SCANDAL: TRUTH OR CONSEQUENCES (TV)
Summary
One in this drama/political thriller about the Pope & Associates crisis management firm in Washington D.C.
Two years ago, Defiance County adopts its new electronic voting machines, and the voting volunteers are instructed on the use of the memory cards used to tabulate results. The memory cards are covertly switched out by Jesse as a means of rigging the election. Quinn, then Lindsay Dwyer, calls him and tells him that she passed the bar exam. In the present day, David calls Hollis and his lawyers into his office and tells him that the Cytron explosion was linked to tampering with the electronic voting machines in an attempt to rig the election. Furthermore, he accuses Hollis of being one member of the conspiracy in charge of this attempt and asks him to come clean and make a deal with him by the end of the week. Hollis is outraged at this suggestion and threatens David before leaving. Mellie tells Cyrus that President Grant asked her for a divorce, and he is quite surprised by this development. Mellie is extremely disturbed and demands that Cyrus “fix him.” Olivia continues to contemplate Edison’s proposal as Hollis unexpectedly arrives at the Pope & Associates office. Huck and Quinn bristle at his presence, but Olivia allows him to enter. He complains about David’s efforts and asks her to resolve the situation, threatening to bring down everyone else in the voting rigging conspiracy with him if he is exposed. Cyrus confronts President Grant and points out that his desire to divorce Mellie is “reckless” and “political suicide.” However, President Grant explains that his brush with death has caused him to re-evaluate his life, and that he is no longer afraid of pursuing his happiness; he insists that he can divorce Mellie and still maintain his presidency.
In the past, Jesse discusses his plans to leave Cytron with his newfound money and form his own company. He discovers that Hollis has secured a multi-billion dollar energy contract as an indirect result of his assistance with the voting tampering. He tries to convince Hollis to award him more money for his services, threatening to alert the news media if he does not comply. In his frustration he spills coffee all over his computer, disabling it. In present-day, Cyrus confers with Olivia as they try to figure out what to do about David. However, Olivia believes that David is doing the right thing, and she expresses regret for agreeing to aid in the conspiracy to rig the election. Cyrus tells her that he will fix the situation, and that she is under a great deal of emotional stress due to the assassination attempt. She returns home and falls into something of a stupor. That night she receives a call from President Grant, and he realizes that something is wrong. She tells him that Edison proposed to her and admits that she is tempted to try to live a more “normal” life with him. He reveals that he asked Mellie for a divorce and asks her not to respond to Edison for the time being. She hangs up without saying a word and stays awake in bed until the morning. Edison arrives to check on her and tries to help her, but she tells him to go away. Concerned, Edison appeals to the other members of Pope & Associates to see if they can help her. They decide to take on Olivia as their latest “client.”
Two years ago, Becky mails the bomb to Cytron on instructions from Hollis, framing Dwyer in the process. In the present-day, Quinn tries to organize the rest of the team, noting that everyone is concealing secrets and that they need to discover why Olivia has not yet exposed Hollis as the one behind the assassination attempt. They agree to reveal what they know for the sake of helping Olivia. Quinn begins by recounting her abduction, when Huck knocked her unconscious with a dose of etorphine and transported her to Washington D.C., creating her new identity in the process. Abby believes that since Verna was the one who owned the private plane Quinn was transported on, she may have also been responsible for interfering with Quinn’s trial and getting her to avoid being sentenced. Quinn also theorizes that the same people who framed her also framed Huck for the assassination. Abby reveals her relationship with David and reveals that Hollis employed Jesse as part of his scheme with Cytron and the voting machines; Jesse sold software to Hollis which could tamper with the voting machines. They simultaneously come to the conclusion that Hollis and Olivia used the voting machines to get President Grant elected, much to their mutual shock.
