As any O.G (Original Gladiator) knows, it can be difficult to keep up with the fast-paced world of Pope & Associates. The purpose of this recap is to break down the key moments from each episode without wasting time on unnecessary filler storylines. Ready? Let’s jump in.
**Spoilers below. Scroll down at your own risk**

1. Case of the week: Karen Grant (the President’s daughter)
The episode kicks off with Olivia getting a call from Karen who’s vomiting all over herself at a crazy college party. What a romantic way to push Olitz back together! The teen was somehow able to weasel her way past secret service to get to the party and calls Olivia to save her when she realizes she’s in over her head. Once Olivia arrives at the party, she’s able to get Karen out with the help of Quinn, but the drama doesn’t end there. Karen then receives a text message featuring a sex tape starring herself from earlier that night.
Once they get to the White House, Fitz is livid, as any father would be if their daughter ran away from boarding school, hopped on her friend’s dad’s jet, and got wasted at a party. He asks Karen if she got raped, but she replies angrily that she was the one who chose to do everything she did, a.k.a YOLO. 
When OPA tracks down the boy who recorded Karen and his parents, they say they will agree to keep the sex tape private, but only for $2.5 million. Yes, they’re trying to blackmail the President of the United States and they’re using his teenage daughter as a pawn. Shouldn’t this be illegal? Probably, but anything goes on ‘Scandal.’
Fitz agrees to pay the parents and just sweep the situation under the rug, but Olivia turns the tables on the parents that she calls “sick sons of bitches.” Since Karen and the boys are all underage, the boy’s parents would technically be distributing child porn if they released the tapes. Olivia threatens to call every news organization in order to tarnish their names and is able to scare them off.
2. Olitz Reunites
Thanks to Karen’s wild adventures, Olivia and Fitz are able to find some real alone time for the first time this season. Their scenes are just as broody and melodramatic as you remember from previous seasons and I, for one, am completely over the Olitz roller coaster.
When Olivia visits Fitz to tell him that he’s being blackmailed by the family of the boy who made the sex tape of Karen, they have a quick moment of passion before Olivia ruins it by telling him that she’s currently with Jake. Fitz is obviously still in love with Olivia and he gets really pissy when she mentions Jake and storms out.
Even though Olivia was close to completely giving in to Fitz again, it gives me hope that she was able to break free from his hold this time. I can’t say this enough: the Olitz relationship is toxic and Olivia can do much better. I don’t buy that she’s going to live the rest of her life being as tortured as she is right now and part of leaving this life behind is leaving Fitz behind for good.   
3. Papa Pope takes down Jake…Maybe.
Rowan is no longer the peaceful man we’ve been seeing so far this season. After Jake threatened to take him down last week, Rowan is out to get him first. Papa Pope enlists Secret Service Agent Tom Larson to kill Jake for him, but when Jake catches wind of this, he tries to sway Tom to play for his team instead.
When Cyrus decides to call for a probe in the Secret Service, they find a discrepancy in Tom’s schedule while he was supposed to be on duty at the White House. Tom is brought in to a secret meeting where he asked about his whereabouts on November 2 to which he responds he was on a secret mission, but doesn’t specify. Suddenly, Rowan interrupts the meeting and tells the official interviewing Tom that he would take over the interview from there. Then, we go from 0 to 100 real quick.
While the President and Cyrus look on, Rowan is able to get Tom to admit that on the night he was missing from duty, he was stealing a vile of bacterial meningitis. The same meningitis that killed Jerry Grant. Even though Rowan is the one who ordered Tom to kill Jerry, Tom states that it was actually Jake who told him to assassinate the President’s son.
The episode ended with Tom being put in handcuffs and Jake being surrounded by scary looking men in suits. Things don’t seem to bode well for either of them at this point. 
This may be wishful thinking since we’re only on week four, but I hope this is what ends the pissing match between Jake and Rowan. If this were any other show, you could conclude that this is the end of Jake, but since it’s ‘Scandal,’ we have to keep an open mind to the fact that he just might be able to come out on top after all.
4. Olivia vs. Mellie
Fitz tried to keep his daughter’s escapades a secret from Mellie considering she’s  still having a hard time with Jerry’s death, but she knows something is up when she spots Olivia back in the White House. Mellie initially suspects that Olivia and Fitz are back on, but then Fitz is forced to explain why Olivia is really back.
Of course Mellie doesn’t take it well, but by the end of the episode we see a sweet moment between Karen and Mellie where they’re able to bond about missing Jerry. Despite the circumstances, I really hope this time with her daughter does more good for Mellie than bad.
What did you think of this week’s episode of ‘Scandal’?
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