What the Hell Happened on Scandal Last Season? A Guide for the Obsessed

Shonda Season is Back and Scandal, the Crown Jewel (at least ratings-wise) of the kingdom is returning tonight.

Because Scandal is a show that can be incredibly confusing and crammed with a truly remarkable number of story lines, I’m here to help you study up before the premiere (9 PM Eastern, on ABC).

Remember the “Where On Earth Is Olivia Pope”campaign? Yeah, well, turns out she and Jake are off the coast of Zanzibar chilling on an island drinking red wine on the beach like heathens.

Quinn tracks them down—because she’s the only person doing her job anymore—to inform Olivia that Harrison was killed ~~because~~ Shonda Rhimes don’t tolerate no bullshit.

Olivia and Jake stop having sex long enough to head back to Washington DC where they learn that Olivia Pope and Associates has basically disintegrated. Huck is working in an electronics store; Harrison, as we’ve covered, is dead; and Abby is the new White House Press Secretary. So clearly Abby came out on top here, except that nobody at the White House can remember her name LOLZ—is she “Red,” “Gabby,” who knows and cares?! Not the President or Cyrus, that’s for sure.

Also, Abby doesn’t really like Olivia anymore. She, like everyone else, is pissed that she just up and left with her assassin boy toy.

Remember how Olivia’s dad had the President’s son murdered and then blamed it on Olivia’s mom? Well, Mellie is still bummed and is understandably grieving the loss of her child. She now spends her days in Uggs and sweatpants visiting her son’s grave, day drinking and eating fried chicken and potato chips. Fitz still drinks and broods a lot, but my god his hair is looking as great as ever.

They bury Harrison.

Fitzgerald Grant reveals himself to be the most liberal Republican President in the history of the world. He has appointed a Democratic attorney general (David Rosen who, by the way, effectively drove Abby away, so they’re no longer together) and is pushing legislation for equal pay and gun control.

Portia de Rossi is around as the Andrew the Vice President’s chief of staff and to remind Cyrus that, HELLO WE’RE REPUBLICANS, STOP LETTING FITZ DO THIS HIPPIE SHIT.

Jake is living in DC as Olivia’s unemployed booty call and has taken it upon himself to dig into shit that nobody asked him to look into. He’s investigating Harrison’s murder, the death of the President’s son and is pushing David Rosen to revisit investigating B613.

Huck and Quinn wear matching plaid.

Portia de Rossi instructs a sexy prostitute to seduce Cyrus and he takes the bait.

It only takes 30 minutes into the second episode before Olivia and Fitz are alone in a room together. Their sad love music plays. (God, I love their sad love music.)

Olivia and Jake are still DOIN’ IT and only DOIN’ IT because Jake and the whole world knows that Olivia is still in love with Fitz. Jake is not her boyfriend.

Hey, remember how Fitz only became the President because his wife, mistress, best friend, an aging federal judge and Foghorn Leghorn the lobbyist rigged the election for him? And how he only won a second time because his son had just died? Yeah.

Haaaay Papa Pope.

Jake utters the words: “Call me later if you want me to do that thing to you,” knows how to make a girl swoon.

The President’s daughter made a dirty sex tape while under the influence of drugs and alcohol.

Abby is like sooo jealous of Olivia because she keeps swooping into the White House fixing problems, like the fact that the President’s daughter made a sex tape under the influence of drugs and alcohol.

Papa Pope is trying to take out Jake and vice versa. Tom, the Secret Service agent and murderer of the president’s son, looks super scared as Papa Pope warns him not to open his mouth about anything.

Mellie and Olivia finally run into each other and Mellia grabs Olivia’s $3,000 jacket like AN INSANE PERSON and Olivia lets her know.

Fitz gets mad at Olivia for leaving him, whining: “I almost died without you.” Olivia counters with: I went to that island with Jake. I’ve been banging Jake and now I only want to bang Jake. Turns out, that steadfastness lasts for the immediate moment only because then they’re back to this.

The White House has figured out that Agent Tom was in Maryland gathering the bacteria that murdered Fitz’s son. Fitz calls in his new BFF Papa Pope to question Tom and he subsequently blames it all on Jake because Papa Pope told him to blame it all on Jake. Jake is also arrested and Olivia is left eating cold Gettysburger (which by the way, is not a real restaurant) all by herself.

