Revenge - Burn - Review: "Oh. My. God."

“Burn” wasn’t to the level I was expecting, though the ending was, to say the least, spectacular. (Incredibly, spectacularly, awesome is more like it, though!) “Burn” felt too domestic, too soap-opera-y. It just didn’t feel like a show focused on revenge, it didn’t feel like “Revenge.” Still, “Burn” is going to be a pivotal episode, is going to make the Revenge Wall of Fame. How could it not? The episode marks the death of the Queen, and I still can’t believe it happened. I mean... This. Is. HUGE.

Victoria had been camped out in her hotel room, destroyed by Amanda’s public interview, stuck in the grave she dug for her, in last week’s episode, and unable to get out. Victoria has lost everyone she cares about, she’s lost everything, and, it seems, she has just nothing left to fight for. She’s lost, and Emily’s won, it’s as simple as that. But Victoria doesn’t go out without a bang.

Margaux and Louise have very different ideas on what is best for her moving on. They have old issues to work through, and watching them bickering, I felt it could be fun watching them work together in the future. Louise has quickly forgotten what Emily and Nolan did for her, that without them, she would still be at the mercy of her family, stuck in her pill addled delusions. She’s chosen the wrong side, siding with Victoria, and as Nolan points out, she’s in over her head.

Louise is mad that her fake marriage didn’t work out, mad that Nolan didn’t tell her about his best friend’s most shielded secret. I don’t know if the writers are purposefully giving everyone coming after Emily/Amanda crappy reasons so we wouldn’t, or couldn’t, root for them, but it’s definitely working. Louise comes off as naïve, impressible, whiny, and all over the place, and definitely not a worthy adversary for the duo. (Maybe, hopefully, Margaux and Louise together will be a force to be reckoned with.) She shows up at Nolan’s fundraiser, hell bent on causing drama and getting a confession out of him, but Nolan is one step ahead of her, of course. He’s learned from the best.

“You’re not going to lose me. We’re a team and we’re going to get through this because that’s what we do.” -Emily

Nolan and Emily made up, and it was heart felt. Though I still wish, they would have hugged it out, it was them. They aired out their dirty laundry, they fought, and it was good for them. They were never too big on displays of affection, but Emily told him exactly the right thing. It was time for her to acknowledge Nolan’s pain; it was time for her to really listen to his apology. They’re okay, and I would have been mad if the last episodes of this show had Emily and Nolan (who I still believe are the heart of the “Revenge”) on the outs. One episode is enough, or too much.

Not Louise’s debacle at the fundraiser, not her attempt at humiliation made Tony flee, and it’s about time Nolan got together with someone that had no link whatsoever with the revenged, someone fundamentally good. Nolan and Tony could not be from more different worlds, and while I have to side with Mason on this one, I don’t believe Emily deserves the happy ending, I believe Nolan does and, like Emily, would like seeing Nolan and Tony work out. I don’t need to see more of them, frankly I don’t find their interactions as entertaining as the rest of the characters, and think this episode had way too much of them, but I like the idea of them, like the idea of Nolan having his happily ever after with someone normal.

Victoria felt incredibly out of character in this episode. She seemed way too paranoid, way too intense, which gave me the feeling all through the episode that she was playing Emily. She’s usually poised and focused, and we didn’t get to see this Victoria until she reunited with the chair, a memento from a by-gone era.

“Now that doesn’t sound like the Victoria I know.” - Louise

Amanda has won her fight against Victoria, who has no one left to lose, and if it wasn’t for the USB key with contains the incriminating information Lyman copied from Nolan’s computer, his Infinity Box, she would be done. Victoria became obsessed, paranoid, that Emily would come after her, that she was in danger. Emily definitely managed to get inside her head, but frankly, Victoria was starting to act like a crazy person. (Louise rubbing off much?)

Victoria should know that Emily is much more into mind games than physical altercations, and while someone definitely attacked Victoria and I had a hard time believing it could have been Emily. It’s not her style, and the device Nolan made for her demonstrates she wouldn’t just jump Victoria out of nowhere. She’s calculated, precise. It’s too botched of an attack for it to be her. Isn’t it? Even though Victoria identified her, I can never believe, without proof, anything Victoria says.

