Revenge 1x17: Doubt

Daniel's still in Rikers after the judge stuck it to the 1% by denying his bail.  The Graysons, meanwhile, have built a full-scale Murder Wall in their breakfast nook, full of crime scene photos, beeping faxes and, presumably, bad coffee.  They discuss their best defense - the grey-hoodied man!- and their best way to get Daniel out of Rikers.  The Hot Defense Attorney says that unless Daniel gets really sick, his ass is staying in jail till his trial in December.

Oh, DANIEL.

On the grey-hoodied-man, Charlotte's trying to work with a sketch artist to get a picture of the Graysons' best chance at a defense.  Hilariously, it's just a faceless person wearing a hood.  I kinda love Charlotte.  Victoria starts insinuating that the gray-haired-dude is Jack, going so far as to have the sketch artist just draw a picture of Jack wearing a hood.  New defense!

Speaking of Jack, he's STILL pining after TRET!  UGH.  Jack, NOBODY CARES.  Nolan is sad that his only friend is so sad and pathetic, but TRAC! tells Nolan to put Jack on TRET!'s trail (or a dummy trail.  whatever.  Zyrtec.).  Nolan makes up some story about TRET! going to Montreal and drowning in bagels, and lo, Jack drives off to follow her.  I'm so bored already.

Ah!  But!  Mason Treadwell is back to at least liven this show up with some bowties.  Victoria (urged on by TRAC!) hires him to report on Daniel's case, in the hopes that the potential jury pool will be swayed in Daniel's favor.  The most hilarious moment of this entire season happens when Mason blanches at the reveal that Victoria wants him to blog about Daniel's case.  I'm not sure Mason's ever seen a computer, but Ashley's happy to help him out.

But it all starts going south pretty quickly - Declan tells Mason that Charlotte was too high to have been a credible witness that night.  Charlotte breaks up with Declan and cries and cries and takes more pills and cries some more.  Meanwhile-and-also, TRAC! removes all of Mason's stolen video tapes (that Victoria stole from TRET!) from the Graysons' safe and leads Mason to them.  So now he's mad at Victoria!  The Graysons will not frame Jack like they framed David Clarke!  Mason Treadwell is on the case!  Again!

Thanks, ABC, for not posting any episode stills right before or after the show aired, forcing me to use this ridiculously bad promo image. THANKS A LOT.

Daniel, meanwhile, gets his ass kicked by two of his fellow inmates at Rikers.  During this scene I couldn't help but notice that the towels in the Rikers' shower room seem quite fluffy.  Maybe the Rikers guards go to a lot of really nice hotels and steal them from there?

Because Daniel got beaten up, the judge granted him house arrest.  Um, why?  Is that something we do for everyone who gets their asses kicked in jail?  Because that seems like it'd be a bit counterintuitive to the idea of, you know, jail.  Anyhooskies, Daniel's sad to be locked in to his spacious Hamptons mansion.  Ugh.

Victoria, it turns out, paid that same guy she paid to steal the tapes to get some people to beat up Daniel.  To get Daniel to come home!  Man, Victoria really knows how to show that she loves you.  TRAC! follows her and records Victoria paying the guy off, and then records the guy talking about all the things he's done for the Grayson.  Then she beats him up.  And makes a FACE.

But who cares about any of that?!  The most scandalous thing is that Victoria is totally having an affair with a hot, foreign painter!  Who knows her from when she was still poor white trash!  They do it a LOT.  I'm still not sure what this is all about, but whatever, he takes his shirt off, so I'm happy.  And he's SOMEONE, too, but now I can't remember who because of the zyrtec fog.  But I remember seeing his name in the credits and thinking, "oooh, I like him!"  So, he's that guy.  Whoever that guy is.

And that's it for this week, guys!  What did you guys think?  Was this episode a lot better without a zyrtec-provided high?  Talk it up in the comments!