OMG!! I AM STILL NOT BREATHING.
We were forewarned that this particular episode would be a doozy so we should’ve been forearmed, you know that saying. I tried to prepare, I bought a fabulous bottle of wine and popcorn, ready for whatever Shonda and her team had to throw at me. I thought I was ready… my mind body and soul are still badly shaken up from this episode. Half way through I abandoned my glass and was swigging wine from the bottle. Of course I woke up with a hangover the next day, but that was the least of my problem.
Take a deep breath in and out. Take it because you will need it.
We’ll get the not so minor issues out of the way. Keep your eyes peeled because everything is linked to everything else okay.
Liv and her fabulous Dior coat. She’s ready to do battle and is on a mission to get to the bottom of Operation Remington once and for all. She is about to leave her house when the Fitz phone rings. I don’t know why she still has that phone. At first she fronts like whatever Fitz I ain’t got time for none of that anymore and she walks out whilst the phone is still ringing, he’ll leave a message. HOLD THE APPLAUSE. My girl walks back in and hurries to the phone like one of those chicks who wait by the phone after a first date. She answers and it’s all that heavy breathing stuff at first. He goes on a schpill about his feelings for her and how she should stop looking into Remington and blah, blah, blah and I’m praying, literally saying a Hail Mary, so she doesn’t fall back into this bullshit routine of theirs.
Fitz- I love you.
Liv- So what?
HALLELUYAH!!!!
There once was a time when that would’ve worked but not anymore because what Liv now realizes is that Fitz is okay keeping secrets from her and she prided herself on being the one person who knew him, knew his secrets. She thought she was the one person he would be straight up with but now reality bites. HARD. Besides, not looking into Remington is not an options because that’s just what she intends to do.
Mama Pope becomes the next client of Pope and Associates…Oh dear.
Before setting up her team on this one however, Liv comes clean and tells them all about what she knows of B613 and Remington and her father’s involvement and how her mother died. They are even more game- over a cliff. And so the digging starts and the deeper they dig the more sinister things they discover.
Things like;
- Omar Dresden the passenger taken off the flight because it was believed that he was a bomber.
- How does Omar link to Maya Pope?
- The cover up goes over Fitz’s head to his father who chaired the committee put together to look into the plane crash obviously he covered up the role of his son.
- The only person who knows anything about Omar Dresden is a retired airport employee who worked on flight 522. He is now a security guard and possibly their only link to finding out the truth of what happened on flight 522…and Liv’s mother…
So Quinn and Charlie are getting chummy like Bonnie and Clyde and any simpleton can see the inevitable shenanigans bound to result from this, from a million miles away. Quinn is so dence she redefines the word. This season I have increasingly grown frustrated with Quinn’s character. She is much too simple to work in Pope and Associates and careless. She doesn’t want to have to work to be a part of it, she feels entitled because she learned a few tricks from Huck. I don’t like her, I don’t like her idiocy and I for one am glad that Charlie sets her up for a fall when she blindly is willing to be an accomplice on a “job” he is on. Said job involves drugging a security guard so he can gain access to the building. Quinn wants to be a part of it, she is gagging for it. She agrees to drug the security guard in order to get him access. Only, this is Charlie’s play to recruit her into B613…Yup. She kills the security guard because of course he lied to her about the intensity of the drug meant to knock him out. And Charlie has everything on video…
“You are now B613. Welcome to Wonderland”
Oh and the security guard she killed was only the same one Liv and the team were after… I hope she gets thrown into the hole.
Mellie and Cyrus are plotting to get Sally On side for Fitz’s campaign and the only way to do so is through her husband. So they set about recruiting a “whore” for Daniel Douglas only to find out that Douglas doesn’t really sway that way…no wonder Sally is a bible thumper, she needs all the Psalms she can get!
And now we get to the heavy stuff. Drink a gulp of wine. Take a deep breath… let’s do this.
In the present day; Mellie is shooting a behind the scenes program with the press in order to burnish her tarnished image after putting her husband on blast before the entire world, for cheating on her. The public have fallen out of love with her for being so uncouth so she needs to cosy up to them for forgiveness if Fitz has a hope in hell of getting re-elected. This is her penance of the sort.
