Grace and Hal Steal Poseidon, Trick Kate

Grace Penn (Allison Janney) learns two things at once: that she’s now the president of the United States because the last president, William Rayburn (who was played by Michael McKean), has died; and that Rayburn had a heart attack during a phone conversation with Hal. Grace knows what this means: that Hal called Rayburn to tell him that it was she, his untrustworthy VP, who, behind this back, had orchestrated the bombing of the HMS Courageous, killing 41 British sailors.

So Grace is furious, mostly at Kate (because Kate was the messenger, but also because Grace has always disliked Kate for gunning for her job). And instead of naming Kate as her VP, Grace Penn names Hal.

This precipitates a crisis in the Wyler home (or should I say manse, because they’re still living at Winfield House in England). Hal, in love with his brilliant, beautiful wife, says he’ll turn down the vice-presidency if that’s what Kate wants, and Kate, though she’s cross-eyed with anger, tells him to take it. (What else is she going to say?)

Hal is upset too — he knows how hard it is for Kate that he got the job instead of her, and that she’s now going to have the thankless job of being the Second Lady of the United States instead of the Ambassador to England, where she’s thought of as “England’s darling.”

Long story short, Grace Penn is sworn in, Kate says her goodbyes to her staff at Winfield and at the embassy and she and Hal drive to the airport. Then Hal climbs the stairs to the plane — and Kate doesn’t follow. She stands on the tarmac with tears in her eyes. Hal waits a beat, their eyes locked, and then he boards the plane, leaving Kate behind.

A few months go by, and Hal surprises Kate in England for their anniversary. But the surprise is his when he discovers that Kate is having an affair with a young MI6 agent, Callum Ellis (Aidan Turner), and seems to be happy.

Hal and Kate, who still have to share a bedroom for appearance’s sake, fight about it that night — about how they agreed to be married on the outside but divorced in private, so why the jealousy? About how Kate, just as much as Hal, would love to have sex with her ex, but that’s a bad idea, so back off. And, finally, from Kate’s point of view, how Hal took the job of VP knowing it would destroy their marriage. After the fight, Kate runs down the stairs to a quiet den, curls up into a fetal position on the rug and weeps.

CIA station chief Eidra Park (Ali Ahn), meanwhile, has heard from a source that a Russian official believes that an American was involved in the bombing of the HMS Courageous. The source checks out, and it’s clear that this information is going to leak to the public. Kate, Hal and Eidra fly to meet up with Grace Penn at her home in Amagansett on Long Island, where they encounter Grace Penn’s long-suffering husband, Todd Penn (Bradley Whitford), who really hates being what he calls “first lady.” Todd doesn’t trust his wife nor her new VP, and seems almost jealous of him.

In any case, Grace, Hal, and the White House Chief of Staff Billie Appiah (Nana Mensah) go back and forth about how to deal with the impending leak that Grace Penn masterminded the bombing of the ship. Finally, they land on bringing British Prime Minister Trowbridge (Rory Kinnear) to Amagansett, telling him about the Russian source and admitting that Grace Penn was involved. They assume he’ll stay quiet once they make a deal where America will solve all of Britain’s financial problems if Trowbridge does a joint press conference with Grace Penn and announces to the world that, not Grace, but Trowbridge’s close confidante Margaret Roylin (Celia Imrie) — who died by suicide in the season premiere, while in U.S. custody — had masterminded the bombing.

Kate’s the only one among them who knows that this is a suicidal idea. She knows that Trowbridge will freak out when he hears that any American was involved in the bombing. But no one will listen to Kate, least of all Hal. Desperate, Kate finally tells Grace Penn that Hal is lying when he says he thinks this is a good plan; in fact, he only agreed to it because he knows that when the plan fails and Grace Penn is ousted from office, Hal will become president.

At this point, Billie boots Kate, sending her back to England, but she has an idea. She tries to get in contact with Hal, who won’t speak to her — nor will anyone else. No one trusts Kate anymore. No one, that is, except Todd Penn. As the secret service is escorting Kate off the property, she jumps into the pool where Todd is swimming laps. She tells him that Grace Penn should not tell Trowbridge that she bombed the ship, but instead that Rayburn bombed it. After all, he’s dead, so what does it matter? Todd gets out of the pool: He understands that Kate’s plan will save his wife’s career.

