How to Get Away with Murder S01 E01 – #livingthedream

We asked you guys to tell us what show to watch this fall and you picked… a show that wasn’t this one. Because we have very little respect for our time, we decided to cover this show as well. So, let’s do it.

—

Pilot

Democracy Diva: Welcome, Traumateers! I am thrilled to be using my status as a barred-but-under-employed attorney to help Sweeney and Lorraine snark the new Shonda Rhimes drama “How to Get Away with Murder.”

Lorraine: I’m cracking up already. #livingthedream

Sweeney: You too can spend lots of money/time/sanity on law school so that you can write about it on the internet. For free.

Diva: Like a boss.

We begin at a raucous frat party/dangerous-looking bonfire.

Shaky-cam takes us through the adjacent woods, where a group of beautiful, ethnically diverse twenty-somethings are panicking. Dean Thomas from Harry Potter is one of them – he hurries over with a gold statuette that he went back to find. His character’s name is Wes, but you don’t get any name besides the one you had in Harry Potter or Buffy. Ever. Emma Watson could cure cancer tomorrow and the headline would still be “HERMIONE GRANGER CURES CANCER; IS AMAZING.” (L: A+) Anyway, one of these beautiful people cites a court case to suggest that they clean the murder weapon (the statuette) and hide it in plain sight. They debate over whether they should leave the body or hide it. One of them yells, “This is murder! None of us know what we’re talking about!” They all scream over each other until Dean Thomas gets all Sherlock on their asses.

Dean wants them to decide their fates based on a coin flip. Heads they get the body; tails they leave it. The coin flip takes us into a cut to 3 months earlier.

Dean Thomas bikes to his first day at the fictional Middleton Law School (which I hope is named after Kate Middleton), carrying a messenger bag that is too small to fit even a single casebook. (L: Big books? Immediate confirmation that law school isn’t for me!) We see a zillion fliers in the same place for a missing girl named Lila, who was last seen on August 30, 2014.

Dean walks into class and various law students (including John Bennett from Orange is the New Black) (S: He was literally the only thing I noticed in all of the classroom scenes, so I can’t wait to learn what else was actually going on.) panic/lie about their summer jobs/try to out-do each other with knowledge of shit no one cares about. Congrats, show – you accurately summed up law school in three lines! Dean takes a front-row seat and tries to make small talk with the girl next to him, who could not give fewer fucks, and who was also in the previous scene in the woods. She tells him that seats are assigned and a kid in a suit, also familiar from the woods scene, tells him to find his seat before “The Shooter” comes in. On cue, the magnificence that is Viola mother-fucking Davis struts into the room.

Viola enter-nounces that she is Professor Annalise Keating, and this is Criminal Law 100: How to Get Away With Murder.

I have an endless number of suggestions for what their other 1L classes should be subtitled.

Lor: And reading them on Twitter was the highlight of this episode, even though it happened on Twitter and not on the show.

Sweeney: +1. Sorry, Shonda.

Diva: Thank you, ladies. Shonda can deal.

Anyway, Professor Keating tells the class, fuck learning to study law – I’m teaching you how to practice it. An adorable idea, but surely a bit ambitious for THE FIRST DAY OF LAW SCHOOL. Maybe teach them how to write a case brief first. Anyway, their first case study is “the aspirin assassin,” and Professor Keating cold-calls on various students to exposit the background of the case. Arthur Kaufman was having an affair with his assistant, and when his wife found out, Arthur dumped the assistant and transferred her to a different department. (This is told to us by John Bennett from Orange is the New Black, who I’m sure will do his best not to commit any sex crimes on this show. Maybe.) (S: At the very least, he can come away from this experience knowing a few good lawyers.) In retaliation, the mistress allegedly switched Arthur’s medication with aspirin, which she knew he was allergic to. Half the class raises their hands to answer the next question, but Michaela, Dean’s bitchy almost-seatmate, takes it upon herself to stand up and answer the question even though NO ONE CALLED ON YOU AND WE’RE ALL WAITING HERE POLITELY TO ANSWER THE QUESTION, YOU ASSHOLE. Sorry, but I totally knew this person in law school, and I hated him.

Professor Keating gives Dean Thomas a shot at the next question, but he didn’t do the reading because he never got the professor’s email containing the assignment. She tells him that as a defense attorney, she is constantly surrounded by professional liars, so don’t try and fool this bitch. He admits that he only got into Middleton off the wait list two days ago, so that’s why he didn’t get the email. The other students snicker at him, but fuck all of them. Because they are all still definitely praying for a last-minute phone call from Georgetown Law saying that a spot opened up because one of their admitted students got into Harvard off the waitlist, because that admitted student came to her senses, dropped out of law school, and decided to get an MBA. (L: I already gave an A+. 1430.)

