Let’s discuss how Olivia Pope and her friends flew over the cuckoo’s nest on Thursday night’s Scandal.
Olivia full-body cried. Olivia hadn’t seen or heard from Jake in days, and her gut told her that he was in trouble. Olivia’s gut has been wrong so many times at this point, she can’t even get anyone to endorse it on LinkedIn (and you know folks will endorse anything on LinkedIn), but she was right this time. She learned that Fitz had Jake in custody for allegedly murdering Harrison and Little Jerry. Olivia refused to believe Jake killed them, but her father got in her head and scrambled her brain, which put her in major mental-meltdown mode. So by the time Abby went in for a hug, Olivia let out a full-body ugly cry.
Jake was crazy and it drove Fitz mad! When Fitz showed up to force Jake to confess to killing Little Jerry, he first wanted to make sure Jake was eating well. Curious. Then he and Jake sang a few verses of “(Sittin’ on) The Dock of the Bay” together. Strange. The next thing you know, Fitz was straight mollywhopping Jake. So bloody! Yet, in between blows, Jake was chuckling and taunting Fitz about having been “inside” his girlfriend. Fitz may have been doing the butt kicking, but Jake was the one doing the torturing.
Papa Pope is sick in the head. Before Olivia found out that her dad knew about Jake’s disappearance, Papa Pope showed up to Olivia’s house giddy, unannounced and in the mood for happy hour. He offhandedly asked Liv how things were going with Jake, and when Olivia said she didn’t know where Jake was, Papa Pope slyly asked, “What could have possibly happened to a man like Jake?” (Even though he was the one who framed Jake for murder and had him taken into custody.) We knew Papa Pope was an evil genius, but he’s now crossed over into the realm of “sick bastard.”
Huck is unhinged. Huck has been stalking his ex-wife and child ever since he learned of their whereabouts at the end of season 3. Pause. It’s hard to believe that Huck could track down Jake’s location in under 10 minutes but hadn’t been able to find his estranged family until Quinn led him to their house last season. It looks like they’ve only been three stops north on the Red Line the whole time! But I digress. Huck agreed to stop stalking his ex if she let him see his son. She agreed, but when Huck came by for the visit, a therapist was there and his son wasn’t, which caused Huck to kirk all the way out. The crazy in Huck’s eyes when he choked out the doc was chilling.
Mellie’s brain melts. Mellie was still on a dark-liquor-and-fried-chicken bender, and it was wearing Fitz thin. So when Mellie accused him of skipping their daily visit to Little Jerry’s grave to cavort with Olivia, Fitz finally told her that Little Jerry didn’t die of natural causes; he was poisoned. To be fair, I’m not really sure what the appropriate response is in this particular situation, and Google didn’t know either, but Mellie's response blew us all away. Instead of shock or rage, she was immediately overcome with peace and relief. As she put it, “He died so that we could stay in this White House for four more years. He died for our sins. … He died for us!” They must have accidentally edited out the clip where Mellie fell and bumped her head.
David Rosen dove off the deep end. David Rosen was not built for this race. The fact that Judge Sparks killed himself after David blackmailed him with B613 files has been eating him alive. He popped up in Abby’s office tipsy and talking loud about how he killed someone because he was trying to be Olivia Pope. Eh. When I wanted to be Olivia Pope, I went to Crate & Barrel and bought a pair of $14 wine glasses. Nobody died.
Dr. Quinn: Medicine Woman. Remember Catherine, Olivia’s law-school friend who was accused of killing her own daughter a few episodes ago? Well, it looks like the dirty ex-cop who handles security for her husband’s law firm might be responsible for her daughter’s death and now the death of her daughter’s best friend, Faith, because they had access to a file he wants. When Quinn figured out that Faith swallowed the key to the locker holding the file, she found her body in the morgue, split her open with a scalpel and surgically removed the key from her intestines. I’m telling you, there's a YouTube how-to-do-it-yourself video for every occasion.
Akilah Green is a recovering Washington, D.C., lawyer-lobbyist-politico turned TV and film writer and producer living in Los Angeles. She currently works for Chelsea Handler’s Netflix talk show, Chelsea. She has also worked as a staff writer for Kevin Hart’s production company, HartBeat Productions, and as a consultant for Real Time With Bill Maher on HBO. In addition, she co-wrote and is producing Scratch, an indie horror-comedy feature film, and is a regular contributor to The Root. Follow Green’s adventures in La La Land on her blog, Twitter and Facebook.