Around mid-season 2, Nick Brody has become this as some see him as flawed, but ultimately sympathetic considering everything hes been through with stress and being manipulated but also really appreciated his Heel–Face Turn. Others think he merely changes from a hardened survivor who's able to keep his secrets from everyone to a weak and whining pawn between the CIA and Abu Nazir, but then again he could only stand keeping his secrets for so long.
By Season 3 onwards, Carrie herself has become this. She goes from an analytically geniusCowboy Copwho takes own initiatives off-protocol because she knows she is right, to having moments of genuinely jeapordizing CIA's operations (in particular when she tries to get proof of Brody's innocence). It doesn't help that her moral ambiguity increases and her rapid change from a Cowboy Cop to a rather Unscrupulous Hero weren't appreciated by everyone. For instance, she sleeps with Vague Age year-old Ayaan (who is also a devout Muslim who doesn't believe in premarital sex) just to get information out of him and later use him as a pawn to get closer to his terrorist uncle, and she is almost willing to reduce Saul to collateral damage just to kill Haqqani after he killed Ayaan which whould have happened if Quinn didn't talk her out of it. While all of that is supposed to make her a flawed, but well-meaning Anti-Hero, some viewers find her more unsympathetic than she is supposed to be because of reasons like these. There are also those who don't necessarily dislike her, but merely finds her not as interesting as she used to be back in Seasons 1 & 2.
As the series goes on, Carrie's bipolar condition has become this. Some fans consider it an essential part of Carrie without which her character wouldn't be the same, while others would like the writers to just do away with it.
Season 3 has been this for many fans, as the increased reliance on twists, romance melodrama with Dana and Carrie's pregnancy, and the continued survival of Nicholas Brody have caused much debate about the shows quality.
The Chris Carter Effect: Brody's arc could have been satisfyingly resolved at the conclusion of season one, or season two at the latest. Instead the writers kept him around until season 3, and a significant number of fans consider that resulted in a steady decrease of the series' quality.
Creator's Pet: Dana in season 3, mostly because of the writer's decision to devote 35% of every early season episode ("Tower of David" excepted) to her Romantic Plot Tumor despite how pointless and unpopular it's been to date.
Designated Hero: Carrie, by Season 3. She drinks heavily despite being pregnant, and nearly compromises national security while pursuing her love affair with Brody. As noted by Andy Greenwald, Carrie is quite bad at her job. It goes From Bad to Worse when she sleeps with Aayan, repeatedly, despite him wanting to be pure and keep his beliefs (his age is left vague, but he's a devout Muslim who doesn't believe in premarital sex) all to turn him against his father. Many fans were rather Squicked by this.
Diagnosed by the Audience: It's implied early on that Max has some manner of spectrum disorder. Carrie rather cruelly describes him as Virgil's "weird little brother".
Ham and Cheese: Jake Weber is having a ball portraying the right-wing America-loving TV host Brett O'Keefe with his overly-American accent. You can almost feel him Chewing the Scenery.
The Season 2 finale, "The Choice", aired two days after the Newtown, Connecticut elementary school massacre. While the real-life tragedy was not the exact same as the fictional attack depicted in the episode, the Newtown attack did provoke similar reactions to that of prior actual terrorist attacks.
Reviewers have long criticized the show for making Al-Qaeda more competent than they really are, though the writers tried to justify this deviation by implying that Abu Nazir's network is actually a Qaeda splinter group. Several months after the conclusion of Abu Nazir arc, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria came to prominence. For those not keeping up with the news, ISIS started off as a franchise of al-Qaida until they broke off completely in mid-2014, and they have proven to be far more powerful and dangerous than their former parent organization.
The last few episodes of Season 5 feature Peter Quinn almost dying on several occasions, and the finale itself implied that Carrie was moments away from pulling the plug from his hospital bed. Nevertheless, the Season 6 premiere reveals he survived. ...And then the Season 6 finale happens and kills off Quinn anyway under similar circumstances where he sacrificed his life for the greater good.
Abu Nazir is an al-Qaeda commander who longs to destabilize the American government. After capturing soldiers Nicholas Brody and Tom Walker, Nazir forced Brody to seemingly kill Walker, before later halting his torture so he could nurse Brody back to health. After his son, Issa, and dozens of other children are killed in a drone strike launched by Vice President Walden, Nazir used the incident to expose America's hypocrisy to Brody. Seeking revenge, Nazir allowed Brody to be rescued by American soldiers so he, and Nazir's other agents, would gradually dismantle Walden from within and eliminate anyone in their path. When Brody fails to kill the Vice President, he instead has Brody try to influence Walden's policies against the Middle East. As he plans another terrorist attack, Nazir kidnaps Brody's Love Interest, and forces Brody to assist him in killing the Vice President in exchange for freeing her. Once Walden is dead, Nazir allows himself to be caught and killed by the police so his followers can later set off a bomb during Walden's memorial service and frame Brody for the attack.