Olivia doesn’t know that Jake has been arrested so she’s all mopey and sad about why he isn’t calling her back. Meanwhile, Jake is being interrogated as Papa Pope acts like he has hasn’t set this whole thing up.

Huck is stalking his family now that they don’t want to hang out anymore after he told them he was a secret spy. They think he’s insane. He watches them from his car and it is creepy.

Fitz is now completely convinced that Jake killed his son. Olivia takes this news poorly.

Fitz punches Jake a lot in order to beat a confession out of him. Jake does not confess to ordering Tom to kill the President’s son because Jake did not order Tom to kill the President’s son—Papa Pope did.

Papa Pope and Fitz are buddies now who drink scotch and work together to bring down Jake. (Remember when Fitz taunted Papa Pope by telling him that he knew what Olivia tasted like? That was gross.)

Fitz eventually agrees to hand Jake over to Papa Pope so that he can secretly torture and murder him. When Olivia learns this, she flips out and tells Fitz that if there is any hope of them ever getting back together, he need to get Jake back. Fitz, the weakest President ever, caves, telling Jake: “Consider it my gift to the woman we love.”

Papa Pope is mad and he lets Olivia know it.

Huck starts playing online video games with his son Javi. Javi does not realize he is playing said video games with his murderous secret spy dad.

Fitz and Olivia start their horny late night phone calls again.

Meanwhile, back in the real world, a senate seat in Virginia has just opened up after the current senator was caught on video shitting his pants during a tryst with his mistress. The guy Fitz endorses to replace the shitting senator turns out to be Abby’s ex-husband, Charles, who used to viscously beat her. Leo Bergen returns as Charles’ campaign manager.

Naturally, Abby doesn’t take this news well. The only upside to this is that she and Olivia are friends again. Olivia promises to ruin Charles’ senate race. In order to do that, she must help his competition, Susan Ross.

There is a car bombing at the US Embassy in West Angola! This sets the stage for a very long plot point about this fake country.

Cyrus is starting to figure out that his male escort boyfriend might be leaking secret White House information.

Portia de Rossi is getting in Mellie’s ear and luring her with promises of being more than a First Lady and having influence on foreign policies.

MY GOD THEY TALK SO FAST.

Tom is kinda bae tho.

Olivia visits Tom in Supermax Prison. (Note: This led to me falling down a very long Wikipedia hole about supermax prisons which ended with me reading lengthy articles about Sammy the Bull, Terry Nichols, John Gotti and the Unabomber.)

FITZ AND OLIVIA HAVE DIRTY PHONE SEX. OH MY GAWD A COUPLA HUMPIN’ BUNNIES, THESE TWO.

Abby tells Leo that Charles is a woman-beating piece of shit.

Tom is almost stabbed to death by a prison guard. He thinks Papa Pope is sending him a message.

Leo leaks the news that Charles was the one who set up the shitting senator fiasco and Charles is forced to withdraw from the race—meaning Susan Ross is the new senator of Virginia—BECAUSE HE WUVS ABBWEY. They kiss. They are in a relationship now and for the rest of the season.

Mellie is back on her game and still isn’t in the mood for Fitz’s shit.

Whoops, turns out Olivia had Tom stabbed in prison and made him think it came from Papa Pope to scare him into confessing. It worked like a charm and Tom confesses that it was actually Papa Pope who gave him the orders to kill Fitz’s son.

Jake, Olivia and Fitz end up in the super secret bunker strategizing how to take Papa Pope down and shit gets awkward.

Andrew the Vice President’s car is blown up (but not while he was in it). The attack is thought to be from the West Angolan Liberation Movement.

Remember when Andrew the Vice President and Mellie used to hook up? They start doing that again.

Cyrus is bugging Portia de Rossi’s phone because he figured out that she sent his hooker boyfriend to set him up. He learns that she’s dug up quite a bit of dirt on him.

Remember how Cyrus has a daughter who is never around?

Jake’s face looks like this, fyi.

Oopsies, Andrew the Vice President is also sleeping with Ellen’s wife.

Huck has secretly been hanging out with his son. His son accidentally sees him murder a man. They stop hanging out.

The Three Slutty Musketeers hatch a plan to take out Papa Pope. Olivia is to lure him to dinner and they are going to snipe him down.

Papa Pope figures out their plan because he has the deepest well of knowledge on the planet. The plan unravels. Papa Pope ain’t happy with Olivia. He chucks her the deuces and tells her she’s on her own now.

