Scandal Season 6 Episode 14 Review: Head Games

OPA becomes QPA when Olivia makes Quinn head of the gladiators on the latest Scandal.

This Scandal review contains spoilers.

Scandal: Season 6, Episode 14

OPA becomes QPA when Olivia replaces herself with Quinn as head of the gladiators. But the White House and OPA will need to band together quicker than they thought to take down one final evil before Fitz leaves office. Here’s our review of last night’s Scandal.

Quinn was all sorts of powerful and inspiring as Olivia put Quinn to the test on whether or not she could handle taking over OPA. Of course, we didn’t know it was a test and started thinking Olivia was becoming power hungry and greedy all over again.

Once again, Shonda Rhimes presented us with an episode concerning racial issues as it centered around a case about a hate crime. Well, if you use the term “hate crime” loosely. It was apparently labeled a hate crime after Sean, a black man, was accused of lynching a white man, Bobby. “Bigot Bobby,” as most called him, was a white supremacist. However, the facts and circumstances made it clear that Sean was innocent. Especially after Quinn confronted one of “Bigot Bobby’s” white power counterparts who then openly admitted he was the one to kill Bobby so he could be the leader of Bobby’s racist crew. He took the opportunity to blame it on Sean who was unjustly imprisoned for life.

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However, Quinn had one of the best scenes of the night and quite possibly one of the best scenes her character has ever had. She got a meeting with the president and somewhat timidly presented the case to Fitz. When he seemed weary, she stood her ground in a very Olivia-esque manner and got Fitz to pardon Sean.

Later, when Quinn confronted Liv about her indifference and snobbery toward the case, she revealed to Quinn that it was all a test to see if she could handle running OPA. Needless to say, she passed with flying colors.

Fitz is trying to go out with a bang in his final week as president, conducting presidential interviews, including a transparent interview about how he could have done more in his presidency. He only talked so candidly after a conversation with Marcus who confessed the president needed to expose his faults and take more initiative in learning about the people of this country. He even hired Marcus on to head his foundation after he leaves the White House, leading Marcus to turn down Mellie’s job offer as communications director. Marcus is done with the White House and wants to continue on his original mission…to make a difference.

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It is strange to see this presidency coming to an end. It feels as though it is the end of the series when we all know there is still another season of Scandal to go. The most final moment of the night was Rowan walking to his airplane after his “goodbye forever” dinner with Olivia. He almost made it too…

Not so fast, Rowan.

Liv stops him and brings him back to the White House. Even with Gertrude’s (real name of Peus’ sidekick) head given to David Rosen as a gift from Rowan, his task still isn’t fully done. All he wants is to be done with everything. With B-613, with the White House, with Washington D.C. But after Jake found out that Peus and Gertrude were taking orders from someone else, it was only a matter of time before he discovered who was heading the whole operation.

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Mama Pope is back, everyone.

This fact alone felt foreboding in that Papa Pope may not get the happy ending he was seeking when trying to leave the country. His closeness to freedom and solitude was so quickly taken away once Olivia retrieved him after the news about Mama Pope. That only makes it feel like his one chance at the good life…just slipped away before our eyes.

Now, of course Shonda Rhimes wasn’t about to leave us with a nice and tidy, wrapped-up end to Fitz’s reign. His final challenge will be to stop Olivia’s mother in what looks like a possible attempt at not Mellie’s job anymore, but her life.

Next week is the two-hour season finale and if everyone is kept alive…I will be shocked.

Rating:

3 out of 5