Revenge - Recap: Tick-Tock, Goes the Clarke

And yet, I felt "Blood" was so cluttered with stories that felt completely inessential that I couldn't help but feel confused. Seriously, why is Emily (Emily VanCamp) pushed so far off to the side this week? I could understand it if this were more of an ensemble drama like Downton Abbey, in which there is no real lead, per se. But this is Revenge. And it just feels like a narrative mistake to focus so little on her journey, as the episode volleys back and forth between the Graysons, Mason, the increasingly tiresome LeMarchals, and Nolan's would-be tech start-up partner, Javier (Henri Esteve). This wouldn't have been such a big deal if not for how much more interesting Emily's side of things actually ended up being, as Aiden (Barry Sloane) revisits the circumstances of his father's death in furtherance of helping piece together just how Pascal (Olivier Martinez) is connected to Conrad (Henry Czerny) and the frame-up of their fathers. So "Blood" was a mix of good and bad, this week. But at least the plot is moving again for next week, as it looks to be the return of Emily's "one-by-one" approach to revenging. After all, if you're going to knock down a few dominoes, you've got to set them up first.

Credit: ABC

So Emily and Aiden travel to England to meet with Aiden's mother (Claire Jacobs), whom he hasn't seen in 8 years. His mother still lives in the old family home, even in spite of all the controversy surrounding Aiden's father being branded a terrorist by the media following his death. Thus, Aiden is forced to confront his father's death more directly, as he revisits his dad's old workshop -- the very same spot in which he discovered his father's body after the man shot himself in the head. Apparently, the late Trevor Mathis had planted the bomb on the plane because the men who'd kidnapped Colleen (his daughter, Aiden's sister) threatened to kill her if he didn't. Ultimately, Aiden judges his father as having taken "the coward's way out" and bitterly resents him for it, more so than for the whole scandal that resulted. To make matters worse, Aiden's mother doesn't know that Colleen is dead, and so she still clings desperately to the hope that her daughter is alive. All in all, the story is as emotionally dark as anything Revenge has done in recent weeks, I'd argue.

Credit: ABC

And through the generally darker nature of that story, we got some solid scenes. Aiden confessing the truth about Colleen to his mother is the most human the show has allowed Aiden to be in some time, showing that this is truly a man that comes from somewhere. He has a past and a history beyond just sharing the same mentor and (occasionally) the same goals as Emily. He's his own man who exists independently of her, and he has his own wrongs to avenge. Barry Sloane is far better than the show often allows him to show. But beyond Sloane's solid performance, we get further motion on the search for a connection between Pascal and Conrad. In the workshop where Trevor killed himself, he finds the name of a reported carved into a workbench: Oscar Chapman. Turns out, Chapman died years ago, and he may provide the missing link, if he's not the missing link himself. Aiden and Emily set out to find him, after another customary roll in the hay, since these two just can't decide if they're together or not. Hell, they allow Aiden's mother to believe they're engaged -- all this before his mother breaks it to Emily that she's essentially marrying a man who is emotionally still that 11-year-old boy that found his father dead. Which I guess makes him the perfect fit for Ems, really. If nothing else, it makes him a perfect partner to help track this Chapman down, since they both are working towards the same goal: a measure of retribution for their fathers.

Credit: ABC

On that score, it turns out Chapman is actually alive, having faked his own death some years ago. We learn this from Mason Treadwell, who, earlier in the episode, threatens Emily with an ultimatum from prison. Either she shows some sign of commitment to following through on her "Take the fall for these crimes and you can have exclusive rights to my revenge story" plan, or he'll blab her true identity to Victoria (Madeleine Stowe). She has 24 hours to make up her mind ("Tick-tock, goes the Clarke," he teases from the prison phone). In classic Emily Thorne fashion, she follows through by having some face cream sent to Mason, who puts it on and quickly begins to convulse before falling over, dead. Except not so much. Apparently, the cream was laced with a potent Japanese herb that causes the body to simulate death for twelve hours. Nolan (Gabriel Mann) is able to spirit Mason away via body bag, and essentially bust him out of prison, setting him up with a new identity, some money, and a scenic villa in the Maldives, where he is to wait for future instructions. And it's here that Nolan learns the truth about Chapman, which sets us up for another mystery hunt, since there is someone out there who holds the key to unlocking this entire pesky Pascal/Conrad connection.

Credit: ABC

And on that note, I don't think I could possibly have cared any less about Pascal and Conrad's interminable bickering than I did tonight. Maybe it's just from wanting to get back to more Emily-related stuff, but every scene related to Conrad poaching a South American investor from Voulez just came across as terminally dull. Doubly so for just about anything involved Margaux (Karine Vanasse), who continues to feel marginalized by her father. Yes, it's a strange mirror of how everyone seems to be doing things either in the name of, or in opposition to, their father. But even now, this latest development, in which Pascal reveals that he's really signing Voulez over to Margaux's shiftless half-brother Gideon, does nothing more than set up the introduction of another wheel-spinning character down the line. So this isn't even a case of cautious optimism for the future, as I'm kind of dreading the addition of another LeMarchal to the mix. Ditto the love triangle developing between Margaux, Jack (Nick Wechsler), and Daniel (Josh Bowman), which just feels strangely devoid of any real passion. That said, we at least got a solid scene of Pascal admitting he hasn't always been the best father to Margaux, a scene that succeeded in being far more poignant than I would have expected it to be. But that felt like a one-off gem, and in no way a harbinger for things to come.

Credit: ABC

In fact, I felt the same way about Stevie (Gail O'Grady) falling off the wagon after Victoria taunts her with a bottle of gin and accusations of guilt in indirectly causing the "death" of her client, Mason Treadwell. Much like with Margaux and Pascal, it only works when all the story is stripped away to simply being about a parent and their child. In this case, it's an inverse relationship, as Jack takes care of Stevie and vows to get her out of the Hamptons and back to LA, for her own good. However, when Jack refuses Stevie's offer to come with, saying he intends to help Emily finish carrying out her plan, Stevie makes the proclamation that Daniel was right: Jack is in love with Emily. I'd say I didn't see that coming, but that would be a lie. Of course, it would also be a lie if I said I wasn't intrigued by it. And hey, it's leagues better than the nonsense in which Charlotte (Christa B. Allen) gets snoopy when she senses Jack, Nolan, and Emily are in league with each other, prompting her to team up with Javier, who's angry with Nolan for offering him an uneven partnership contract for his app. For a story that might actually end up tying into the main revenge plot, this felt so tangential as if to be nonexistent. Hopefully, they find a way to use these two characters better, in the coming weeks, if they absolutely must be used at all.

"Blood" is an iffy Revenge, in which the good is weighted dreadfully against the bad. But even a bad Revenge is still Revenge, so it's not like I'm mad at the show. I mean, hell, I'll watch if the show is populated with nothing but LeMarchals and Charlottes and Javiers. I mean, of course. But I just can't pretend as if that'd be good for the story in any way whatsoever. So here's hoping Revenge focuses a little less on secondary and tertiary characters, and instead gets back to giving us the Emily-related goods next week.