​“Homeland” is hitting the reset button in the upcoming fourth season, Showtime topper David Nevins told the Television Critics Association’s Winter Tour on Thursday, acknowledging the wave of criticism over the year of what many critics saw as a third season that had lost its footing.

“This is a show that’s fundamentally about a field operative and we haven’t seen her much out in the field operating,” Nevins told the gathering.

Although the showrunners haven’t outlined their plans for Season 4 in detail yet, he confirmed that Mandy Patinkin will be a “central” part of the upcoming storyline.

Nevins indicated that he wasn’t as bullish on limited-series or event series programming as some of his competitors, but did say that something like FX’s “American Horror Story” or HBO’s “True Detective” held some appeal.

And he acknowledged that Catholic Church drama “The Vatican” died because “the world changed on us” with the abdication of Pope Benedict and the arrival on the scene of Pope Francis.

Nevins said he was glad he didn’t order 13 episodes of the Kyle Chandler vehicle because it would now feel “dated.”

Shifting to Netflix, he said that Showtime felt “stacking rights were important” and was maintaining its policy of not selling streaming rights to platforms like Netflix until a current season has concluded.

“We decided about three years ago, if you want our first-run programming, you’ve got to subscribe to Showtime,” Nevins said.

Read More: Los Angeles Times, The Hollywood Reporter, Deadline

Brief Take: Nevins’ comments on limited-run series are telling since most of the rest of the networks at TCA have been flocking towards them, including, FX, CBS and The CW

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