Scandal can be one of the most frustrating shows on TV right now; it has a bag of tricks that it reaches into every episode, without fail, and your enjoyment of it really depends on your tolerance for Shonda Rhimes speechifying and unnecessary camera tricks. That said, it’s entertaining as hell, and if you looked up “guilty pleasure” in the dictionary you’d probably see a picture of Olivia Pope with a glass of red wine as big as a fishbowl.
Oliva, living under the pseudonym Julia Baker, is beach bumming it up with Jake on an island 100 miles off the coast of Zanzibar. The whole thing looks like a Corona commercial, right down to Olivia’s one-piece, which probably cost around $400. She gets a letter telling her that Harrison is dead. Not Harrison! Who will wear stripes and paisley and give long unsolicited speeches about how great Olivia is now? Anyway, she and Jake go back to DC for the funeral. Except we all know that she’s not “back for now,” she’s “back for good,” otherwise there would be no show. I feel bad for Jake. First of all, despite being a ruthless killer, he’s more or less the human equivalent of the puppy dog emoji, and now after finally getting what he wanted – an uncomplicated life with Olivia, where beer gets delivered by a boat – he’s getting dragged back to DC, where she will inevitably cross paths with her ex, who also happens to be the president. I guess that’s one of my biggest gripes about Scandal; few people other than Olivia seem to have any agency, regardless of how competent they are (think of how many high-profile cases David Rosen lost due to some chicanery on her part).
Back in DC, Olivia starts getting the gang back together. She goes to the OPA offices, where the furniture is all covered and no one’s there. Well, Quinn is there, and tells her that OPA is no more. Then who’s paying the rent here? And why? Quinn wastes no time launching into one of this episode’s approximately 50 speeches, telling Olivia how she tracked her down: her taste for expensive wine. Here’s how people talk in ShondaLand (I’m paraphrasing here, but not by much): “Your weakness was wine, red wine, expensive, complicated red wine.” It’s just constant speechifying, with that “x, x + modifier, x + modifier + modifier” structure. It wears thin real fast. Like, within seconds. It’s been three seasons of this, but I guess if I’m expecting anything different, that’s a Trevor problem, not a Scandal problem.
Abby is now the White House Press Secretary, and Huck, calling himself Randy now, is doing geek-squad computer repair stuff. Guillermo Diaz might be the most one-note actor on any show. Every line is delivered with that same breathy monotone. They all pretty much tell Olivia to fuck off, which was nice to see, but it’s like Olivia and Jake’s life on that island – we know it won’t last. They all turn up at the funeral. The cult of Olivia is hard to escape from.
Meanwhile, Jake tells Rosen to continue his investigation into B-613. He says pull the trigger or give the files back. Haha, back to whom, Jake? You? That’s a whole storage unit full of files, and you’re gonna, what, take it back to the island with you? Let’s get real here. Anyway, Rosen looks like he’s about to pick up where he left off, but he also gets offered the Attorney General position. Rosen gets shit on so much on this show it’s nice to see Scandal throw him a bone.
So it sounds like I’m being really, really harsh. And in a way, I am, but I tease because I love. And the reason I love Scandal is because, in episodes like “Julia,” it can take, say, a Senator worried that she killed another Senator, then turn it into a cover-up, then an argument for equal pay that’s so clearly dear to Shonda Rhimes’ heart that Olivia might as well be breaking the fourth wall to deliver it.
A Few Thoughts
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I realized why I hate that goddamn camera-shutter effect so much. No one from OPA is ever seen staking someone out and taking a bunch of pictures, so why have that effect? It’s unrelated to anything that happens on this show. I mean, I’m sure it happens, but we don’t see it. The effect got used so much in “Julia” I almost had a seizure.
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I am in awe of the restraint shown by Joe Morton and Jeff Perry. Eli Pope didn’t go on a single five-minute rant, and Cyrus didn’t raise and lower his voice arbitrarily while speaking with that weird sub-Christopher Walken halting cadence
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Mellie wants to stay in her robe, get drunk, and use the White House bowling alley. I can get behind that
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Compare a show like House of Cards to a show like Scandal, where the White House details are hilariously vague. “We gotta get these votes, time to press some flesh, reach across the aisle” – could that mean any less?
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HARD lol at Portia de Rossi’s hair
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