As season three winds down, the drama has only begun to heat up! Olivia Pope and associates have finally brought down B6-13, but at the possible cost of many lives. In last week’s episode the country cheered Olivia on as she finally learned how to destroy B6-13, but that wasn’t the last of “command.” Over the course of this season we have seen much tension and strife between all of the characters, but this episode brought all of them together in one room.
Olivia’s tampering with B6-13 may have been her signing President Grants death wish. Although a nobel act, the shutdown occurred right in the middle of a covert plan to capture Maya Pope. However, with Maya in the wind, Olivia, Jake, Cyrus, Rowan, and President Grant must all meet up to discuss a solution to their problem. For much of this season they each seemed to be fighting their own battles, but now they have to join forces to win this war.
This may seem like a common mission, but they are none too happy to be working side by side. Especially Rowan, who now has to work alongside the man who replaced him. Tensions are high, and Olivia is forced to choose between her father and her lover. Meanwhile Jake calls in his B6-13 backup, which brings Quinn back into OPA headquarters.
While everything is falling apart, Mellie is holding down the White House, or rather she would be if she weren’t walking around in a drunken stupor all day. She is finding it hard to continue to hold the secret of her sexual assault by President Grant’s father a secret, and is dealing with it by trying to bring down the president. Her method of choice is attempting to leak a story about the paternity of their son. However, thanks to Olivia Pope, she realizes the error of her ways and has Olivia “fix it.”
While everyone is focusing on their own personal failings, Maya Pope has the perfect opportunity to plant a bomb intended to kill the president, which would not be possible if the president had listened to Olivia’s instructions to stay in the White House. Obviously he can’t do this while in the midst of a grueling fight to win a second term of presidency, this time on his own.
Since Huck captured Dominick, Maya’s lover and accomplice, Rowan uses him as a last ditch effort to gain the location of the bomb. However, he overlooked one detail; Maya doesn’t love anyone… except maybe Olivia. Olivia heads to Ohio to join him on the campaign trail, hoping that her presence will prevent her mother from killing him. Luckily they get tipped off by Rowan who assumes the bomb is at the rally and everyone is evacuated because of a “sprinkler malfunction.”
Unfortunately the bomb threat was a hoax and Olivia arrives back to her office to find her father badly wounded by her mother. Although that is not it for the bomb, which has actually been planted at the funeral of a senator that recently died, or rather was murdered by Maya. Jake Ballard reveals this just in time for Cyrus to call a stop to the whole thing and save the world essentially. But as we have seen before, Cyrus can’t always be trusted to do the right thing. In fact, he ensures that Sally arrives at the funeral, and delays President Grant with a well-timed lie. What Cyrus does not realize is that Andrew, President Grant’s vice presidential nominee, has also arrived at the funeral. The fate of many lives rests in the hands of Cyrus Beene and there is only one hour left to save them.