Flash back to fifteen years in Santa Barbara. Young Mellie x Fitz, pre Olivia and her magical thighs, are in bed, happy and very much in love with each other. Mellie. Before the White House, before Washington, before Cyrus, before Defiance, BEFORE LIV. Mellie is partner in a law firm and Fitz is building his political CV after retuning from the war. Cyrus with his Movember beard is here at the behest of Jerry, Fitz’s father, to help map out Fitz’s political future. This is where we see Mellie in it to win it for her husband, all rosy cheeked and fresh eyed. This is where we see Mellie pay a hefty price for Fitz. This is where we see him undeserving of her.
Fitz and his father have a difference of opinions on how he should run his campaign, Jerry would rather Fitz ran on his war record but Fitz, knowing what skeletons hide in that closet, would really rather not. From this scene we understand that Fitz’s life was decided for him by Jerry and Mellie was there to prod him along and placate the situation, she is after all who was chosen to marry him in the merger, if we remember from season 2, Mellie you danger girl…watch it. Theirs is a political marriage merger set up by Jerry- Mellie is of blue blood, rich family from the South and Fitz is from a political legacy and together they are a match made in political heaven. Fitz and Jerry cannot agree on anything and Cyrus is not particularly thrilled to be involved in the family drama. Enter Mellie, the lynchpin. After a talk with Cyrus, who pulls no punches in laying down the facts of life as the wife of a politician, she understands that her life, her career and everything to do with her must come second where Fitz is concerned, if he is to make it all the way to the White House. She must be prepared to play the perfect wife and nothing but. I would hate to think that this is what all first ladies must agree to in order to help their husbands make it into the White House and I’ll be even more furious to think that after all the sacrifice he still finds the time to fool around with an intern…you know who you are Mr President. But anyway, Mellie understands that she has to be Fitz’s Ride or Die chick.
Back to the present and we find Mellie still cozying to the cameras and playing up that frothy first lady act she has perfected, even though she is dying on the inside at the insipidness. In a bid to show America that they remain a strong family she has to make a show of taking Teddy, aka America’s baby, who is not a baby anymore, in to the Oval office say goodnight to his hardworking father, all pre arranged of course. Fitz is meant to be the doting daddy in this scenario, America’s father and perfect husband, awaiting a good night kiss from his wife and baby boy…
Open the door…no Fitz in the Oval…
Back to the past. Mellie and her father-in-law are having a drink and Jerry is banging on about how much of a good father he has been to an ungrateful Fitz, giving the guilt schpill. He can’t hold his alcohol so he lets Mellie in on a little secret regarding Ftiz’s military career. The real reason flight 522 had to be taken down. Jerry thinks Fitz weak because and is convinced his son will not amount to much because of that flaw. Suddenly, he looks at Mellie, as if seeing her for the first time. He slurs out a compliment. Touches her knee. She tries to ward him off but Bastard Jerry only presses harder. He rapes her as Fitz sleeps peacefully in a bedroom upstairs.
He didn’t show up for her.
Grab another drink now.
Back in the oval present day. A pissed off goes on to give Fitz a read that’s been a long time coming, fifteen years too long because God knows if she holds it in any longer she might explode. If she has to be reminded of how much his doesn’t love her, by him constantly not showing up for her, it will be too much. So she lets him have it.
Mellie- ‘You didn’t show up. For me! You didn’t show up for that stupid reporter, for me and Teddy and that photo op in the oval. You left me hanging and I had to do everything myself. I always have to. I am tired of doing everything myself! I am alone here. We’re supposed to be partners. We’re supposed to be in this together-‘
Fitz- Let’s pretend we’re something we’re not.
Mellie- (sighs) If you knew the sacrifices that I have made. The things that I have given up. And the pieces of myself that I have given away for you and you treat me this way. You declare war on me and you shame me. And you make me beg for scraps when I have done nothing but fight for you. You don’t have to love me but we are in this hell together and the flames are burning both of us with equal intensity baby, so the lead you could do is be my friend. Just a little bit. The least you could do is show up. Show up for me. Show up for me Fitz. That’s like being like some..stranger.
