Season 5

Complete listed story — includes the ending

1. Separation Anxiety

Two years after the events of season 4, Carrie has left the CIA and works as a security consultant for the Düring Foundation in Berlin, where she lives with her daughter Franny and her boyfriend Jonas, the foundation's legal counsel. The foundation's head, Otto Düring, makes plans to travel to a Syrian refugee camp in Beirut to secure relief funds, against Carrie's warnings. Carrie secures safe passage to the camp for Otto after requesting help from a Hezbollah commander. Two hackers in Berlin obtain classified CIA documents revealing that the CIA and the German intelligence agency, the BND, are illegally spying on German citizens for counterterrorism purposes; they leak one of the documents to Laura Sutton, a journalist at the Düring Foundation. Saul, who has fallen out with Carrie after she derailed his bid for CIA Director, arrives in Berlin, where the BND orders him and Berlin station chief Allison Carr to end the surveillance program immediately. Saul independently continues the program, enlisting Quinn to assassinate confirmed targets.

2. The Tradition of Hospitality

After an attack in the refugee camp is foiled, Carrie and Otto are almost killed by an IED explosion while fleeing the scene. Carrie stays in Beirut to find out who was behind the attack and is told that she was the target, not Otto. Laura goes public with the leaked document revealing the CIA's illegal surveillance program. She is detained by the BND until Jonas obtains her release. After a meeting with the BND regarding the leak, Saul informs Allison that at the request of the German government she is being recalled from her position as station chief, but Allison reaches out to Dar Adal in an attempt to have Saul recalled instead. Quinn receives the name of his next assigned kill: Carrie Mathison.

3. Super Powers

Carrie sends her daughter to the U.S. for safety and takes refuge in a secluded cabin with Jonas while trying to find out who is after her. She decides to temporarily go off her medication, feeling her intellect is sharper without it. Saul confronts Allison over her attempt to get him recalled, and informs her he has negotiated with the BND to allow both of them to keep their postings in Berlin; the two are later shown to be in a sexual relationship. Numan, one of the hackers who leaked the classified documents, contacts Laura to give her the remainder, but is unaware that his partner Korzenik has stolen them and plans to sell them to Russian intelligence. Quinn kidnaps Jonas's son to draw Jonas away from Carrie; he arrives at the cabin that night and incapacitates Carrie.

4. Why is This Night Different?

Quinn holds Carrie in a warehouse and informs her of his orders to kill her; they take photos staging her death. She and Quinn scout the post office where Quinn receives his assignments to confirm whether it was Saul who gave the kill order; Quinn is ambushed by a hitman, who wounds him before being killed in a gunfight. Korzenik, expecting to sell the CIA documents to a Russian diplomat, is instead taken to meet with SVR agent Ivan Krupin, who tortures Korzenik to get the location of additional copies of the documents before killing him. Saul and Allison lure General Youssef of Syria to Switzerland and try to persuade him to take over for president Bashar al-Assad after a planned coup. Youssef boards a plane to return to Syria. Carrie calls the only contact number on the hitman's phone, and Allison answers in Russian; Youssef's plane explodes seconds later.

5. Better Call Saul

Allison is revealed to be working for Ivan, who shows her Quinn's staged photo "confirming" Carrie's death. Allison suggests to her superiors that Israel is behind the bombing of General Youssef's plane; she manipulates Saul into suspecting Etai Luskin, his friend who is Israel's ambassador to Germany, while leading Dar Adal to suspect Saul and Etai conspired in the attack. Dar orders surveillance on Saul. Carrie learns from Astrid, who works for the BND, that the hitman who shot Quinn works for the SVR. She realizes that she needs to see the leaked documents, but Laura tells her the Russians have them, meaning the only way she can get them is from the CIA. Quinn's condition worsens; Jonas, who is with him, calls for an ambulance, but Quinn flees. Quinn attempts to kill himself, but is stopped by a passerby before falling unconscious.

6. Parabiosis

Quinn is nursed to health by Hussein, the passerby, an Iraqi doctor who is not licensed to practice medicine in Germany but instead manages a building in which a group of Syrian jihadists reside. Quinn convinces most of the jihadists he is a mercenary, not a spy, but is forced to kill their leader in self-defense. Carrie tells Saul about her theory that the Russians want her dead, adding that she needs to see the leaked documents; Saul refuses to believe her, but becomes suspicious when he realizes he is being followed. He learns from Allison that Dar Adal ordered the surveillance. Jonas tells Carrie that Quinn escaped, and he leaves her when she refuses to go home with him. Carrie goes to Otto and requests a private plane to help her disappear. Saul covertly makes copies of the leaked documents and gives them to Otto before being detained by the CIA; Otto gives the documents to Carrie.