Jake had handed over a bunch of B613 files to David Rosen so he could prosecute Papa Pope after they captured him. Turns out all the files are blank.

OH SHEEEEIIIT. Mama Pope is back. As they search high and low for Papa Pope, they stumble across Mama Pope in that hole that he kept her in which has previously been occupied by Huck and Jake.

Mama Pope walks in all cocky thinking that she can run shit and that Olivia is on her side. Big mistake. Olivia don’t give a fuck. She tells them to charge her with murder and terrorism and lock her ass up.

This West Angola shit is getting out of hand and now the White House has to decide how they’re going to move forward.

However, there are more immediate fish to fry when Portia de Rossi leaks the photos of Cyrus and his male escort boyfriend.

Somebody tries to kill Jake. Jake figures out that Papa Pope is cleaning house and having everyone who used to work for B613 killed.

Quinn goes to warn Charlie that Papa Pope is after him and they end up doing this.

Cyrus gives Fitz his resignation letter.

Quinn learns that Charlie was ordered to kill her. They fight. He doesn’t kill her.

To make up for the almost killing her thing, Charlie gives her some B613 files that he stored away. Huck gives these to his wife to prove that he’s crazy for a reason.

Papa Pope sneaks into Olivia’s apartment and pulls a gun on her and vents about her scheming with her crew of white boos to have him killed. Olivia gets the gun away from him and threatens to shoot. THEN THIS BITCH PULLS THE TRIGGER ON HER OWN DADDY. (This is easily one of the dopest scenes Shonda has ever written.)

BUT HOT DAMN THE GUN ISN’T LOADED.

Papa Pope does not like this. He says he’s leaving forever.

Olivia talks Cyrus down from the ledge and agrees to announce his engagement to Michael the prostitute and spin the whole scandal as a love story in order to save his job.

OK SO, there’s this whole subplot around Andrew the Vice President, Portia de Rossi and some goons they hired. It’s not that important. The result of it all is that they were the ones who faked Andrew the Vice President’s West Angola car bombing in order to force Fitz to go to war with West Angola. They are working with a company that would stand to make an enormous profit from a war with the region.

The point of it all is that Andrew the Vice President wants Fitz to declare war on West Angola but Fitz says no.

So, dum dum dum….

ANDREW THE VICE PRESIDENT HAS OLIVIA POPE KIDNAPPED.

One minute Olivia is dancing to Stevie Wonder, enjoying some vino and about to have sex with Jake on the piano and the next…

Homegirl is gone.

HALFTIME FOLKS.

GET YOUR FLUIDS UP. STILL HALF A SEASON TO GO.

So, Olivia is gone. A group of masked men kidnap her and take her literally just across the hallway. Jake, rather logically, thinks that they left the building so he goes running outside in his panties chasing after a car that does not have Olivia in it.

The kidnappers shoot Olivia’s old neighbor, Lois. 🙁

Olivia wakes up who knows how much later in a cell that she thinks is somewhere around the world like Morocco. Olivia does not love prison life, but she forms a sort of bond with her cellmate who claims to be a kidnapped journalist. She comforts him by boldly proclaiming that if she’s missing, the President of the United States will go looking for her and she ain’t wrong.

After an escape attempt, Olivia taunts her prison guards by saying that she knows they can’t kill her. She is right, so they kill her cellmate instead. Whoops.

In a second more successful escape attempt, Olivia beats down one of the guards with a sink pipe, steals his gun and shoots and kills the other one. It seems like she has finally escaped through the big red door but, surprise: The noise and scenery were all fake. She’s in some airport hanger somewhere and her “dead” cellmate is actually her captor.

Andrew the Vice President is somehow able to convince the Secret Service and half the White House staff to turn on the President and prevents Fitz from doing anything to help Olivia.

Fitz asks for proof of life so Olivia shoots a hostage video. During the filming, Olivia cleverly asks for a glass of water, the reflection from which will later be used by Huck to start finding her. Andrew says that Fitz must declare war on West Angola or Olivia will be killed.

Fitz starts dropping drones and basically declares war on West Angola.

Back at home, the Scooby Gang of Huck, Quinn and Jake are getting closer to finding Olivia after Lois’ friend tips them off.

Huck tortures Portia de Rossi for information about Olivia’s whereabouts.

