Tonight’s show opens with Victoria burning a check and a bloody visitor sign-in sheet and a maid wiping up a lot of blood. Was that an old form from Emily’s mom’s days in the psych ward? Time will tell, one can only help.
Cut to 24 hours earlier: Emily and Aiden are chatting on beach, and she’s not happy that he found her mom, wondering where he went to find her and how he got his hands on the flight recorder. Aiden tries to warn Emily again that it’s not finding her that’s the issue, it’s what she’ll find when she does. They know the white-haired man could have been brainwashing her, but Emily doesn’t want to hear any of it.
Victoria’s cattiness continues as she, Conrad and Charlotte have a Grayson family sit-down. Going back to the initiative isn’t a good idea, Victoria says, but Conrad says it’s all her fault they’re in it again anyway, since she teamed up with the white-haired man. Victoria wants to know what Amanda knows about her dad (you’ll recall that Charlotte interrupted her mom’s interview saying she knew ‘the truth’), but Charlotte says she didn’t tell her anything — it’s all in David Clarke’s journals — and that Victoria will have to ask Amanda herself. On his way out before a business trip, Conrad asks Ashley to keep an eye on Daniel because Daniel was really nice to him before — surely that kind of support doesn’t exist in this family! — so he thinks he’s up to no good. Ashley vows to help him — look at how she’ll turn so quickly on Daniel to get ahead!
Amanda moves out of the Stowaway (Jack dumped her last week) and heads to casa de Emily Thorne to live for awhile. “Why were you getting that witch to embrace me?” she asks Em. Emily fills her in that her mother is still alive, and that Victoria’s the only link to her left. She needs Amanda to put her father’s (faked) journals on her radar, in hopes to get her to crack with some information about her mother. Just then, Victoria invites Amanda over and tells her to bring the journals.
Padma and Nolan are having a business chat in his office when Emily shows up, to the disappointment of Padma. She needs Nolan’s expertise into breaking into the Graysons’ newly-bugged house. Of course, he’s amenable. Padma comes back curious about Nolan’s father’s storage going up for auction, since he’s passed away. But Nolan didn’t know he was dead! Sad. We’ve been seeing a vulnerable side of Nolan lately, and this surely adds to it.
Meanwhile, Declan wants to get the stuff he stole back, but Trey says he won’t help. When the guy they robbed comes back to get his stuff and Jack offers the money that Trey paid Declan, he says that won’t be enough, and he needs about 20 grand. Poor (literally) Jack can’t pay that off til the Stowaway reopens (assuming it does, if they pass their health inspection, but they don’t. More on how this plays out later.).
Amanda heads to Grayson Manor and reads to Victoria from the journals, while Emily feeds her her words via earpiece. Victoria offers to buy the journals off her, but Amanda doesn’t want her money. What she wants is information on Emily’s mother. Victoria lies and says she’s never met her. But we all know this is true because of the visitor’s log that has Victoria’s signature on it (pretending to be Charlotte Clark). Later, Amanda will confront Victoria on this.
It’s a late night at the office for Daniel, and Ashley comes in. They’re both so fake with each other, it’s great, until she tells him to stop the act and tell her what’s up. She tells him she’s worried Conrad’s up to no good. Daniel assures her that he’ll turn on his father if he needs to. He doesn’t realize that she’s spying on him for Conrad.
Aiden returns to the Pine Crest Motel. Emily’s mom is there, and she’s on to him. But he’s on to her quicker, wanting to know everything about Gordon, the white-haired man, because the initiative is after him. She tells him where to find a hard drive with info on it, but wait, she’s on to him even quicker! When his back is turned, she shoots a stun gun at him, ties him up, leaves and says she’s either coming back with Gordon or not at all.
Back to Daniel and Ashley. He tells her about the fake Victoria kidnapping and about how the ransom money was used to help Grayson Global. She’s happy to be privy to everything when just then, Conrad calls. Of course, Ashley doesn’t answer and lies to Daniel about why he would be calling. But it doesn’t look like he believes her…
Emily gives Amanda the psych ward visitors’ record proving that Victoria did know her mother. She advises Amanda to get the money Victoria offered for the journals so she could compare signatures. Amanda (of course) obliges. Back in NYC, Padma swipes Nolan’s father’s storage keys when she spies him reading his obit online. I’m sad for Nolan!
