranian had a smoke and a talk about the interview showing they are in cahoots.

You want to really blow your mind- go back and watch Season 2 beginning with episode 4, "New Car Smell." That is the first time Quinn appears in the series. Pretty amazing the way it all started out and progressed with him and Carrie. I never thought there would ever be a time when they would cast Quinn as so pathetic. I hope he gets his mojo back soon.

Would someone please explain the sudden significance of a crumpled cigarette pack? Save for its literary antecedents (yes, I caught the Le Carre reference), frankly I'm rather unclear why Saul finds it so inexplicably interesting. Did I miss a past reference, or is there a revelation to come?

One of the biggest surprises and disappointments when moving to Europe 14 years ago was the high popularity level of American television. What?

The ritual seems to be fight for years to push back American influence like McDonald's and then, after losing the battle, accept and adopt the American product at an even higher level than America itself.

Go figure!

I think the scene of Quinn lurking with the gun is supposed to make us think he's paranoid. But I wonder if he's right. And someone is after Carrie. Maybe something to do with the gang member who posed as a Muslim. He did threaten her. If so Quinn will be back in his relationship with Carrie of having her back. And that might save him.

Pres. Keane. Did she run in House of Cards and get elected in Homeland? Very confusing.

I have followed the show faithfully for years but have become very tired of it. I became tired about the middle of last season. It has for me become very oppressive. The first couple of episodes this season did not help with the funk. I have cancelled it on my DVR and am saying 'no more'. I'm saying bye to "Homeland" as I think it has more than run its course.

Does anyone else feel that Quinn should be recovered by now?

The way to my heart?
Homeland.

Glad it's picking up pace again. I do feel hyper stimulated by this episode though and I so hope to they reel in the sub plots in the next couple of episodes.

Aside from the vision of Saul on the motorbike (absurd for so many reasons and unfortunately captured here), I loved this episode.
I hope we see more of the FBI agent who was the husband on Nurse Jackie.
I'm happy to admit that I was hoping Carrie would succumb to Quinn's advances, though that's gotta be tough when he reeks....
Judith, please be careful about knocking Indiana..."of all places" - lots of Midwesterners on here...

The show runners should have cut off the Quinn character last season. It would have captured some cult status and some dignified farewell. Now he is left meandering about...slowing the pace of every scene. This episode has been the best so far. The Saul scenes are engaging and full of promise.

I hope we are about to see Quinn be the Boo Radley to Carrie's Scout.

I watch this show for three reasons and not in any particular order:

Rupert Friend
Mandy Patinkin
F Murray Abraham

That about sums it up.
Was over Carries whining long ago, this year she is totally unbelievable in her new civie life. Not buying it and was gobsmacked at her response to Sekou. As if the half arsed apology would suffice. And why isn't she in jail for ignoring a court order?

So long as the three above are still in this show I will be watching. Carrie is an afterthought and an ends to a means.

The only question for me is - when will Quinn be outfitted with a special bionic arm and leg and become super CIA man - whooping rear ends for Carrie. The "Rocky" story was there from the get go - there was no way he was going to just lay there and have convulsions all season. Go Quinn!

The least interesting scenes are the ones with Carrie in them.

Hooray for the scenes with Saul and his sister. Wonderful actors, wonderful characters, and a surprisingly complex political storyline.

Indiana - where the ‘Hoosier’ Woody (Cheers) comes from! Not being american I don’t know too much about your hinterlands, but JJ Gittes in the film Chinatown derides an orange farmer as a ‘dumb Oakey’ which means I guess Oklahoma - the story portrayed disturbingly by Henry Fonda in Grapes of Wrath.
What I think I know (to coin a Rumsfeldism) is that Indiana is home to the only US citizens who aren’t immigrants, and Barrack Obama honoured one Black Foot with the Freedom Medal last year. It was their land, although being nomads they wouldn’t have recognised the legal concept of ownership that allowed the colonial settlers to thieve it from them - rather like the West Bank I’m reliably told: the Bedouin had no title deeds either!
I don’t get why the launch of season six was delayed to January pending your election result (the Trump one/won). I had thought one of a pair of alternative scripts would run to reflect November’s result, but isn’t Keane a Hillary-based character? Was the Trump (VP Walden character) version ditched ? That would have been an amusing line - POTUS bumped off by an apoplectic PTSD Quinn !
But viz the fag packet (the cigarette pack), over the five seasons there were numerous conspicuous borrowings from Le Carre, of which the fag packet is another (Smiley’s People) - does it contain a microdot ? The close-up of the packet when Saul picks it from the bin (26’32”) shows it is Arabic, not Korean.

P. E. Keane is "keeping her enemy closer."

Still, it's great to watch Carrie with her terminal stress encounter one difficult problem after another and be willing and able to bend the rules to accomplish her ends (unlike the rest of us) although, it may not work out the way she assumes it will. Seems appropriate in Trumpville where a good night's sleep is hard to come by and who knows what will happen tomorrow. Dar's listening in on the President-elect is another reminder of the Pandora's box we opened with the Patriot Act.

Thank goodness, I'm not alone as I fume over the inexplicable chaos of this season. My frustration centers on a lack-luster plot that puts more emphasis on interpersonal subplots than on the usual suspense driven story line that provides thought provoking engagement with highly charged international espionage. Please, spare me another episode of Quinn and Carrie trying to reconcile their relationship through his PTSD. Not to sound insensitive, Quinn's trauma and recovery very much belong to this new season. I think I can speak for many fans as I encourage Showtime to "catch the train!" And one more thing Showtime.....I'm exhausted myself by watching Carrie marching down hallways and sidewalks toward her various duties, whether personal or professional. Let's get the CIA intrigue moving!