Though Kate is still persona non grata, she’s allowed to stay. Trowbridge arrives, along with his advisor (and Kate’s crush) Austin Dennison (David Gyasi), and the deal is made: In exchange for America’s financial help, Trowbridge will tell the world that Margaret Roylin bombed the ship. Before the press conference begins, Dennison visits Kate in her quarters and tells her that this deal will mean that America will forever be in the debt of England. That is, anything England wants, America will have to give them for generations to come. Kate tells Dennison that that’s not going to happen. Their parting is icy.

Then, when it comes time for the press conference, Trowbridge goes rogue and announces that President Rayburn blew up the HMS Courageous, killing 41 British seamen. He doesn’t even mention Roylin. Mayhem ensues.

Back in England, citizens are now protesting the U.S. outside the consulate, and Kate gets stuck inside the manse with Callum, who has come by to tell her that, on top of all these events, there’s a Russian submarine felled off the shores of England, all its crew dead. Not only that, but on the sub was carrying the super weapon Poseidon, a nuke that has heretofore been thought of as only a myth because it’s capable of such unthinkable destruction.

Kate and Callum fight about the fact that he took it upon himself to make decisions (about who to tell and who not to tell) about such an important matter. And she suddenly realizes that she’s fallen for a man who’s exactly like her husband. She lays into him the way she does Hal. Callum says he’d never let a wife of his talk to him like that.

Still, something must be done about the sub before China or Russia gets to it. (Trowbridge is currently buddying up to China.) Callum says that Grace Penn needs to apologize to Trowbridge for what Trowbridge thinks are Rayburn’s actions, and then the two countries can deal with the sub and the weapon together.

When Kate talks to Hal, he gets Billie on the phone and helps organize a meeting between Grace Penn and Trowbridge in England. She won’t apologize, but she’ll offer to help with the sub. The meeting happens at Trowbridge’s house, and Trowbridge wants nothing to do with Grace Penn or America. He storms out.

Turns out Trowbridge thinks Grace Penn is lying about the Poseidon, and so it becomes Kate, Hal, Billie and Grace Penn’s mission to convince him before it’s too late.  Kate tries to get Callum to tell Trowbridge all he knows, but Hal nixes that plan, knowing that Callum is good for Kate, and not wanting her to lose him.

So Kate comes up with another plan: Unbeknownst to Trowbridge, the Americans will send a submarine to take photos of the Russian sub, which will have been modified to hold the weapon. Grace Penn can then show them to Trowbridge and prove that the Poseidon exists.

Grace Penn balks at how dangerous sending an American submarine into English waters would be, and Hal, after asking Kate to leave, tells Grace that there’s a way to make this work. We don’t know what that plan is, but Grace Penn agrees.

Later that night, Callum visits Kate in her room and she lies to him, telling him she’s got things to do when in fact she just doesn’t want him there. Maybe the tide is turning on her feelings for him.

The next day Grace Penn, Billie, Kate, and Hal meet with Trowbridge. Grace Penn shows him the photos the Americans have taken of the sub with the Poseidon, and apologizes for all the trouble caused. She says that she’s ready to help Britain with the Russian sub. But Trowbridge still refuses.

That’s when Hal whispers to Kate to talk to Trowbridge — clearly, they made a plan last night where Kate would convince Trowbridge to bury the Russian sub so that no nation could ever get it. Trowbridge agrees to Kate’s plan. This is the kind of teamwork that Hal and Kate have been excelling at for years — and what makes their marriage so electric — and when Hal winks at Kate from across the negotiating table, she is clearly pleased.

Shortly after, Kate breaks down and apologizes to Hal, begging him to take her back. He does. It’s clear that she’ll give up her job in England and come back to Washington with her husband.

As the cars are being loaded, Callum pulls Kate aside and tells her that he believes the Russians stole the super weapon — that radiation levels near the sub have dropped 60%, and the only explanation for that is that the weapon is no longer there. Kate tells Hal that the Russians found the sub and took the weapon. Hal rushes away, ostensibly to tell Grace Penn.