Olivia plays some genius mind games and panders to the male ego and convinces the head kidnapper to sell her on the open market instead of keeping her for whatever it is Andrew the Vice President wants to do.

Portia de Rossi is tired of being tortured by Huck and gives the gang Andrew the Vice President’s cell phones. They use the phones to figure out that Olivia is actually just around the corner in Pennsylvania in an abandoned airplane hanger. They conduct a raid, but Olivia is already gone, sitting on a plane with her hair pressed, ready to be sold.

Now that Andrew the Vice President’s kidnapper has gone rogue, his plan has fallen apart and he has no more leverage. Fitz tells him to resign. Also, Fitz fires the entire Secret Service and replaces them with Navy Seals. Can you do that?

The kidnapper who Olivia beat with a metal pipe isn’t having any of this mess and shoots and kills the head kidnapper. He’s the captain now.

Andrew the Vice President doesn’t want to resign.

Huck wants to bid on Olivia with money he stole from B613. The problem is that the auction is on something called the “ghost internet” and they can’t find the site. This Olivia auction is only for the big dogs—world leaders, international terrorists, major drug cartels, etc. The gang needs an international terrorist to get in on the action. Luckily, Mama Pope is free.

Mama Pope will only help if she gets something in return. She starts out aiming very high asking to be transferred to a medium security prison with a library and outdoor time. Eventually, they agree to give her a TV in her current prison.

Huck has once again gone down a murder hole and kills a bunch of people he really didn’t need to kill, especially in this manner.

The gang is finally able to get into the auction under Mama Pope’s terrorist name (Marie Wallace) but it’s too late. The new guy in charge stopped the auction to sell Olivia to a cash buyer: Iran.

Back in Washington, the joint chiefs and company want to kill Olivia since she has such a high security clearance and so much secret government knowledge. They’re worried the buyer will use her against them which, duh, that’s the whole point. Fitz is like, nawl, bring her back alive.

The kidnappers meet with Iran and are ready to hand Olivia over when, surprise: Olivia speaks Farsi. She plays the two sides against each other, telling each of them that the other side is planning on screwing them over. She ends up blowing the whole deal.

Cyrus goes behind Fitz’s back and tells the CIA to “neutralize the asset,” AKA KILL OLIVIA.

Back to the auction: There is a tie between Huck/Marie Wallace and “some Russians.” The kidnapper realizes that Olivia wants to go with Marie Wallace so he chooses the Russians.

After an unsuccessful attempt that included having sex with him again, Mellie tells Portia de Rossi that she has to get Andrew the Vice President to resign. Portia de Rossi enlists Huck for help and he does something violent and weird to Andrew the Vice President while Portia de Rossi watches in horror.

Jake goes to visit Mama Pope for one last Hail Mary. For some reason, Mama Pope knows Papa Pope’s exact whereabouts: Some lake in Canada where he’s just chillin’ and fishing. Papa Pope refuses to help Olivia.

As they prepare to hand Olivia over for a second time, Cyrus is about two seconds away from having the CIA fire a missile and kill everyone.

Remember Stephen from the first season? Probs not. Anyway, instead of Russians, Stephen and his friends from Interpol show up to save Olivia. Cyrus somehow recognizes Stephen so the CIA doesn’t murder Olivia.

Turns out, Abby called Interpol and tracked Stephen down for help. The Russian gang that bought Olivia “owed him a favor,” so they pretended to buy Olivia. Olivia tries to get Stephen to come back and he’s like, nah, I can’t, ABC didn’t give me a new contract.

Andrew the Vice President has “had a stroke,” so he’s out thanks to Mellie and Portia de Rossi (and Huck’s depravity).

Olivia is back home, safe and mentally unsound. A hot minute later, Fitz is at the door and she is piiiiiissed. She is piiiiiissed that he actually went to war over her. He let a bunch of US soldiers die just to get Olivia back. She is piiiiisssed because so many people have sacrificed so much to get and keep Fitz in office and he almost gambled it all away on his sidepiece.

Fitz argues that he had to save her, but then Olivia helpfully points out that he didn’t actually save her. It was a combination of her own smart maneuvering and her friends that saved her. Fitz is sad.

By the way, the timeline of all of this is about two weeks. Olivia was gone for two weeks.

Aaaaand we immediately transition into“The Ferguson Episode.”

