Homeland: “The Clearing” Recap

By Chris Hine

For the second straight week, Homeland takes a respite from the breakneck pace with which it began the season to slow down and give us another chessboard-arranging episode. That could be a problem on other shows that don’t have the sense of character structure and self-awareness of what they do well like Homeland does. But “The Clearing” was a masterful episode, one that paralleled three of the characters, who, against their better instincts, want to believe in something or someone, only to be disappointed by the episode’s end.

First, let’s start with Dana. She wants to believe that her family and Finn are not like the other politicians at the fundraiser, that they’d have the good sense to put what is right above politics and report the love-struck hit-and-run accident to the police. She coaxes (a tipsy) Finn into telling, and Vice President Walden and his wife act predictably – they want to keep it as quiet as possible and essentially try to sweep it under the rug.

But damn the politicians, Brody and Jessica decide to put what’s right ahead of political expediency and go to the police. Before they do, Dana has a final chat with Finn as he leaves the party. In a wonderful moment for Timothee Chamalet, whose eyes in this scene are deader than that lady they hit, he tells Dana, “This is why I liked you, because you don’t know how it works.” There’s a sadness there that was bubbling under the surface of this relationship. The world-weary Finn saw a beautiful innocence in Dana, and whether Dana knows it or not, that innocence is fading. I liked to take potshots and little jabs at “Dinn” or “Fana” throughout the season, but this episode gave depth and maturity to this relationship – depth and maturity that wasn’t manufactured by, you know, hitting and killing a lady. Damn it, I did it again.

Brody and Dana go to the police the next morning. Except the CIA has gotten wind of this and Carrie is there to stop Brody because the CIA needs Brody to stay close to Walden. Dana, oblivious to what’s actually happening with Brody and Carrie, thinks they’re just trying to sweep it all under the rug too, and when Brody tells Dana, “We can’t do this now,” he lets her down. Dana has had this intuition all along that Brody is not all that he seems, and now, despite her hopes otherwise, she thinks he’s just like everyone else. That he’s not special. That he won’t do what’s right. It’s a watershed moment in their relationship, and I wonder if Brody will be able to patch up that mistrust.

Now onto Brody, whose epiphany involves his relationship with Carrie. Brody is a big ball of a mess right now. As I wrote about last week, the new ticking bomb in this season isn’t what the terrorists took out of that bombmaker’s wall in Gettysburg – it’s the powerless and castrated Brody, who is going to want to reclaim his manhood at some point. His talk with Rex, a Vietnam vet who is hosting the fundraiser for the Veep, makes him even more depressed. “That guy is the man I could’ve been,” he tells Carrie and, as he usually does when he’s feeling powerless and depressed, he takes comfort from Carrie, who arrives at the party to “empower” Brody. So that’s what the kids are calling it these days. They kiss out in the woods, and Brody tells Carrie: “I do feel used. And played. And lied to. But I also feel good.” Then he asks Carrie: “Two minutes with you, and I feel good. How do you do that?” And walks away, realizing he is, ultimately, being played. Brody’s epiphany is that, as much as he’d like to trust Carrie and wants to believe she isn’t manipulating him, he can’t fully trust her, and any comfort he derives from intimacy with her is shaded by that doubt.

Lastly, there’s Saul. I’ve been saying that Homeland hasn’t given enough weighty material to Mandy Patinkin this season. That changed in a big way last night. The hunt to find out Roya’s contact leads Saul back to Aileen, the blonde terrorist from Season 1 that he drove from Mexico to Langley who is now stuck in a lightless box that is her prison cell. Those two, if you recall, shared a moment in which they opened up their souls and confessed how they came to be what they are. You know, how terrorists and their captors tend to do. So Saul starts pumping Aileen for information. But Aileen isn’t giving up the information easily. Her price? A room with a window. There was something so depressing about that request. Aileen could’ve bargained for a shorter prison sentence, or freedom, or anything like that. Instead, she’s so beaten down by her circumstances that all she wants is a window. And even that was a chore to get, as the warden had to swing his dick around and show Saul who was boss, forcing Saul to appeal to the attorney general.

That gave Aileen and Saul some time to catch up and let Patinkin and Marin Ireland flex their acting chops. It was beautiful to watch. The beautiful sadness in Aileen shone through on Ireland’s face. The relief and happiness she had to do something so simple as to see daylight was enough to break your heart, even though she is, you know, a terrorist. And Saul was happy to be helping Aileen break out of her situation, just as Aileen, in her own way, helped Saul cope with his crumbling marriage. But the reunion took a turn for the tragic. Aileen was lying and fed Saul false info about Roya’s contact and killed herself by using Saul’s glasses to slit her throat. She did all that just so she could have a last moment of peace – one last chance to gaze at a sunlit field and drink a little wine. After that, it was back to hell for her. Instead, Aileen would rather be in the real hell.

Saul wanted to believe Aileen was different from the others that he encountered in this business. That she was telling the truth, that their connection was genuine and that unlike Brody and Carrie, their affection wasn’t confused for manipulation. But in the end it was, even if they did bond and even if Aileen did thank Saul as she gave her final breaths. No matter how strong their connection was, ultimately, they too, were using each other, and that’s the real tragedy of it all.

In all three cases, the circumstances of Brody, Dana and Saul trumped their individual desire to believe they could be bigger than the situation – a sobering realization for all three. Cynicism triumphed over optimism, and I wonder if optimism didn’t just decide to cut its losses and pack it up to leave Homeland permanently.

Other thoughts:
— “A hitter, a spitter and a shitter” – that’s what they used to call me on the pickup basketball courts of West Pittston, Pa., growing up.
— Who else thought the scene in the pool with Brody was a nod to the Breaking Bad episode in which Skyler just randomly tries to drown herself in the pool?
— How long did this fundraiser last? It seemed awfully strange to me that it lasted that long.
— Poor Chris, he just doesn’t have a clue. I wish I could be as oblivious and ignorant as him. I realize he was probably created to show that Brody had more of a relationship with Isa than he does with his own son, but he is just a total waste of space as a character. I love it.