Any-tangent, before Dean Thomas can answer the question, another gunner chimes in with the answer. It’s Laurel Castillo, the other girl from the woods scene, and Professor Keating says what I wish all my law professors had said on the first day of class:

Seriously, those two sentences would have saved me a full three years of eye-rolling.

Lor: It’s funny because I was so outraged at the expectation that all these kids would already know what they came here to learn, and then she’s all, “LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES: LEARN ABOUT THEM.”

Diva: Don’t get me wrong, we were definitely cold-called about fact patterns on the first day of class, but we weren’t expected to already understand what we were talking about. I hope.

Professor Keating admits that the aspirin assassin isn’t a past case – it’s a current one that she’s working on as the defense attorney. There are about a billion and a half laws and professional rules that prevent her from being able to bring her students into this case, but this is television. So they pack the entire class into the Professor’s townhouse/office/12 Grimmauld Place, Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix (L: Tears for Sirius!) and make the poor mistress get interviewed by two hundred 1Ls, all treating her like a fact pattern. Mistress cries and insists she loved Arthur and would never hurt him.

The know-nothing 1Ls somehow have to present a one-minute summary of their best defense for this case the next day. Keating lets them use 12 Grimmauld Place, and the client’s discovery file, because you’re definitely just allowed to pass that out to whoever the fuck you want. She introduces her associates – a bearded dude named Frank, and a blonde woman with a killer bob named Bonnie, but you don’t need to know that name because IT’S PARIS GELLER FROM GILMORE GIRLS AND I’M SO HAPPY ABOUT IT. (S: This perfect TV head canon just writes itself. Fanfic writers, please begin constructing the details of Paris’s intervening years from the GG finale to this episode.) Anyway, every year, Professor Keating chooses four students to come work for her because for some reason, everyone wants to hire 1Ls who know nothing. The top student wins a golden statuette of Lady Justice and her scales – AKA the murder weapon from the first scene. The winner can turn in Lady Justice at any time to get out of an exam. Wait, WHAT?! No. Not allowed.

Lor: If it doesn’t make sense for these kids to be in their first year, why use that? Help me understand.

Diva: “We’re already expecting you to know all the things without learning any of them, so here, another trophy to help you not learn things!”

In his unfurnished but spacious apartment, Dean Thomas talks to himself about the case. He can’t focus because of his neighbor’s music, so he knocks on the door. A pierced, moody girl opens it and talks about how she hates living next to law students, with their crazy rabbit sex and nervous breakdowns. ACCURATE. Back in his own apartment, Dean traces over scary-looking markings in his wall that might have been made by human hands scraping the shit out of them.

Guys, 1L year is hard, but it’s not solitary confinement. Let’s all just calm the fuck down.

Lor: Whatever. TV never lies, so I’mma stay clear of law school forever.

Sweeney: And also be terribly concerned about what this is suggesting about the sanity of lawyers.

Diva: Flash-forward to the Murder Night. The students are at 12 Grimmauld Place, rolling a dead body into a rug. They stagger around with it until they reach the front door – the FRONT DOOR, which is DEFINITELY NOT how you get away with murder. There’s a cop outside because one of their cars is blocking the sidewalk, but he’s too terrible at his job to notice them hurriedly dropping the giant rug they’re carrying in the middle of the night.

Sweeney: How to Get Away With Murder? Be on a TV, that magical land where inept law enforcement officers thrive.

Diva: Post-commercials, Incompetent Cop asks if this is that law professor’s office. Michaela plays it cool and offers to call Professor Keating so she herself can explain why she needed four of her students to burn one of her rugs while she was away. Laurel is like, girl, what are you doing, but then Michaela fake-remembers that Professor Keating had to attend her mother’s funeral that day. Incompetent Cop is like, no, don’t call her, and there’s riot-esque noises in the background so I should probably go pretend to do my job somewhere else. Suit Kid is pissed that Michaela wasn’t being helpful until now, but since she just saved all of their asses, he should probably just STFU.

Lor: Plus, I wouldn’t say she wasn’t unhelpful as much as she was being hesitatnt about covering up a murder. It’s a little different.