I totally agree with your reviews! I kinda need some Crazy Carrie and these character's storylines to tie together. I feel like I'm watching three different storylines and it's way too disjointed. Also, Carrie and Quinn. The writers have two terrific actors and two terrific characters. I have no clue why they haven't figured out yet what to do with them, what their feelings are. They need a massive talk and after last week's lovely ending scene, the writers just decided to take a knife to their relationship.

So interested that you thought this episode was slow. I thought it was the best one in this young season, with the frequent breaks from one of the 3 stories - Carrie, Saul, and Quinn - both advancing the story lines and increasing the tension, as each compelling story had to be put on hold while the next rolled out.

It's still painful for my bruised mind to juxtapose PEOTUS Kaine with POTUS Trump. Strangely, the former feels like my real world, the latter some fantasy that can't be true. I'm sure I'm not the only one. How will the Homeland writers deal with this as the series progresses beyond episode written before the election?

I found strange to see many times in the background women not wearing a scarf to cover their heads. Needless to say that a woman-even assuming under the diplomatic umbrella-driving a motorbike in "Oman" seems unlikely. Improbable details that derails furthermore the interest in the serie. Let's see how it unfolds.

I thought this episode only reinforced the notion that Carrie really needed to be on meds to function at all logically and realistically. So, too, with Quinn, because when he seems to be off his meds, he's making plays for Carrie and arming himself for Armageddon. (The show runners must do everything in their power to create an opportunity for Quinn to shower and clean himself up. I would imagine by now he reeks).

It is intriguing enough to stick with it...
looks like an interesting ride.
I do hope they lose the "Israeli settlement" theme
which is tedious, and played somewhat trite, on the show.
Otherwise, all in for the season.

I thought that the Iranian spy left the crumpled cigarette pack left in the trash can (after we see him put it in his jacket pocket?) because it had a mic in it and that Saul, finding it in the trash, realized everything that had been said after the Iranian left had been heard by the Iranians. No?

Well, at least, we got a good twist: Saul vs. Dar and their relations with the Promised Land, and Saul and Dar vs. Madame President-Elect and Carrie. As usual, Carrie is in the middle of something that should have a serious impact on her life. As usual, Carrie is going to save the world after failing a bit civilian case (Sekou's story-line), old sweet Carrie, she always tends to reach the critical point (honestly, she usually actively creates them). One of these critical points is Peter Quinn whose state of mind is far from calm and reason yet. But we can literally feel all changes that follow one another in his head and body - thanks to Rupert Friend's impressive performance. At the same time, Peter-Carrie relationship remains a point of force and emotional vehicle of the show. Personally, I am very happy that Odysseus-Quinn returned from the Kingdom of Death and eager to know how his line will be developed.

Keane is following the oldest political warrior advice: Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. It's wise for her hear everyone's advice. She wouldn't have gotten this far in her career without dealing with self serving agendas. It's good for her to stroke both Saul and Dar, but she would be wise not to put all her eggs in Carrie's basket just for the sake of female bonding.

Can't wait to find out what the gold cigarette pack really means to Saul.

I appreciate the slower pace of this season thus far...it hearkens back to the early days of the show and, thankfully, steers away from the 24-like last couple of seasons.

Thanks for the thoughtful review of episode three, Judith. But let me offer another interpretation. First, what is the significance of the shower scene? We assume that Quinn is going finally to clean himself up as Carrie suggested. But the shower stall is a gas chamber in a dream. It evokes images of both Psycho and Auschwitz. Mostly, it tells us not to believe our eyes. We know that Dar is working with Tovah. But to what extent? He could be working for Mossad. What do we really know about him? And the cigarette pack? What does this suggest? Did we even see the real Nafisi? Remember that Carrie recognized his name last week in episode two. Dar would have known that she knew of Nafisi. That whole interrogation scene could have been an elaborate hoax set up by Mossad. But they over-sell it. The fake Nafisi tells Saul an obvious lie: that the Iranian nuclear program itself was a hoax to open up trade with the west. Saul knows that is a lie. And Dar pretends to be disappointed that Tovah did not do the interrogation herself. That was part of the hoax so that Saul would feel in control.
Dar and Saul are both ruthless but Dar has no scruples and an entirely different agenda. He clearly is working against the interests of the United States. Is he trying to start a war with Iran? Is he trying to sabotage the new president? Are those his people bugging Carrie's brownstone? It appears that way but nothing seems as it is. Saul will get some answers from the PA.

Judith, I absolutely adore your recaps. Right on the nose and also hilarious. Still confused about the meaning of the crumpled cigarette package though. Or perhaps my attention wandered, lost in the disappointment of Quinn not actually taking a shower.

Just wondering why Saul couldn't just pick up a phone and call Javadi in Iran and see if the whole alternative nuclear program thing was true or not? Or are we supposed to forget Season 3???

Homeland nearly lost me after Last season - with the bizarre dull turn carries life took and nobody behaving in ways that were normal for them (everyone fooled by Allison- including Dar) everyone's favorite character Quinn utterly wasted in the bizarre terrorist plot. And Quinn and Carrie never having no the conversation any two people would in their situation. Not sure where this season is going - but any more of civilian Carrie and woefully sad Quinn and I will no longer be watching.