Tweet OMG! Tweet. Hear that? It’s the sound of a zillion Twitter accounts buzzing. That’s right, ABC’s extremely bingeable How to Get Away with Murder returned on Thursday night, and the episode plunged us into the investigation revolving around Lila’s disappearance. Sam’s gone, Wes is feeling guilty, and Viola Davis is looking as flawless as ever.
Will They? Won’t They? Do We Want Them To?
The relationship between Annalise and Wes gets a bit more complicated in the mid-season premiere (that’s right, it can get weirder). She instructs Wes to destroy any DNA evidence in Sam’s murder just moments after we see Annalise discover her husband’s bludgeoned body—a moment that Davis handles with an expert mixture of terror, sadness, and shock. How will the creators and writers of HTGAWM further the relationship between Wes and Annalise? Will they stay messed up mentor and student, or will they go a different route and pursue a physical relationship?
Asher is proud of himself (as always), and he pursues Bonnie after their fling. She stops it right away saying, “I was drunk and desperate.” Harsh. Things remain complicated between Laurel and her lumberjack-turned-non-lawyer Frank. What else is new?
Alliances Drawn
Now that Sam has disappeared, the police start questioning everyone who was always at the Keating household. Davis opens the episode with a tearful confession (and an incredible new ‘do!) of her husband cheating on her with Lila, and the rest of her Scooby team begins getting paranoid. Connor openly announces that he thinks they’re screwed (“Hello, Raskolnikov!” he declares to his fellow classmates), and he convinces Michaela to turn themselves in thinking they court will go easy on them. They later convince Laurel to join them (If there’s one thing I know how to be, it’s smart” Michaela proudly declares, laughably saying that she could start her life over as a crime fiction author or a housewife), but as they are literally walking up the police station, Annalise stops them. When Viola Davis pleads that you should trust her, you believe her…or do you…
The Most Awkward Court Case Ever?
Annalise has always been all business, and it’s quite awkward when she defends Rebecca in the courtroom. She stands firm that Sam murdered Lila after she learned she was pregnant, and they prove that he is the baby daddy. The moment when Annalise reads the paternity test is a triumphant moment for Annalise, but, as Frank tells her, “no one’s this excited when their husband knocks up a dead girl.” The main struggle is to place Sam at the murder scene, and they manage to snatch Sam’s laptop from the DA, show him arguing with Lila at an abortion clinic AND put him in Philadelphia at the time of Lila’s murder. All in a week’s work for Annalise’s team—no biggie. Rebecca has the charges against her dropped.
The Drama Continues?
I have three words for you: Marcia Gay Harden. She only appears at the very end of the episode, and introduces herself as Sam’s sister to the detectives working on the case. It seems that the students are settling into normal lives or going their separate ways (Michaela has her wedding dress fitting and Laurel goes back to the legal aid guy whose name no one remembers, etc.), but it appears that Sam’s sister is going to stop at nothing to prove that Annalise is a liar. Better sharpen those claws, everyone. Viola Davis squaring off against Marcia Gay Harden? That’s must-see TV.
The drama seems to have settled into a more lived-in tone. While this is only the first episode back (and there’s only 3 more, WTF?!), does anyone else feel that it has settled into a more mature state of drama? The messiness of the Sam’s death feels a bit high school, high-risk but now that the dust is starting to settle, maybe the jaded students are going to act more like adults? Then again, the adults are just as screwed up. Surely, everything will go back to Tweet OMG Tweet next week.
After all, this is How to Get Away with Murder.
