Recap/Review: How To Get Away With Murder's 1x14: The Night Lila Died

I know it was a double bill season finale but I'm reviewing both of the final episodes seperately (next one on Monday), so here are my thoughts on the first half of the finale.

Written by Michael Foley
Directed by Laura Innes

Kangaroo Court: Oh, Rebecca - your lying, manipulative, scheming antics were eventually going to catch up with you and how appropriate that it would be in the final run of episodes for this happen. Aside from the fact that you were a terrible friend to Lila (who is actually more annoying than you are) but Wes finally wised up to your dubious charms and Laurel, Connor and Michaela were more than happy to confront you on your true involvement in Lila's demise. Also it seems that threatening the Keating 5 only results in being tied and gagged and left in the bathroom as well. Even Annalise looked shocked when she walked in on that moment.

With Friends Like These: Let's be honest - both Rebecca and Lila are terrible friends to each other. Rebecca has a horrible tendency of trying to bring people to her questionable level and Lila was just a vacuous spoiled trying to live on the wild side before realising she actually loved her loser boyfriend, Griffin. In flashbacks, we saw Lila and Rebecca's horrible friendship fall to piece and the latter getting revenge of sorts by sleeping with Griffin and making sure that Lila caught them. I want to feel bad for Lila, considering she ended up dying horribly but she's actually pretty annoying to be honest.

Getting Tested: With Connor being a "drug addict", Oliver thought it would be a great idea for the pair of them to get tested for STDs so that they then could have sex without any worries. A reasonable enough request and one that saw Connor's sexuality partially explained onscreen with some backhanded comments from Michaela and Asher on safe sex but on the plus side - Connor's gotten the all clear. As for Oliver, if I wasn't spoiled already, I could've easily guessed what would be revealed about his outcome in the second part of this finale. More on that in the second part of this review too.

Changing Judges/Lawyers: Oh Annalise - you send your boyfriend up shit creek and when he isn't getting denied bail and his ass handed to him in prison, at least you try to do the right thing by getting a better judge for him. Nate has every right to piss with Annalise but I did like that he's going to follow her advice and get a better lawyer for himself (I smell big guest star next season) and I also liked Asher's role in the judge's downfall and the rather direct way in which Frank informed both Asher and Bonnie that he was aware of them sleeping together. It's the little moments really.

Confession Is Bad For Trials: Obviously of course it is but I really liked the case of the week. Not only did it break up the flashbacks and current fears of Rebecca with the Keating 5 (minus Asher) but it was twisty enough to keep general interest going. The show could've easily had Father Andrew being an actual paedophile instead of one who ended up killing a fellow priest for the crime in question, so points there for the twist and the great scenes that Andrew also had with Annalise. While this is likely the last case of the week for this season, I thought it was a solid and engaging ones. Sure we've had better ones but this was still great stuff though.

Next episode, we finally found out who murdered Lila.