Diva: Flashback to Murder Class. (I did not even remotely understand the timeline of what was happening until I watched the episode a second time.) Michaela’s defense for the aspirin assassin’s case is that the wife killed Arnold, not the mistress. Everyone else gives their defenses, but only the attractive people make it to the next round. (L: Girl, we’re just working on racial diversity. Ain’t nobody got time for ugly people on TV yet.) Dean has to go last and come up with a theory none of his 200 classmates have mentioned yet, so he says they should claim self-defense because the mistress had Stockholm syndrome from being brainwashed by her boss/lover. It’s not a great argument, but Professor Keating keeps him in the running for the competition and gives ten points to Gryffindor.

Keating teaches them her three-step defense plan:

She’ll see them all in the court room at 9:00 AM. Which means they have to skip their Torts class to attend this trial. Professor Keating, your colleagues all hate you.

Aspirin Assassin Trial. Michaela runs in and whispers something to Professor Keating. Keating then proves that the witness is colorblind and thus couldn’t have known what color the pill was and whether or not it was aspirin. Michaela has accomplished Step 1 of the defense plan and is now the student to beat.

At home, Dean Thomas gets an idea and for some reason feels the need to bike to 12 Grimmauld Place in the middle of the night. He walks right in because the door is contrivantly unlocked, and doesn’t bother knocking but just keeps opening closed doors until he finds his professor receiving oral sex from a super-jacked dude. Dean tries to run away, but Professor stops him in the hall and wants to know why he’s there. He learned what a directed verdict is, and decided that he needed to run over and tell her in person about something that she learned in her first semester of law school too. She tells him it’s not a good idea, and kicks him out.

Lor: All of that made very little sense to me when I watched it. Probably because I was trying to figure out who the dude between her legs was.

Diva: The law part isn’t actually that relevant or interesting, but I was mostly distracted by why NO ONE LOCKS ANY DOORS.

Flash-forward to Murder Night. Suit Guy, whose name is Connor, sings along to a Christmas song but makes it about murder.

Dean picked up some extra things from the convenience store so he wouldn’t look too suspicious on the surveillance video. Connor is all, why bother when we can just murder the store clerk too? Just so we know he’s losing it a bit.

Flash-back to Trial Week. Connor hits on a nervous IT guy who works for the ad agency upstairs – the one where Arthur and his mistress worked. Connor flirts his way into getting some details about the case out of the IT guy, and then they have sex and ABC comes astonishingly close to showing us a rim job. In court the next day, Connor hands Professor Keating something that was definitely not legally obtained. She hands the witness the document and asks him to read it aloud. The prosecution is like, um, WTF, that’s not in our discovery file. Professor Keating plays dumb and says she thought it was. Bonnie chimes in that she found the email in the files given to them by the client’s previous attorney. And the worst judge in the world decides the laws of evidence don’t matter at all, so she lets the evidence come in even though she knows it wasn’t properly introduced. It’s very nice that the witness admitted to writing this email, but there are still procedures that needed to be followed that no one gave a shit about.

Laurel goes to the restroom, and Arthur’s mistress and wife both go in as well. Laurel spies on them from the crack in the stall door, and sees the wife put a gentle hand on the mistress’s shoulder. They say nothing, but share a moment that two people working against each other definitely wouldn’t be sharing.

Dean Thomas comes home to an argument and fight-noises happening from next door. A guy runs out of the neighbor’s room. Dean tries to help the neighbor, but the girl is like, GTFO.

At a fancy party, a psychology professor tells the students to calm down about law school and it’ll be fine. This nice man is the husband of one of their professors, and he jokes with them about how tough she is on her students.

Dean gets OH SHIT face when he realizes that this dude is Professor Keating’s husband – and he’s definitely not the one he saw going down on her the other day. Professor Keating enters and gives Dean a death stare. They all toast to their first year. Kids, you’re going to need a lot more than champagne to get you through this.

Sweeney: But free champagne is always a nice start!

Diva: Murder Night Flash-Forward. The students carry the body through the woods, and a guy and a girl nearby are trying to get it in. We can’t see them, but the girl wants to make sure the guy won’t tell some other girl about their little tryst. Laurel’s phone rings – having the volume on your cell phone while carrying a dead body is also definitely not how to get away with murder – and it’s Frank, Professor Keating’s bearded associate. He’s shirtless in the picture that pops up, because people on TV are really bad at secret affairs.

Lor: I feel like How To Get Away With a Secret Affair might be the rung you clear before murder.

Diva: Ah, but you don’t take Legal Ethics: How To Get Away With A Secret Affair until 2L year.

