Episode Report Card M. Giant: B- | 367 USERS: B YOU GRADE IT The Final Countdown
By M. Giant | Season 7 | Episode 24 | Aired on 2009.05.18
At 7:37:22, Taylor is surprised to enter the residence and find Henry sitting up in a chair in his robe, and Olivia pacing around the room unhappily. She knows right away that something's up, and it's not just Henry. "Olivia wouldn't say until you got here," Henry says gravely. As Olivia gestures for her mom to sit down, she prefaces by saying she hopes they'll understand. "It's going to be hard enough to say once." Taylor calls her Livvie as she asks what's up. "Jonas Hodges is dead because of me," Olivia says slowly. Taylor's upset enough when she merely thinks that Olivia just leaked the info, but Olivia says it's even worse: Fighting tears, she says, "He killed Roger. Hodges killed my brother. And then you agreed to put him into Witness Protection." So really, this is Taylor's fault. "And the thought of him getting away was too much for me. So I called Martin Collier." They both react somewhat to that name, because as we know, everybody knows Martin Collier=evil. "He had once told me he knew someone who could do this kind of thing." Taylor thinks she's saying Martin hired a hit man, but Olivia has to say she did it herself. Taylor's eyes close in anguish as Olivia starts babbling about having tried to call it off, but it was too late. Henry asks who else knows, and Olivia tells them about Ethan and his recording of her and Martin, and how he's leaving it up to Taylor. She doesn't mention that Aaron knows as well, and of course we all know about Aaron's poor record of covering up for people in the White House. Instead of deciding what to do right now, Taylor grabs her daughter by the shoulders and shakes her, demanding, "How could you do something so stupid?" Well, Madam President, look at her birth certificate. If the date on it is less than thirty years ago, then there's your answer. It used to be that everyone under twenty on this show was automatically an idiot, but then Spawn got older and raised the bar. Henry tells Taylor to quit yelling at Olivia, and reminds her that Hodges killed their son. "If anyone deserves to die, it's him. All you should be thinking about now is how to protect our daughter." In other words, he wants her to destroy the recording. "And cover up a murder?" Taylor says incredulously. Henry tells her to cut the crap. "You're Olivia's mother." "I'm also the President of the United States," she reminds him. "And our family's already paid a steep enough price for that," Henry says. Ooh, dick move. "Your job cost our son his life." Taylor says she couldn't have done anything to save Roger, so Henry says she can save Olivia. "For God's sakes, Allison. We've already lost one child." Olivia's just staring pathetically at Taylor this whole time, which, if she were my kid, I'd ship her off to jail just to get her to knock that shit off.