Tom Walker is a former soldier turned terrorist. After being captured alongside Nicholas Brody, Nazir forced Brody to beat Walker to death. In reality, Nazir helped Walker fake his death, and Walker snuck back into Washington D.C. to carry out most of Nazir's plans. Posing as a wandering vagrant, Walker routinely delivered messages to and from Nazir's agents, all while managing to elude various law enforcement officials. When Walker is finally exposed, he evades multiples police officers chasing after him and kills a hunter before the man can report him to the authorities. He also lures multiple CIA agents into a trap by pretending to meet with one of his contacts, only to have him killed in an explosion upon realizing he betrayed Nazir. Walker later assassinates Vice President Walden's chief aide as part of Nazir's elaborate plan to have the Vice President murdered and escapes without the police ever finding him.
#NotOurHomeland and #NoQuinnNoHomelandnote A small but very vocal portion of the fanbase was so upset over Peter Quinn's death that they blew up Twitter with these two hashtags and even put an ad in The Hollywood Reporter voicing their complaints.
Narm: Some of Claire Danes' overacting approaches it, especially when the sultry jazz kicks in.
Narm Charm: Jake Weber's overacting as Brett O'Keefe. His accent is so American that it's blatantly obvious it's not, but given that Weber is portraying an exaggerated version of Alex Jones, somehow that makes it work even more.
Nightmare Fuel: Of all the horrible scenes that have happened in this show, an overwhelming chunk of the audience agree that Carrie's near-drowning her own baby terrifies them the most. Does she mean it? Is she just careless? Or is it an illusion entirely? We'll never find out.
Older Than They Think: The concept of a homecoming American MIA convert to Islam has been explored much earlier in 2006, in John Wells' spy novel series. Coincidentally, the author of the series is a friend of Howard Gordon's. In fact, Saul Berenson is named after the author.
Romantic Plot Tumor: Opinions among the lines "Get on with the CIA's War on Terror and please do show Nick Brody every now and then, because personal dramas pertaining other characters are of little concern" are not uncommon, especially regarding the beginning of Season 3.
Lauder is a jerk who, without his war wounds and occasional Cassandra Truths, has absolutely no redeeming value whatsoever. Of course, one could say that without his war wounds, and the ensuing alcoholism, he wouldn't be such a jerk.
Jessica's affair with Mike tends to be one of the the weakest storylines of any given episode. Her racist anti-Muslim rant in "The Smile" didn't do her any favors either.
Dana in Season 3, due to her boring romance storyline. Viewers are annoyed that a series who calls itself a spy thriller invests so much time on a teenager's angst.
Last and not least, Chris. He just isn't there.
Seasonal Rot: A common view among the fans is that the series' writing quality gradually declined after a universally celebrated Season 1. The general consensus is that the third season is the worst, but the quality of the rest of the series is quite divisive between critics and fans.
Sophomore Slump: The first season is universally loved. The rest... not so much. However, which seasons are good and which seasons are bad is a divisive issue on fandom.
Take That, Scrappy!: A lot of fans were getting sick of the Brody family as a whole by Season 3, especially with Dana's infamous romantic subplot. So the writers not only wrote Jessica and Chris out the season, but they also had Dana move out the house to live in some crappy motel with a roommate, and hanged Nicholas Brody in the season finale. From Season 4 onwards, the Brody family is never brought back up.
They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: After the discovery of Brody's suicide video in Season 2, the writers could spend the whole season milking out Carrie's new operation on Brody and working out their relationship in a Death Note chess game-style. Instead they blew it right at the end of the episode.
Trapped by Mountain Lions: Dana Brody's storyline takes several notes from Kim Bauer's book, especially in Season 3. In the middle of a gigantic geo-political game, the show focuses on her relatively meaningless teen, angsty problems with her also troubled boyfriend.
Vocal Minority: The #NotOurHomeland group only consists of a few thousand fans who were unhappy over Peter Quinn's death, whereas the rest of the fanbase, while unhappy over this event, still kept watching the show. Nevertheless, this group still managed to make a few headlines where they publicly criticized the show over Peter Quinn's treatment.
Win Back the Crowd: Season 4, for many fans. After the problematic season 3, Carrie is now in a new spy plot and a new location. Also, The Scrappy Brody family don't return after taking so much valuable screentime in Season 3.
The Woobie: Nicholas Brody. He comes back to his family eight years after leaving them, tortured and broken and struggling to return to normal life—while also being forced to lie to them. Then he thinks that he's found someone who understands him—nope, she's been spying on him the whole time. It gets worse in the second season after the CIA finally finds evidence that he is a terrorist, and forces him to work with them. He has to keep lying, and even more than he did before.
if it has no logical basis from previous scenes.