HomeTVHomeland 8x03 False Friends recap

Homeland 8×03 False Friends recap

The third episode of Homeland season 8, saw Saul (Mandy Patinkin) in a tricky situation while Carrie (Claire Danes) hoped that Yevgeny (Costa Ronin) would make contact once more.

If you want to avoid spoilers for Homeland season 8, we suggest you stop reading now. If you don’t mind then please keep reading.

The episode opened up with Carrie smoking cigarettes while memories of her time in Russian captivity flashed through her mind. Her last encounter with Yevgeny seemed to have brought a little more back. She remembered them holding each other and begging him not to leave her as she was dragged away.

Carrie was due to head back to Germany now her mission was complete but as usual she had other ideas. She wanted to find out more from Yevgeny both for herself and to learn why Russian intelligence was in Afghanistan. She took her proposal to station chief Mike Dunne (Cliff Chamberlain) and he reluctantly gave her 48 hours. Carrie suggested that Yevgeny would make contact and might even be willing to be recruited.

Homeland - 8x03
Credit: Sifeddine Elamine/SHOWTIME

What Mike didn’t tell Carrie was that he agreed to the meeting as a way to try and see if she was working with the Russians or not. As expected Carrie received another note addressed to her with an address. She went to the meet and the CIA team monitored her covertly. At the specified time, Yevgeny was nowhere to be seen. He did appear though when the call to prayer came and he sat with Carrie next to a fountain so that they could talk without being monitored.

Carrie learnt that he had saved her from a suicide attempt using her bed sheets. It brought back more flashes of memory and he also told her things that she had told him that only she would know. This included her trying to drown her daughter Frannie back in season 4. It’s still not clear if he’s telling the truth about what happened but it did appear to shock Carrie.

Meanwhile, after being kidnapped last episode, Saul was held prisoner by Taliban Leader Haissam Haqqani (Numan Acar). The pair have a respect for each other following their previous dealings but Haqqani needed to be sure that it wasn’t Saul who told the Pakistani government of their meeting. Saul assured him that is wasn’t him and said it must be someone in Haqqani’s camp. He refused to believe it and confronted one of his men who said the only people who knew were the one’s that Haqqani told himself.

This led Haqqani to wonder if it was his son Jalal (Elham Ehsas) who had betrayed him. This was confirmed by a scene showing Jalal meeting with the ISI’s Tasneem Qureshi (Nimrat Kaur) to discuss what steps to take next now Haqqani was dead. Jalal soon found out that his father had survived when he called him up and summoned him to his hideout.

Homeland - 8x03
Credit: Sifeddine Elamine/SHOWTIME

Going on the advice of Tasneem, Jalal pretended that he thought his father had been killed. He also tried to help figure out who had been behind the assassination attempt. The forced Haqqani to set a trap for his son after leaking information that they had Saul prisoner. It worked and Jalal reported in with Tasneem while his father listened.

Haqqani unchained Saul and told him he was free to go. Instead of leaving, Saul stuck around to find out what had happened and gave advice to Haqqani. The result was Jalal being dragged outside, thrown on the ground and tied to a metal pole by his neck. Jalal continued to lie, even when his father fired a bullet near his head and pointed a gun to his face. In the end, Haqqani let him live but threw him out on the street like a dog.

With that over (for now), Haqanni and Saul sat down to hammer out a peace deal. Haqanni was upset at Saul’s suggestion that they would have to disarm but Saul talked him round with the benefits that would come. The result was Haqqani agreeing to a historic peace deal and Saul promising him that he would get it passed by the President. Haqqani said the ceasefire would begin the next morning.

Saul headed back to the station in Kabul where he made a call to President Warner (Beau Bridges). Carrie joined him and she suggested the President do what Elizabeth Keane had planned and make a secret trip to Afghanistan. It would win over the military and sell the deal to the American people. After the meeting Dunne wanted to know why Carrie went off grid for 90 minutes after meeting Yevgeny. She said she was walking to clear her head but it seems that she wasn’t telling the truth.

Homeland - 8x03
Credit: Sifeddine Elamine/SHOWTIME

Elsewhere in the episode, Max (Maury Sterling) was getting increasingly annoyed at everyone using him as a luck Buddha. He was also upset at Saul being taken prisoner. He began to pack up to leave but incoming bad weather grounded all air traffic.

At the end of the episode, Jalal was walking along a road when a car approached. He tried to hide but the car stopped and out stepped Tasneem. They left together, presumably to do some more plotting against Haqqani.

Can’t wait for the next episode? Read our Homeland season 8 episode 4 preview.

UK viewers can watch the next episode of Homeland season 8 on Channel 4 on Sundays at 9pm.

Greg Ellwood
Greg Ellwoodhttps://8ce250469d.nxcli.io
Greg is the Deputy Editor of Entertainment Focus. He writes about Games, Tech and TV. You can find him on Xbox/PSN/Steam as Tahllian.

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