Just then, Todd Penn comes up behind Kate and asks her whether it bothers her, the relationship between Hal and Grace Penn. Kate says no, why would it?, but then she looks over and watches the way Hal and Grace Penn are standing together, whispering, and then she knows: It wasn’t the Russians who stole the super weapon; it was Grace Penn and Hal.

She confronts Hal, putting it all together as she does: The Brits will consider this an act of war. The Russians will think the Brits stole the weapon, and will attack them. Not only that, but Hal used Kate to convince Trowbridge to bury the sub, implicating her in this plot.

Hal orders Kate to keep quiet, and then goes over to Grace Penn. She asks if everything’s OK, and Hal says no. He says, “She knows.”

“Kate’s such a mess this season,” I say to Cahn to start our (unrecorded) Zoom call off. She says, “Kate’s always a mess,” and laughs.

Yeah, I say, but why did she hook up with that shit Callum? Why didn’t she have the long-promised affair with Dennison? Cahn laughs when I call Callum “a shit,” and tells me a story about guy, during a recent interview, who asked her about Kate’s “mental illness.”

Clearly, this bothered Cahn. So she said to the guy, “I wrote a character who was bipolar in ‘Homeland’ — that’s a medical condition. But I don’t think I’ve said anywhere that Kate is crazy.’” Then she says, “Men think Kate is crazy; women think Callum is a shit.”

Still, I’m on Team Hal, because, to quote Paul Newman about Joanne Woodward, why have hamburger when you can have steak? I push Cahn: Kate is all over the place. She tells Hal to take the VP job, and then cries on the rug in a fetal position after blaming the end of their marriage on the fact that he took the VP job. What’s up with that?

Cahn says: “Kate got to the airport, got out on the tarmac, and she hit a wall. She just couldn’t move forward. And Hal could have turned around and come down the stairs and said to her, ‘Let’s talk about this. Let’s work this out.’ But he didn’t. He just turned around and stepped onto the plane.”

OK, fair. But then why didn’t Kate have the affair with Dennison, I ask Cahn.

“You plant these characters like seeds in a garden, and you wait to see how they grow,” she says. “Dennison grew to be a moral center in the show, standing between Trowbridge and Kate. He’s worked so hard to get where he is, and he’s not going to throw his career away by having a fling with an American who’s there only temporarily.”  She then adds, “Dennison was useful to Kate as a comparison to Hal, who Kate has always had issues with when it comes to where he is morally.”

So then why Callum?

“Hal has kept Kate centered for years,” Cahn says. “And now they’re at that time in their life, during a divorce, when their world falls apart. So Kate is casting about to figure out who she is.

“People do this when they first get divorced: They find the same person. Because they think they have the perfect person in their spouse — except for these flaws. And when they look for a new person, they want that perfect person again, only this time without those flaws. But the flaws are actually the flipside of what makes that person who they are.” She holds out her hand, palm side down and then flips it, palm side up.

“True love is not beautiful,” she says. “True love is un-beautiful. I think of relationships like any other drug or addiction.”

I am still digging in, because it really bugs me that Kate would have this important revelation about Callum — that he is not a good guy — and then she goes sniveling back to him, asking him to try again. I say to Cahn, “Why would Kate do that? She’s a strong woman.”

Suddenly Cahn blanches and says, “Oh, my God, Trish.” She puts her hand over her mouth and takes a sharp intake of breath. “Oh, my God,” she says again, “I just realized something.” Finally, after a solid minute, she says, “I never realized that I’m writing about my parent’s marriage!”

She tells me the story. “My mom wanted to leave; my dad didn’t. He was devastated. And I understood why she did it — my dad didn’t, but I did. But the thing that I found hard was when they then started dating.”

That is, dating each other.

Finally, she says, about her mom and about Kate, “My mom experimented by making decisions and then living them. I think that’s very brave.”

After a moment, she says, “I had no idea that I was writing my parents’ marriage. Thank you for the therapy session.”

And just like therapy, our time is up.

There is so much more to cover so I throw out one last question about Hal. Did he use Kate to get the super weapon? Was he so angry at her that he just pretended to want her back?

Cahn says, “Hal used Kate to make the deal where they’d bury the empty sub. But he wanted her back. He accepts her back fully. I have a lot of empathy for Hal; he’s tried so hard to let her go.”

But is he evil?

“There’s nothing a character in this show does that we can’t justify,” Cahn says.