I’ve always tried to look on the bright side of Bonnie Winterbottom’s life, a high-heeled, stained-wood semi-purgatory in which Annalise Keating croons the verbal equivalent of En Vogue’s “My Lovin’ (You’re Never Gonna Get It)” directly her way on an endless loop. Not so bad, right? A throwback!
But the truth has been bubbling under the surface like a pool of blood under a boring white blouse this whole time: Though fierce, Bonbon’s devotion to Annalise is not quite as strong as her hatred for herself. She survived sexual abuse as a child. She wears magenta tweed coats to hide/highlight (depending on your style) her secret shame. And she’s also a highly manipulative stone-cold LIAR.
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Bonnie’s cry-lying is off the charts this week as she confesses to Asher the salacious details of how she wishes she killed Sam. Was it a self-defense murder against a rape attempt, or the explicit sexual fantasy of her wildest dreams? Who can tell? This character is so, so tragic. Asher is sold on her web of lies — the “I love you” certainly helped — and will not testify against the Bonnie-Annalise-Frank murder trio (who aren’t even the four people who killed Sam anyway). But by episode’s end, three weeks into the future just so this is as confusing as possible, Asher does weasel his way out of Bonnie’s bloody murder-mansion getaway car and shows up at the police station ready to make a statement against her. Love hurts.
On lying ability alone, Ms. How To Get Away With Pretending You Murdered is the purest evildoer of the night — really, the ultimate honor on this show. But Bonnie does have some worthy competition:
D.A. Who? The Face of Evil is obviously a close second based on her perma-clenched jaw alone.
Annalise was particularly rage-y this week, which makes sense — covering up multiple murders and running a cult can be exceedingly stressful. Only a woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown would don a statement bracelet, earrings, and necklace, so you know shit is getting serious. “Nothing you say will make me not hate you right now,” she seethes to Bonnie, the daughter-figure she’d do anything to protect. Annalise also schools Asher about how his white male privilege means he’ll never understand rape, fills Nate in on the fact that his wife asked her to pill-kill her, and guilt-trips the Keating Four for destroying the lives of her and her evil associates. But the boss’ best line is a run-of-the-mill bark to her lapdogs related to the Hapstall murder case: “Get your thumbs out of your asses and find me proof that dead woman lied.”
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Doucheface is not quite as evil as his corrupt judge dad (though we still don’t know what happened at Trotter Lake), but this is by far his most intense nostril-flaring of the entire series.
Can puppies be evil? Scratch that; Wes’ jacket looks so cozy I want to die.
Absolutely not evil in this episode is MVP Connor, who wisely begins day-drinking because the Keating Four might as well; they’re all going down anyway. Literally. A few hours before telling Oliver he loves him, Connor expertly twists a regular afternoon at the cult house into a running tease for an orgy. At least he’s up front about his intentions: “We are running out of beer, and I would like something more hardcore.”
Suddenly inspired, Laurel and Frank crank out a quick load of laundry.
But even when Frank is off the clock, his magical evil wheels are spinning somewhere, switching dead-girl suitcases and planting meth in Levi’s car. Did Wes and Rebecca’s foster brother really think they could outsmart the mastermind in a three-piece suit? Fools! Wes eagerly laps up the bait Frank left on Annalise’s desk: a key that looked way too shiny to have already been used and abused. That’s how the Keating Four stumbled into a storage unit with the answer to all the show’s mysteries basking in the spotlight.
It’s just a freaking suitcase, but production hilariously shoots it in the style of the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey. Inside the luggage lies the destiny of human evolution: stacks upon stacks of cold hard cash. Connor totally should’ve swiped some so Oliver could finally get paid for his police hacking.
Meanwhile, Annalise sits Asher down in the creepy silence of his own home to share footage of the terrible thing that happened to Bonnie as a child.
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That hideous doll on her bed would be enough to make anyone turn out like Bonnie, but the truth runs much deeper than orange clown hair and a tiny hat. According to Annalise, the man abusing her was her own father.
Is Bonnie’s martyr complex ruining you? Where’s Rebecca’s corpse? Will Eggs 911 get off (so that Michaela can get off)? See you next week, and please don’t forget to…
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