Tag: Claire Danes

Homeland, Carrie and Brody, Was it Love?: Part III

Last we left our star-crossed duo, Brody and Carrie were standing outside a church and there was rain. Now, we’re continuing trying to get an answer for the question: Was it love?

Till this point in Homeland, we already know enough about Carrie Mathison to know that she uses sex, the same way she uses wine and music, as an escape from the restlessness, the constant spinning in her head. She wears a wedding ring when she goes out so there’s no confusion by either party about what the sex is about. Just sex, nothing more. We know she’s had a life full of risk-taking. We know she dated Estes and broke up his marriage. All of these tidbits of her back story are meant to establish the fact that Carrie believes in her soul that a life of coupledom, marriage, and children is not in her future. She can’t even dream about it, because of her illness, because of her job, or because she finds herself incapable of doing the work a real relationship would require, or withstanding the inevitable boredom of it. So she uses men for sex. And she uses sex for control. And then she gets back to work. It’s an arithmetic that’s worked brilliantly for her.

With Brody, it’s different. She’s working. But she’s also attracted to him. And it’s all very confusing and also quite intoxicating.

Is it obsession? Yes, okay. The magnet pull of a self-destructive force? Sure. But it’s real. Palpable, relentless, and necessary.
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Homeland, Carrie and Brody, Was it Love?: Part II

Last we left, our couple had just met across a table and over files at CIA offices. Since then, Carrie Mathison has continued getting to know this mysterious Marine, Sgt. Nicholas Brody. Thanks to well-placed surveillance, she continues to get a head start on upcoming events by spending a few nights with her subject. Unbeknownst to him of course, but nights spent, nonetheless.

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Homeland, Carrie and Brody, Was it Love?: Part I

As I’ve written before, I didn’t know who Damian Lewis was until Jennifer Lawrence went full-on fangirl over him on camera. Until then, I’d heard of Homeland only thru my Twitter timeline, taken over by live tweeters every Sunday night. And what you learn from following timelines for a show is 1) a lot of people you like to keep up with on Twitter watch a show, and 2) a lot of those people, when they are watching said show, are often reduced to exclamations of “OMG #Homeland”, “WTF #Homeland”, “Wow, didn’t see that coming #Homeland”, and the very informative “Can’t wait till next week #Homeland”.

So, JLaw’s unscripted display of awesome awe at seeing Brody on a red carpet combined with the wealth of information from my timeline drove me to pursue the show. I got the basic premise and players and knew it came from the folks who made 24, but, foolishly, before deciding to shell out the Showtime subscription, I started with trying to find clips on YouTube. All I found were music videos, and the kiss in the parking lot was immediately spoiled.

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Damian Lewis LOVES Singing Show Tunes! *UPDATED*

“And Damian [Lewis] likes to sing show tunes, surprisingly.” — Maggie Siff about lighthearted moments on Billions set

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Well, Maggie, you have known Damian for a short while so it is okay you are surprised. Are we surprised at all? No way! And I would say Claire Danes would not be surprised, either 😀

This is what Claire tells Digital Spy about Damian:

“I don’t think most people know what a song-and-dance man he is. I suspect Damian’s dream gig would be a Broadway musical, and he would be amazing. He actually took tap-dancing lessons throughout the filming of Homeland’s second season.”

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Brody in Homeland S6

When Brody died on Homeland, I was one of those fans who searched high and low, scrambling to find somewhere to talk about him and about the show. At one point I ended up on the Facebook page for Homeland and tried fruitlessly to sift thru all the flat “No Brody No Homeland” pointlessness to find someone who saw what I saw in the character and in the show. Brody will never die, I thought. So why rage into the void, begging for him to come back from the dead? Shows do listen to such things, I suppose. But, even if they did listen to all the pleas from fans, what would Brody come back for? To be a dad to his new daughter? To live happily ever after with Carrie? Really, fans?

No. Brody was dead. In fact, he was dead from the minute he got off the plane and saw Jess for the first time. I spoke at length of this aspect of the character before, here and here and here. The remarkable thing about the character was this very thing, that he was a dead man walking. A cipher, a mystery, an empty vessel filled with nothing except what various people put in his head. The fact that Damian played that emptiness so FULLY is the remarkable thing, the memorable thing, the thing that compels us to never let go of the character. Characters written so completely and played so fully never die, do they? The truth and the reality of Brody lives on and will never die.

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