The fourth season of Showtime’s Homeland hasn’t gotten an official release date, though I suspect it will return around the usual time in September. A lot transpired at the end of the third season necessitating a considerable number of changes to the series, most notably (SPOILERS) the death of Nicholas Brody (Damien Lewis). When we left off at the end of last season, Saul was no longer with the CIA, Brody was dead, and Senator Lockhart — the new head of the CIA — had assigned a new position to Mathison and allowed her to pick her own team for it.
Here’s what we know about Homeland now, going into the fourth seasosn.
1. The fourth season will be set largely in the Middle East, though most of the filming will be taking place in South Africa. Shooting began this month.
2. The storyline will follow Carrie Mathison, who has been assigned to one of the most volatile and dangerous CIA stations in the Middle East (Islamabad, Pakistan). It puts her back on the front lines in the war on terror. The fourth season of Homeland is set to become, more or less, a single-lead show.
3. Laila Robins (who six of you may remember as the wife in Planes, Trains, and Automobiles) joins as a series regular in the role of Martha Boyd, the United States Ambassador to the Islamic Republic of Pakistan.
4. Corey Stoll (House of Cards) will guest star as Sandy Bachman, the CIA Chief of Station in Pakistan and a rising star in the Agency’s firmament.
5. Raza Jaffrey (Smash, MI:5) also joins in a heavily recurring role, playing Aasar Khan, a decorated lieutenant-colonel in the Pakistan intelligence service.
6. Character actor Michael O’Keefe will play deputy station chief John Redmond, stationed in the CIA’s Pakistan outpost. He serves as No. 2 to Stoll’s character.
7. Saul (Mandy Patinkin) will return, but as showrunner Alex Gansa says about this season, “It is mostly a Carrie story. Saul figures into the narrative in a very, very important way.” Saul will play something akin to a CIA private contractor.
8. Nicholas Brody’s family will not return for the fourth season (and yes, that means no Dana!)
9. There will be an important story arc dealing with Carrie’s baby, who her father suggested he’d take care of at the end of last season (unfortunately, her father was played by James Rebhorn, who has passed away). We do not know whether Carrie will keep her child or not.
Sources: KPop, TVLine, TVGuide, EW, Daily Mail
