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Homeland - Season 4 Episode 06: From A to B and Back Again
In the fourth season, Carrie is working as a CIA station chief in Kabul, Afghanistan. Pakistan station chief Sandy Bachman tips Carrie about the location of terrorist target Haissam Haqqani in Pakistan. Carrie orders an air strike, supposedly killing Haqqani, and 40 civilians are killed as a wedding was taking place at his location. A survivor of the air strike, Aayan Ibrahim, after losing his family, returns to medical college where his friend uploads the wedding video from Aayan';;;s phone. This causes uproar and Carrie is recalled to the U.S. by CIA Director Lockhart.
Ultimately, the strength of "From A to B and Back Again" stemmed not so much from that shocking head shot -- a moment of violence made even more devastating by its emotional stakes -- but in the questions it raised about Carrie's priorities.
A naïve asset unwittingly helps the CIA's Carrie Mathison close in on a terrorist plotting against Americans. But the covert operation ultimately backfires with tragic consequences on "From A to B and Back Again."
A recurring theme of Season 4 is that Carrie has lost her moral spectrum, but it's unclear if even the death of a man she seduced, used and sent off to die will be enough to bring her back from the brink of losing her soul.
"From A to B and Back Again" is vintage Homeland, spiraling toward the conceit the series has always used to frame its chase down the rabbit hole of American foreign policy: that way madness lies.
A strong, portentous episode of Homeland closes out the Carrie/Aayan thread in a sad if satisfactory manner, while also setting up the second half of the season.
Every week it becomes increasingly harder to root for her. That she was willing to sacrifice Saul without even blinking destroys whatever empathy she had left after seducing Aayan and berating Fara. Have the writers painted themselves into a corner?