SCANDAL Recap: Better The Devil You Know

This episode of Scandal wastes no time getting right to it so neither shall I.

Huck has Poor Quinn naked and duct taped on a tarp in her living room. Huck is a scary man, but hey at least he is offering to give Quinn the “friends and family discount”, which means he won’t flay her or remove her fingers and toes. That’s right – FLAY HER! Then he promises not to kill her after he LICKS HER FACE. I maybe should warn you a number of sentences in this recap are going to have all caps. Know why? Because this show is bananas!
About to pluck out one of Poor Quinn’s teeth – I hope Pope & Associates has dental – he gets a call from Olivia. Olivia is freaking out; she doesn’t know what to do. Her Mom is alive and with her at her apartment. Huck advises her to run, toss her cell phone and run to the safe house.

Sidebar: I have a minor gripe. I expect better of these characters sometimes. Like back in the day when Jake was so easily able to bug Olivia’s apartment because Huck swept for bugs every Wednesday at 10:00AM. Who doesn’t know to vary that timing of that task? Or, for instance, right now when Olivia takes her Mother back to her apartment. Really? You don’t think your Father is coming for her? Where is the first place you would look? I’d check OLIVIA’S APARTMENT! Why does Olivia have to call Huck to be told to run? Olivia of all people knows what her Father is capable of. End sidebar.

Oh and it turns out Huck listens to mainstream hip-hop or reads blogs by anyone thinking they are cool because after hanging up he says, “YOLO.” before removing one of Poor Quinn’s molars.

Olivia gets her Mom at the safe house with the rest of the Gladiators. All except Poor Quinn of course. Huck and Jake are pretty calm about the whole thing whereas Harrison and Abby are a little more agitated. Abby quips, “You can’t show up with dead Momma Pope & expect us to fall in line.”

Momma Pope says all those years ago she found out what Command was, “I married a man and found out he was a monster.” so she does the most logical thing (she types with sarcasm) Momma Pope takes some files and tries to hop on a plane to London to meet with a reporter and expose Command. Unfortunately, for her, Command caught up with her and locked her up. Thankfully Jake and Huck realize Momma Pope must have a tracking device on her and they are able to remove it just in time – moments later Charlie and a team show up but the Gladiators and Momma Pope have gone.

Command isn’t okay with losing Momma Pope and tells Charlie to find her. All the while we see Huck and Jake doing spy things, like changing out license plates, putting nifty silencers on their handguns and supplying the team with burner phones from a seedy looking motel. Olivia finally speaks up and says her Mom is getting on the first flight to Hong Kong after Harrison secures new papers for her.

The next morning Olivia sits down with her Mom. She says she spent all her time thinking about Olivia and the life she imagined she had. In her mind Olivia was married to a dentist with a son. She had lots of love and laughter and happiness. Momma Pope tells Olivia there isn’t a lot of laughter in her life. Now this may be true but HELLO, YOU ARE ALIVE AFTER 22 YEARS OF BEING “DEAD”. Give the girl some time to adjust. I also wonder if Olivia’s Mom is based on my Mother. I’m pretty sure she would prefer I was married to a dentist as well.

Olivia’s Mom takes it one step further and comments, “Eli raised you in his image.” This does not sit well with Olivia.

Outside the motel room Jake and Huck are discussing what to do about Command. They need to take him out and they need some help. Queue a visit to the White House for Jake. He spills the Olivia’s Mom is alive news and asks for Fitz to give the order to have Command taken out.

Indulge me in one more sidebar if you will: Scott Foley is pretty. Like really pretty. Whether he is wearing his I’m a spy and holding things down at the motel clothes or right now in his uniform at the White House. That is all.

Jake doesn’t take Fitz saying no very well. In fact Jake delivers an in your face barely holding it together speech about how Remington caused him to get “sucked into the wake” of Fitz’s “political destiny”. For 22 years he has been enslaved to B-613 while Fitz was elected President on handshakes. Fitz says he really does want to get rid of Command but when Jake says “Get off your ass and give me the assets I need,” Fitz says he just can’t. Jake is about to leave when Fitz says, “You don’t want to be a hero. You want to be her hero. Word to the wise – she doesn’t need one.” This is coming from the man that built her a house based on a conversation about making jam so take that how you will.

A few hours later Jake and a team attempt to take Command down but it was a trap and half his men end up dead while Charlie and Command speed off from the detention center. Command wants Charlie to activate his asset. Poor Quinn. Charlie says he will find her. She is still naked and duct taped on a tarp. It is not a good look.

Jake tells Huck about the failed mission so Huck puts Jake in charge of Olivia’s protection and runs home to find Poor Quinn trying to get out of her tape bonds. Huck secures her and says he wouldn’t be doing this if she had just betrayed him but she betrayed Olivia and that, for him, is unforgivable.

At the motel Harrison and Abby show up with the fake papers and another problem. Olivia’s Mom is on the no-fly list. Getting her out of the country with the terrorist charges Command listed is going to be difficult, probably impossible.

Olivia calls Fitz and Fitz wants to know what he can do. She isn’t calling him for help; she is calling because she wants to hear his voice. She wants to talk about Vermont and jam and the kids. She just needed, “one minute”. Fitz answers her that he is taking care of it, “it’s handled”. Who wants to be her hero now? If it wasn’t for the “one minute” part of this conversation I would be scoffing at him trying to outdo Jake. But I’m not because the “one minute” thing is just about the most romantic thing even though it is technically nothing. Did I say sidebar? I meant too. Anyway he’s going to have her Father killed and her response is, “Thank you.”

