Seven episodes in and ABC's How To Get Away With Murder continues to reign supreme on Thursday nights among its fellow Shondaland productions.
"I Want You to Die" was written by Tanya Saracho and directed by Jennifer Getzinger. Yet again the season's main storyline concerning the fateful night at the Hapstall mansion was beautifully progressed, adding to the shadow of intrigue and suspicion that has hovered over the main characters in this series.
The episode began and ended with the usual flash forward but this time things were different as Annalise wasn't seen in either. Proceedings got underway in the Hapstall mansion where we see Michaela paired with Connor, and Laurel paired with Wes. Armed with a handgun, the latter pair watch as Connor flees the house despite Michaela's protests. Laurel asks Wes what they should do, to which he replies:
Stop them.
Activities in this hour in the present day occurred a mere four days prior to the night at the mansion. Present day action began with Wes finding a handgun hidden among clothes in his drawers. A quick flashback to a couple episode prior sees Levi tell Wes that he left the gun he used to confront Bruno at the cemetery at his house.
This episode had the strongest lecture scene in some time, with Mother Theresa the subject of one of Annalise's lectures. Viola Davis is always outstanding in this series but in this episode she gave it a little something extra. Annalise delivered a brutal lesson to her student in how to use someone's positive attributes against them in court. This scene was a lot of fun to watch.
Annalise's students, along with Bonnie and Frank, were tasked with placing Philip Jessup at the crime scene which saw the parents of Caleb and Catherine Hapstall murdered. This wasn't an easy task, and as we learned in the dying moments of last week's hour, Oliver did some autonomous digging into Philip's life against the orders of Connor. Little did he know he's more than met his match in the IT department as Oliver's webcam was being watched by Philip.
What didn't help Connor's mental wellbeing was Oliver being brought onto the team more or less permanently by Frank. I'd forgot that Oliver had never met Annalise before - a moment which provided some interesting dialog, and a great one-liner - one of many in this episode - from Annalise:
You're the man who's constantly saving our asses.
To lure Philip out for a DNA sample, Oliver made a profile using Connor's image on a gay hookup website. The meeting at a coffee shop was on, but present day events concluded with Laurel, who was against the stakeout to begin with, calling Annalise to force Frank to call off the stakeout. Laurel had earlier bumped into Philip while making said call to Annalise, but Philip made his way from the coffee shop to Oliver's apartment where he gave him a very nasty surprise.
Famke Janssen made a stunning return to the series in this episode too. Her character, Eve Rothlow, returned to defend Nate from prosecutor Emily Sinclair, who was chasing him on the suspicion of assisting in the suicide of his wife. Long story short, Eve threw the case deliberately by not cross-examining the nurse who cared for Nate but who supported voluntary euthanasia. Eve played the long game perfectly, and used the nurse through Nate to swap the blood samples ordered for testing by the judge. The blood tests came back negative, once again allowing Nate to keep his freedom, but only just.Eve and Annalise shared some really interesting moments in this episode, chief of which came in the final quarter. The case of the week also contained suicidal themes, and after seeing Wes was too close to the subject to think objectively thanks to his past concerning his mother, Annalise pushed him onto Eve's case, which he sat and listened to intently. Eve deduced that it was Wes Annalise was protecting, to which Annalise said:
He's not just some student. It's him.
This was very interesting. Though neither spoke directly about this, it seemed clear to me that Eve somehow knew that Wes was the one who killed Sam. Great stuff by the creative team here.
The case of the week was really good, and didn't suffer from the shorter than usual screen time. A delusional man was being accused of driving the new husband of his ex-wife to suicide. It was Laurel's time to shine here as she put on that beautiful accent and gathered intelligence by being cute and clumsy in front of the right people. After learning through a gut feeling that the prosecutor was involved with the wife, Laurel conned a doorman into the courtroom as a material witness. It's one of the more implausible instances of trickery by Annalise and her students, but it was definitely creative, and made for good viewing.
It was what immediately followed the outcome of that case that was immensely interesting for me. Outside the courtroom, Laurel virtually asked for thanks and praise, before complaining she gets no real credit or attention from Annalise. Having earlier been caught making out with Frank by Annalise, this was Laurel's grounds for complaining about the way she was being treated. Annalise shut things down beautifully with the following:
Me not paying attention to you is the best compliment you could ever get
So true, and so damn good.
Bonnie was well and truly caught in the middle in this episode, but she brought it completely upon herself. Firstly, Asher tried four or so times to tell Bonnie his side of the story concerning Trotter Lake, which Bonnie had learned about via Emily Sinclair. In her mind, the gang rape Asher was indirectly involved with was unforgivable, and despite Asher saying he loved Bonnie, there was no going back.