Conrad has a strange meeting with a woman we’ve never seen before — she’s in the initiative — saying that since their agent (the white-haired man, who’s dead, remember?) went rogue, they’ve been making threats, and that needs to stop. The lady says she doesn’t believe Gordon would kidnap Victoria and is looking forward to hearing his side. Sassy.
Cue to the big Grayson party of the episode: a baby shower for Amanda. Hilariously, Amanda invites her stripper friends along, and someone mentions they know a thing or two about shower games. Eesh.
Daniel fakes a call to security saying someone’s parked in his spot illegally — he sets it up so that it’s Ashley’s car, and she’ll have to leave for a moment to move it. With her gone, Daniel snoops through her purse and listens to her voicemail from his dad. He now knows the two of them are working together.
Time to open baby gifts. Emily got Amanda a baby carriage. Victoria got her a baby journal, with a cool $100,000 check inside that no one but Amanda knows about. All of a sudden, Amanda’s “exhausted” and needs to lie down. Victoria follows, and this is where Amanda confronts her. Victoria denies, denies, denies, but later tells Conrad that she’s getting very close to the truth and couldn’t have done so without help. Emily is feeding her words through that earpiece again, but it goes fuzzy and she misses the following conversation: Amanda asks Victoria why David Clarke would lie to his own daughter about her mother being dead, and Victoria says it was out of protection because her mother tried to KILL HER! Upon hearing that, things get super-tense: Victoria and Amanda are in a tug-of-war over the $100,000, and Amanda slips and falls off the second floor. She’s still alive, but she’s rushed to the hospital. She gives Emily the earpiece back and tells Emily to make sure the baby lives. Charlotte hops in the ambulance with her.
Surprisingly, this wasn’t the biggest shocker to me tonight. Was anyone else totally thrown for a loop about the whole Trey working with the guy whom he robbed thing? So apparently Trey’s robbery of the dude’s house was really a setup — the guy knew he was getting robbed. Now they’re trying to get their money back (though it was really never taken in the first place) so they can buy the Stowaway. They had the health inspector tell Jack and Declan that their place was still moldy, but alas, that was a setup too. I swear, this town is so shady.
We circle back to the beginning of the episode as Victoria’s burning the check and visitor’s log and the maid is cleaning up blood. Conrad returns from his trip and is mad at Ashley for not calling him back. Ashley says there was nothing to report in the first place, that Daniel isn’t conspiring against him, and she doesn’t want to be his little spy anymore. This is good news to Daniel, who’s of course surreptitiously listening from the wings.
OH MY GOD YOU GUYS ALSO PADMA AND NOLAN MADE OUT. It was really sweet. They were going through all of Nolan’s dad’s old stuff from his storage unit. Of course, Nolan tripped on his way to kiss her. But that made it even more endearing. Nolan and Padma forever! But then! In the storage unit, Padma discovers a framed $500,000 check from David Clarke. What could that be about?
At the hospital, Amanda and the baby (somehow) survive, but Amanda’s in a coma and the baby’s in the NICU. Declan’s there with Jack, and Declan sees Charlotte and gives her his coat. Aww, do you think they’ll get back together? Their union was Declan’s only true purpose on this show, I thought. But wouldn’t it be crazy if somehow this whole Revenge universe was DECLAN’S master plan? Wouldn’t that be amazing? Everybody’s a suspect on this show!
So anyways, Emily, probably breaking some rules here, wanders through the hospital and stumbles upon Amanda’s room. Who’s at her bedside but HER MOTHER! Emily recognized her and recalled a memory of her mother keeping her underwater when cops came for her dead. So she did try to kill her? Was that what Victoria was referring to, or was there something even more serious she did? Anyways, it doesn’t look like her mom saw her, but judging by next week’s teaser, the two will become reacquainted rather shortly. All this craziness gets Em a bit teary at the end, and she cries into Aiden’s shoulder when he comes by at the end of the episode, about how, yes, her mom does have some skeletons in her closet. How Emily is shouldering all this madness is beyond me. Anyways, lots to think about (as usual) here, so comment below if you think anything’s worth adding!
