Wednesday, October 30, 2013

My Review of Revenge's 3x05: "Control"


Written by Ted Sullivan
Directed by Allison Liddi-Brown

Emily (to Daniel, re losing her father): “I still feel that pain like it was yesterday, so I push people away.”

Well, this episode was certainly a mixed bag for Emily, wasn’t it? On one hand, she managed to succeed in pulling two of the men in her life back in line while potentially driving two other of them away from her. Let’s focus on the latter for a moment, shall we?

Jack wasn’t best pleased when Aiden threatened him and when he found out that Emily knew Aiden, it seemed to annoy him all the more. While I do think that Jack does have a right to be angry with Emily, it does seem that nothing he says to her at the moment is sinking. This is probably setting up an inevitable shooting for Emily but at the same time, I can see why Emily herself isn’t so keen to take Jack’s advice on board.

Similarly Emily didn’t seem that receptive this week when Nolan advised her to be more careful as well with her general scheming. However while Emily didn’t really pay attention to Nolan on that front, she did at least have the sense to take his advice on sharing something with Daniel to reel the latter back in.

I have to admit the Daniel stuff this week was actually a lot more interesting. I liked that both Victoria and Margaux both pointed out that he didn’t know his fiancée as well as he thought he did and that he listened to. More to the point, I did kind of like Emily feeding Daniel some of the real her in order to sate him. For the time being, it’ll probably work but it’s becoming obvious that Daniel is wising up a little towards Emily though.

Then there’s Aiden. Aiden made a blunder this week by putting Jack in harm’s way and threatening him in order to get him to leave. However I do like that he did amend the situation by actually figuring out who really did try to kill Conrad and that he told Victoria about it as well. That did make up for his behaviour in the last two episodes as did his final scene with Emily in this episode as well.

As for Conrad’s would be assassin – Patrick. Of course it had to be him but I did like that Victoria got Charlotte to lie while the latter thought she was protecting Jack. As twists go, it’s a pretty neat one but if Patrick is willing to try and kill Conrad then it’s certainly likely that he might try to shoot Emily as well. His fixation on Victoria alone would certainly give him a reasonable motive to do so.

Keeping with Patrick in this episode – is it too much to hope that he genuinely likes Nolan? He certainly acted that in this episode by being hurt with the latter investigating him and then kissing Nolan again at the end of the episode. I do want to root for the pair of them as a couple but if Patrick does turn out to be Emily’s shoot, then his time on the show and relationship with Nolan won’t be too long for this world sadly. It’s also another reason why I am now hoping Emily’s shooter does turn out to be either Charlotte or Ashley.

Also in “Control”

Why do I get the feeling that Victoria and Margaux are going to team up at some point in the season against Emily?

Conrad (re Jack): “You believe you can help me with that?”
Aiden: “I guarantee it.”

Conrad seems to think that Aiden and Victoria are sleeping together. Going by Aiden’s exchanges with Victoria though, it’s obvious he’s not.

Margaux (re Emily): “You’ve never seen her parents?”
Daniel: “No.”
Margaux: “Well, it seems then that we both have to learn about your elusive fiancée.”

Jack (re Conrad): “I don’t care what he wants.”
Aiden: “Well, you need to.”

Not surprisingly enough, Patrick is working in Victoria’s gallery. I do like that Patrick and Daniel put their differences aside in this episode too.

Nolan: “You say that Ems but the more strings you pull the easier is it to get strangled.”

Nolan: “I’ve always been wired a little differently, which is great when it comes to inventing gadgets, not so great when it comes to dealing with people.”
Patrick: “I get that. I’ve been here for six months and I still feel like an outsider.”

Standout music: Silversun Pickups “Ribbons & Detours”.

Victoria (to Margaux): “You can spend your life being controlled by powerful men or you can control them.”

Victoria (re killer): “Who was it?”
Aiden: “One of your children.”

Chronology: Not long from where “Mercy” left off.

“Control” was definitely a stronger episode than the previous one. I still think this season is a marked improvement on the last one but it does also feel like we’re just counting down to the moments where Emily gets married and shot at the same time. Still, this was a great episode with some nice character moments though.

Rating: 9 out of 10

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