Revenge

We open season 4 with Victoria in the mental facility saying exactly what the doctor’s would like to hear. And Emily and Nolan hosting a party in their newly redecorated Grayson Manor. David is also about to come out to the public now that he’s been exonerated. Margot’s brother is running the magazine with her and Jack is becoming a cop. This is all apparently 6 months after the end of season 3.

Charlotte is back on her drug bullshit, and she is clearly in bed with Gideon and manipulating Daniel for money.

Good news for Daniel, David takes over as the stupidest boy in school when he trusts Victoria. This man truly believes that Victoria was just an innocent victim with him. She lets him believe his daughter is dead and apparently this psycho bitch is the “only thing that kept him alive”, not the fact that he has a daughter, not the opportunity to see Charlotte, Victoria…Victoria is what kept him alive. Now David Clarke was not a good father but that is such a batshit thing to say. Also her acting scared of him is actually insane. She is so psychotic. She even turns him against Emily, like truly a terrible person. She is worse than Conrad, at least he was honest about who he was.

Charlotte tries to jump off a building so Emily comes clean about who she is, to which Charlotte kind of just tells her to fuck off. Charlotte also has a full ass psychotic break burning the stowaway with Emily inside. The Grayson kids literally turn into their parents by the end of this show.

Emily being entirely uninterested in Jack’s cop buddy is hilarious.

Nepo baby moment number 3 apparently now Daniel wants a position on wall street. Again, didn’t even finish his business degree, has run an investment firm with no qualifications, partnered in a magazine with no media or creative experience and is now a personal financial adviser? There has never been a less qualified nepo baby.

My poor sweet baby Emily has to ID who broke into her house and that’s how she finds out that her father is alive. And then she has to watch Victoria claim him like he’s an object. And now Emily has to fight through all the horrible shit Victoria has been saying about her to David. Emily’s new mission is to get to her dad and this is the most emotional we’ve ever seen her. And David doesn’t believe that the girl that’s buried is his daughter, something doesn’t make sense to him. Charlotte is fed up with Victoria’s bullshit too, but she still cuts Emily out.

Emily has a confrontation with Margot, who has turned into the kind of heartless bitch that is perfect for Daniel, who is cheating on her during this confrontation.

Charlotte is truly her mother’s daughter, as she takes David to meet Jack. She uses Jack, and she forces him into lying to David. Charlotte cements the idea that Amanda is dead. And that leads him to blaming Nolan for not taking care of Amanda. The last season of this show really makes me scream at my TV a lot. Both Jack and Nolan give her hope that she is still in David’s heart.

Charlotte is truly a fucking trainwreck, she is exactly like her parents and heres the deal I say this with every piece of media analysis ever, your trauma does not justify your actions. If you are a shit person then I literally don’t care what you went through to get there, the minute you make your trauma everyone else's problem, you are the asshole.

David knows something is wrong but he is so broken and delusional that he thinks the person that wronged him is Nolan. And he blames him for Amanda’s financial situation on live TV.

Charlotte is leaving her mother, finally. Victoria remains delusional and psychotic. And David is literally very delusional, and Emily needs to drop the alias now. Daniel and Charlotte talk about how they don’t want to become their parents but like, we passed that point a long time ago. Daniel has shot 3 people and buried his family's secrets. He is Conrad. And Charlotte lied to and manipulated her brother, David, and Jack. She is Victoria.

Emily finally tells David who she is and she is emotional and exhausted from fighting and just as she reunites with her father, Victoria gets electrocuted. David, having been broken and brainwashed, goes with Victoria to the hospital instead of staying with Emily, now to be referred to as Amanda. David just being by Victoria’s bedside is so disgusting and she continues to try and poison David against her.

Oh I almost forgot to mention the Hamptons newest psychopath Louis, who has already tried to kill Margot, slept with Daniel, and is trying to cuddle up to Nolan. She is in fact absolutely nuts but Nolan clearly feels bad for her.

Ya know for someone who became a cob Jack has just 0 deductive reasoning skills whatsoever. Like seriously so stupid.

