Scandal has become more and more disappointing to me as this season progresses. What started as a high paced political drama about a political fixer, who actually did her job, has now turned into a melodramatic soap opera with plenty of cliff hangers that don’t have much shock value.
For the last few episodes I was able to guess what would happen (if you’re not caught up there are spoilers ahead!).
When the California governor turned out to be in love with Mellie? So obvious.
Huck and Abby being the ones to “kidnap” David rather than it being Cyrus’ hit man? Again, not really a nail biter.
It’s possible that because of my obsession with television I’ve just become great at guessing what will happen next but honestly I’m sick of hearing people continuously talk about how great Scandal is.
Is it entertaining? Sure. But it’s not greatly scripted, edited, or acted out.
For starters, the show began with Olivia Pope, being an independent force as a political fixer who made her own choices. Now Olivia doesn’t fix anything and instead the show only focuses on her “love triangle” with Fitz and Jake. It’s a little bit of stretch to call it a love triangle, however, since really it’s clear that the only thing standing in between Fitz and Olivia being together is his marriage and presidency. Otherwise they’d be in Vermont right now.
Jake is only there to keep Olivia company and keep her warm at night since she can’t be with the one she really wants. In summary, he’s her security blanket.
The storyline of this show no longer focuses on the dirty inner workings of politics and the blood thirsty, backstabbing inner workings that happen within the American government. Instead those things only come second to all the love affairs and relationships on the show.
Every episode seems to be more and more about who’s sleeping with who and less and less about who’s actually running the government.
Lastly, what was really the last straw for me was tonight’s episode in which we were promised a jaw dropping ending in the last 30 seconds. Many fans seem to be satisfied with the “shocking” ending of this episode but I am not.
First of all, the ending was a classic cliff hanger that happens in many shows. There’s a gun shot, screen goes black, and everyone’s left wondering who got shot? It’s a tired ploy to get viewers to Tweet about the show and guess who died, not a stroke of cinematic genius.
Moreover, it seems obvious to me that James is the one that got shot. For one thing, it would provide the writers with another story line because Cyrus will be furious if that is the case. Also, James’ death get’s way more players involved than David’s death. Of course Olivia’s team will care if David is dead but the whole White House will care if James is dead. Plus, then there’s the question of who’ll raise his daughter since Cyrus is really not fit to be a stay at home father and didn’t really want the baby in the first place.
I admit I could be wrong but I’d put money on it being David because that would provide the writers with the best material but honestly who got shot isn’t relevant here. What is relevant is that so called surprising and jaw dropping ending was nothing I haven’t seen done before in other shows. I was expecting much more by the way the episode was being hyped up but again found myself disappointed.
Although I do believe Scandal is an entertaining show, which is why it gets so many views and why I keep watching it, it’s not the greatest thing since sliced bread. People talk about it so much because it’s exciting. There’s sex scenes, affairs, murder, and drama. However, just because a show has these things doesn’t mean it’s Emmy worthy. It just means the writers know how to catch an audience’s attention.
I know people will disagree with my opinion so have at it in the comments. I rest my case.
Zakiya N. Jamal 