Trial Flash-Back. Laurel tells Frank that she thinks the wife and the mistress teamed up for revenge against Arthur. She realizes he already knows this, but he insists he didn’t say that. She accuses him of just not wanting to admit that he’s representing a guilty client. Frank turns into my least favorite character on this show as he tells Laurel that he sees girls like her all the time – idealists who want to change the world, but instead take corporate jobs, and quit as soon as they get pregnant so they can stay home. I cheer as Laurel calls him a misogynist and storms out. And I cheer even louder when Paris Geller glares at Frank from the corner of the room and says, “Stop. Screwing. The students.”

Lor: I’mma need a gif of that soon. Other shows need it.

Sweeney: Ask and you shall receive:

Diva: Thank you for that perfect gif.

Fancy Party. Dean pulls Professor Keating aside and promises he won’t say anything about her affair. She breaks down and cries about her husband and their struggles to have a baby and how hard it is. She touches Dean’s chest way, way too much and asks him to forgive her, and thanks him for keeping this between them. He’s like, YES THAT’S FINE CAN I PLEASE GO NOW and bounces. Professor Keating wipes away her tears like someone who knows more than just a little bit about being a professional liar.

Lor: What was her goal there though? To make Dean Thomas the most uncomfortable he’s ever been in his entire life, including his time at Hogwarts? Mission accomplished!

Diva: I don’t know, but I think the point is that we don’t know her motives yet, and that’s what made this scene fascinating to me.

Paris Gellar watches the news and we see a guy talking about Lila, the missing girl. Lila’s boyfriend is also the guy we saw leaving Dean’s neighbor’s apartment after that fight. (I had to watch that scene three times to figure that out.) (S: And I thank you because this is news to me!) Mr. Keating walks in and Paris greets him just a little bit too warmly. And she looks very uncomfortable when he gives his wife a kiss. I bet this comes back to haunt us soon!

Dean Thomas at home, examining more mysterious scratches in his furniture.

Outside his door, he finds a bottle of alcohol from his neighbor as an apology. Her name is Rebecca, and no, she doesn’t want to drink it with him, because she has to go shave her hands.

Trial. Convenience store footage was found of the mistress the night before the attempted murder. She’s very clearly buying aspirin. Professor Keating takes her client into another room and screams at her for lying to them and fucking them all over. She calls the mistress a liar and kicks her out so she can think. Paris Gellar thinks the mistress could have been buying the aspirin for normal, non-murder purposes, but Professor Keating just wants to know why Frank was too busy fucking an undergrad to do his job. Keating decides she needs to figure out a way to fix this on her own. So she calls Detective Nate Lahey as a witness, and when he takes the stand, Dean realizes that Detective Nate is Professor Keaning’s lover.

Post-commercials, Professor Keating questions Detective Nate about where he was two nights ago. (She knows where he was, because he was inside her skirt at the time.) Now, this is direct examination of a witness for the defense, which means Professor Keating is not allowed to ask leading questions. So 99% of this entire line of questioning should have been thrown out, but no one cares about criminal procedure except me, so Keating gets to do whatever the fuck she wants. Keating asks if Nate was at home with his wife, who was recently diagnosed with cancer. That seems like an odd place to drop in that tidbit, but okay, show. (S: Especially since it’s clearly only there for the audience’s perspective and serves no purpose for her weird leading questions.) She thinks it’s strange that Nate wasn’t at work the night he was supposed to be, when a junior detective received the surveillance tape of the convenience store. That detective testified that the store owner sent him the video at 8:00 PM, but it wasn’t logged into custody until 2:09 AM. Nate insists it takes some time to get things into the system. Professor Keating asks if he’s ever seen the department alter evidence to help the prosecution get a conviction, and FINALLY the prosecution is all,

The world’s worst judge allows the questioning to continue, and Detective Nate admits that he knows his office has tampered with evidence before. Uh oh. Does Keith Mars work for this department? (S: A+ in part because you haven’t even seen the last of Keith Mars Tampering With Evidence.) (D: Looking forward to more blatant disregard of the law!) Anyway, the trial ends, and Professor Keating’s voice over announces how justice prevailed today, as she wears the world’s most fantastic green coat. After her press conference, Michaela is all, “I wanna be her,” and at this moment, I cannot disagree.

Murder Class. Professor Keating announces the lucky four students who will be working for her. #1 – Connor Walsh, because rim jobs are the most important tool in the criminal justice system. #2 – Asher Millstone, AKA John Bennett from OINTB. #3 – Michaela Pratt, because she appreciates fabulous green trench coats. #4 – Laurel Castillo. And because of sex secrets/contrivance/an unexpectedly large workload, there’s a fifth member of the team – Dean Thomas.