The entrance of the Malcom Black storyline was definitely a hail mary, this show was clearly supposed to have ended already but essentially what happened is Network execs said “well the show has good viewership and it's making us money so you can’t end it yet” so writers had to come up with something. I’m sure this is also what led to David still being alive. That said, Daniel dying as he finds out that he’s going to be a father is weirdly emotional. Like he has not redeemed himself to be clear, his trying to get back with Margot moments are paired with flashbacks about a situation where Daniel knows this girl got raped and during her trial he chooses his future over hers. So like we already hated Daniel, then we find out he didn’t help a girl that got raped? And we are supposed to feel bad that he dies? It was emotional that he saved Emily, it was great that he sacrificed himself for someone he caused so much harm for. But still, not redemption.

Margot goes to the police to try and clear Daniel’s name and Emily essentially agrees with her. She keeps to her story while also making Daniel sound like a broken person, who was still good. She took the blame for being the one to break him. Margot tells her not to come to the funeral and though Emily is upset about that it makes sense. Supposedly Ems is the one that shot him; she doesn’t need to be at the funeral. And the real rough part as Emily and the audience is that Malcom Black came looking for his daughter anyway, so ruining Daniel’s public image didn’t work, it wasn’t necessary.

David and Emily talking about the best way to make Victoria suffer is so psychotic but we love Emily already and we’re kind of used to it by now.

We’ve mentioned before how this show is kind of an eat the rich commentary at least it started that way. David tells Jack “after everything, you still believe in the justice system”, I think this is a good second bit of commentary that this show does very well. The justice system is just as corrupt as billionaires, because billionaires control the justice system.

Victoria spills her guts to Margot, about everything. Everything, everything.

Emily and Nolan find out that Louis’ family has been drugging her, and when they go to her room to help her Emily finds out that Victoria is the reason Kate came after her and by extension the reason Daniel is dead.

We’ve talked about how this is clearly an extension storyline, but I will say that the writers did everything they could. The tone is the same, the intensity and stakes are consistent. But we still get something new in seeing Emily be on the defense instead of the offense. Everything we’ve seen from her so far she’s been in control, even when something goes wrong she’s fixed it. She’s always 3 steps ahead but in this last season she’s on the defense. She doesn’t know her opponent, and she’s operating 1 step behind.

Margot is so perfect for Daniel, she wants to go after Emily but she is so wildly out of her league. She wants to expose Emily and get her prison time without realizing that if she does that Victoria also would go to prison. Victoria does truly try to talk her down as she knows Emily would destroy Margot if they went head to head.

Guys Emily Van Camp is so hot, they're all in this warehouse and her and Victoria are all tied upm Vicky kicks her the knife and Ems kicks Malcolm in the face and then hops over her restraints…mmm.

Nolan and Louise get married so that she can escape her mother, and her mother tells her that Louise killed her father. Which of course, she didn't. She was only 13. So Nolan comes to her rescue like the adorkable knight and shining armor he is.

Another new face halfway through the last season is…a choice but enter Natalie Watters.

Emily gets together with Ben the second Jack walks up, because of course this poor boy can't catch a break.

Jack is having a bad time, he basically tells Emily that he loves her and she pushes him away. He's back to bartending at Nolan’s club after a push from his friends.

Margot just won’t let up on going after Emily, she is now going after everyone around her. Using Louise’s brother to get to Nolan. The likelihood that Lyman could just get onto Nolan's computer is absolutely zero, sorry the computer he keeps all their evidence on? No, my techy boy would encrypt the hell out of that shit.

Margot being willing to go after Jack just shows how far gone she is. She has gone absolutely batshit crazy being willing to take a father away from his son. Emily is now on the offense which should make Margot very scared. She starts clearing Jack’s name by going after Margot’s henchmen. And of course Emily thwarts Margot once again. But Margot is really hell bent on destroying Emily which by the way is completely unwarranted. She knows that Emily didn’t actually kill Daniel, she knows what the Graysons did to Amanda and David and her psychopathic ass doesn’t care. She is going to be a terrible mom. Margot’s dumbass gets hit by a cab because her bitch ass was standing in the street and honestly it's what she deserves, her baby is only 9 weeks along, it felt nothing and it's not a person yet so don’t even go there with the “but the baby!” bullshit. It's not a baby is a clump of cells with no brain and no pain receptors. Margot of course uses her mistake to lie and turn Victoria back against Emily. We all know Emily didn’t push her so here we go with more yelling at the TV.