This is without a doubt, the best scene of the season so far. Bellamy Young does a hell of a job with Mellie and this season especially, she has continued to show off her chops and this scene with Fitz is most powerful. It broke my heart to see her so anguished because it is at that point she realized that whatever it is she expects from Fitz, whatever arrangement their understanding breeds, she may never get it. She will continue to give of herself and he will continue to make her feel foolish for doing so. Its this reasons she doesn’t expect him to show up for her the next day of filming, so she makes an excuse for his absence to the reporter.
But, surprise, surprise, who comes bounding in like the proud husband, Fitzgerald Thomas Grant III. And show up he did.
Reporter-…How do you explain the rash decision that made you go on national television and air your marital dirty laundry in front of the entire world?
Fitz- ‘I say they are barking up the wrong tree…I had the affair. I damaged our marriage and caused the public grief, and I should be the sole carrier of the blame and outrage for this embarrassing fiasco. To place it elsewhere, to blame Mellie for speaking out is false. For Mellie to accept that blame and to take responsibility for any of it would be equally false. I made the mistake. I’ve apologised for it and now it is time…I am moving on. We are both trying to move on. And all we can ask is that the American people try to do the same.’
BOOM.
The last few minutes don’t let up either, things get real crazy, real fast, so keep up.
– Papa Pope is seen going to visit Omar Dresden, remember the mystery bomber who was taken off flight 522. He is in lock up under heavy security. Omar Dressden aka Maya Pope…WTF?!!
– The same moment Papa Pope is having a reunion with Mama Pope, Fitz is in the Oval going through a secret file on Liv and he finds out that Rowan is Eli is Papa Pope and is Command. (yes just keep losing it)
– Flashback to the past, Mellie is knocked up. Who is the daddy to Fitz’s first born child?!
ABANDON HOPE!! DRINK MORE WINE!! THIS SHIT JUST GOT REAL MAD CRAZY!!
I have questions.
1. Why is Mama Pope being held prisoner? What is her connection to Omar Dresden? Is she a terrorist?
Whatever she did we now know that Mama Pope is not just an innocent bystander. She crossed Papa Pope and she must have crossed him with a threat to Liv and he had to put her away to spare their child the heartache and pain that would come from her finding out the truth about her. I want to believe Papa Pope really did act on his daughter’s best interest and became Command to protect her.
2. So Fitz has a son that could be his brother or will we be spared the drama but put on edge until we find out that he is really the father because Mellie has to come clean to him. And what does this mean for their future? Will he stop being such a dick to her?
3. Will Cyrus now use James as Daniel Douglas bait? I mean its Cyrus…
4. When will Huck discover Quinn is B613? And when does she die because I am TIRED of her skanky behind. SHE’S GOT TO GO.
And one last thing;
There were some cantankerous tweeters calling Mellie out, blaming her for being raped by bastard Jerry for the ludicrous reason she wanted to use it as her arsenal; to get him to back off Fitz and back him up one his (Fitz’s) own terms. DAMN THOSE PEOPLE TO HELL. I know this is fiction but having known people who’ve been abused and considering how much more glaring rape has become in society, that scene was intensely awful to watch. I can’t even begin to speak for rape victims who watched it. What’s just as troubling is that there are morons who hold such a sinister view towards rape. THIS IS NOT OKAY. Its ugly, its despicable, its awful and its hurtful.
Rape as a plot or as part of a character’s story line is something that leaves a lot of people, myself included, unsettled because it is often used to dent a character’s strength, make her seem brittle and precious. It is used as an explanation for a flaw in her make up. It’s a way to stifle a character, but in this respect we got to see the character become stronger. Mellie didn’t back down and Jerry did not get the last word. In real life scenarios this is not often the case, a lot of rape cases go unreported because victims fear being blamed or not taken seriously. Therefore, that there are people with such views about a fictional program even is, quite frankly, abhorrent.