My Review of How To Get Away With Murder's 5x07: "I Got Played"

Written by Maya Goldsmith
Directed by Eric Laneuville

Annalise (to Birkhead): "I can't wait to take you down."

Hopefully when this does inevitably happens, it will be pretty glorious. In three episodes, the show has certainly made Birkhead into a decent enough antagonist for Annalise as the fall out of Nate Sr's death also resulted in Annalise also botching Nate's chances of getting an inquest for his father. Like the title of the episode says, but it does seem like Annalise was a little too easily played here.

I was disappointed to also learn that Annalise had been drinking again but at least Bonnie took some steps to try and get her back on track while Tegan also stepped into the fray by giving Annalise enough dirt so that Emmett would take her back at Caplan & Gold. The Emmett bit took an interesting turn as Annalise offered to help him rather than blackmail him and he accepted her offer. Perhaps Emmett might not be a baddie after all.

Then there's the adoption bit of the episode - did Annalise successfully adopt a kid and lose them? Birkhead tried to hold this over Annalise in order to get her to back down but it wasn't successful. It's possibly that Gabriel might be that kid but surely, Annalise would've remembered him, right? Speaking of Gabriel it does seem like he's got his hooks into Michaela as Frank and Laurel continue to do nothing more than just spy on him.

As for Connor and Oliver - well, they talked to a nice female priest about their upcoming nuptials, went out with everyone else for the least "Gays Gone Wild" on network television before the former got into a fight with a homophobe. This at least answers as to why Connor is covered in bruises on the big day.

Speaking of the big day, the flashbacks seem to now indicate that Bonnie is not the killer but that she does know who the killer is though. The victim also seems to be male and the killer clearly had help in moving the body as well. It's probably the most exciting part of the flash forwards that we've had and hopefully next week's winter finale will give us a satisfying answer.

- Asher had some nice bits with Bonnie/Ronald and the gang this week but it's becoming obvious that the show has no idea what to do with him though.
- Connor hates Mamma Mia apparently. Yeah, I could live with that if I were Oliver.
- Laurel openly teased Michaela about her Tegan fixation but I'm still hoping for an Annalise/Tegan pairing at some point this season.
- Chronology: Not long until the big day now. A month has passed since Nate Sr's death as well.

I Got Played did little to advance Bonnie's storyline and I'm not sure about this previous adoption storyline with Annalise (who was floundering a lot this episode) but the flash forwards were the strongest we've had and hopefully this Gabriel storyline will be done with soon as well.

Rating: 7 out of 10