Scandal Season 5 Premiere Primer, Because We Care

What were Olivia Pope and co. doing in the season four finale? Jog your memory here

By Jean Bentley Sep 24, 2015 7:30 PMTags
Scandal, Scandal Season 5ABC

It's been a long time since we saw Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) being Washington, DC's HBIC—like, WAY too long—so it's understandable that you might have forgotten some of the bananas events that happened in the Scandal season four finale.

The episode ended with Fitz (Tony Goldwyn) and Olivia k-i-s-s-i-n-g, but before they got there—openly making out on a White House balcony!—a LOT of stuff went down.

For example, before the makeout sesh, Fitz kicked Senator Mellie Grant (Bellamy Young) out of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., along with his top adviser Cyrus (Jeff Perry), and installed Portia de Rossi's Elizabeth North.

Oh, and Huck (Guillermo Diaz) murdered an entire room of people (the Grand Jury that was convened to hear testimony about B613, whom Command aka Rowan aka Eli Pope aka Olivia's terrifying father ordered killed), then Quinn (Katie Lowes) found out an put a gun to his head while riding on a bus. NBD.

Olivia and Jake (Scott Foley) turned Rowan in to the CIA, but Papa Pope (Joe Morton) had pull with Cyrus, who threatened the CIA director and got the do-gooders arrested instead (don't worry, they got out). The B613 agents who knew he was Command didn't fare as well, however, and all went the way of the poor Grand Jury members. He also destroyed all the covert organization's files, and released Mama Pope (Khandi Alexander) from jail in exchange for her silence. But Olivia got some revenge, and had her dad (well, his alter-ego Eli Pope) arrested for embezzlement.

Olivia and Fitz were basically the only two with a happy ending, "but everybody else was in a fairly blown apart place," Shonda Rhimes told reporters at TCA. "So Cyrus was no longer working in the White House. Mellie was no longer living in the White House because Fitz had kicked her out. Jake had said he was walking away. Quinn was thinking about killing Huck. So, you know, things were not going so well for people. And we pick up sort of right there in that environment, and we see what happens next."

When Scandal makes its triumphant return, Fitz and Olivia are still together (but are they standing in the sun?!), while everybody else is still dealing with the fallout of helping Command. Remember Mellie also helped him? Yeah…not great. Meanwhile, the Queen of Caldonia (love you, fake Scandal countries!) and her family turns into a tragedy and Olivia Pope swoops in to save the day. Don't expect Mellie to just sit around and watch Fitz and Olivia play house either, it is Mellie after all.

Your four months of Scandal-less torture ends tonight at 9 p.m. on ABC.

What are you most excited to see from the new season? Leave your hopes in the comments below!