‘How To Get Away With Murder,’ Season 3 Episode 6: ‘Is Somebody Really Dead?’

Yet another shocking turn of events in this week’s episode of How To Get Away With Murder. We begin with Annalise Keating (Viola Davis) finding out about Bonnie (Liza Weil) visiting Frank (Charlie Weber) in Coalport after Laurel (Karla Souza) spills the beans directly to Annalise, with both Wes (Alfred Enoch) and Bonnie present, although the latter shows up behind Laurel at Annalise’s house right after she says this.

‘How To Get Away With Murder,’ Season 3 Episode 6

A naturally-furious Annalise chews out Bonnie for lying to her and going behind her back to go seek Frank. As Annalise begins to trash Bonnie for acting ‘stupid’ and guessing that she slept with Frank, Bonnie reveals that she secretly managed to get Frank’s confession of murdering Wes’ biological father, Wallace Mahoney, on tape, after calling him out for doing it while Wes was standing right there and thus making him a suspect. She plays the recording in front of Annalise, Wes and Laurel, but Prof. Keating refuses to bring this to the police. The reason? She is afraid if they all rat out Frank for this, he may retaliate by revealing to the authorities the Keating 5’s own little secrets, which include killing Annalise’s husband Sam (murdered by Wes), and Asher (Matt McGorry) killing former A.D.A Emily Sinclair for her saying Asher’s father deserved to die.

> BUY NOW: ‘How To Get Away With Murder,’ Season 2

Immediately, everyone begins pointing fingers at each other: Wes begins to say Frank should be killed for trying to frame him for Mahoney’s murder, which Bonnie criticizes him for, while Laurel tells Annalise this is all her fault for going after Frank in the first place. Annalise angrily retorts that she never actually hired a hitman to kill Frank, and as she and Bonnie continue to bicker, Wes gets a call from Meggy (Corbin Reid), who says the NYPD are outside his apartment. (Remember: Mahoney was killed in New York) Laurel begins to talk to Meggy and per Annalise’s instructions, Laurel tells Meggy to say to the police she believes Wes simply went to the library, but that she’s really not sure.

Annalise decides that Wes should stay with her for a few days (or weeks, we don’t really know) so that he doesn’t go talk to the police. Wes literally doesn’t leave the house for anything, not even for Annalise’s class, and he and Bonnie constantly exchange cold words and express severe distrust for each other. Bonnie hires a lawyer for Wes, with Annalise’s grudging approval. Meanwhile, the other four members of the Keating squad and the rest of Annalise’s class gets assigned a new case, as Annalise gets her license back from the Philadelphia board, though with conditions that include her submitting to random alcohol testing and continuing to attend AA meetings.

The first case with Annalise re-instated as a lawyer involves a female veteran named Daniela (aka ‘Dani’), who is accused of assaulting a man at a bar by slashing his throat with a knife, though not killing him. After Laurel, Asher, Conor (Jack Falahee) and Michaela (Aja Naomi King) fail to present strong arguments for a defense, Annalise chooses the squad’s nemesis, the unabashedly nerdy, arrogant and sycophantic Simon Drake (Behzad Dabu), as her first chair, despite the fact Annalise found out last week that Simon was the student behind the defamatory ‘killer’ flyers. Simon suggests using the defense that Dani was suffering from PTSD following an incident where she was attacked from behind and nearly killed several years ago during a mission in Afghanistan, as well as the fact that she is a woman serving in the armed forces, hoping the judge and jury will sympathize with this.

Annalise’s first performance in court since her reinstatement goes atrociously, and her nemesis, plaintiff lawyer and A.D.A Renee Atwood (Milauna Jackson) makes no effort to rub it in her face. Not to mention the fact that Atwood is still dating Nate (Billy Brown), after the policeman left Annalise because of her alcoholic tendencies. Annalise attempts to badger and incriminate the man that Dani attacked at the bar, the first to take the witness stand, with supremely aggressive questions, which lead Atwood to repeatedly object and the judge to sustain all of these objections, pressing Ms. Keating to move on.

In the courtroom bathroom after the first recess, Michaela– as always, incredibly desperate to do whatever it takes to impress Annalise and become first chair– reveals a game-changing piece of information she discovered about Dani’s case. Records show, Michaela explains, that Dani was never actually in Afghanistan the day of the mission she claims caused her supposed PTSD. The veteran was working a desk job that day. Annalise angrily confronts her client, telling Dani she has severely hurt her own case by lying. Annalise says she can’t put Dani on the stand given this new revelation, but she does so anyway, and plans for Bonnie to interrupt Dani’s description of the made-up incident mid-trial by storming into the courtroom and presenting Ms. Keating with documents that prove she is lying, so that Annalise can show this to the judge.

Conor pays a visit to Wes at Annalise’s house one day and begins blaming him for everything that has happened to the Keating 5 because of his murder of Sam for trying to defend his ex-girlfriend, Rebecca. Conor then threatens Wes by saying he will kill him if Wes mentions Conor’s name to the police.

Asher fights with Michaela again, for the n-th time about wanting to be in a real relationship with her, as opposed to simply being sex-friends, and Michaela rejects his advances until nearly the very end, succumbing to Asher’s good-natured character despite his outwardly childish and goofy persona (Asher even does a fantastic, GIF-worthy ‘Cotton-Eyed Joe’ jig, again poking fun at Michaela for her Southern upbringing).

Meanwhile, Michaela continues to help Oliver (Conrad Ricamora) find a new guy to date by using a gay dating app, and Oliver ultimately lands a date with a guy named Thomas, who kisses Oliver on the first date. Conor continues to be jealous, desperately wanting to get back with Oliver, but the latter refuses.

Dani’s case ends with her confessing to lying and pledging to submit to Veteran’s Treatment Center, a program designed for veterans to cope with substance abuse (which Annalise deduced after Dani told her she ‘needed help’) and other similar issues. Although Dani begins to protest that this option will forbid her from serving in the army ever again, Annalise explains that her only other option is prison, so Dani ends up choosing the former.

Meggy goes to visit Wes, concerned for his well-being and attempts to urge him to speak to the police and tell them he was simply a witness to Mahoney’s murder and not the killer. She even offers to let her aunt, who is a lawyer, defend Wes but he refuses, and breaks up with her, saying he doesn’t want her to get hurt or keep involving her in all this mess. Meggy leaves, heartbroken.

Wes goes to visit Laurel without telling Annalise or Bonnie, and although he initially continues to suspect Laurel is still in love with Frank, she quickly dismisses this and says she is done with Frank after learning that he tried to indirectly frame Wes for Mahoney’s murder. Laurel implicitly tells Wes that the only person she really cares about now is him. Wes tells Laurel he broke up with Meggy, and the two sleep together. FINALLY! It was only a matter of time. After they have sex, Wes shows Laurel the news on TV that Wallace Mahoney’s other son has confessed his murder to the cops. Conor, Michaela and Asher also quickly learn about this.

We then fast forward to three weeks later, when Annalise’s house is burning down and Laurel is unconscious and pregnant in the hospital after being found in the basement of the burning house along with an ‘unidentified male’ (Though it isn’t explicitly stated, it seems plainly obvious that Wes is the one who got Laurel pregnant). The night of the fire, Michaela learns of this news from a phone call from Oliver, who is at the hospital. Michaela desperately looks for Asher at Middleton University’s dorms, where several loud parties are raging on, and after finding him drunkenly dancing like a naive freshman, she tells Asher of the fire, and terrified, he says the episodes’s title: ‘Is somebody really dead???…”

How To Get Away With Murder airs Thursdays at 10 p.m. ET on ABC.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfkBJcYiz3A