When Margaux hears of what happened, she decides it’s time to take things to the FEDS, to hand over the information they have on Emily/Amanda. Setting off an alarm, and having the building evacuated, including her Victoria and her cronies, Emily, passing for a firefighter gets the thumb-drive back.

And just like that she’s done. Or so she thinks.

“You know what this means? Finishing this isn’t just a fantasy. It happened, today. For the first time in my life there are no more battles to fight.” - Emily

The most boring and unappealing part of the episode has to be David having cancer. Do we really need that storyline with only a couple of episodes left? Do we need more drama than we already have? Lymphoma just seems like a poor plot choice to simply add unnecessary drama. Doesn’t the show already have enough of that? Despite the premise of the show centered on him, despite how Amanda/Emily feels about him, after 20 episodes, I can’t come to care for him. I just can’t. And if it wouldn’t completely destroy Emily I would rather see him dead sooner rather than later.

Nolan has Tony, David has cancer, and Jack is leaving for Los Angeles with his mother. It’s would have been great way to force Amanda’s hand, if he’s just given her the chance. When Nolan, acting as the middle man between them, ran up to her with the news of his departure, I was half expecting her to say “Good for him, he deserves to be happy,” because I’m having a lot of trouble following what’s happening with them romantically. Back and forth, and back and forth again. Could you just get on the same page already?

When Jack stated he knew what he wanted to do with his life, I kind of wanted him to say he wanted to sail to Haiti, with his son, like in the first season, before Emily, before Amanda, and somehow it would have come full circle. But I guess when you’re wife dies due the explosion of your boat, it changes the appeal of the sea.

I think Jack was a jerk in this episode, and I get it, he’s tired of putting himself out there for her. He’s hurt, and he did his part when it comes to their relationship, but not giving Emily the chance to say goodbye, that’s just childish and honestly, quite mean. Was he afraid of what she’d say? Or what she wouldn’t say? Maybe he knew she would get him to stay if he gave her the chance.

Despite Emily/Amanda, I found it petty that Jack didn’t even tell Nolan, only casually mentions it, as if it’s no big deal. After all Nolan’s done for him, after all they’ve been through together.

Amanda, even though she doesn’t think she deserves him, runs after him, tries to call him, but she’s too late, and she’s left, alone. I was kind of expecting, (maybe hoping) that in a traditional TV moment, Jack to be behind her. I believed he’d have changed his mind, but he didn’t. He left, and Amanda stands alone, on the tarmac, until Mason arrives, mad he didn’t get the exclusive he was promised. Friend or foe?

“Yes, everything but you, which I suppose is just now becoming apparent, standing there, alone, on the tarmac. Realising that while you hid behind your mission of revenge, everyone else around you evolved. Did you really think they’d wait forever? Sacrificing everything and getting nothing in return. Did you honestly believe that you’d get your happily ever after? After so many lies, to so many different people, until all you had left were enemies. Like the little pyromaniac that you are, you started a fire and you convinced yourself that you could contain it. And now your dirty little secret: You can’t exist without revenge. The endless cycle of hate is your addiction. And like all tales of compulsion this will end the same way. First, you will crash. And then, you will burn.” -Mason

“Burn” can’t be the end of Victoria, can it? But holy cr*p, this ending was insane. Revenge always does poignant deaths but this one… just wow.

We watched her give up, surrender to Emily, in a totally un-Victoria way for the first half of the episode, only to come back to her ways when claiming back control, when taking things in her own hands. Victoria said goodbye to the world in her chair, wearing the ring Pascale gave her, bringing the manor down with her, one of the many things Emily had taken from her, but that she wouldn’t be keeping.

Victoria gave up, and with nothing left, blew up Ex-Grayson Manor, taking down Amanda with her. Because we know she’s the one that’s going to take the fall for it. But why? And how?


I was hard-ish on this episode, but I can’t love them all. The ending was spectacular, and if the episode had only been the last 5 minutes, I would have been jumping up and down, but it wasn’t. The rest of the episode just didn’t cut it out for me. How about you guys? Am I alone on this one?