I'm kind of offended by how good Revenge was this week. I'm an ardent side-eyed fan of the show, and I like to watch it with my tongue firmly in my cheek, Chardonnay in hand, laughing out loud at the Dell tablets and fake rich people. But "Suspicion" was actually really awesome. How dare this show! I need my superior chuckles, Revenge, not an hour's worth of TV that engages my emotions and makes me feel all kinds of confusing, earnest sadness and yearning. I blame the episode's three-pronged attack, which involved A) perfect poetic irony, B) a plausible and subtle turnaround for Ashley, and C) mother-effing ninjas.
Revenge started the way it usually does, with Emily and Daniel making out while Madeline Stowe looked on from a CGI Widow's Walk. So far, so silly. Daniel's first day of interning for his dad's company included the most overcast company volleyball tournament of all time. Fair enough! "Kara" also made the most of the gloom by sunbathing outside the Red Lobster, which made Nolan contact Emily, who then asked Kara to leave, and she was like "NOPES."
It was all in keeping with typical Revenge hijinks, except we got to spend a lot of screen time with Nolan, which, YES PLEASE. Showrunners, if you want to keep your necessary explanations of the characters' convoluted actions engaging, let everything be narrated by Nolan, because everybody in the audience kind of wants to go on a road trip with him. Just saying. So we had Nolan giving Emily the play-by-play, and then we also had his discovery that Tyler had stolen his credit card, leading to a follow-up scene (finally!) between the two that I know we've all been waiting for since the hotness a couple weeks back.
Apparently Tyler, in true hustler fashion, had used Nolan's credit card to buy Ashley a stunning/hideous gown (an orange sheath under black lace? Halloween is so far from this show's timeline, costume department, that I don't even care how good the sales are at JoAnn Fabrics right now). Daniel's father pitted Tyler and Daniel against one another as competing interns, both on the stormy volleyball pitch and at his fundraising soiree. Tyler asked Nolan to invest through him in the company, and Nolan's answer was to set up his stealth USB webcam and bounce. This was actually a weak moment in the episode: Tyler scanned Lydia's incriminating speech onto the computer to read it? Why? Why not just pull it out and look at it? Why go over it in Nolan's house? Bizarre.
But, confusing technological jibber-jabber and intrigue aside, I'm loving all the Nolan. After his tense meeting with Tyler, we returned to the Graysons' manor. Victoria was parading around in stilettos and a bandage dress while slipping Lydia pills and hiding her wheelchair. Whatevs. Also, she intercepted Charlotte's texts to Declan. Sure. The police found Frank's cellphone, which Emily hid on the property. Yawn. Typical Revenge.
Then a couple amazing things happened:
Victoria marched down to Red Lobster and offered Declan money to break up with Charlotte. "What's your number?" was how she phrased it. "Everybody has a number."
Jack actually had chemistry with someone. After weeks of ineffectually hovering around Emily's porch, it was refreshing to see Kara melting in Jack's arms. He actually seemed vaguely likable, like Jack Sparrow + 10 lbs and a crisp preppy haircut.
Tyler and Nolan KISSED! And Ashley saw! …and ran off in a huff, but Tyler intercepted her and told her to stop hating the players and get in the game. And she did! The next time she saw Victoria, she offered to stab Emily in the back, pretty much, provided Victoria would help her get ahead. Ashley's tentative steps toward bitchcraft were beautifully handled: She's now a tragic character, abandoning real relationships to cozy up to a minx like Victoria. And the actress playing her is making it happen. You got chops, Madekwe!
Revenge rounded out these stunning developments with an ending that was, to use a scholarly term, like a Jet Li punch to the face. Kara confessed to Jack that she's the real Amanda. Jack embraced her as the love of his life, then dragged her to his home away from home, Emily's porch, so she could see the swing he buffed and varnished and also inform Emily of her "real" identity. It was a moment of almost literary irony, a moment that reminded me of childhood viewings of The Little Mermaid when Eric fell in love with the fake Ariel. Emily had to silently accept everything she had given up—the man she honestly loves, who would've accepted her as herself—all to continue on her twisty path of revenge. It's both weird and awesome to honestly be effected by this show.
Oh, and Emily is a mother-effing ninja, apparently.