Now while all this is going on Sally Langston is getting ready to sign papers that will put her hat in the ring for President. Leo however advises Sally that in order to win the election she will, after getting as far as the actual Presidential race have to ditch her conservative Christians and go Pro-Choice. She balks at the idea. This is awfully amusing to me as I recall her young unwed daughter having an abortion a few seasons ago. Something she had to sign off on because her daughter was underage. After a little reflection she gets on board the pro-choice train and signs her, “I’m running for President” papers.

Sally tells Daniel Douglas she is announcing her candidacy the next day. She thanks him for all his hard work and disciple over the years. They are finally going to be rewarded. Daniel Douglas looks worried – me thinks it is because of the whole dallying with the Chief of Staff’s husband the night before but I’m not a mind reader, I could be wrong.

Cyrus is in his office looking over the pictures of said dalliance when James stops by for a visit. James makes comments that push Cyrus a little more towards the edge before leaving and running into Daniel Douglas himself. Daniel wants to make sure James won’t publish anything about the gay sex they shared. He ascertains that he is a man, a Christian and in love with his wife. Apparently that is the trifecta to being straight? He says he is a man a few more times, calls being gay a despicable sickness and leaves James standing in the hallway shaking his head.

In the Oval Office Sally drops off her, “I’m running for President” papers. Fitz tells her she can’t win. Sally disagrees. Fitz however is not fazed, “You are making the biggest mistake of your life crossing me and I will spend the rest of my life working tirelessly to remind you of that. You will regret this day forever.” Sally does not take his threat as seriously as I think she should. No one on this show cares for my opinion though so onward.

Cyrus comes home to find James alone – from the look on his face he expected to walk in on James and Daniel Douglas going at it on one of the tables in the living room. Cyrus finally breaks down. He says he knows, he knows James had sex with Daniel Douglas. James does exactly what I want him to do and calls Cyrus out. He PIMPED OUT HIS HUSBAND and now he doesn’t like the results. Who could have seen that coming. Oh wait – I did and Mellie did and everyone watching did.

Cyrus has the nerve to accuse James of going too far but James cuts him off, he wants a divorce. He’s leaving Cyrus.

Unfortunately Fitz calls at that moment and summons him back to the White House. He wants to know what happened with Sally, he thought Cyrus was going to take care of it and now it is too late. Fitz storms out leaving Mellie there to watch Cyrus start to cry. CYRUS IS CRYING. Mellie is as uncomfortable as I am. For her part Mellie gives empathic advice, “It hurts until it doesn’t. You think what he did will break you but it won’t.” She tells Cyrus to see it through before leaving him with his thoughts.

Cyrus pulls it together and brings Sally the pictures of James and Daniel Douglas. She isn’t pleased but she doesn’t back down either. Sally says he will never release those pictures because it won’t help Fitz that the Chief of Staff’s husband had relations with a married man. His plan backfired. Cyrus did all of this scheming and setting up his husband for nothing. Cyrus calls James and apologizes and lies in the same sentence. He says Sally will never see the pictures, just forgive him.

Now for Poor Quinn. Charlie finds Poor Quinn still tied up on the floor. She gets cleaned up and downs some vodka to help her mouth after, “Huck’s little dental adventure”. She starts to cry and Charlie tells her to suck it up, so she doesn’t eat steak anymore, at least she has no drill holes. Well if that isn’t the pep talk of the year I don’t know what is.

Poor Quinn laments that Huck was the only person she had. Charlie says that isn’t true, she has him. He kisses her and she balks, only for a second though, before dropping her towel and pulling him down onto the couch. It’s not that I’m not a big believe in the power of sex or anything but now – this is the time to do the assassin?

Later Charlie and Poor Quinn outside Wonderland where Poor Quinn is going to help Charlie track the Gladiators. She does some tech speak and Charlie is overcome, he has to kiss her again and then calls her, “the best girlfriend he ever had.” BLACKMAIL AND SEX AFTER TORTURE DO NOT A RELATIONSHIP MAKE. Do you hear me 50 Shades of Grey.
Sorry – sidebar – I was going to say sidebar.

So to wrap it all up – At an undisclosed airstrip Olivia and the team have Momma Pope ready to get on a military plane. They will even be able to skirt customs in Hong Kong. They give her a burner phone and a gun and say their goodbyes.

As soon as her Mom is on the plane Olivia remembers something from the day her Mom “died”. After her Mom left they got a phone call from a guy asking for Marie. Olivia calls Huck and asks what the name was that Command used when he put her Mom on the no-fly list with the terrorist charges. It was Marie, Marie Wallace. Olivia realizes her Mom is a terrorist. “He isn’t the monster, she is.” This whole time Command was protecting Olivia from what her Mom really was. Anyone watch Alias? Does this not resemble that whole family dynamic?

This is of course a problem because Huck and Poor Quinn had a conversation between teeth pulls. Poor Quinn is in Commands office with a syringe in her pocket. HUCK SENT POOR QUINN IN TO KILL COMMAND.

Now really – I don’t think it is much of a problem.  It’s not like Command is without some ridiculously large faults and if you ask me he has done some truly unforgivable things.  This just isn’t one of them.

Also Cyrus is asleep on his couch when he gets a call from Sally. “Cyrus I have committed a sin.” We pan out to see Daniel Douglas on the floor dead. SHE KILLED HER HUSBAND and then called Cyrus.

Quick poll – Who on this show hasn’t committed murder or hired one out? Cyrus had Charlie kill Amanda Tanner. Fitz killed Verna and now Sally has killed her husband.

So there you go. Another week another near heart attack for me with all that is going on. What did you guys think?
The fall finale is next week and the previews look as crazy as always.

Scandal airs Thursday 10/9c on ABC