---
title: "Homeland"
year: 2011
kind: "series"
canonical: "https://film.one/tv/homeland"
fi1m_score: 78
critics_score: 80
critics_reviews: 8
published: "2026-09-17T20:16:15.143511+00:00"
updated: "2026-09-17T20:16:29.797912+00:00"
region: "US"
licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL."
---

# Homeland (2011)

Created by Alex Gansa, Howard Gordon · MPA TV-MA · Drama, War & Politics, Crime

**Fi1m score: 78** · Critics 80 from 8 reviews

*In a sentence:* A hero comes home from a hole in the ground and the only person who wants the truth is the one nobody believes

> Claire Danes and Damian Lewis hold a first season as tight and doubtful as any spy thriller television has made. It runs to eight seasons; it has said its piece by the end of the third, and those we recommend warmly.

## Synopsis

Carrie Mathison (Claire Danes), a CIA officer, has been warned by a source that an American prisoner of war has been turned. Soon afterwards Nicholas Brody (Damian Lewis), an American prisoner of war, is found alive and flown home to Washington as a hero. Carrie is certain he is the man her source meant. Her boss, David Estes (David Harewood), refuses her surveillance, so she has cameras put into Brody’s house and watches the feeds from her living room, hiding her bipolar disorder from everyone but her mentor Saul Berenson (Mandy Patinkin). Brody returns to a wife, Jessica Brody (Morena Baccarin), who has been seeing his friend Mike Faber (Diego Klattenhoff), and to two children, Dana Brody (Morgan Saylor) and Chris Brody (Jackson Pace).

## Review

Howard Gordon and Alex Gansa had spent years on *24*, and *Homeland* is what they made when they wanted to ask whether the man with the gun might be wrong. Working from Gideon Raff’s Israeli series *Prisoners of War*, they set up one question and hold it for twelve episodes: is Nicholas Brody (Damian Lewis), the prisoner of war flown home from captivity to a hero’s welcome, an American who survived or a weapon that has been posted back? Carrie Mathison (Claire Danes), the CIA officer, has no evidence, no permission and a diagnosis she is hiding. The first season is as good as any spy thriller television has made. The series runs to eight seasons and 96 episodes, and its best work is done before the end of the third.

Danes is the reason to watch. Carrie’s judgement is superb and her behaviour makes nobody trust it, and Danes plays both at once: the quick reading of a face across a room, and the mouth that will not stay shut in a meeting. The pilot’s key scene has her in her living room in front of a bank of monitors, watching Brody’s house, and Michael Cuesta, who directs, cuts between her face and the feeds. When Brody and his wife Jessica Brody (Morena Baccarin) go to bed, Carrie does not look away and neither did we. We were uneasy, then ashamed, because the series had just made us do exactly what she does.

Lewis works in the opposite direction. Brody says little, keeps his hands still, and lets other people fill the silence with what they need him to be: the press wants a hero, the government wants a poster, his wife wants her husband back. The flashbacks to his cell are brief and ugly, and Lewis carries them into every polite sentence he speaks at home. Mandy Patinkin’s Saul Berenson is the one we came to look forward to; he listens with his whole face and talks like a man reading a report aloud to himself. David Harewood’s David Estes, the boss who has to say no, is given more decency than that job usually gets.

Sean Callery’s score is the surprise. It is built around a solo trumpet, jazz played slightly wrong, and it follows Carrie rather than the plot, so two people talking in a parked car can sound like something coming apart. The photography passes through several hands (Giorgio Scali, Peter Levy, Christopher Manley, Nelson Cragg and David Klein) and keeps to a flat, greyish Washington of car parks, kitchens and offices lit like hospitals. Espionage looks like admin here, which is the point.

The Brody household never earns its screen time. Baccarin is handed a wife whose function is to be lied to, and the children, Dana Brody (Morgan Saylor) and Chris Brody (Jackson Pace), pull the series towards a domestic drama it cannot write. We were bored by the teenage strand and then irritated by it, because every minute there was a minute away from Danes and Patinkin. The first season’s question has to be answered eventually, and what replaces it is a competent, increasingly ordinary agency thriller in which Carrie is right and the institution is wrong, over and over. Rupert Friend’s Peter Quinn and Nazanin Boniadi’s Fara Sherazi are good additions, and neither brings the doubt back.

