In the spirit of complete, total honesty, I was shocked at the announcement that Revenge season 4 was given a green light considering the horror of season 2 and the uneven nature of season 3. 

HOWEVER: If all of the episodes of Revenge season 3 had been as dark and story-driving and fantastic as Revenge Season 3 Episode 22, there never would have been a doubt in my mind that the series would be renewed for a fourth season. 

The Revenge season 3 finale had everything a good finale should have: closure and cliffhangers with a healthy dose of shocking twists thrown in for good measure. Consider me officially jazzed to find out what's going to happen to Emily Thorne when this series returns in the fall.

We've all been kicking around the knowledge that someone important would die on the Revenge season 3 finale, with many, if not most, of us speculating it would be Aiden thanks to Barry Sloane's new series The Whispers. 

Well, we were correct. RIP Aiden Mathis!

It was clear from the beginning that it would be Aiden who died. He and Emily were just too happy together, savoring their shared victory in the Conrad Grayson takedown and devising a joint plan to eliminate Victoria Grayson that involved Aiden paying a visit to Michelle Banks, the therapist who convinced an 8-year old Amanda Clarke that her father was a terrorist and murderer.

As the last remaining person who could testify to and prove Victoria's connection to the David Clarke scandal, Aiden and Emily needed her on their team. But Victoria got there first and laid in wait after having the good doctor poison Aiden with a paralytic.

After explaining why she was killing him, Victoria suffocated Aiden with a pillow, seeing his death as payback for Emily's role in Pascal's demise. Victoria Grayson totally got her hands dirty with that one. Part of me is shocked that she murdered him herself but then part of me is completely not shocked that she would do something like that.

Patrick had to get his ability to kill from somewhere, right?

(Sidenote: I'm glad the writers didn't have Emily run to Jack after Aiden's death and instead allowed her to channel her grief into the Victoria-takedown. Having her seek comfort from Jack would've been too much.)

While Emily lost the man she called the "love of her life," she did manage to clear her father's name. 

Her plan to avenge Aiden's death was straight bad ass and just a little crazy, and once again, Emily played Charlotte like a fiddle.

After being attacked in the cabin that turned out to belong to David Clarke and realizing that Victoria had been behind the letters Charlotte had received, Emily encouraged Charlotte to have David Clarke's body moved, not because she wanted Charlotte to go through with it but because she needed Victoria to show up at the cemetery.

Victoria certainly did only to find Emily digging up FauxManda's grave instead of David's all so she could have Victoria committed to a psychiatric facility for her obsession with Emily Thorne and Amanda Clarke.

GENIUS! Emily Thorne strikes again! I may have let out a good ol' fist pump in my living room as Emily sauntered down the hospital hallway and casually threw on her overcoat. (I totally did.)

Do I think Victoria will be forever kept in the mental institution? Not at all. But she's there for now and for now is good.

Just like I don't think Conrad Grayson is actually dead after being stabbed by...DAVID CLARKE!

This is the revelation we should've been expecting for three seasons, but which was almost too predictable so we thought surely the writers wouldn't go there, right? (Did you follow that?) 

The suddenly undead character is a TV trope well-used in dramas and soap operas which many of us probably expected to happen sooner or later with David Clarke. But then it almost seemed like maybe he would be dead and the writers wouldn't have him reappear having been in hiding for all these years, but they did and we weren't expecting it. Or at least I wasn't expecting it. 

It's an excellent cliffhanger for next season. As excellent as Charlotte having Jack arrested because she knows that he's the one who released her when she was kidnapped, thanks to a tell-tale thumbstroke when he put his hand on her shoulder just before almost telling her the truth about Emily Thorne and Amanda Clarke. 

He was right there on the verge of spilling the secret when she seized up and bolted from The Stowaway, and hey, we can't blame her for being skiddish. She was kidnapped and her parents are abhorrent nightmares of people. To find out that the one person she trusted was involved in her kidnapping would be quite unsettling. 

Jack will probably be able to untangle himself from that snare more easily than Daniel Grayson will from his. 

Gideon LeMarchal is brand new on the scene and already I like him, aside from that letting a girl overdose on cocaine and doing nothing to stop it thing, I mean. He just swooped in with a plan to unseat Daniel Grayson and any enemy of Daniel's is a friend of mine. 

You can stay, Gideon. You can stay. At least for the first part of Revenge season 4.

What did you think of Revenge Season 3 Episode 22? Were you shocked that Aiden died? How long will Victoria stay in the hospital? Is Conrad Grayson really dead? Grade the Revenge Season 3 finale.

Miranda Wicker was a Staff Writer for TV Fanatic. She retired in 2017. Follow her on Twitter.