Never Snort Acting
We begin with Huck doing what I like least: being Huck. Back when he was kind of a mysterious, emotionless drone, it was more fun, and sympathetic. Now he's all stoked to torture Quinn and doing the absurd nose-panting googly-eyed "No TV no beer make Homer go something-something. Crazy? DON'T MIND IF I DO!" shtick that is overdone and poorly played and SO TIRESOME and also taking things way too far. I don't really buy it, and worse, it makes Olivia look stupid for the fact that her people are losing their shit and she has no idea. Yeah, I know, she's busy, but whatever.
Cringe, Rant, Vent. So.
To borrow a gag from Blackadder: Somewhere between her arrival and when Huck stripped her naked and bound and gagged her to find out who she's working for, Quinn must have been kicking herself for not thinking to say, "Let me tell you who I'm working for." So instead, Huck waxes rhapsodic about how he's going to enjoy this and he's really sorry and he hates that he has to do this but he IS going to like it and she's fresh meat AND THEN LICKS HER FACE (I had a really clear shot of it and it was so icky I decided to withhold it) and threatens her with some dental instruments. I openly laughed at how awful and dumb and incongruous the face-licking was. What the hell are they doing over there? We can't possibly take Huck seriously ever again, can we?
Tense; Torn; Craving.
It's Torturus Interruptus, though, because Liv calls and tells Huck that her dead mother is alive and well and going all Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer on the devices in Liv's house. So Huck quickly yanks a tooth out of Quinn's mouth and then tapes her up and leaves.
Entrancing Voters
Sally's political adviser tells her that she's going to have to compromise her principles if she wants to win -- namely, she has to come out and declare that she's pro-choice. Sally practically vomits into her mouth trying to rehearse this bit of rhetoric, but finally chokes it out and then signs the papers to resign the vice-presidency. Sally 1, Her Gag Reflex 0.
Intro Craven Gents
James goads Cyrus with double ententres about Daniel Douglas and what a fascinating interview he was, and how he really "went deep," etc., while Cyrus marinates in a fetid stew of his own psychosexual scheming.
Rec: Invent Rat Song.
Liv flashes back multiple times to the day she last saw her mother, so we get to revisit awesome Young Olivia Pope, who is reading "Bridge to Terabithia" and jamming to "Ben" by Michael Jackson. Inasmuch as anyone jams to a song about a rat.
Racer Venting Snot
Harrison does this a lot, per usual, and not much else. Also per usual.
Start Reconvening
Liv spends most of the hour in some form of head-gripping shock, as if she's walking through a fog. Her whole team finds this alarming, if understandable, and the hour is spent trying to get her mother to a safe house -- which B-Vigilant quickly figures out because she has a chip in her, so they slice that sucker out and hightail it to a motel until they can get her out of the country. This involves calling a lot of people and asking for favors that aren't granted, and very staid pantsuits.
Arc Grist? Nonevent.
"Hi, Harrison, here are those false papers you asked me to procure. Oh, and also, your backstory called and said hello and he'll see you soon, so hang in there, because at least soon you can make your Stress Face at your OWN problems."
Cares? Venting? Torn.
Liv's mother, meanwhile, recovers nicely from having a bug hacked out of her, because orange juice fixes everything. She also takes her first meaningful conversation with Olivia and manages to use it to criticize her, with some pointed HMMs and whatnot, as she notes that SHE always hoped Olivia would be married with kids and a life full of laughter but WHATEVER, guess not. She then artfully blames this on Liv's father's poor guidance. I was really hoping Olivia would respond with, "Well, at least I'm having an affair with the president and maybe also that hot guy standing over there with the rifle, both of whom are sculpted and cardiovascularly demanding pieces of tail."
Er, Vets Narcing? Not!
We also get yet another scene where Jake shows up to talk to Fitz, as a thin excuse for their jealousies to froth. Here, Jake demands the president's help with Olivia's various parents, and Fitz says he can't help right now, and Jake utters the words "Operation Remington" and indicates that he resents that he was sucked into B-MoreCareful because Fitz went and shot down Oceanic 816. So they still don't like each other, and although it's mostly still because of Olivia, it's also because in some way Jake blames Fitz for the fact that he ended up in a torture hole.
Sin Art Convergent
Sally thanks Daniel Douglas for his patience and his virtue, because the Lord is soon to reward their faith with a presidency. Daniel Douglas is thinking, "Sausages are a pretty virtuous meat, right? Can I still get credit on that technicality?"
Groin Recants. Vent!
Daniel Douglas then corners James and tells him not to put any of that stuff in his article, because he's not GAY, he's just SICK WITH A DISGUSTING DISEASE, which is a wonderful way to speak to the man with whom you just had hot sex. James does him the favor of listening politely and assuming (correctly) that this is a very troubled man at odds with himself.
Vent Tangier Scorn
James, meanwhile, tortures Cyrus until he breaks, and does so in a kicky velvet jacket (among other things). Cyrus storms home and demands to know what happened, and James tells him and demands a divorce and full custody. Cy tells him that he will go NOWHERE because there are photographs. James can't believe this, because James manages to be naive even though he's married to Cyrus, who is a professional Illusion Puncturer.
