After the antics of last week's episode - the death of Walden, the capture and release of Carrie after some face time with Abu Nazir - this week's episode all seemed a bit... pedestrian, with the world's most wanted terrorist reduced to doing his own donkey work with a torch and some karate chops - a bit unbecoming for this previously enigmatic, international man of mischief.
Has Carrie lost her raison d'etre, now her biggest villain is no more?
Until just as quickly, it was all over, with Nazir lying on a sheet, blood oozing, Carrie's will-to-power and life purpose evaporated in a puff of gunfire, and Brody's reaction to the loss of his former tormentor a complex mixture of acting goodies in the hands of actor Damian Lewis.
Considering the world's second most powerful man had just suffered 'death by pacemaker', everyone seemed strangely preoccupied by their own affairs... Carrie's ongoing one-woman hunch-machine, Brody's family dysfunction, their mutual fascination undermining all the usual protocols, so business as usual, then.
Brody - does peace finally beckon, now Nazir is dead, and his wife ready to let him go?
Usually, there's Saul to serve as the resident moral compass, but he had his own problems, defending some charge cooked up by Estes who, alas, wants him gone. Once again, it seems the biggest threat may be lurking within. So far, so last series - but actor Mandy Patinkin is very much required to keep this show on the road.
Estes (David Harewood) has news for Saul (Mandy Patinkin), and it's not a promotion
Just as Carrie's interrogation/therapy session with Brody was the highlight of the first half of this series, so her session with journalist Roya provided the real meat here. If we thought Carrie was intense, she's a veritable beauty contestant compared with the contemptuous passion being spat from the other side of the table. We need to see Roya again for the it's-probably-time-enough finale next week.