Stevie Grayson is on some shit thinking she gets a say in literally anything regarding Emily and Jack.

Also everyone saying Daniel would never attack Emily needs to be reminded that he shot her, and Aiden, and Tyler…the dude had emotional and violent tendencies. Now I know he saved Emily but him attacking her was so not far fetched.

Emily clears Daniel’s name by coming out to the world as Amanda Clarke, Margot and Victoria are shocked by her clearing Daniel's name, Nolan is shocked by all of it and Jack is standing by her side as she does. Because this poor sweet boy is so in love with her.

Victoria manipulated poor Louise into finding the flash drive Lyman stole from Nolan. Victoria continues to play the victim as if Emily attacked her and her family for no reason.

Again, Lyman just getting onto Nolan’s computer is the least believable part of this entire show. Emily basically being a super spy, sure. Global conspiracy? Of course. A rando using a flash drive to get onto a tech genius’ computer? Absolutely not.

Now the Clarke’s are a daddy-daughter duo who are truly unstoppable together. All of Emily’s wronged persons attempted coming together with Victoria at the helm but the very dangerous duo squashed the plan. Nolan realized he done fucked up (seriously who keeps evidence of all their crimes?).

Amanda opens up on live TV about all the people that she lost on her Revenge quest, and why she did what she did. Margot was getting all antsy hearing Amanda talk about Victoria and I’m so sorry but Margot’s feelings make no sense. Anyone that can hear about everything that the Grayson’s did and still defend them is gross, fuck Margot.

Now we see Amanda being the one hunted by all the people that she took down.

David is apparently dying from cancer but he won’t tell Amanda because she finally feels free, Victoria’s last attack on Emily is killing herself and framing Emily for it.

Jack has decided to leave for California and be with his mom because Emily said she doesn’t want to be with him.

So we have some very upsetting abandoned storylines, first off Javier. Nolan and him were going to be partners again and they left on good terms and then Javier just never came back. And Charlotte checked herself into rehab and then we just never hear from her again, including at Daniel’s funeral. Now I know that was probably a, the actress wanted out situation but it's still really lazy and could have been wrapped up better.

Mason comes out of nowhere to basically keep Emily busy while Victoria blows herself up in her old house, taking Grayson Manor down with her. Victoria had left a suicide note, but before she did she staged and attack at her penthouse. Now the problem I have is that in 3 and ½ seasons of this show there has not been a single thing that showed that Victoria is capable of framing Emily. Emily is eons smarter then Victoria, as is David so it's very hard for me to believe that she had the brains for this set up. Also we spent this whole show setting up Nolan as the hackeriest hacker, the techiest of tech guys and yet he couldn’t have recovered the video Victoria sent?

I will say the circular writing of Emily being wrongfully arrested at David’s house while being ripped away from Jack was a good choice.

Charlotte calling out her mother even after death is my favorite thing, she finally got a wake up call. Margot continues to be a massive bitch, she is fully aware that Emily didn’t kill Victoria but she is so blinded by rage that she doesn’t care.

When visiting Emily in jail, David collapses and Emily just has to stay there behind the glass unable to help him. Also framing Amanda and attempting to take her life away from her after taking her childhood and father away from her is straight up sadistic. And the doctors give David 6 months to live, and Amanda literally just got him back and the idea of losing him permanently is a lot.

Amanda tells Ben how Victoria faked her death and framed her and though he doesn’t believe her the man is a good cop and he investigates, and gets himself killed. Margot literally had Ben murdered to cover up Victoria’s lie.

Louise is so delusional…”most people think they know who Victoria was” bitch you knew her for like 2 months and you are so unstable and so easily manipulated. Also Nolan calling out Margot’s righteous ass bullshit was a good moment.

David finally kills Victoria who in turn shoots Amanda. And though David dies from his cancer we finally get a happy ending in Charlotte finally being back in her life, and Amanda marrying Jack. And of course Nolan basically becomes a revenge consultant.

Overall I think the show is pretty solid, it of course has some flaws and the writers very clearly got backed into some corners but they did very well with their circumstances and they managed to still tell a story that had a satisfying ending (even if it did go on too long). It is one of my favorite shows, I was happy to rewatch it after several years and it is one of the very few pieces of plot driven media that still has enough character development to hold my emotions.