After the shooting of a black 17-year-old boy by a white police officer, the DC police chief calls Olivia in order to prevent a riot. The father of the boy shows up with a shot gun, demanding answers. This episode ends with the highly unbelievable happy ending wherein the white cop admits to tampering with evidence and lying about the boy having a gun and is sent to jail. Later, Fitz meets with the boy’s father to offer his condolences.

Can I just say again that the absolute most unrealistic Republicans on Earth exist in this show. Fitz, a Republican, so badly wants to speak out publicly about the shooting of this black kid. A Mexican Republican woman is governor of New Mexico and records a video talking about racist police. Throughout the season, Fitz’s administration is trying to push legislation for body cams, equal pay and gun control? PUH-LEASE.

As all the Ferguson stuff is happening, now that Andrew the Vice President is a vegetable, they need to replace his seat. Because Mellie wants to be President eventually, Fitz agrees not to appoint anyone too good so she won’t face stiff competition.

So now Susan Ross is going to be the next Vice President and boy is she annoying.

Olivia, clearly not recovered from the whole being kept in a cell thing, is drinking white wine alone in her apartment, so you know times are tough.

Huck’s wife turns all those B613 files that he gave her into David Rosen so now he has to “investigate.” Huck testifies to David Rosen about B613. He was supposed to lie and say that he couldn’t remember any of the events, but Huck caves and tells him all about the hole that Papa Pope kept him in. David is not happy, but now Huck’s wife likes him again because she knows for sure he isn’t lying so, #worthit.

Remember when Lena Dunham guest starred? Yeah.

She plays a kink enthusiast who is shopping a book about all the powerful men in DC who she did dirty things with. This is bad because it’s just bad and because David Rosen and Abby’s boyfriend Leo Bergen are mentioned in the book. Abby knows that if the book is published, she’ll have to resign as Press Secretary to prevent her presence from reflecting poorly on the White House.

Mellie has decided to run for the senate seat in Virginia that Susan Ross vacated when she became the Vice President.

Huck begs David Rosen for immunity following his testimony about B613. David Rosen says no because it would tip-off Papa Pope and he’d kill them all. Huck does not like this.

In the midst of her PTSD and depression and inspired by Lena Dunham’s kinky sex book, Olivia goes out to a bar and picks up a dude using the fake name, Alex. She/Alex doesn’t follow through with the hookup because she has a kidnapping flashback and has to go home.

Portia de Rossi begs Mellie to let her run her campaign. Mellie says howdy/yes.

Huck is completely insane again and kills Lena Dunham even after Olivia has already fixed everything and prevented her from publishing the book. He says that she will talk eventually, which would take David Rosen down, which would impact Huck’s ability to get immunity for his testimony.

Nevermind! David Rosen gets him his immunity after all. Lena Dunham is still dead.

As Jake and Fitz have gross, weirdly paternalistic weekly meetings where they discuss Olivia’s safety and mental health, Olivia goes back to the bar, finds that guy and is doing this.

Ha ha ha, silly men.

Everyone is woken up in the middle of the night because Cyrus’ fake real hooker fiancé (yeah they’re not married yet) was out making out with dudes at bars.

After pushing the wedding back four times, Olivia tells Cyrus that they need to hurry up and get this done so people will forget about Michael cheating on him. They spin the bar hookup as a bachelor party and announce that the wedding is taking place soon.

Olivia asks Mellie to host a “gay Republican White House wedding.”

UGH SALLY LANGSTON IS BACK.

Sally is getting her Fox News on and offers a reward for proof that Cyrus’ marriage is a sham. She’s getting her information because Leo Bergen is working for her again and leaking information, which seems really rude and unnecessary. Abby gets back at him by looking through his phone for information.

We are blessed with flashbacks from Cyrus’ life as a straight man and his dreams of holding office which were crushed when his wife left.

Turns out, Michael the fiancé/hooker has been seeing some guy for seven months which is against the terms of his contract and might fuck up the whole wedding. Sally has the guy booked on her next show.

Lol remember how Cyrus has a daughter.

Olivia figures out that Sally’s dead gay husband was on Michael’s client list. Olivia threatens to expose it so Sally kills the story. Cyrus and Michael get married and Cyrus agrees to be less mean to Michael after meeting his horrible homophobic parents

Cyrus has had a lot of black and white weddings.

