How To Get Away With Murder – I Got Played

By: Dustin Bradley

ABC’s How to Get Away with Murder airs its mid season finale tonight and boy, oh boy, did last week’s episode set up some really nice payoffs for this finale. “I Got Played” was a penultimate episode for the books. Let’s discuss and recap down below.

We open the episode a few weeks after the tragic death of Nate Sr. (Glynn Turman). The guards and media are trying to say that Nate Sr. was violent with them in his last moments, but we all know what really happened and so does Annalise (Viola Davis). Governor Birkhead (Laura Isnnes) had him killed and had all of it covered up as a means for political gain and to get Annalise out of the game. The governor denies this, of course, but we all know it’s most likely true.

Nate (Billy Brown) is certainly devastated because he had just gotten his father back and it is upon his request that D.A. Miller (John Hensley) opens up an inquest into the incident. And Miller agrees despite Bonnie (Liza Weil) insisting that he doesn’t because it could tank his career. Annalise thinks it’s a great idea because if they team up then maybe they can win. And team up they do. Who would have thought that Miller would actually be a respectable guy? Let’s hope that if he’s not tonight’s victim then he is still someone who remains good.

Oliver (Conrad Ricamora) is put to the task of finding dirt on the guards based on an idea from Michaela (Aja Naomi King) and Gabriel (Rome Flynn). He finds that the husband of the female guard had been admitted to the hospital badly beaten and from the looks of it, it’s being called a domestic dispute. The guard swears that it wasn’t her, but at this point we know for certain that there is no way the Governor did not put out the order to kill Nate Sr. She doesn’t even really try to seem innocent.

Speaking of Michaela and Gabriel, the two of them seem to be cozying up quite a lot lately with Gabriel trying to scam his way into the “Coliver” wedding, which is suspicious and makes me wonder if he has ulterior motives. I guess we shall find out tonight? Eventually, he convinces Michaela to take him as her date.

Back in court Annalise takes the stand at her insistence and with some help from Bonnie they convince Miller to give it a shot. But she jeopardizes the whole trial when she goes on an impassioned speech not only about police brutality against people of color but particularly cases where the law enforcement agencies try to cover it up. While the speech was highly emotionally and impactful to the courtroom, it did nothing for the jury because they find that there was no wrongdoing in the situation by the guards. Now, while I’d like to believe that this verdict was the free will of the jury, I can’t help but wonder if the governor got to them.

Over in Coliver land, the boys seek out the church they will have the ceremony in and the female priest who will marry them. Connor (Jack Falahee) has doubts but this would make Oliver and his mother very happy so he will do whatever it takes for the love of his life. Oliver is not only inspired by the church conversation but also feeling bad for the gang and the court’s decision so he decides to take the group to a gay bar. On the way home, Oliver and Connor get called called a horrible  name by a passerby who doesn’t like their PDA. Connor decides to fight back, which causes his face to look they way it does in the present day at the wedding. I’m gonna say this side note, I don’t think I personally have ever heard the word “faggot” on network television and especially not ABC until this episode. And while it was very disheartening that the bigotry still exists I have to give kudos to ABC for not sugarcoating a situation that is all too real to many LGBT+ folks.

Elsewhere in the episode, Laurel (Karla Souza) is still reeling from the information Frank (Charlie Weber) told her about Gabriel and she wants Frank to tell Annalise as soon as he can because she deserves to know but Frank can’t do that. He can’t tell her because, shocker, she’s been drinking again. Not only has she been drinking to cope with Nate Sr.’s death, but also because Governor Birkhead threatened to leak some adoption papers that Annalise is involved in. And something tells me that this may have to do with Gabriel. I am choosing at this point to believe the popular theory that he is Sam’s love child with a mistress and either Annalise doesn’t know at all or she actually helped facilitate his adoption.

Also, Annalise gets her job back at Caplan and Gold with some help from Tegan (Amirah Vann) who assists her in digging up some information on Emmett’s (Timothy Hutton) misconduct in London. And despite the obvious Annalise way of blackmail, she takes the Olivia Pope route and begs Emmett to give her her job back and she will help him fix all of his problems. She will find a way to assist him if he just helps her.

And now for the final moments. We flash to the “night of the bloody snow” and we are back with Bonnie as she walks away from the body, which is clearly a man. She tells a mystery person to take the body and his car and drive as far away as possible as they will deal with it all later. From the way she talked to mystery accomplice, it would have to be someone new to all this ,which makes me think that Oliver may have finally gotten his hands dirty. Now, as for the victim, right now my guesses are Gabriel, Nate, Emmett or Ronald (even though we saw him a few episodes back I still think it maybe a possibility). I am truly hoping that the victim isn’t Oliver because if it is I think I will truly riot because we already lost Wes and I couldn’t do with losing someone as beloved as Oliver. Plus ,it’s his wedding so Pete Nowalk (series creator) don’t do this!

Let’s find out tonight on the midseason finale of How to Get Away with Murder at 10/9c oN ABC!