Mellie goes for a medical exam and receives word that her baby is doing fine. She recounts the births of her other two children and how President Grant was there for her each time. Huck visits Olivia and offers to kill Hollis for her, but she forbids him from doing so and tells him that Cyrus will take care of Hollis. Huck is convinced that Cyrus will attempt to assassinate Hollis using his own operative, likely Charlie. Olivia realizes that Huck is probably right and this rouses her from her bed, spurring her to action. She visits Verna in the hospital and tells her that she intends to turn Hollis in to the authorities regardless of the consequences. She wishes to protect Verna, but Verna feels that her life and integrity lost meaning when she agreed to the election rigging scheme; she feels as though her cancer is somehow karmic justice for her misdeeds. The police obtain a warrant to search Hollis’s office for evidence linking him to the assassination attempt and they discover such evidence, allowing David to have him arrested. However, David informs Olivia that while he has enough to hold Hollis for the next 48 hours, there is not enough evidence to formally charge him. He says he will do what he can, and notes that her cooperation does not exonerate her from his investigation into her activities.
Olivia argues with Cyrus about Hollis’s arrest, and he says that he wanted to see “vengeance” wrought upon him. Olivia counters that she is interested only in “justice” and is willing to pay the price for their conspiracy. She apologizes to her team for manipulating their lives and offers to answer any of their questions. Quinn wishes to take her up on that offer, but Harrison, Abby, and Huck warn her about the potential legal consequences she could suffer. In light of this, Quinn acquiesces to Olivia’s request to help her get evidence on Hollis; they propose to do this by finding out how Becky was paid for her services. Quinn proposes that if they get access to Jesse’s bank account they could use it to help determine its link to Hollis’s finances. In the past, Becky spies on Quinn and Jesse as Quinn discovers evidence that Jesse was sleeping with one of his co-workers. In present-day, Quinn visits the electronics store where she dropped of Jesse’s laptop to be repaired, hoping to recover it.
Cyrus calls in David to his office to express his concerns about the potential outcome of David’s investigation into Hollis. He warns that there could be grave consequences if the matter were to reach the press. On Jesse’s computer the team discovers evidence of a hidden Caiman Island account and traces the payment back to a routing number. However, they require Becky’s bank account number to confirm their hypothesis. In order to obtain this Harrison and Huck pose as Becky’s legal counsel in order to visit her in prison. She refuses to help him until he reveals that he figured out her involvement in the Cytron explosion; two years ago she witnesses Huck carrying Quinn’s unconscious body away from her motel room. He says that he cannot prevent her from getting the death penalty, but hopes that she’ll cooperate so he can arrange to visit her while she is on death row. As a show of trust, Huck writes down his real name on a slip of paper and shows it to her; this gesture proves to be convincing enough for her to give him the bank account number.
Mellie finds out about Hollis being taken into custody and goes on a tirade about how she is the one who was responsible for improving President Grant as a person and working to make him presidential material. Cyrus says that while he can handle the situation with Hollis, President Grant is beyond his ability to influence now. Cyrus calls Charlie and orders him to assassinate Hollis as soon as he’s released, and make it look like he died in an accident. Olivia and her team work to trace the number Becky gave them as Harrison warns Olivia that she could be in great jeopardy if they are successful. She says that she couldn’t live with the guilt of what she had done; Harrison promises to protect her any way he can. David argues with Hollis’s lawyer about his case, utilizing what little evidence he has. Cyrus runs polls about President Grant’s potential divorce, and the numbers demonstrate that the American public would turn against him quite strongly if he were to go through with it. President Grant plans to go see Olivia without any pretense of secrecy, and Cyrus warns him against this. They are interrupted by an unspecified medical emergency involving Mellie and President Grant rushes to her.
Huck gets into Becky’s bank account and searches for the payment made to Becky for the assassination job. However, the payment did not originate from Hollis, and Olivia calls David to tell him this. He is furious at Olivia for misleading him, and reveals that Hollis was released an hour ago. President Grant arrives to find that Mellie has gone into labor. She is in a great deal of pain and President Grant rushes to her side and takes her hand, offering her reassurances. Her labor intensifies and she attempts to give birth to the baby. Charlie gets into an elevator with Hollis, ready to assassinate him as per his instructions. Includes commercials.
