Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington), former White House staff under President Fitz Grant (Tony Goldwyn), is a "fixer." When someone important in Washington has a crisis or a scandal, she gets the call. She and her team do whatever it takes to make the bad stuff go away for their client, even if that means a crime goes unsolved. Everything is told at breakneck speed, with a directing style that reminds me a lot of Tony Scott (and that's a good thing).
Olivia and her team, including Stephen Finch (Henry Ian Cusick, Lost), Harrison Wright (Columbus Short), Abby Whelan (Darby Stanchfield), Huck (Guillermo Diaz), and new hire Quinn Perkins (Katie Lowes), all work together as "gladiators in suits" to do whatever it takes for the client. While they cater to very interesting clients throughout the season such as a war hero with a huge secret accused of his girlfriend's murder, a South American dictator whose wife and children have been kidnapped, and a Supreme Court nominee with a shady past who claims to be a saint, they have secrets and crises of their own.
Woven throughout the season is an underlying storyline involving President Grant and a White House aide named Amanda Tanner who claims the two had an affair. At first, Olivia is asked to make this nonsense go away as a favor to her old friend, Fitz. Before long, Olivia realizes that the girl's story rings true and sounds all too familiar and she takes the girl on as her client, rather than destroying her life as she earlier intended. This places her at odds with the President, his aide Cyrus Beene (Jeff Perry) and the V.P.'s aide, Billy Chambers (Matt Letscher), all former close friends. Olivia doesn’t know who to trust and surprising revelations, including a pregnancy and a murder or two, all point to those she once trusted as being involved in some fashion. In the past, she has always "trusted her gut," but this time, the stakes are too high and she can’t even trust herself, much less anyone not on her team.
I wasn't crazy about all of the members of the team initially, but as the season wore on, they grew on me. Each one has their strong points and their own foibles which reveal themselves as things progress. Stephen is a notorious womanizer who wants to ask his girlfriend to marry him, but doesn't know if it will stick. Abby is a real hard-ass investigator, but Olivia knows how different she was when they first met. Huck was formerly CIA and he must face his dark past to help Olivia unravel Amanda Tanner's mystery. Harrison is suave and confident, but Olivia once saved him as well. Finally, Quinn Perkins begins as a fragile and caring soul, but quickly becomes a good member of the team even as she finds herself falling for a charming but dogged reporter named Gideon Wallace (Brendan Hines, Lie To Me). Because of her association with him, she is quickly becoming a liability and her past becomes the biggest mystery of all, leading to the season's cliffhanger.
Special features are slim, but enjoyable and include featurettes on the breakneck pace, unusual scripts, and the cast of Scandal. All are short, but worth watching. Overall, I really enjoyed Scandal: The Complete First Season. It's one of those guilty pleasures reminiscent of Dirty, Sexy Money, but with a different vibe. While, at times, I thought Kerry Washington's character was a bit too much, as a whole I really liked watching it and can't wait to find out what happens next season.