Secondly, Bonnie tried to go head to head with her boss, but she was handsomely defeated. Through things Asher had said to her, Bonnie deduced that it was indeed Annalise who had convinced Asher not to testify - contrary to what she had been led to believe a couple weeks ago. In among the high volume, emotion-filled verbal quarrel, Bonnie dropped the title:
I want you to die.
I knew someone had to say this, but Bonnie wasn't high on mu list of suspects here. It's an ominous statement to make ahead of the revelation of Annalise's shooter due in a fortnight.
The one-liners didn't stop there. Early in the hour, Annalise somewhat jokingly said to Frank:
If you want to protect us, kill Emily Sinclair.
And after learning of Sinclair's plan to go after Nate on suspicion of murdering his wife, a short but sharp verbal exchange between Sinclair and Annalise left a lot to interpretation:
You're messing with the wrong bitch.
Is that a threat?
I guess you'll see.
Those three lines make more sense when you consider the final scene of the hour, which, as expected, is a flash forward. In the Hapstall mansion, seconds after the episode's opening flash forward, Wes and Laurel call to Connor and Michaela to stop running. Just as they turn around, the body of Emily Sinclair falls past them and hits the ground. The horrified faces of Michaela and Laurel are seen as the camera climbs to the top floor where Bonnie looks toward the ground.
Two things here. Firstly Sinclair has to have been dead when her body thrown off the building. If she wasn't, there would have been noise, probably screaming, as Sinclair fell.
But the second thing isn't quite so clear. As the camera climbs to reveal Bonnie, we see Bonnie wearing her blazer, buttoned up. Those with vivid memories of the episode two weeks ago will recall watching Bonnie take off her blazer in the service station bathroom to reveal a heavily blood-stained blouse underneath (the image is in my review of that episode here).
In the flash forwards in Episode 5, "Meet Bonnie", Bonnie and Asher fled the Hapstall mansion in a car, though Bonnie was on foot prior while Asher was already in the car. This must surely mean the blood that came to be on Bonnie must have come from someone else because if Sinclair was killed by blunt force trauma, Bonnie would have got blood on her clothes - specifically her blazer - as she threw Sinclair's body off the top of the building. I doubt Sinclair died of blunt force trauma because she had no facial injuries in the close-ups of her body that we've seen.
But what's perhaps even weirder is the purpose for throwing Sinclair's body off the roof, post mortem. I'm struggling for theories on that one. Aside from perhaps causing a diversion for the police, there isn't any logical reason to do that to a dead body. Blood trails or remnants of skin and hair are clear indicators that a body was moved - it wouldn't take a detective with half a brain to figure that one out.
So where did the blood on Bonnie's blouse come from? Is there a fourth body that is yet to be discovered, on top of the dead, then alive body of Catherine Hapstall which was carefully placed in the woods near the mansion by Frank? Where was Caleb Hapstall before Michaela met him? Or did Bonnie shoot Annalise at close range and somehow manage to get a large amount of blood on her blouse?
One final point before I wrap this review up. When Connor was leaving the house, his hands and clothes were free of blood. What's more, in the earlier episodes of the season, all four students, Wes, Connor, Michaela and Laurel, were leaving the mansion together, and in much more of a rush. This means Annalise must not have been shot when Wes and Laurel stopped Michaela and Connor from leaving. That therefore means Sinclair was dead and thrown off the roof prior to Annalise being shot.
But here's my theory: Annalise was shot by Wes, possibly accidentally. Wes is the only one with a gun. He had it with him inside the mansion. Him and his fellow students most likely return to the mansion to find Bonnie after Sinclair was thrown from the roof, and Wes shoots Annalise, possibly accidentally after mistaking her for someone else. It explains why Connor was so frantic in his attempts to save Annalise. It explains why everyone fled the scene. To provide a suspect, Frank somehow abducted Catherine Hapstall, knocked her out, covered her in blood spatter, and dumped her in the woods near the scene.
What it doesn't explain is how Bonnie got so much blood in such a localised area on her clothes. Bonnie must have killed or seriously injured someone, but I don't think it was Annalise. And what was Nate rushing to the scene for, and trying to call Annalise for, though she was too badly injured to answer his calls? Nate knew she was in danger, but we don't know who was the source of that danger. Or, had he received word that she was wounded and was just rushing to help? If that was the case, why did he then pick the students up and head to town.
It's what seems possible at this stage, but it also seems way too easy. With the information in these short flash forwards, the theory flood gates have well and truly opened.
In all, this was yet another stunning hour of How To Get Away With Murder. The reintroduction of Famke Janssen, a decent lecture scene, a pretty solid procedural case, and significant progress on Philip and the flash forwards all came together perfectly. A shout out to the music department who produced a really unique score for this episode too.
As always, thanks so much for reading! Do jump in the comments below and share your thoughts and theories, in particular your timeline of the version of events leading up to the shooting of Annalise. See you all back here next week!
