Sunday, November 17, 2013

Scandal - Everything's Coming Up Mellie


Olivia (Kerry Washington), Huck (Guillermo Díaz), and Jake (Scott Foley) bring the rest of the team into the investigation into the death of Olivia's mother (Khandi Alexander) and her suspicions that both her father (Joe Morton) and Fitz (Tony Goldwyn) were involved. Meanwhile, Quinn (Katie Lowes) continues spending time with Charlie (George Newbern) which will prove to have dire consequences not only for Quinn, who gets blackmailed into joining B613, but for the investigation into the truth behind what really happened the night the airliner was shot down.

The episode's other major storyline centers around Mellie (Bellamy Young) both in the present where she has consented to a camera crew following her around the White House and flashbacks to the early days of Fitz's first governmental campaign where the pair met Cyrus (Jeff Perry) for the first time. The flashbacks show us a far happier couple than the current President and First Lady as well as the number of sacrifices Mellie has had to make along the way for his husband's political career including hiding the fact that she was raped by Fitz's father (Barry Bostwick) in a disturbing scene that calls into question the true parentage of Mellie's first child and works to continue the show's recent attempts to help humanize the character.

There are also subplots involving Mellie and Cyrus' failed attempts to tempt the Vice President's () husband with a prostitute () and James () getting fired from his job for not landing the First Lady's latest interview. The crux of the story, however, has to do with the search for answers about Olivia's mother (which Quinn's tale dovetails nicely into). The episode's final scene offers a huge (and, if I'm honest, more than a little unbelievable) twist that changes the entire narrative of the story completely.

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