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He blames her for the attack, but not half as much as she blames herself: "If you're asking me, did Abu Nazir outsmart me, yes he did. If you asking whether I will ever forgive myself, no I won't."

As Carrie, Claire Danes invests these statements with exactly the breathless agony that has won her an Emmy for her performance and made her target of a thousand online impersonations. She is off her Lithium (she fears it blunted her mind) and is obsessed with trying to work out what happened, madly scribbling across her yellow pad.

But she is also on the outside of the agency, which has been taken over by Saul (who has been released without explanation from the investigations launched against him in season two) as director and the sinister Dar Adal (who has emerged both from retirement and deep cover) as his sidekick.

While it is joy to watch Mandy Patinkin and F Murray Abraham strut and spar as this ancient Odd Couple, it stretches credulity that they would have ended up in charge, however many of the CIA high command had been killed. Even less likely is that they would have managed to organise the assassination of "six targets on three continents in a tight time window".

Saul agonised about giving the go ahead – "We're spies, not assassins" – but did so anyway. The scene, more like 24 or even Zero Dark Thirty than Homeland, gave the episode its title (Tin Man Is Down) and also the only moment of tension in an opening episode that progressed with glacial slowness.

There was, however, quite a lot of information to pack in: Quinn is in Caracas, bungling the operation with repercussions for the future; Brody's daughter Dana has tried to kill herself and picked up another annoying boyfriend to whom she sends naked selfies; Brody's irritating mother-in-law has moved in; the Brody home is shrouded in darkness because they are under constant public attack, apparently having harboured a terrorist in their midst. (Did they love the décor so much they couldn't move?)

Of ex-Marine Brody himself, there was no sign. Which left it to Danes to carry the episode. She did so magnificently – and never better than in its closing shots when she watches on TV as Saul goes in front of Lockhart's committee and hang her neatly out to dry.

Danes's face reflected every second of the shock It was brilliant and means, of course, we will have to watch next week to find out what happens. It's the Homeland way.