Details
- NETWORK: ABC
- DATE: January 31, 2013 10:00 PM
- RUNNING TIME: 0:57:56
- COLOR/B&W: Color
- CATALOG ID: 111935
- GENRE: Drama, mystery/suspense
- SUBJECT HEADING: African-American Collection - Drama; LGBT Collection - Drama; Drama, mystery/suspense; Politics
- SERIES RUN: ABC - TV series, 2012-2018
- COMMERCIALS:
- TV – Commercials – AT&T phone service
- TV – Commercials – Best Buy electronics
- TV – Commercials – Chili’s restaurants
- TV – Commercials – Citi credit cards
- TV – Commercials – Clorox disinfecting products
- TV – Commercials – Ford automobiles
- TV – Commercials – GNC fitness stores
- TV – Commercials – Green Mountain coffee
- TV – Commercials – H&R Block tax services
- TV – Commercials – HP computers
- TV – Commercials – Honey Bunches of Oats Greek breakfast cereal
- TV – Commercials – JCPenney department stores
- TV – Commercials – Kay jewelers
- TV – Commercials – Lincoln automobiles
- TV – Commercials – L’Oreal hair coloring
- TV – Commercials – Maybelline cosmetics
- TV – Commercials – McDonald’s restaurants
- TV – Commercials – Mercedes-Benz automobiles
- TV – Commercials – Olive Garden restaurants
- TV – Commercials – Sears department stores
- TV – Commercials – State Farm insurance
- TV – Commercials – T-Mobile phone service
- TV – Commercials – Verizon phone service
- TV – Commercials – Walmart department stores
- TV – Commercials – “Bullet to the Head” motion picture
- TV – Commercials – “Escape from Planet Earth” motion picture
- TV – Commercials – “Flight” home video release
- TV – Promos – “Body of Proof”
- TV – Promos – “Jimmy Kimmel Live”
- TV – Promos – “Modern Family”
- TV – Promos – “Red Widow”
- TV – Promos – “Revenge”
- TV – Promos – “Scandal”
- TV – Promos – “The Oscars”
- TV – Promos – “Zero Hour”
CREDITS
- Mark Wilding … Executive Producer
- Betsy Beers … Executive Producer
- Shonda Rhimes … Executive Producer, Created by
- Tom Verica … Co-Executive Producer
- Mark Fish … Co-Executive Producer
- Jenna Bans … Co-Executive Producer
- Judy Smith … Co-Executive Producer
- Scott Collins … Producer
- Heather Mitchell … Producer
- Merri D. Howard … Producer
- Holden Chang … Associate Producer
- Peter Noah … Consulting Producer, Writer
- Jeannot Szwarc … Director
- Chad Fischer … Music by
- Kerry Washington … Cast, Olivia Pope
- Columbus Short … Cast, Harrison Wright
- Darby Stanchfield … Cast, Abby Whelan
- Katie Lowes … Cast, Quinn Perkins
- Guillermo Diaz … Cast, Huck
- Jeff Perry … Cast, Cyrus Beene
- Joshua Malina … Cast, David Rosen
- Bellamy Young … Cast, Mellie Grant
- Tony Goldwyn … Cast, President Fitzgerald Grant III
- Gregg Henry … Cast, Hollis Doyle
- Debra Mooney … Cast, Verna Thornton
- Norm Lewis … Cast, Edison Davis
- George Newbern … Cast, Charlie
- Susan Pourfar … Cast, Becky Flynn
- Adam Shapiro … Cast, Jesse Tyler
- April Parker Jones … Cast, Doctor
- Shannon Cochran … Cast, Susan Sawyer
- Amy Rosoff … Cast, Trisha Traynor
- William Stone Mahoney … Cast, Clerk
- Jeff Doucette … Cast, Warden
- Betty Murphy … Cast, Fern
- Suzanne Voss … Cast, Rose
- Renee Dorian … Cast, Elaine
- Bart Tangredi … Cast, Lead Agent
- J. René Peña … Cast, Secretary
- Angelo Tiffe … Cast, Doyle Attorney
- Kelly Sry … Cast, Computer Store Guy