The fourth season of ABC's How To Get Away With Murder came to an interesting conclusion last night, with a surprisingly large number of questions succinctly answered, and a handful of juicy new prospects for a likely fifth season. This was by no means a spectacular finale, but it did its job well. Just like the season premiere, "Nobody Else Is Dying" was written by showrunner Peter Nowalk, with Jet Wilkinson directing.
This finale focussed heavily around Laurel's baby, Christopher. The adorable wee fella featured first up, and the story of him being reunited with his mother took center stage, so let's delve into this first up.
In a nutshell, we finally saw Jorge's storyline closed out. With the missing hard drive in Annalise's posession, leverage was now available to have him arrested and charged for his crimes. I really enjoyed how this came about because it initially started with some risky bluffs from Laurel and Annalise thanks to their failure to find incriminating evidence on the hard drive. This forced Annalise to try to turn Tegan Price, which didn't look like it worked initially, but towards the end an extended cut of their conversation showed Tegan was on board. She was able to point Annalise in the right direction, and Jorge's fate was sealed once he left the hospital after seeing his grandson for the final time.
Tegan, this is not worth dying for.
I'm really glad this is over, and the ending was otherwise harmless to everyone involved. Jorge is still alive - although I'm only pleased about that because there is such a thing as too many unexplained deaths, and with Laurel's mother unaccounted for, just one presumed dead parent is enough for now. Speaking of that, near the episode's ending we saw Laurel had some deep scratches on her forearms that likely came from her mother. On multiple occasions she denied knowing where her mother was, but the early money would indicate this is a lie, and that Laurel now joins her other students with a body count greater than zero.
So, who was the victim of the car crash teased last week? In a stroke of genius, it turned out to be the District Attorney, Todd Denver. I wouldn't have minded it being Bonnie, which was who I had my money on, but I'll take Denver as a substitute any day. As an antagonist, he's run his course, and it's fitting that he ends his run on the show at the same time Jorge does.
With Denver gone, this opens the door for Nate to gain some power and leverage moving into Season 5. It was widely known that Denver kept files on Annalise Keating and her students, and Nate found them. He didn't destroy them like he claimed, but now has a few novels worth of reading to get through before he knows his acquaintances better than they probably know themselves and each other. Likely avenues for exploration early in Season 5 include a child Bonnie had as a result of a rape that may still be alive, and the Gallivan case, which Nate worked as a detective and Denver oversaw, and which we know nothing about beyond that.
It's a potential Pandora's box for sure, and one of the things that happens with these sorts of things is that new information tends to suddenly appear out of thin air thanks to that source, so if the writers need to bail out or change tack, they can rapidly link it all back to that source with varying amounts of cohesiveness and success. Hopefully the How To Get Away With Murder writers can avoid the traps other writers seem to fall into.
I’ve become me. That’s what I’m proud of.
I got pretty tired of Asher's bitching about his breakup, which he spent the entire episode - a season finale - doing. Fortunately, Michaela was better placed to take some action, calling in an anonymous tip to ICE, which saw Simon transferred to a secure hospital and likely facing deportation. I don't have an issue with this because Simon has run its course, and Michaela removing him from proceedings using this pretty brutal method says a lot about her, and her heated conversation with Annalise following this made for really good viewing. Like Denver and Jorge, Simon is another antagonist who has run his course on the show, and this is a cunning and clean way to see him exit.
Interestingly, Wes's old apartment still isn't out of the picture, as that's where Asher has moved into while he's a bachelor. Laurel moved in with Bonnie, which vacated that apartment. I still think that place has some secrets it hasn't revealed yet, but maybe they're best left to rest given Wes's death was now quite some time ago.
In smaller but significant news, the media reported that Annalise won her class action lawsuit, which was aided by Scandal's Olivia Pope a fortnight back. This was always going to happen so I wasn't exactly bouncing around the room with excitement, but it's a solid win that should provide some bouyancy to all involved for the next wee while.
The finale's ending, however, wasn't as good as it could have been. We see Frank enrolling in law school at a Middleton University open day, but as he's filling out a form, a tall and handsome young man by the name of Gabriel Maddox steps up to the check-in table and begins hitting on the lady manning it. Frank recognizes the name, but doesn't seem overly alarmed. He makes a call to someone right then, saying to the recipient "Hey. Looks like the good times didn't last long. Her kid's here."
I'm scratching my head for two reasons. Firstly, did we really need to match Wes's stereotype for a character to fill a void that doesn't really exist, and secondly, I'm not really interested in storylines where we guess what a paternity test will say because that doesn't match the series' initial premise which, to quote the title, is how to get away with murder. We've had plenty of motherly stuff on this series this season, with Laurel's baby, her mom, and then Annalise's mom thrown in the mix as well.
It's unlikely, but I'm kind of hoping Annalise doesn't have anything to do with Gabriel's past because that would be playing along the lines of Wes, which I'm not keen to see rehashed. However the unmistakable foreshadowing which saw Annalise looking after Laurel's baby while Gabriel was being introduced doesn't give me much hope on that front. What I can't complain about being recycled is the piece of music titled 'Back to the Start', by Digital Daggers, which debuted on How To Get Away With Murder in the freshman season, if I recall correctly.
A final point I want to mention is Bonnie potentially starting something with her colleague, Ronald Miller. Miller had a more prominent role in this hour as he tried to fill the hole left by Denver's death. The pair both swiped the right way on their dating app, but this can and only will end badly. Bonnie needs to get to know someone she doesn't work with, because so far her relationships haven't lasted.
In all, I'm glad this fourth season is over. It hasn't been the easiest or most enthralling season to watch, but there's been enough there to keep me interested for its duration. Things I'm annoyed about include another season of lacklustre flash forwards, Annalise's parents, Michaela cheating, and too many mothers and babies. Things I enjoyed, however, included the flash forward twist whereby everything we saw in the first half of the season was still to happen, the superb winter premiere, the Scandal crossover, and the deaths/eliminations of Denver, Jorge and Simon.
A fifth season hasn't been confirmed, but it's highly likely How To Get Away With Murder will return, especially given Scandal is wrapping up in the next few weeks. Hopefully a reboot of sorts, as hinted by showrunner Peter Nowalk in some of the post-mortem interviews, might breathe some new life into the series come fall. Sideline the babies to a degree, open up the flash forwards to levels seen in the first two seasons, and bring some more intense storytelling that is plausible and unpredictable, and Season 5 will be pretty darn good.
That's all from me for this review, and for this season! It's been great reading what you all have to say in the comments so head down there for one final time and tell me what you thought of this finale, and also your thoughts and theories leading into Season 5. Thanks for reading, and see you back here in the fall.
