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How to Get Away With Murder Recap: Let’s Be Frank

How to Get Away With Murder

It’s About Frank
Season 3 Episode 5
Editor’s Rating 4 stars
VIOLA DAVIS

How to Get Away With Murder

It’s About Frank
Season 3 Episode 5
Editor’s Rating 4 stars
Viola Davis as Annalise. Photo: Richard Cartwright/ABC

Another week, another flashback-filled episode. Thank God we get some big-ass text to let us know where we are in time. Thank you, big-ass text. Also, thank you, God, for all the hairstyles Annalise wears in this episode. It provides a sense of realism to show how many haircuts and protective styles a black woman will try out in her life.

This episode starts out in THE PRESENT DAY as Laurel gets examined in the hospital … and the doctors put some of that ultrasound jelly on her belly. She’s pregnant. Meggie lets Oliver and Bonnie know exactly what’s going on with her. Then we flash to THREE WEEKS EARLIER, when Bonnie plans for her father to be cremated after feeling his cheap-ass suit. She gets a call from Laurel, who wants to know where Frank is. Bonnie says she’ll call Laurel if she sees Frank and she turns around and Frank is standing RIGHT THERE. Oh, hi, Frank. How have you been?

Back on campus, the Keating Gang is studying for their big exam and Simon, that guy in their class, gives them a photocopy of his own ass. Meanwhile, Annalise is off having the blackest black girl magic experience — getting her weave sew-in by none other than Mary J. Blige. I just about passed out during this scene because it was so perfect. At one point, a man comes into the salon selling DVDs. Annalise lets the girls in the shop know that Nate isn’t staying with her anymore. While Annalise lives inside one of my dreams, Bonnie talks with Frank to figure out just why he did what he did. Then, we enter one of many Frank-related flashbacks.

Suddenly it’s 11 YEARS EARLIER. Frank is alone in a jail cell and Sam Keating is visiting him. Frank’s family got in touch with Sam to find out whether there is anything he can do to make sure Frank gets out on parole. Frank resists, but Sam takes the case to Annalise who has amazing micro braids down her back. Annalise doesn’t see the point, but she meets with Frank anyway. Frank has been committing crimes in prison and Annalise thinks he’s trying to avoid the real world.

Back in the THREE-WEEKS-EARLIER time, Annalise goes to an AA meeting. Why is it that whenever a TV character has to go to an Anonymous meeting, they’re always running late and sit in the back hoping not to be noticed? Annalise is reluctant about sharing, but then she notices President LaGuerta there. Annalise confronts her after the meeting, which is very appropriate and a good idea; then she goes home to pack up all her liquor and throw it in the trash. Somewhere, Bonnie and Frank are arguing about Frank’s coming clean to Annalise. Back in the past, Sam insists that Annalise help Frank and Annalise says that Sam just wants to feel like a daddy and guilt her into having children. Annalise breaks down and reminds him that the last time he touched her was when she said no to IVF. Sam comforts her and tells her that she’s enough for him. That’s all any of us want.

Annalise is throwing out all her liquor in the THREE-WEEKS-EARLIER time and she reminisces about taking shots of Jägermeister with Sam on their first day in the house. She had a kicky short haircut when they move in. In an effort to deal with the withdrawal, she shaves her legs and the blood reminds her of when she miscarried in 2001. This episode gets dark. She flops into bed to keep wallowing and think about the day when she got hired by the university and made out with Sam. She’s writhing around in pain because you can’t quit drinking cold turkey, I learned that in health class in ninth grade. She goes to the trash, fishes out a bottle, and starts drinking.

Then there’s this fight between Simon and the Keating Gang. He accuses them of stealing his laptop and Michaela gets up in his face when he says she just wants to trade her rich daddy for a rich husband. She rips him a new asshole and he runs away terrified. Also, she has a little bit of a southern accent. Wes is having dinner with Meggie’s dad, who thinks bonding is asking one million pointed questions. Annalise is back at home, cradling her bottle of alcohol and listening to Kelis. Listen, we’ve all been there. She calls Nate and leaves him a positively tragic voicemail.

Bonnie and Frank are lying in a hotel room. Frank knows he can’t go back. Maybe Bonnie could run away with him. They could go to a small town and get regular jobs. They could have babies? Maybe? No? Okay. While they drift awkwardly off to sleep, we flash back to Sam and Frank in the prison discussing Frank’s attempted-murder charge. Sam knows that Frank still has some guilt over trying to kill his father, but Frank admits that he planned to knock over that car while his father was repairing it and his only regret is that it didn’t kill him. Frank breaks down crying and Sam knows that, deep down, he’s a good boy. When the flashback is over, Bonnie gets down next to Frank on the floor and imagines their life together. Maybe they could go on hikes. They touch each other’s faces for a really, really long time and have sex on the floor of the hotel room while an angel serenades them. Nate listens to his Annalise voice mail while he’s in bed with the prosecutor.

Wes goes straight from his dinner with Meggie’s dad to helping Annalise dance drunkenly in the hall and holding her hair back while she pukes. Annalise breaks down while lying on the floor of her bathroom. She screams at Wes to go away because everyone is too good to her, including Nate. Wes tells her that he’s there to protect her. He drops Annalise into bed and she dreams about going to help Frank in prison after her first bout of morning sickness. She has flashes of her happy pregnancy and relives the accident.

Meanwhile, it turns out Michaela really did steal Simon’s computer and he was the one who made the “killer” fliers. Annalise isn’t too concerned that some hater is trying to bring her down. She storms over to Simon’s apartment and threatens him to keep his mouth shut. She heads over to President LaGuerta’s office to let her know that she will be filing a lawsuit and she will expect to get her job back. President LaGuerta relents, but lets Annalise know that she needs to get real help.

Oh! Also! Wes and Laurel are into each other, I guess? And Wes is going to break up with Meggie? Whatever their relationship status, Wes takes Laurel to Annalise’s house to tell her that Frank is in Coalport and ask why she tried to have him killed. Then Bonnie walks in …

Oliver and Bonnie are at the hospital in the FIRE time and they try to call other people to let them know that Laurel is pregnant. Bonnie tells a mystery caller and Oliver tries to call Connor, but Michaela picks up (with her weird old southern mom?) and he lets her know instead.

A previous version of this recap misspelled Meggie’s name.

HTGAWM Recap: Let’s Be Frank