David is trying to convince Jake to join Huck, Quinn and Charlie in testifying against Papa Pope aka Command. Jake is all: Lol definitely not. Drop this case or I’ll kill you, maybe.

New plan: They start tracking down other former B613 agents to testify against Command. David Rosen offers them immunity and puts them in a safe house while they convene a secret grand jury. Unfortunately for them, Jake is spying on the group and hears this whole plan.

Olivia’s new bautiful booty call’s name is Franklin Russell, but goes by Russell. Apparently he also knows that Olivia’s real name is Olivia and not Alex.

Jake kills all the B613 witnesses that David Rosen and friends had gathered up. Jake has lost it. He is camping out across the hall from Olivia and threatens to go after her if they try to take him out.

David Rosen wants to keep fighting, but Huck, Quinn and Charlie are like, nah, let’s not.

Ruh roh, Jake didn’t kill those agents, David Rosen’s assistant/secret B613 agent Holly did and has been keeping tabs on the case against B613 this whole time from inside David’s office. Jake kills her.

Jake and Olivia were actually spying on errrybody this whole time. Jake convinces David that he’s on their side and they all need to wear white hats and stick together and blah blah if they have any chance of getting rid of Papa Pope.

Ok, back to more important things. Olivia’s booty call shows up at her door with HER DAD. Ughhh so embarrassing, dad.

Papa Pope drugs and ties up Russell so he can deliver a monologue to Olivia telling her to leave him alone once and for all and drop the damn B613 case.

The next day, Russell comes back to try to figure out what had happened the night before. He wants answers. Instead of finding answers, they do this.

OH MY GOD A REAL STORYLINE RIGHT NOW IS THAT THIS REPUBLICAN PRESIDENT IS PASSING LEGISLATION FOR POLICE REFORM INSPIRED BY THE SHOOTING OF A BLACK KID BY A WHITE OFFICER.

Mellie officially announces her campaign.

Olivia tells Papa Pope that she’s still going after him. He’s all, ok, ok cool, but this is gonna suck for everyone involved. Jake experiences this firsthand soon after when Russell attacks and stabs him many times. Oops, Russell works for Papa Pope.

This bitch Sally is back again and is questioning whether or not Mellie can and should run for senate.

Papa Pope is unhappy that Russell didn’t actually kill Jake like he was supposed, so he shoots Russell in the arm.

Olivia thinks that Papa Pope is responsible for Russell’s injury which, yes, he is, but not in the way that she thinks. In order to protect him, Olivia brings Russell to the secret hideout where they’re trying to keep Jake alive. So now Jake is neighbors with the dude who just tried to murder him.

The gang talks openly about their plans to off Papa Pope in front of his henchman.

Cyrus appears on Sally’s show to convince people that it’s cool for Mellie to be a senator. Unfortuantely, polling shows that that didn’t really help. Portia de Rossi suggests that they leak news that Fitz and Mellie are separating to help Mellie’s chances and eliminate the conflict of interest.

Fitz hits Olivia up for late night phone call but this time they keep things professional. He wants to know what to do about Mellie. Olivia says, fuck what the country thinks, she’s only trying to get elected in the state of Virginia. Those are the only opinions that matter. She says that Mellie actually needs to play up her closeness to the President so the Virginia voters will think that they’re getting a senator with special access. Damn she’s good.

After aaaalll that, Olivia and company decide to throw in the towel and say fuck it—Papa Pope wins. He kills way too many people at the drop of a hat for this shit to be worth it.

Russell is back at Olivia’s apartment having a secret phone conversation with Papa Pope about something called Foxtail.

Olivia figures out that Russell is B613 and was leaking information to Papa Pope.

Now they must torture Russell to find out what Foxtail is.

I love how much Olivia straight up doesn’t give a FUCK. Two days ago she was all boo’d up in this guy and now she’s having someone drill holes in his knees.

Ok, home stretch, people.

Olivia has a new client—a sailor who was raped by her navel officer. The pertient information here is that the lawyer who is assigned to work with them on the case turns out to be an undercover B613 agent. He shows up at Olivia’s apartment, sedates Huck and takes Russell.

The gang comes back and sees what has happened. They’re worried that now they’ll never find out what Foxtail is.

A minute later, we learn that Foxtail is Mellie’s Secret Service nickname. After a rousing campaign speech, she is whisked off to meet a wealthy donor who is no one other than Papa Pope who clearly has Beyoncé-level time management skills.

