Scandal ‘More Cattle, Less Bull’ Recap – Episode 03.05
LJAY
The Breakdown
Eli and Olivia continue their Sunday dinners and Olivia makes it clear that she hates the dinners. She goes as far as to stay she tries to forget they even happen. Huck and Jake are working on their plain to kill Eli. Jake is in Eli’s house as he comes home. Jake is trying to get information off of Eli’s computer. Eli goes into a room and barley misses seeing Jake hiding in a corner.
Cyrus and Mellie are looking for someone to run the re-election campaign. They court a man named Leo who flat-out denies their request because he thinks Fitz is a loser. Elsewhere Congresswoman Josephine Marcus has hired Olivia Pope. Marcus is trying to cover up the baby she had at 15. Olivia has her team go to Montana to do some digging. In Montana, Huck is looking at the files Jake got from Eli’s PC. Huck sees the meeting that Eli and Fitz had. Eli is tracking the person that accessed the server where the Remington file was located. Jake is walking down the street talking to Huck on the phone and a black SUV pulls up and a man tells him to “get in the truck”.
Jake has been summoned to the White House by Fitz. He is taken to the basketball court and the White House version of white men can’t jump breaks out. After Jake gives Fitz a hard foul and falls to the ground. Fitz tells Jake that he was only supposed to “watch her” (Olivia). Cyrus gives Olivia a call about getting dirt on Josephine Marcus Olivia declines. Olivia then calls the team and tells them that the white house has people in Montana.
Harrison and Abby find all of the people who know about Congresswoman Marcus’ baby and give them 10k in hush money. They approach the baby daddy and he declines. A TV crew and Cyrus’ errand boy pull up to the baby daddies house. While Abby stalls them, Harrison has Huck pull up dirt on the baby daddy. Once that is done he doesn’t mention anything about the baby to the TV crew. Back at the White House Fitz calls Eli and tells him to back off Jake because Fitz knows Jake is digging into the Remington case. Eli states that he doesn’t take orders from Fitz’ office.
Huck tells Jake to go to his office to run a program that can get them information in the Remington case. They are trying to figure out why Fitz was listed on a mission he didn’t participate in. As Jake is leaving, Olivia comes into the office. Olivia left her “Fitz phone” at the office and goes to get it. After day dreaming about being at the White House correspondents dinner, she throws the “Fitz phone” in the trash. Olivia’s team finally finds the nurse that delivered Josephine Marcus’ baby. Olivia confronts Josephine about the baby. It turns out Congresswoman Marcus never gave the baby away, she was passed as her sister. Josephine Marcus doesn’t want that truth coming out. Marcus says it’s not worth it if that’s what has to happen for her to become president.
Fitz wants to dismantle B6-13 and Cyrus tells him it can’t be done. Cyrus tells him it’s been tried but Fitz should leave it alone unless he wants to end up like Kennedy. At a debate the issue of Congresswoman Marcus’ and a secret comes up. Marcus’ admits that she gave a baby up for adoption. Afterward her sister Candice puts two and two together and walks off. Cyrus watches the debate with Mellie and Fitz, sure of Marcus’ impending doom. Cyrus is joyful but after Marcus comes clean he feels that Congresswoman Marcus’ just won America’s heart. Olivia tells Marcus that what she said was beautiful and Marcus fires Olivia.
Fitz calls Olivia and they go over the jokes he is thinking about using at the correspondents dinner, Mellie listens in from afar. Abby fucks things up with Davis Rosen again. Abby lies to him by saying she is still in Montana when she is sitting in her office. Jake and Huck are stilling trying to find out where Fitz could have been during Remington. Olivia calls Jake and asks him to take her to the correspondents dinner, he finally agrees. Huck tells Jake that Olivia needs that (to go to the correspondents dinner). At the correspondents dinner Sally Langston corners Leo in the men’s bathroom and asks him “hypothetically” her chances if she ran for president as an independent. Sitting at the a table one of the secret service agents nod to Olivia, Jake tells her to go. The secret service agent leads her to a room where Mellie is waiting for Olivia. Mellie tells her thank you for coming.
Mellie asks Olivia to run Fitz re-election campaign. Mellie tells Olivia that Fitz is not the same person without her and both Fitz and her need Olivia by their side to run the campaign. Mellie also tells Olivia that they need to give Fitz this chance. (Considering they rigged the last election) Leaving the dinner Jake tells Olivia he is going to catch a cab. He knows that she only wanted to go to the dinner in order to see Fitz and he says he doesn’t play 2nd fiddle to anyone even the president. Abby is in Rosen’s’ apartment when he gets home. He forgives her because her ex-husband was at the dinner which is the reason why she didn’t want to go. Harrison calls Olivia and she wonders why is he still in the office. At the office Josephine Marcus is there and wants to rehire Olivia to run her campaign. Olivia doesn’t accept but Marcus’ tells her to sleep on it an if she feels the same way in the morning then to tell her.
Quinn has a package delivered to her, it is the gun she purchased in Montana. When Jake gets home he finds Huck is back at his house. Huck thinks he has figured out where Fitz was during Remington. It turns out that a plane went down off the coast of Iceland. This plane carried 300+ passengers and was shot down by Fitz on orders from the government. One of the people listed aboard the plane was a woman named Maya Lewis. Maya Lewis was Olivia’s mother. Huck and Jake knock on Olivia’s door.
The Analysis
Wow, I guess it all starts now. There have been only a few shows in history where my mouth was literally hanging open. This was one of those episodes. This is a bombshell that usually closes out a season and here we have it 5 episodes in to the 3rd season. From here questions will arise such as. Did Fitz know why he was shooting down this plane and who was on it? Or was he just a solider taking orders? We pretty much can assume Eli was the person pulling the strings on this mission but why did he put a hit out on his own wife? And lastly what in the hell is Quinn doing with this gun and does she have someone in mind to use it on or is this a “just in case” type thing. We know that Huck and Jake are going to tell Olivia what they found out about the Remington mission. Will this change her mind about running Fitz’ reelection campaign? If it does we know that Olivia will more than likely run the campaign for Marcus because when Olivia gets scorched she goes for blood.