Carrie’s illness is handled with more care than we expected and, later, with less. There is a sequence near the end of the first season involving a wall, a stack of paper and a box of coloured pens that we will not describe, except that Danes is astonishing and the writers are honest about the price. In later years the mania tends to arrive when the plot wants a jolt.

It sits closer to [*Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy*](https://film.one/film/tinker-tailor-soldier-spy) than to *24*: suspicion in offices, the wrong person being certain. It does not have le Carré’s patience, and it does have a bomb in most seasons. Watch the first twelve episodes as a single film and then decide how much further you are prepared to follow her. We went on a long way and only sometimes regretted it.

*Fi1m score 78, published 17 September 2026.*

## What the critics say

Every one of the eight reviews is positive, and they agree on why. The praise clusters on the two leads: Claire Danes as the bipolar CIA analyst Carrie Mathison and Damian Lewis as Nicholas Brody, the returned prisoner of war who may or may not have been turned. Almost all the critics measure the series against 24 and find it the quieter, more cerebral programme, trading that show’s certainties for moral shades of grey. The pilot’s unanswered questions, about Brody’s loyalties and Carrie’s grip, are counted as strengths rather than evasions.

The spread is narrow and the reservations are mild. The Independent thinks the talk of its intelligence relative to 24 is overstated, and the Evening Standard, reviewing the second series, wonders whether the tension and twists can be kept up for long. The British notices that arrive later tend to sit a little cooler than the American ones that greeted the pilot.

### Reviews we read (8)

- **The AV Club**, Emily St. James (90/100, inferred): The pilot is potentially the best new show of the fall, a quieter and more cerebral take on the War on Terror thriller than 24. It features compelling characters and leaves plenty of intriguing questions about whether the returned POW has been turned and whether the CIA analyst is losing her grip. [Read](https://www.avclub.com/homeland-pilot-1798227443)
- **The Guardian**, Sam Wollaston (90/100, inferred): The critic calls it a brilliant, complex thriller that is plausible and nuanced, unlike simpler shows like 24. He singles out Claire Danes' mesmerising performance as the driven, bipolar CIA agent Carrie Mathison. [Read](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2012/feb/19/homeland-tv-review)
- **The Hollywood Reporter**, Tim Goodman (85/100, inferred): Homeland stands out as one of the fall's best new dramas with its timely post-bin Laden terrorism premise and compelling gray-area intrigue involving a suspected double agent. Excellent lead performances from Damian Lewis and Claire Danes drive the suspenseful spy story that feels ripped from the headlines. [Read](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-reviews/homeland-tv-review-241914/)
- **Variety**, Brian Lowry (80/100, inferred): The series quickly moves beyond its formulaic setup to deliver Cold War-style paranoia about a returned hero possibly turned terrorist. Strong performances, particularly Damian Lewis as the ambiguous Brody, and clever flashbacks help establish an intriguing thriller superior to prior Showtime efforts on the subject. [Read](https://variety.com/2011/tv/reviews/homeland-2-1117946255/)
- **Evening Standard** (70/100, inferred): The review finds the second series compelling with strong performances and taut writing, though it questions whether the blend of tension and twists can be sustained long-term. It singles out the reversed power dynamic between Brody and Carrie as effective. [Read](https://www.standard.co.uk/showbiz/celebrity-news/homeland-series-2-review-it-may-not-last-but-all-is-good-for-now-8194001.html)
- **The Independent** (70/100, inferred): The review commends the series for its expert twists, moral shades of grey, and strong central performances, particularly Claire Danes as the conflicted CIA agent. It notes the promising start despite some overstated claims of intelligence compared to prior shows like 24. [Read](https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/reviews/the-weekends-viewing-homeland-sun-channel-4-luck-sat-sky-atlantic-7209276.html)
- **The Times** (70/100, inferred): The review praises the shift from the certainties of 24 to a more nuanced post-9/11 thriller focused on internal threats and moral ambiguity. It highlights the central performances of Claire Danes as the bipolar CIA agent Carrie Mathison and Damian Lewis as the returned POW Nicholas Brody. [Read](https://www.thetimes.com/culture/tv-radio/article/certainties-of-the-war-on-terror-are-now-replaced-with-a-fear-from-within-9x659zspnw5)
- **Digital Spy**, Alex Fletcher (90/100, inferred): The pilot is captivating TV thanks to the stunning performances of Claire Danes and Damian Lewis and the complex, uncertain characters they play. It features fully rounded characters with no wasted lines or plot devices and establishes a compelling cat-and-mouse dynamic. [Read](https://www.digitalspy.com/tv/ustv/a366505/homeland-review-tvs-best-show-of-2012/)

