Scandal Season 3 Report Card: Grade It!

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It was an interesting season, to say the least. Scandal Season 3 saw the introduction of Olivia's parents, the revelation of Mellie's rape, and the coming unhinged of Quinn Perkins. 

There was sex. There were lies. There was (probably) videotape. Let's take a minute to grade Scandal Season 3 and look back at some of the best and worst moments from the season.

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BEST COUPLE: None of the couples on Scandal are what we'd call "best." In fact, most of them are downright dysfunctional. But one couple stands above the rest as being a solid, mostly respecting pairing: Abby and David. Sure, they've been dishonest with each other from time to time, but they typically come clean and they're better off for it. Plus, having them together gets more Josh Malina on our screens and makes Abby slightly less neurotic.

WORST COUPLE: All of the rest of them? Seriously. The couples on Scandal are notoriously unhealthy, manipulative, and sometimes really hard to watch. Mellie and Fitz. Fitz and Olivia. Olivia and Jake. Cyrus and James (R.I.P.!) Not to mention whatever's going down with Huck and Quinn. Would it be so hard to write a healthy relationship for a change? Just for a few episodes? If this is art imitating life then we're all completely doomed.

BEST CHARACTER: By a mile, this award goes to Huck. He's broken and loyal, and he isn't afraid to call Olivia on her crap. (Neither is Jake, but he's not winning this one.) Of all the characters on Scandal, we know the most about him, and maybe that's why we like him so much. He's the best-developed and is the character who, time and time again, we root for him to get back up and find his happy. Whether or not he's found that with Quinn, or whether he'll try to work things out with his family remains to be seen. Eagerly remains, that is.

WORST CHARACTER​: With so many bad guys to choose from, how can we pick just one? Oh, right, Rowan Pope manipulated the President and then killed a teenager to get what he wanted: his job back. YIKES! Maya Pope might have sold arms to terrorists, but she didn't order a hit on a kid!! One thing's for sure, though, Joe Morton deserves all kinds of awards for his portrayal of the probably evil Rowan on Scandal season 3.

BEST EPISODE: This honor goes to the Cyrus-James retrospective episode, "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang" (Scandal season 3 episode 14). We said goodbye to James Novak and processed that loss in time with Cyrus Beene who threw himself into his work in the wake of his husband's murder.

We saw the early days of their relationship back to a time when Cyrus Beene was just beginning to become a political monster and before he sold his soul to a Devil named Defiance. Olivia also learned of Jake's culpability in her friend's death and vowed to take down B613 for fear that Jake would turn into Rowan Pope. At the end, we watched as Jake, feeling remorse over what he'd done, sat with James while he took his final breaths. And then we cried our eyes out.

WORST EPISODE: The early part of Scandal season 3 was very slow. VERY. It dealt heavily with the aftermath of Mellie outing Olivia as Fitz' mistress and led to a cover-up which should have prevented OPA from working on the Grant re-election campaign. Enter Josie Marcus, a politician from the midwest with a secret and a good chance of winning a spot on her party's ticket. She showed up on Scandal Season 3 Episode 4, the lowest-viewed episode of the season's first 6 outings. The Marcus story, however, was short-lived and wrapped up in a matter of three installments.

HOPES FOR SCANDAL SEASON 4: We'd like to see a return to some of the case-of-the-week scandals that made the early season so interesting, before this became all about whether or not we'd hear Fitz and Olivia's music begin to play. It'd be a change of pace to see Olivia Pope BE Olivia Pope again. 

In Columbus Short's exit, there's a hole to fill at OPA. Who else to fill it but Stephen (Henry Ian Cusack)! We'd love to see him return as Olivia's right hand man. He would also make an intriguing side to an Abby-David-Stephen love triangle. Or we'd love to see Mekhi Pfifer come to town as a brother or cousin of Harrison's, initially there for a funeral but smelling a rat and sticking around to solve the case of his relative's death, if Harrison's exit is by death, that is.

OVERALL GRADE: B-

What grade would YOU give Scandal Season 3?

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

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