Episode Report Card Pablo G: B+ | 25 USERS: A+ YOU GRADE IT Natural Election
By Pablo G | Season 2 | Episode 21 | Aired on 05.12.2013
Ems hurries into the Grayson victory party. She goes up to a bouncer and asks to be let in VIP. She has to wait while he runs a check with security. While she waits, she scans the room for Jack and calls Nolan, but there's no answer. Cut to Nolan being interrogated. They ask when he conceived Carrion -- whether it was during one of his countless visits to David Clarke in prison. The investigator queues up surveillance footage on a nearby TV of young Nolan meeting with David. Nolan invites the FBI to figure out who unleashed Carrion and why. He namedrops the Falcon and the Initiative, explaining that they killed Padma. Nolan's starting to sound a bit like a conspiracy theorist, and has just implicated himself in Padma's death yet again. Now, the investigator begins playing a video of Padma confessing her relationship with Nolan.
Back at the party, everyone's watching the big screen TV, which is showing the local news. They project that Conrad will win the election. Ems finds Ashley and asks where Jack is. Ash says she has no idea, so Emanda reveals she knows all about Ashley's plan with Jack and that Declan's dead. All Ashley knows is that she's supposed to play the tape of Conrad talking to Nate during the speech and Jack wanted a press box to watch. Ems tells Ash that Jack's there to kill Conrad and she cannot let him go out to the podium. Cut back to the video of Padma. Tears stream down Nolan's face as she implicates him as David Clarke's disciple, an anarchist and Americon Initiative. She entirely sold him out. But was this all carried out by the Initiative? And why now?
Backstage, Ashley congratulates Conrad on officially becoming governor of New York. She tells him he can't go out onstage yet without his family, but Conrad doesn't really care at this point. Ash gives Conrad every opportunity to redeem himself, but he just doesn't. She brings up Declan's passing, and Conrad nonchalantly calls it "terrible" and segues directly into how it'll play into his speech. Ashley can't believe her boss never misses out on a trick. "You don't get to where we are by ignoring opportunities," he intones. After thinking for a couple seconds, she says she thinks they're all set for Conrad to go out onstage and she'll let everyone know. Holy shit. Go, Ashley! When she walks out, an elevator door opens to reveal Daniel and a security guard. Dan looks like he's seen a ghost and has his hands clasped in front of his stomach awkwardly. He asks to borrow a shirt as his father passes by to go out onstage. With his father gone, Dan moves his hand to reveal his shirt cuff covered in blood.