Geez! This episode of How to Get Away With Murder felt like a game of rapid fire. As a viewer, you had to be completely in it. Blink, and you’d miss several important details. So, for this recap, let’s dig and analyze the many pieces of episode four’s twists and turns.
We begin the episode with Annalise spitting fierce notes into the oldest voice recorder she could buy. Seriously, the thing still requires a cassette tape. She’s preparing for her class action lawsuit, Keating vs. the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and the woman means business. To me, the motivation to take on this case still feels a bit murky, and I’m not alone. Her therapist, Isaac, is attempting to make sense of it, too. In all honesty, it seems like a snooze-fest of a case. Just in the past two episodes, we’ve seen Annalise get an (ex) prostitute off the hook, and free a scary looking tattooed prisoner. I need some specific details of this new case soon — and they better be just as entertaining as the previous ones.
While her personal endeavor develops, Annalise’s centerpiece law project this week turns out to be intriguing. After basically begging Middleton University President Soraya Hargrove for her job back (and getting a flat out, no), she does what she does best: negotiate. Hargrove is going through a nasty divorce, wanting custody of her children, and Annalise offers to help. She only has about $3,000 in the bank, and needs money to get her class action suit on and popping. The deal is that, for a check, she will consult on Hargrove’s case alongside the university president’s original lawyer, Teagan, who happens to be Michaela’s mentor at the law firm she’s now interning at. This brings Michaela face-to-face with Annalise. It also puts the Middleton law student all up in the Middleton President’s personal business. Apprehensive at first, because of the close connections, all four women decide to move forward together.
Between the four powerhouses, there is a lot going on. Tegan is a self-proclaimed “boss bitch,” but she’s totally overshadowed by Annalise during the divorce proceedings (she also hinted that she may want a slice of Annalise’s pie), Michaela is seeking a new mother figure in Teagan, Hargrove is a distressed mess (until the end, when she knows her and the ladies have the settlement in the bag) and Annalise looks tired physically and emotionally, but somehow manages to give unworldly gusto towards the case.
The ladies end up winning, but, in typical How to Get Away with Murder fashion, Annalise initially fumbles. This time, sending a confidential email to the wrong recipient. The usual miracle happens and Annalise finds a substantial piece of evidence at the last hour, making the win that much sweeter.
It was great to see four women of color working together with minimal drama and succeeding. It seemed clear that the writers/casting directors intentionally made a point to compose Hargrove’s ex-husband and his representative as white men, creating a powerful and memorable contrast.
In Laurel’s world, she’s still running around Philly working endlessly to take her father down. Michaela informs her homegirl that she can’t dig into the law firm’s files because the computer tracks the user’s every move. Selfish Laurel insists that she tries anyway (she’s a terrible, terrible friend). Michaela eventually comes up with an alternative plan: Oliver could hack into the system and get the desired info. The amount of user-ation these “friends” pull on each other is astounding, and these are by no means small asks. If caught, firings, severe damage to reputations, jail time and other great consequences could follow. Now possessing such off moral compasses, they have unknowingly turned into true criminals.
It seems that Oliver agrees to the hack plan (pun intended). At the end of the episode, the new piece of the puzzle given to us this week is Oliver in the middle of a bloody crime scene at the law firm Michaela is working at.
Before getting into the aforementioned mess, Oliver did some digging of his own. He met up for coffee with Connor’s dads and learned all about his boo’s biological father’s coming out. It’s the main reason Connor doesn’t really rock with his pops. The outing really hurt the family as a whole. On the other hand, his Connor’s dad, Jeff, says that his son is his hero and was the driving force to help him make the jump to live in his truth. Jeff and Connor know each other well, and that is really the core of their turmoil. Jeff knows Connor is not being his true self, and Connor could be envious that his father is. Jeff points out that for Connor to return to his authenticity, he should begin by dumping Oliver, who he believes is a great person, but not the right match for his originally headstrong, edgy son.
Without having to really use anyone, Laurel has two really big moments in this episode. One victorious and the other freaky. She finds out that her dad has been donating to DA Denver under a pseudonym (win), and rides Frank to suppress her pregnancy-induced horniness (loss). I still believe that the baby she’s carrying may not be Wes’. Discovering that to be true would be a huge turn of events, because she’s mostly motivated to take her father down for the murder simply because the victim is her baby’s father. What if it’s actually Frank’s? Next week, it looks like he’s questioning the baby’s paternity as well.
