How to Get Away with Murder: My Recap

Source:abc.go.com

At the request of my sister-in-law, Charlene, I’m coming back to my blog this week to do a recap of How to Get Away with Murder.  I had been anticipating this show ever sense I saw the preview for it over the summer.  So all day at work all I could think of was what the fierce Viola Davis had waiting for me.

As much as I respect Shonda Rhimes for her success in television I have to admit that I’m not that crazy about Grey’s Anatomy and no matter how much I try, I cannot get into Scandal.  With that being said I was willing to give this new show a chance.

My notes while watching the show

So here we go…

In true Shonda Rhimes fashion the show moves a mile a minute.  I mean you cannot take your eyes off the television or you will miss a vital clue.  And everyone talks so fast.  Like for a minute, I felt like a kid who should be in a remedial class but got stuck in an AP class by accident.  I had to use the commercial breaks to marinate on what happened.  Finally, I got into the flow of things and was able to catch on to most of what was going down.

The show starts off with students trying to figure out how to hide a body.  We are then introduced to Viola Davis playing the smart, no nonsense law professor, Annalise Keating.  She was basically that teacher you had in high school that you thought was mean but you actually learned the most from her.  She starts the class off with a case that her law firm is working on and asks the students to come up with a reason why her client is being accused.  Poor Wes Gibbins, played by Alfred Enoch, just got accepted two days before classes started so he didn’t have time to get caught up on the case.  This is brought to attention when Professor Keating asks him a question and he cannot answer.

Another student answers the question for Wes which prompts Professor Keating to say,

“Never take a learning opportunity from another student.  No matter how smart you think you are.”

From jump we know that we are going to get a special kind of life philosophy from Professor Keating.  She assigns the students to come up with a defense for her client whom has been accused of attempting to kill her boss who she was having an affair with.  Whoever comes up with the best defense gets a statue that will exempt them from one of her exams and the opportunity to work at her law firm along with other students that she picks. 

Now I’m far from a law student so I’m not even going to try to decipher the many different defenses the students came up with but let’s just say that Wes, Connor (Jack Falahee), Michaela (Aja Naomi King), Asher (Asher Millistone), and Laurel (Karla Souza) end up obtaining spots at her law firm.  These different ones get their spots because of their willing to go far and beyond to get more evidence to help win Keating’s case.  This includes invading people’s health records and hooking up with random people at bars. 

Keating let’s us know there are 3 ways you win a case

•       Discredit the witness
•       Introduce a new suspect
•        Bury the evidence to create doubt

We see Professor Keating do this with elegance and grace while using her students as her henchmen to do the dirty work.  I have a feeling before it’s all said and done these students will be doing more than getting a law degree.  They will basically be Keating’s oompa-loompas (Oompa, doompa, doompa-dee-dee, what will you do to get your law degree?). 

Throughout the show we keep getting flashes to Wes and ‘em trying to figure out what to do with a dead body but we have no idea who the dead body is until the end.  We also keep hearing about a girl who has gone missing and you know the missing girl has to be connected with one of the main characters.  We also find out that Professor Keating is a THOT.  When Wes thinks he has found a break in the case he rushes over to her law firm to find her getting down with Billy Blanks’ twin brother.  He turns out to be Keating’s side boo thang(who happens to be a detective connected with the case she is working on) and that she is actually married to one of the professors at the college who wants kids but unfortunately Annalise is having a hard time getting pregnant.  Or at least that is the story that she tells Wes (he’s the only student that knows she’s having an affair).  At this point she can’t be trusted (most THOTS are untrustworthy). 

However, not only does Keating have THOT tendencies but she’s a true playa for real.  When it seems that she is about to lose her case, she gets her side boo thang to lie on the witness stand.  Now you know you a playa when you get can your side piece to commit perjury.  At the end, they find the missing girl floating in a water tower and the dead person the students have been toting around is actually…wait for it…Mr. Keating.  Things have gotten real and it’s just the first episode.

So here are my final thoughts and questions:

• The show is most definitely not for the family: there were 2 steamy scenes within minutes of each other.
• Michaela is going to get on my nerves (she is an obnoxious over achiever)
• I'm scared of Connor Walsh because he seems like a man with no boundaries.
• I think Mr. Keating was having an affair with the missing girl or Wes' next door neighbor or both.  You never know with Shonda Rhimes.
• What happened to the law student that used to live in Wes' apartment who left the bite marks on the bed post and the scratching on the wall?
• Lastly, who killed Mr. Keating???????

I’m looking forward to see where this series is going to go.  What did you think of the series premiere of How to Get Away with Murder?