Maybe that is because this first season is really more of a really long movie than actual episodes. I don’t think there is much thought going into when one part ends and the next starts - so until the first season wraps up, the little snippets don’t really add up to much and are often red herrings.
So now we know the “why” of his flip to the side of the terrorists - and it seems to be directed more at one person (the VP) than the entire Western World. If that is the case, and he just wants to punish one individual, then not sure if that fits into the usual formula of mass terrorist. Perhaps we will learn more about this evil VP and start rooting for him to be killed or at least disgraced and thrown out of office.
I had a thought – what if the VP was right? What if Nazir’s plan was to get Brody emotionally invested in his son, and then either kill him (the son) or knowingly put him in harm’s way?
It seems like a long way to go to turn a US soldier – then again, we have seen that it has been effective. And do we really think that Nazir thought Brody was the best choice to teach his son English? You’d think he could have hired a private tutor who would be at least as effective and much more trustworthy.
Has anyone else wondered if the older guy (Carrie’s mentor) is a sympathizer with the terrorists? It’s been nagging at me for weeks now, some undercurrent there.
Nazir seemed unemotional when he entered the room where Brody was preparing the boy’s body. So it’s plausible that it’s not his son. And the whole thing with the vice-president and having Brody run for office makes the show seem like it’s supposed to be an updating of The Manchurian Candidate.
I started to have the same feelings several few episodes back…there were a couple of things I thought might be subtle hints, he got perturbed at Carrie for messing up his rug (when Brody’s prayer rug was a fresh plot point), something else I can’t remember right now.
The lie detector test never did come out right for [Carrie’s mentor], and his wife is from an Arab country. He spoke some kind words in the prisoner’s language and embraced him. Now I’ve forgotten who gave the prisoner the razor blade.
The way the relationship and bombing was portrayed, I definitely thought it was not really Nazir’s son and that the bombing was a setup rather than it being a missile. It could be the writers and director trying to mislead us, but the kid definitely acted a lot different than you would expect if he was actually the son of someone with power and getting introduced to a new teacher. Plus, it seems very likely a son that age would have already started learning English, particularly if his supposed father was fluent.
They showed a press conference detailing the missile strike, a pentagon type briefing. I guess they could’ve faked it, along with killing and maiming a bunch of the people they live with, as well as causing destruction to their homes, but it’s far more implausible than a father showing quiet grief for his son. Besides, if he wanted to fake it being his real son, he could’ve just acted griefed. Or, you know, been legitimately griefed by having just murdered a child as part of a ruse to get a captive on his side.
The idea of the bombing being a ruse is pretty ridiculously far fetched.
There’s nothing else in the plot that’s in the same ballpark of implausibility as:
Faking a bombing which kills and maims your neighbors, or possibly disciples and compatriots.
Destroys your property.
Kills a little boy as the main thrust of this deception.
Fake a pentagon news briefing describing the bombing. (and you know, hoping that the guy never googles the incident that has become a driving force in his life)
The tip-off is apparently the father not showing sufficiently noisy grief for the boy, therefore it isn’t his son, even though if that’s the entire point of this ruse, he could simply act griefed.
All to have an emotional reaction from a hostage in the hopes of turning him.
What else has happened in the show that’s even within orders of magnitude of that?
He’s presumably saying that theR’s interpretation is fair game, because everything else in the plot is that level of ridiculous, so it could be true. I’m saying the show hasn’t even approached that level, so it would be utterly shocking if they did now.
They don’t have to fake the briefing. They can control what Brody has access to, so they could easily make him think a real briefing from the past took place at a different time. If he was a prisoner for years they could easily tell him a false date that matched a real missile strike. They already supposedly made him think he killed a fellow Marine.
Again, the father spoke fluent English yet the child apparently didn’t even understand a simple greeting from what I recall. Something was off.
There are plenty of other equally implausible things that have happened. If I get some time I’ll list some. It’s a good show, but it is fiction and I think people have different ideas of implausibility.
For implausibility – how about turning both POWs into traitors without at least one of them knowing about the other?
Making one of them think he killed the other and even forcing him to bury the body, without it actually happening? Aside from the questionable wisdom of forcing one to kill the other (which – how do you do that??) as a tactic to earn loyalty, how do you fake that?
Regarding that bombing, perhaps it was a happy coincidence and Nazir took advantage of it to make Brody think the kid was killed as a result? And BTW, I wondered why Brody didn’t take advantage of the chaos after the bombing to escape. I know that he was probably no where near any Americans, but he might have been able at least to call the US government.
It was my impression that Brody was already 'turned" by the time he was at the house. He was there in part as a test of his loyalty and also perhaps as a comfortable place to wait while they set the stage for his ultimate operation.
