Showtime has set Sept. 30 for the return of its dramas Dexter and Homeland.

The seventh season of Dexter, starring Emmy nominee and Golden Globe winner Michael C. Hall, will begin the evening at 9 p.m. The sophomore season of Homeland, the recent Golden Globe winner for best TV drama, follows at 10 p.m.

Homeland, starring Globe winner Claire Danes andDamian Lewis, averaged 4.4 million viewers during its freshman season. Its finale audience of 5 million viewers is Showtime’s most-watched season ender for a freshman series.

– source The Hollywood Reporter

“Homeland” executive producers Alex Gansa and Howard Gordon got on the phone with Speakeasy shortly after the finale aired to talk about how the conclusion was received by fans–and to offer their exclusive thoughts on the next season.

How does it feel to have wrapped up the first season?

Alex Gansa: Honestly, I’m so exhausted right now. I’m going to lay in bed with an ice pack on my head and a morphine drip in my arm for the next five or six days.

Did you follow what people were saying about the ending on the Internet? Or did you try to stay distant from all that?

Gansa: I would say a little bit of both. There are certain things—for example your blog I read all the time—the Wall Street Journal I read all the time. I read A.V. Club, I read Grantland. Those are kind of my touchstones that I read after every episode. But I’m not obsessive about it. It’s interesting to see what smart people thought about the episodes and whether people got them or not. I know that some people are a little polarized about the finale, but whatever—that’s part and parcel of the game.

Most critics were reacted positively to the finale, but there are some viewers that wondered if the plot betrayed the Carrie character by having her undergo life-altering shock therapy. What did you think of that?

Gansa: Two things I would say about that. We did a lot of research, not only about bipolar disease but about ECT (Electroconvulsive therapy). It’s not as extreme as I think the people who are having trouble with it are suggesting. It is a treatment and therapy of last resort for bipolar illness, but it also happens to be very effective in tempering the mood swings and making the mania and depression less extreme. So we felt that after all Carrie’s been through this season, and after all she’s been through for the last ten years of her life that she might at this stage decide she can’t take any more.

[Howard Gordon comes on the line]

Gansa: I was just talking about Carrie and the ECT treatment and whether we think that Carrie’s character would undergo something that’s possibly that life-changing and extreme.

One thing about that character is that although she has emotional and career difficulties, she still has a very clear sense that she’s right about what she wants for the country and how she wants to protect people. To see her at the end undergoing this procedure that might change all that, is startling. What kind of debate did you have about it?

Gansa: We definitely had some debate about it, but if you do the research on the actual procedure it isn’t as extreme as the “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” model of it. The side effects are really not always that great. And if people are worried about there being a huge personality shift from Carrie, I don’t think that’s in the cards. There are risks, but I think she thought they were outweighed by the benefits. I think she made a very difficult decision to go through with this because she needed it to stop and she needed it to stop from damaging her life.

Gordon: Plus she was wrong, or she thought she was wrong, about Brody.

How far in advance do you have the show plotted?

Gansa: We have a fairly good architecture for the second season. But you know people have been saying that since the first episode. Well, the pilot is good, but where do they go from here? Or, oh my God, he’s innocent, how can they keep the show going from here? When you get a lot of smart people in a room together, there’s always a way to push the story forward in interesting ways.

Do you see this series as ending at a set time after a few seasons and telling one complete story, like some limited-run British series or HBO’s “Rome”?

Gordon: I think as long as your characters have a story to tell, I think the show will have life to it. As long as they’re moving forward and carrying their baggage and history with them. I think the show has got an edge because it’s about the CIA, so there’s no reason for it to stop unless it’s out of gas.

What could possibly be next for the Carrie character? She’s lost her job, she thinks she’s lost her mind, she’s lost the man she may be in love with—what’s next?

Gansa: One thing I can tell you is that the Brody-Carrie story is not finished. That is one of the main reasons we decided not to have Brody be able to complete his mission. We felt the emotional connection between these two characters, the emotional recognition they have for each other and ultimately love, even though it’s ultimately a twisted and damaged kind of love, hasn’t been resolved. That’s the part of the story that we’re most compelled to tell. How does this love affair between these two people, this unlikely story, play out? There really wasn’t the time to do it in a satisfying way the first season, so we’ve got an entire year to explore that central fundamental relationship. And that’s what we’re going to put a lot of a storytelling energy into to see how that resolves.

How far are you on the next season?

Gordon: I didn’t tell Alex but I finished the first five scripts this morning. [They both laugh.] We’re at the beginning of the process. At the beginning you throw all your ideas on the table and how you arrange them and sort them out becomes the work of the season. When do we start shooting? May or June?

Gansa: Early May. So we’ll be back in the writer’s room in early February. We’ve begun to have talks, and we have the rough architecture of the second season in place, but in a really, really preliminary way.

Do you plan to add new characters next season?

Gansa: We will definitely introduce new characters. Both our leads, Brody and Carrie, will be in slightly altered and new circumstances. But that said, we will keep most of the people around them that we introduced this year.

Some critics thought “24? went on too long and became unrealistic at times. How do you keep your show going, and keep the thrills coming, without it getting unrealistic?

Gordon: I think as long as you’re emotionally true to the characters, in terms of having them react in a honest way to the circumstances, that forgives quite a bit. Unlike “24,” “Homeland” is in some ways much more modest and slowing-boiling in the thriller aspect.

Gansa: The anxiety comes from a psychological place not an action place. The situations we put our characters in are going to be easier to sustain.

Gordon: Plus, “24” was only doing one day at that only highlighted the improbability of some of the stuff.

Will we see more of the side characters like Abu Nazir?

I think we probably will. It’s hard to say right now, but that instinct is probably right.

What else are you guys working on beyond this series?

Gansa: My full focus is on this. Howard’s focus is slightly split.

Gordon: Yeah, I’m working on a show called “Awake” which is an NBC show which got a  mid-season order and which is almost done shooting. Hopefully it’ll be done shooting by the time we start shooting this, the second season [of "Homeland"].

When might viewers expect to see the second season of “Homeland” actually on the air?

Gansa: I believe the show will come back on the air in late September, early October of 2012.

How will you keep the interest going as viewers wait for the show to come back on the air?

Gansa: Well, one thing that will happen is the DVD of the first season will come out and you’ll see a lot of deleted scenes.  And they’ll be some great additional material and it will get people even more excited about the second season.

Showtime posted some killer ratings Sunday night, apropos of its bleak content.

The 90-minute finale of the Claire Danes terrorism drama “Homeland” was the cable station’s highest-rated finale for a freshman series, drawing 1.71 million total viewers with its initial 10 p.m. airing, and grabbing 2.03 viewers overall across the night’s multiple airings.

Sunday night’s finale also represented a 58 percent increase over the series’ October premiere, and a season high for the series.

Over the course of its first season, “Homeland” has become Showtime’s second-highest-rated series, behind only “Dexter.”

Speaking of Showtime’s veteran serial-killer drama, “Dexter” sliced a big, juicy chunk out of the ratings with Sunday night’s season six finale providing Showtime with its most-watched telecast of the year.

The initial 9 p.m. airing drew 2.23 million viewers, with that number jumping to 2.71 for the night. The season has averaged 5.4 million total viewers across all platforms — a 10 percent improvement over last season.

Even the leader of the free world needs his DVR.

He just got it installed, according to People Magazine, and on it are a pair of premium cable dramas. President Obama loves Showtime’s critically acclaimed new spy thriller Homeland, starring Claire Danes, and HBO’s Boardwalk Empire.