How to Get Away with Murder – Do You Think I’m a Bad Man?

By: Dustin Bradley

We open on Michaela (Aja Naomi King), well make that Professor Michaela, seeing as how Annalise (Viola Davis) has given her the reins of this case and class. The case is a black female whose boyfriend died at the hands of a police officer during a robbery gone wrong. The DA’s office is piling up charges one on top of the other and it’s up to Michaela to help her client clear the charges that are incredulous. She asked the class to come up with solutions and, despite her seeming interested in them, it turns out that she’s only looking to solve one major issue in this case and that is restitution. The court is asking her to pay thousands of dollars in restitution. Instead, Michaela wants her to pay zero. 

Her first battle in court is a bust as she can’t get the prosecution to bring the restitution price down to zero. In fact, she pisses the prosecution off so badly that they pile on a felony murder charge.  While brainstorming a way out of it the only credible idea comes from Gabriel (Rome Flynn) who wants to put the client on the stand so that she may convince the jury that this was not something that was planned to go south and that she is incredibly grieving the loss of her significant other. Michaela thinks that it’s an awful idea, but Annalise (Viola Davis) insists and she even goes as far as to suggest that if Gabriel can’t convince the judge and jury then he needs to leave town with his mother Vivian (Marsha Stephanie Blake). Gabriel takes the offer and at the next court hearing he puts her on the stand and tries his hardest to show off their client in a meaningful way until the prosecution badgers the witness and pushes her to yell obscenities at the prosecutor.

Even if this wasn’t a win for Gabriel in court it is still enough to show his mother and Annalise that he is in this to become an actual lawyer and not just for revenge on Annalise as they previously thought. His mother is so impressed that she tries to convince him to go to law school anywhere but Middleton to escape from Annalise’s grasp. But Gabriel’s made a life here and he’s tired of his mother trying to ruin it and pushing him to go after Annalise. So, he finally admits the truth to his mother that he was, in fact, the person responsible for her ex-boyfriend’s overdose even if it was an accident.

On the final day in court Michaela take some advice that was previously given to her by Annalise during a peptalk and now understands that the DA is only piling all of these charges on so that the client will not sue the city for negligence on at the police officer;s fault. She uses this information, plus the emotion of her past experience with the Sam, and offers a passionate plea to the court. Michaela ends up getting no jail time for her client and only probation. The only catch is that the client will not be able to sue the city under any circumstance.

Then there’s Bonnie (Liza Weil) who is trying to get a job at Caplan and Gold so that she can keep an eye on Tegan (Amirah Vann) for Nate (Billy Brown). Tegan sees through this rouse, but after she steps up to try and help Connor out of a jam, Tegan caves and hires her on a trial basis.

Let’s move to Connor (Jack Falahee) who had a pretty big storyline this week continuing the saga of his immigrant client from the previous episode. He ends up technically kidnapping the kid and taking him across state lines to meet with the mother who he’s helping apply for asylum. Unfortunately, ICE intervenes fairly quickly and detain them. Connor calls Oliver (Conrad Ricamora) and Bonnie for help, but little does he know that Oliver ends up calling Tegan. After Tegan and Bonnie arrive, Bon-Bon tries to convince the ICE facility head that she still works for the DA. Things go awry when he asks for her DA badge. That’s when Tegan has to step up and call her contact at homeland security, who happens to be her wife, and get their clients released. 

Now, let’s talk about Frank (Charlie Weber) who is still searching for Laurel. He finds a lead when a street cam picks up a photo of her leaving the bank and entering a cab. He tracks down the cab driver and gets him to tell him the location of the safe house that she has been staying in. However, when he arrives there is only an empty baby crib and a not too happy Xavier Castillo (Esai Morales). Let’s see where this takes us.

Back to Vivian! After having a discussion with both Annalise and Gabriel separately, she decides that it’s time to reveal to Gabriel that Annalise is not a good person by giving him her mystery box that she brought with her in the first episode. It turns out that this box has nothing to do with Sam‘s death/disappearance. Instead it is his old therapy sessions between one Annalise Harkness and Dr. Sam Keating. She also goes to the FBI with that knowledge that Annalise gave her about the framing of Gabriel and tells them that she’s done doing their dirty work after they framed an innocent boy for terrorism. They threaten to unseal her arrest records and she lashes out saying she will bring them down with the very lawyer that they are investigating.

We close the episode with three very important things happening. One is Gabriel inviting Michaela over to listen to one of the therapy sessions where Annalise reveals that Michaela‘s father might not have been who she thinks he was. It seems he may have been the lawyer and not the victim. We also get the FBI inviting Nate in to discuss an opportunity where they revealed to him the missing piece to uncover – the real person behind his father‘s death – in exchange for pertinent information about Annalise.

The final part of the episode is the flash forward which, again, has the FBI questioning somebody about the murder that will take place. Except this time instead of Michaela it is Connor, who after seeing photos of the victim, starts to maniacally laugh. This turns into a panic attack, which becomes him keeling over on the floor in the FBI screaming for a medic.