6) Carrie Mathison
Actor: Claire Danes
Show: Homeland
The one constant in a show somewhat inconsistent in its holy shit greatness and brow-furrowing frustration, Claire Danes’ bipolar CIA analyst Carrie Mathison is the reason to get sucked into Homeland‘s terrorism-fueled plots, and why you’ll stick around for everything else. This year she found solace with a hot lawyer in Berlin, but – duh – evildoers came knocking and she once again had to connect photos with yarn on walls to discover the truth behind some scandalous leaked CIA documents.
To delve into those secrets, Carrie had to submit to her disease, the show treating bipolar disorder with simultaneous nuance and hilarity (she basically gains superpowers by relinquishing her meds to delve into her bipolar obsessiveness), but Danes wrangles Carrie with such honest abrasiveness you never once question the ability for her to exist in Homeland‘s world, or our own.