Scant Vino! Err, Gent.
"I'm repeating another coat. I must not be right in the head. Man, if only there were something nearby that could give me some drinks."
Ever-Constant Grin
Abby asks David Rosen for help that he ultimately can't give her, but it's worth it for this shot of her looking beautiful.
Inner Tact Governs
Sally hands Fitz her resignation paperwork, which -- if I remember correctly -- catches him by surprise, because Cyrus and Mellie hadn't told him that Sally was plotting. I THINK. Maybe not. Regardless, he essentially declares war and she is not intimidated, because he is the world's worst president and everyone knows it.
Grants' Inert Coven
Mellie and Fitz then go all Disappointed Parents on Cyrus for not fixing this. Fitz gives him a particularly nasty dressing-down, and as he storms out of the Oval Office, Cyrus -- who has just had his divorce showdown with James -- breaks down into convulsive sobs.
Regnant Contrives
Mellie's "WTF? IT FEELS!" face is priceless. She goes to give him a moment, but then doubles back to tell him that the pain does eventually go away and you just become numb to it, and you can go on functioning. It's a very sad peek into the harsh reality of her marriage, although Fitz's infidelity wasn't something Mellie tricked him into doing so she could use it as blackmail against the other party. Cyrus is more the architect of his own demise here, although years of staying put makes Mellie just as much the architect of her own misery too, I suppose. Basically they both earned a Masters in Architecture.
Covering Tan Stern
Charlie has been trying to find Quinn, but can't. And then he has this BRAINWAVE that maybe he should try her house. He finds her, minus two teeth now and also cut up from trying to free herself with a broken glass. Quinn is having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. Perhaps she should move to Australia.
Instant Converger
And then they have post-torture bleeding-molar sex.
Constant Revering
Liv takes a moment to sit on the stairs of this motel -- presumably under her invisibility cloak, so that B-Relentless can't see her there in the open air -- and call Fitz. She just wants to hear his voice, and tells him that her father put her mother on the FBI Most Wanted list under a false name, with a bunch of trumped-up charges, so that they can't get her out of the country. She also swears she didn't call for his help. But guess what? He is going to help anyway and doesn't want to hear another word about it. Olivia is written very submissively in this relationship. I can't tell which comes first, Fitz's control or Olivia's surrender.
Reinvent? Congrats!
Thanks to Fitz, Mama Pope gets on a military plane to whisk her to Hong Kong, and thanks to Abby, Olivia runs after her for a proper hug before she never sees her mother again. And then her mother boards the plane, and predictably, Olivia has a flashback to someone calling the house the morning she died and asking for a "Marie Wallace," which happens to be the name under which Mama Pope is on the Most Wanted List. In an instant, she realizes that her mother is a sick terrorist nutjob, but I really felt while watching that she could have turned around and screamed for someone to stop the plane a lot faster than she did. Then again, it had been a long day for her. She'd basically just come back from Vermont Sex with Fitz and found her dead mother lurking in a shrubbery. She's allowed to be slow.
Ants Cornering Vet
However, the news that Liv's dad is not The Big Bad here comes as an unfortunate googly-eyed nostril-flaring shock to Huck, who is tracking Quinn...
Revert Sting? No Can.
... who, it turns out, had finally decided to strike a deal with Huck, and seduced Charlie into thinking she was on their side and THEN tricked her way into Wonderland with him so that she could inject Eli/Rowan/Command with something nefarious. She hasn't DONE it yet, but Huck's calipers are all in a twist over it.
Scorn; Grave Intent
Mellie has told Cyrus to man up and finish what he started, so he gives Sally the photographs and tries to blackmail her into toeing the line. She refuses, although the chunks she is threatening to blow all over these prints rival the pro-choice puke she was choking back.
Gent: Star Conniver
Lost and having failed, Cyrus then crawls onto his office couch and calls James and tells him that he's sorry, he's the worst, and that Sally will never see the photos, and would he please just stay. James has already started packing, but I got the impression he was moved by Cyrus's plea.
Snit; Goner Can't Rev.
And that is a shame, because Cyrus then gets a call from Sally, who says, "I have committed a sin." That being, CLUBBING DANIEL DOUGLAS IN A WHITE HOT BRAIN-FOGGING RAGE. That was GOOD STUFF. So now Cyrus can't hide that he showed her the photos, unless James remains as adorably suggestible and dim as he's been. Daniel Douglas certainly looks at least mostly dead, but he might be really most sincerely dead, if you'll pardon mixing the movie quotes. This episode exemplifies the best and worst of Scandal: The political intrigue and scheming and twists like this are all quite compelling in a soapy way, whereas the spy stuff and the torture and the Worst-Named Shadowy Organization Ever (it makes me miss The Initiative, y'all) and Huck's manic eyeballs all represent the way this show goes careening off the rails into something grim and not fun. Here's hoping we get more beating people over the head with lamps in the future. Wait, that came out wrong.