## Details

- **Created by:** Alex Gansa, Howard Gordon
- **Creator:** Alex Gansa, Howard Gordon
- **Director:** Lesli Linka Glatter, Michael Cuesta, Dan Attias, Alex Graves, Keith Gordon, Seith Mann, Clark Johnson, Tucker Gates, Michael Offer, Michael Klick, Guy Ferland, Jeffrey Nachmanoff, Carl Franklin, Charlotte Sieling, David Semel, Nelson McCormick, Daniel Minahan, Brad Turner, Lodge Kerrigan, Jeffrey Reiner, John David Coles, David Nutter, John Dahl, Jeremy Podeswa
- **Writer:** Chip Johannessen, Alex Gansa, Patrick Harbinson, Meredith Stiehm, Alexander Cary, Ron Nyswaner, Howard Gordon, Henry Bromell, Debora Cahn, Charlotte Stoudt, Ted Mann, Anya Leta, Barbara Hall, James Yoshimura, Gideon Raff, Benjamin Cavell, David Fury, Evan Wright, Liz Flahive, Will Soodik
- **Story:** Howard Gordon, Alex Gansa, Chip Johannessen, Patrick Harbinson
- **Teleplay:** Chip Johannessen, Alex Gansa, Alexander Cary
- **Cinematography:** David Klein, Nelson Cragg, Giorgio Scali, Christopher Manley, Peter Levy
- **Editor:** Jordan Goldman, Philip Carr Neel, Harvey Rosenstock, Joe Hobeck, Terry Kelley, Michael Ruscio, Sarah Zeitlin, Victoria Grimsley, Garret Donnelly, David Latham
- **Music:** Sean Callery
- **Producer:** Lauren White, Katie O'Hara, Michael Klick
- **Cast:** Claire Danes as Carrie Mathison; Damian Lewis as Nicholas Brody; Mandy Patinkin as Saul Berenson; Rupert Friend as Peter Quinn; Morena Baccarin as Jessica Brody; Nazanin Boniadi as Fara Sherazi; David Harewood as David Estes; Maury Sterling as Max Piotrowski
- **Certificate (MPA):** TV-MA
- **Release (the US):** 2 October 2011
- **Genres:** Drama, War & Politics, Crime
- **Trailer:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KyFmS3wRPCQ

## Where to watch in the US

- Netflix: streaming
- Hulu: streaming, hd
- Disney+: add-on, hd
- Amazon Prime Video: buy, sd
- Apple TV: buy, hd

*Checked 2026-09-17.*

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## Awards

- Golden Globes 2012: Best Television Series – Drama (won)
- Primetime Emmy Awards 2012: Outstanding Drama Series (won)

## If you liked this

- *Prisoners of War* (2010): The Israeli original: slower, sadder, more interested in the families than the agency.
- *The Americans* (2013): Suburban Soviet spies in Reagan’s Washington; the marriage is the mission and vice versa.
- *Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy* (1979): Alec Guinness hunts a mole through filing cabinets; the ancestor of every office thriller.
- *Le Bureau des Légendes* (2015): French intelligence as a workplace drama; procedure, coffee and one very bad decision.
- *The Conversation* (1974), Fi1m 92: Gene Hackman listens to strangers for a living and starts to hear too much. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/the-conversation.md)

---
© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/tv/homeland