“Why kill a man when you can kill an idea?”
It's not often a television series has me completely
absorbed into it by the final scene of the pilot episode.
Normally it takes a few episodes, sometimes a complete season. However Showtime's Homeland managed to
capture my undivided attention within the first twenty minutes of the pilot. Inspired by Gideon Raff's
Israeli television series, Hatufim, showrunner's Howard Gordon & Alex
Gansa (of the Kiefer Sutherland vehicle 24) run over familiar territory,
dealing with the subjects of terrorism, espionage and paranoia. It tells the disturbingly intense story of a troubled U.S.
Marine returning home to his family after being a tortured prisoner of war for
8 years to the al-Quada. Even though he's
celebrated as a hero, an equally disturbed CIA agent suspects him of being
turned by the enemy and a potentially dangerous threat to the country.
While 24 was driven by it's implausible, yet riveting,
action, Homeland keeps it's feet firmly grounded in realism and makes the
experience all the more terrifying.
Driven by such intimate intensity, Homeland is the type of show that will keep you awake at night wondering if
it's time to lock yourself up in your house with a tinfoil hat.
The first 5 episodes are consistently strong, compelling and
effectively suspenseful, however it seems to lose it's step for a few episodes
in the middle but still has enough purpose to keep the viewer trucking on forward. Thankfully, we're rewarded by the final 4
episodes that pick up the slack and dare you not to break a sweat or hold your breath.
Without the wonderfully absorbing cast, including My So Called Life's Claire
Danes, Band Of Brother's Damian Lewis, Firefly's Morena Baccarin and Dead Like
Me's Mandy Patinkin, Homeland probably wouldn't have been nearly as
emotionally engaging.
It's not a perfect series or even breaking new ground, with
24 and Rubicon before it, but it is certainly something that's easy to
recommend to anybody that loves episodic suspenseful television.
13 episodes. Roughly 55-60 minutes each
Buyer's Guide:
Available in DVD and Blu-ray box sets and on iTunes, Netflix and Amazon.
3½ instances where
your own side is scarier than the enemy out of 5
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