7. Oriole

Carrie reviews the documents and finds one indicating that one of her Iraqi informants tried to contact her and refused to speak to anyone but her. She calls the informant, who reports that he saw corrupt Iraqi lawyer Ahmed Nazari resurface after being presumed dead. Carrie tracks Nazari down to Amsterdam. Saul admits to Allison that he delivered his copy of the leaked documents to Carrie; Allison reports this to Ivan. While searching Nazari's house, Carrie sees one of Ivan's men remove something from his safe and narrowly escapes after being discovered. She calls Allison and requests a meet. Dar Adal orders that Saul be taken back to Langley, but Etai has his men extract Saul. Quinn learns that Bibi, now the jihadists' leader, is the nephew of a high-priority CIA kill target; seeing an opportunity, he agrees to guide the jihadists to the Syrian border after receiving Dar Adal's authorization.

8. All About Allison

In flashbacks to 2005, Carrie arrives in Baghdad to replace Allison as a case officer. Allison introduces Carrie to Nazari, who is one of Allison's assets. Nazari turns out to be working for Ivan, who blackmails Allison into becoming a double agent for the SVR in exchange for millions of dollars Nazari has stolen from the Iraqi government and information that will help her rise through the ranks of the CIA. In the present, Etai helps Saul escape to a secure location after Mossad and the CIA reach a deal for Saul's return. In Kosovo, after restraining Quinn, the jihadists load ingredients for chemical weapons onto a truck and head back to Berlin. Carrie meets with Allison and asks her to review her reports on Nazari to determine whether he might have been a double agent. Numan hacks into Nazari's computer for Carrie, and Carrie sees a photo of Nazari taken at a beachside bar in St. Lucia that she recalls Allison mentioning in 2005; she realizes that Allison is working with the SVR.

9. The Litvinov Ruse

Carrie and Saul enlist the BND to help them prove Allison is working for the SVR. Saul plants a bug in Allison's handbag while she is asleep. The BND tell Allison a top Russian agent plans to defect to Germany, triggering Allison to go to a Russian safehouse to meet with Ivan while under BND drone surveillance. Allison and Ivan are arrested, but Allison insists to Dar Adal that Ivan was her asset and not vice versa. Quinn is held captive by the jihadists, who are planning a sarin gas attack on Berlin. He attempts to convince Qasim, a young and inexperienced member of the group, to prevent the attack. Quinn is brought to a gas chamber where his death is to be filmed as a demonstration; Qasim covertly injects him with atropine, an antidote, shortly before he is placed inside. The gas is released, and Quinn begins convulsing.

10. New Normal

Ivan admits it was the SVR that engineered the bombing of General Youssef's plane. Dar Adal demands further evidence of Allison's guilt and elects to resolve the situation quietly in order to avoid a political scandal. Bibi releases a video demanding that the UN recognize the Islamic State within 24 hours or a chemical attack will be unleashed on a European city; footage of Quinn suffering the effects of the sarin gas is included to legitimize the threat. Carrie and Astrid scan the video for clues as to where it was filmed. Bibi executes a member of his group as punishment for saving Quinn's life, aware that Qasim – his cousin – was responsible, but unwilling to kill a family member. The BND arrest Faisal Marwan, a suspected jihadist, after the Düring Foundation learns he may have information about an attack on Berlin. While searching one of several possible locations of Bibi's hideout, Carrie and Astrid find Quinn alive and take him to a hospital, where he is placed in intensive care.

11. Our Man in Damascus

Carrie and Saul convince the doctors to revive Quinn to find out what he knows about the impending terrorist attack, but he goes into respiratory arrest and is placed back in a coma. Saul attempts to get information from Faisal; Laura goes on air and threatens to leak the remaining CIA documents unless Faisal is released, but Faisal commits suicide when left alone. Allison receives her final assignment from the SVR: to ensure the chemical attack succeeds. She tracks down the professor who designed the jihadists' sarin chamber and, after he tells her the time and location of the attack, kills both him and her CIA escort before shooting herself. She then tells the BND the professor said the attack will occur at Berlin Brandenburg Airport, but Carrie finds clues in Qasim's apartment suggesting the target is actually the Hauptbahnhof train station. She spots Qasim at the station and pursues him alone, texting Saul that Allison misled them; Saul receives the text and finds that Allison has escaped from her hospital room.

12. A False Glimmer

In a subway tunnel, Carrie convinces Qasim to try to stop the attack, but Bibi shoots Qasim, at which point Carrie intervenes, shooting Bibi dead to prevent him from detonating the device. In exchange for being given witness protection in the U.S., Ivan tells Saul how the SVR plans to extract Allison; Saul and his team intercept a car carrying her out of Germany and kill everyone in it. Numan is arrested by the BND; by threatening to have him deported to Turkey, where he would be killed, Astrid coerces Laura into making a public statement denouncing Faisal as a terrorist, thereby avoiding another scandal for the BND. Carrie attempts to rekindle her relationship with Jonas, but he declines out of concern for his family's safety. Saul attempts to convince Carrie to rejoin the CIA, but she rebuffs him. Quinn suffers a possibly fatal brain hemorrhage. Dar Adal gives Carrie a letter Quinn wrote her, in which he expressed his love for her, before departing for Syria. Carrie continues watching over him in the hospital.