Can someone remind me of the line that ended last week’s episode of How to Get Away with Murder? Oh, that’s right. “What’s your penis doing on a dead girl’s phone” is the line that rocked ABC’s Thursday night TGIT lineup, and it’s just the kind of line to set up the emotional fight between a married couple as well as raise the emotions for the rest of the action.
This week’s episode begins with a fight. Anna confronts Sam about his dong appearing on Lila Stanguard’s phone, and the two of them have an argument that can only solidify Viola Davis as an Emmy Award frontrunner. Anna’s current case (involving a teenager shooting his abusive cop father) also revolves around the notion that picking a jury is based on emotions. Selecting the members of a jury is a scientific process it seems. Am I the only one who was kind of hoping for Liz Lemon to pop up in her Princess Leia costume?
As with earlier episodes, How to Get Away focuses on one of Annalise’s four main law students/potential murder suspects. Connor got to get it on to get some information, Michaela’s relationship with her fiancé was tested, and Wes’ relationship with Rebecca seems to develop with each passing entry. Laurel is the focus this week, and she doesn’t seem to care if her fellow students like her or not. Anna’s earlier comment that “it’s the quiet ones you have to look out for” hangs over this week’s episode, and she admits to Wes, Connor, and Michaela that she and Frank did sleep together. Screw the questions about Frank and Laurel’s escapades. My biggest question is why Laurel has a shirtless photo of Frank as his contact card?
Fighting against the police proves to be difficult with Anna’s latest case. Ryan (who is sporting some serious late 90’s Erik von Detten hair) shoots his cop father after witnessing years of abuse towards his mother, and Keating & Associates manages to maneuver around all of the prosecution’s attempts to make Ryan look like a sociopath. Laurel basically breaks the law by informing one of the jurors of jury nullification, and the case is declared a mistrial. Connor also supplies us with our weekly gay content by proving a juror on Humpr (seriously…) is biased towards Ryan’s case. Seriously, guys. I feel like I am learning a lot about law and order over here!
Nate admits to Anna that he lied about Sam’s whereabouts, and it’s revealed that he was fired when Bonnie went to grab Rebecca’s filmed confession. Anna sets up a fake psychological test between Sam and Rebecca to see if she knows anything about the affair between Lila and Sam. “She called him Mr. Darcy, like every other pathetic girl obsessed with Jane Austen,” she tells him. Sam seems to be in the clear, but Anna still doesn’t trust him. Meanwhile, we see the initial spark between Frank and Laurel, but then she goes back to his apartment and asks if she can definitely trust him. When he confirms this, she pulls the idol out of her bag…how many effing people know about this now?!??!
It doesn’t take long after for this relatively twistless episode to leave us wanting more. Wes discovers Rebecca’s apartment empty, but when he asks why she skipped bail, she tells him to look at the wallpaper in Anna’s office bathroom. The same wallpaper in Sam’s dick picture was taken in the same bathroom Rebecca used after her psych evaluation, and Wes is now aware that Sam might be involved with Lila’s murder.
Compared to last week’s penis-tastic episode, this was rather tame, but it did introduce us to a new game of Motive, Motive, Who’s Got the Motive? Anna discovers just how involved Sam was with Lila, and Bonnie overhears Sam and Anna’s fight and has a nice, resentful look on her face…but then who delivered the final blow to Sam?
Despite the crazy twists and turns, the hype, and Viola Davis, I’ve realized this is one of those shows that is actually not very good – unlike, say, The Good Wife. Or, with the flash forward comparison, Damages.
The plot is clumsy and often full of holes, the characters are boring and acting unreasonable all the time, and the actors that are not Viola Davis are bad…
But I’ll ride along I guess.