After class, Dean tracks Keating down and says he doesn’t want to be chosen just because he knows about her affair and what she did with Nate on the witness stand. Keating lectures him for exposing not only that he has no faith in abilities, but that he believes she illegally won her case. She insists that she’s good at her job, and that he should think carefully about this decision. He can either end up “in a corporate office drafting contracts and hitting on chubby paralegals before finally putting a gun in your mouth,” or he can work for her. Are those really his only two options? I mean, I know first-hand how bad things are for recent law graduates nowadays, but shit.

Lor: There’s always recapping shows about law school for free because you love your friends, Dean Thomas! #livingthedream

Diva: We already have Intern Pacey, but Intern Dean Thomas would be a very welcome addition to Team Snark.

Sorority house. A maintenance guy arrives to inspect their water tank. When he does, he finds a dead body inside, which the news tells us is Lila, the missing girl. Dean’s neighbor Rebecca pulls Griffin (Lila’s boyfriend) into her apartment, and they panic as they watch this unfold on the news.

12 Grimmauld Place. Mr. Keating drinks sadly, because Lila was his student. Professor Keating sits down next to him and apologizes, but follows it up with a cold, “I betcha the boyfriend did it.” I’m intrigued.

Sweeney: All the more so because Viola Davis looks at him with very, “I BET YOU KNOW ALL ABOUT HER AND HER BOYFRIEND, HUH?” face. Or maybe I just watch too much TV and read subtextual accusations into everything. Not sure.

Diva: I definitely read the subtext in her face too. Awesome shouty rock music plays as we flash-forward to Murder Night. The five members of Professor Keatings’ all-star 1L team unroll the carpet and pour gasoline all over the dead body. They strike the match, and we see the face of the dead body before they (re-)kill it with fire.

IT’S PROFESSOR KEATING’S HUSBAND. AWWWWWWWWWW SHIT.

Lor: Reading about this episode made it make so much more sense! (S: +1) On that first watch, though, this AWWW SHIT moment and wanting to hug Dean Thomas are mostly what I came away with. In all, it’s just exactly what I expected– I have seen episodes of Scandal before.

On that note, here are some of our favorite #howtosnark Tweets:

I’m unable to say How to Get Away With Murder normally. I say it exactly like Viola Davis in the promo. #howtosnark — Ashlea (@AKobukowski) September 26, 2014

So, law school kicks off with epic frat bonfires, yeah @democracydiva? #howtosnark — Nicole Sweeney (@SweeneySays) September 26, 2014

Ah, crap, this Pilot is titled “Pilot.” OFF TO A BAD START. #howtosnark #HowToGetAwayWithMurder — Lorraine (@LateLorraine) September 26, 2014

#HowToGetAwayWithMurder – don’t base your murder plans on coin-flips. #howtosnark — Democracy Diva (@democracydiva) September 26, 2014

This is reminding me of how I used to drop any class where the professor called on people from the roster #howtosnark — Stephanie (@stephynee) September 26, 2014

My tv is on mute so I have no clue what’s happening, but she looks like she’s being mean to Dean Thomas. Must be a slytherin. #howtosnark — Emmy (@LoveWokeMeUp) September 26, 2014

Dean Thomas didn’t read any books/see any movies abt law school before attending law school. Poor thing. #HowToGetAwayWithMurder #howtosnark — Democracy Diva (@democracydiva) September 26, 2014

She just whispered something about taking a shower after a perm. WIN THAT CASE. #howtosnark #HowToGetAwayWithMurder — Lorraine (@LateLorraine) September 26, 2014

I really have no idea what’s going on in this show. #howtosnark — Ashlea (@AKobukowski) September 26, 2014

Was Dean Thomas always hot? I’m confused. #howtosnark — Stephanie (@stephynee) September 26, 2014

Dean Thomas: more frightened by Viola Davis talking about babies than he is by murder. #HowToGetAwayWithMurder #howtosnark — Democracy Diva (@democracydiva) September 26, 2014

Viola Davis’ face is BEAT in every scene. Gaddem! Her make up person deserves all of the awards. #HowToGetAwayWithMurder #howtosnark #HTGAWM — Ifeoluwa Olokode (@Ifeoluwahan) September 26, 2014

The NSA is going to have a busy night with all these #HowToGetAwayWithMurder tweets! #howtosnark — Democracy Diva (@democracydiva) September 26, 2014

  Thank you to everyone for tweeting along! Be sure to join us next week for #howtosnark (even if you’re watching a day or so behind – we’ll keep checking for tweets until the post goes live!)

Next time on How to Get Away with Murder: Professor Keating starts to wonder if her husband is linked to a student’s disappearance, and Dean Thomas’s hair is so big because it’s full of secrets in S01 E02 – It’s All Her Fault.