Papa Pope ambushes Mellie with a file of all the dirt he has on her and Fitz. He demands that she give him a list of names or else he’ll release all the dirt.

So now Jake is testifying? In doing so, he has to reveal details about Operation Remmington—which you might remember was when Fitz shot down a civilian plane on the (unknown to him) orders from B613.

It doesn’t really matter anyway, because Papa Pope has every member of the grand jury gunned down.

At this point, David Rosen is like, OH HELL NO. FUCK JUSTICE. I’M OUT. He turns in all the files to the case and peaces.

Mellie thinks that she’s the one who got the grand jurors killed. The list of names that Papa Pope asked for turns out to have been those of the grand jurors.

Olivia is really upset and Jake offers to just leave again to anywhere on the globe because he’s still in love with her. Which is like, she’s amazing and all, but go get some self-esteem, dude.

Out of ideas, Olivia goes to her mommy for help. In some not-so-nice words, Mama Pope drops the wisdom bomb that Olivia needs to get her head out of her Prada handbag and chill. The problem with Papa Pope is that nobody even knows B613 and Command exist. If she lets someone more powerful know, they might be able to help.

On this advice, Olivia hits up the director of the CIA and tells her about B613. The director clearly already knows about B613, except she thought it was a small team of four or five men, not a massive group of insane killers.

Mellie goes to Cyrus for help. He is able to figure out that Papa Pope is the one causing problems. Cyrus convinces the the director of the CIA to back down on B613, calmly explaining that Papa Pope is mad powerful and will definitely kill her also.

Sooo, that whole plan backfires and now Olivia and Jake are in jail.

Meanwhile, on the eve of election day, Fitz gives a really nice speech about how great Mellie is, calling her his best friend.

Cyrus tells David Rosen to back off B613 by threatening to hurt Abby. David Rosen caves and forces Olivia and Jake to sign affidavits withdrawing all their statements and accusations about B616.

They have no choice and sign.

Pope Pope calls Olivia and delivers another monologue. He has killed every agent who could have possibly identified him as Command and has blown up all the B613 documents. He also got to Mama Pope. She signs an affidavit denying the existence of B613 for the rest of her life and now she gets to get out of prison. Yikes.

Mellie wins the election. Portia de Rossi spills the beans to Fitz about how Mellie met with Papa Pope and maybe accidentally had all those grand jurors killed.

Pope and Associates are licking their wounds and sulking over having to let Papa Pope go. At that moment, Quinn remembers the $2 billion of B613 money that Huck still has access to. He points out that it has been laundered so many times that it could have come from anywhere and can’t be linked to B616. That’s perfect, actually.

They frame Papa Pope—the regular guy, not Command—for embezzlement and he’s arrested. They may not be able to Command, but they can take Eli Pope.

Having an excellent day, Quinn also figures out that Huck is still sort of working for Pope Pope and was the one who killed all the grand jurors. She confronts him about what a monster he has become and Huck begs her to shoot him. She doesn’t shoot him, but clearly Huck is going to be needing some therapy next season.

Mellie is riding high after her win, but now Fitz is moody again. “You think I’d let you be president after what you did?” he broods. Fitz explains that he knows all about the jurors and says that they’re no longer a team. He growls: “Pack your bags and get out of my house,” and throws in the kicker: “Before I throw you out.”

HEY, BY THE WAY, WHERE IS THEIR BABY?

Fitz finally has it all figured it all out. He know now that Mellie went to Cyrus, that Cyrus then went to the CIA, who arrested Olivia and released Mama Pope. Cyrus did all this by basically working with Papa Pope—the man who killed Fitz’s son. Fitz fires Cyrus and replaces him with Portia de Rossi whose character’s name, by the way, is Elizabeth North.

Olivia is in the mood to celebrate—Jake, not so much. With B613 effectively gone, Papa Pope in jail and Olivia home safe, his mission is over. The upside is that he’s finally gotten the hint. He knows he is in love with Olivia but she is clearly still in love with Fitz and he fully gets that now because self-actualization is a beautiful thing.

Jake essentially tells her to go and get what’s hers.

And if there’s one thing we all know, it’s that Fitz belongs to Olivia.

Fitz goes look for her at her apartment, but no dice.

He sulks around the White House.

And sulks some more.

But of course Olivia is there to receive the man who cannot even begin to function properly without her—aka true love?