Everyone’s favourite espionage drama is back this year for its much-awaited fifth season – except – wait for it, it’s going to be set in Germany for the first time ever!
This isn’t just a first for the show, either. Reportedly, Homeland will become the first American show in television history to ever shoot a full season in Germany. The network, Showtime had announced in April this year that a transition to the European country was in the cards.
Interestingly, while the first three seasons of the esteemed American show were shot throughout in the Middle East, the fourth season found pride of place in Cape Town – although even in this case, the South African capital was doubling as other locations.
Homeland in Trouble in the Middle East?
There had previously been some buzz that the show might return to the United States for its fifth season, but that was not to be. One suspects this had something to do with the fracas created last year for some its Middle East-set storylines.
According to an article in Entertainment Weekly, the Middle East was not too pleased with Homeland’s portrayal of the countries the show was set in.
Pakistan officials complained about their country’s depiction in the recently concluded season of the espionage cable drama, while a prominent Israeli recently took issue with a scene in the season finale.
– Entertainment Weekly
Season 5’s Carrie Will be a Whole New Woman
The show hasn’t exactly been left on a cliff-hanger like in previous seasons. (Season 3 for example was marked by Nicholas Brody’s horrific death – a finale mirrored in shock aspect only, and only by Game of Thrones’ Red Wedding the same year!)
No, the fifth season of Homeland will begin with no tearjerkers. But it will inspire hope for a new and more personalised storyline. According to the show’s official description of the latest season:
Season 5 will pick up two years after Carrie Mathison’s ill-fated tenure as Islamabad station chief. Struggling to reconcile her guilt and disillusionment with years of working on the front lines in the ‘war on terror,’ Carrie finds herself in a self-imposed exile in Berlin, estranged from the CIA and working for a private security firm.
– David Nevins, Showtime president, as told to EW
Germany’s More Than a Location – “It’s a Character”
Actor Mandy Patinkin on Wednesday promised that Germany would have a big role to play in Homeland’s fifth season – doubling as a character on the show itself.
In an interview to Digital Spy, the Homeland actor stated:
It’s set two-and-a-half years later - and Germany is a major character in the piece. It obviously represents a place that has a history of conflict – of moral and ethical concern of a generation that’s trying to recover from acts that their fathers and grandparents did, and the pain and suffering it caused.
– Mandy Patinkin, as told to Digital Spy
Homeland will clearly be riveting this year – what with Carrie picking up the pieces of her life after the CIA damages, and Germany playing a starring role. We for one, can’t wait!