Revenge Season 3 Finale Primer: Read Before You Watch
DansPapers.com has been covering ABC’s Hamptons-set drama Revenge all year, and with the show’s Season 3 finale airing this Sunday, May 11, we offer this helpful guide for newcomers and lapsed viewers. For the fine details, read the last 21 episodes of our Weekly Hamptons Revenge Recap (things get really good toward the end). If you want some additional fun (and opinionated!) Revengery, check out our Top 5 series.
*In order to understand the story notes below, newbies will first want to read our character profiles.
The Story So Far
• Emily and Daniel got a quickie divorce when she intentionally leaked medical records showing she wasn’t pregnant.
• Following a confrontation with Victoria, Stevie fell off the wagon and Jack took her back to California. When he returned, he and Margaux called it quits.
• Nolan humiliated former protege Javier at the launch of his “MyClone” app.
• Emily’s plan to have Pascal coax a confession from Conrad backfired when Conrad shoved him into a helicopter rotor.
• Charlotte was afraid she was being stalked by someone claiming to be David Clarke. Jack traced the stalker to a cabin in the woods, where he found a ring with the initials “DC.”
• Emily, Aiden and Nolan (#Nemilaiden — we won’t let it die!) kidnapped Charlotte and exposed the Graysons’ ugly secrets to her, then released her. When Charlotte confronted Conrad, he ranted about his actions, confessing to everything, not realizing that Emily had planted a camera on Charlotte and broadcast the entire confession to the world!
• After everything, including Conrad’s arrest, Victoria has finally deduced that Emily isn’t who she claims to be—and she may, in fact, be David’s daughter.
Main Characters
Emily Thorne/Amanda Clarke (Emily VanCamp): Our protagonist. After many years away, Amanda Clarke returns to the Hamptons with a new identity, Emily Thorne, to avenge the ruin and death of her father David Clarke, who was framed by Hamptons power couple Victoria and Conrad Grayson for a terrorist attack on (fictional airline) Flight 197.
Victoria Grayson (Madeleine Stowe): Emily’s arch-nemesis. Victoria had a torrid affair with David Clarke while married to Conrad Grayson, who forced her to help frame David. Her guilt has turned her into a tightly-wound, and slightly evil, ice queen.
Conrad Grayson (Henry Czerny): The mastermind behind the Flight 197 bombing. Conrad is a charmingly evil man whose love for money and power is only eclipsed by his love of himself. Conrad is responsible for the vast majority of horrible things that happen to characters on the show.
Jack Porter (Nick Wechsler): Emily’s childhood friend and one-time love interest. Jack runs the Stowaway, a bar on the dock in Montauk. He has a son, Carl, from his late wife Amanda (a.k.a. “Fauxmanda”), who had switched identities with Emily in order to help further her revenge plot.
Nolan Ross (Gabriel Mann): Emily’s right hand. Nolan is a billionaire computer prodigy who swore allegiance to Emily in the name of he father David, who mentored him. Nolan is a wry, foppish man who indulges in both men and women—mostly men these days.
Aiden Mathis (Barry Sloane): Emily’s boyfriend. Trained under Emily’s sensei Satoshi Takeda, Aiden is focused on helping Emily avenge her father. His father was blackmailed into actually placing the bomb on Flight 197.
Daniel Grayson (Josh Bowman): Emily’s ex-husband. Originally an innocent dupe caught in Emily and the Graysons’ crossfire, Daniel has evolved into a Machiavellian manipulator after realizing how many times Emily has lied to him. He also has an itchy trigger finger.
Charlotte Grayson (Krista B. Allen): Emily’s half-sister. Charlotte is the daughter of Victoria and David, but was raised to believe Conrad was her father. She has a history of substance abuse and hard partying, but began to grow up following the death of her boyfriend, Declan (Jack’s brother), and the miscarriage that followed.
Supporting Characters
Margaux LeMarchal (Karine Vanasse): A French publishing heiress, Margaux moved to the Hamptons to open an American version of popular fashion/lifestyle magazine Voulez with Daniel. Margaux began a relationship with Jack and planned to move in with him, but Daniel’s manipulations caused her to become jealous and unfair, resulting in their breakup.
Patrick Osbourne (Justin Hartley): Victoria’s first son, given up for adoption. Patrick came to the Hamptons to get to know his mother and ended up falling hard for Nolan. Patrick spiraled out of control, cutting the brakes on Conrad’s car and killing his biological father, who had raped Victoria when she was a teenager. Victoria and Nolan sent Patrick out of town to apprentice for an artist and stop his path of self-destruction.
Stevie Grayson (Gail O’Grady): Conrad’s first wife, the kind and compassionate Stevie came to the Hamptons after Conrad manipulated a drunken Emily into calling her to be her divorce lawyer. Stevie, a recovering alcoholic, revealed that she was Jack’s biological mother and tried to have a relationship with him. After an ugly run-in with Victoria, Stevie fell off the wagon and Jack took her back to California to recover.
Pascal LeMarchal (Olivier Martinez): A powerful, dangerous businessman, Pascal came to the Hamptons under the pretense of helping his daughter Margaux with Voulez, but ultimately came to romance Victoria and blackmail Conrad for various business dealings. After Pascal murdered a man who knew the truth about Flight 197, was revealed to have killed Aiden’s father and got engaged to Victoria, Conrad pushed him into a helicopter rotor, killing him (obviously).
Lydia Davis (Amber Valletta): Conrad’s ex-mistress and Victoria’s former best friend. Lydia was thought dead after boarding a plane that exploded in the Season 1 finale, but she actually got off the plane with Victoria and agreed to disappear. Lydia returned seeking revenge on Conrad for screwing up her life, but ended up falling right back into his bed. Lydia was forced to take the blame for shooting Emily and went on the lam.
Sara Munello (Annabelle Stephenson): Daniel’s first love from the wrong side of the tracks. After surviving massive spinal damage in a car crash caused by a drunken Daniel years ago, Sara reconnected with Daniel and accepted his apology when he hired her to make his wedding cake. The two fell back in love and had an affair, but Emily called Sara’s mother, who shamed her into leaving Daniel.
Niko Takeda (Stephanie Jacobsen): A cutthroat woman bent on avenging her father (and Emily’s sensei) Satoshi Takeda’s death. Niko came to the Hamptons to help Aiden and Emily after Emily was shot by Daniel. She also hoped to resume her relationship with Aiden. After learning that Aiden had killed Takeda, she attempted to kill him but was stopped by Emily. Realizing nothing would bring her father back, Niko left town.
Javier Salgado (Henri Esteve): Nolan’s protege and friend from prison. Javier is a spunky computer whiz who romanced Charlotte and sold his avatar aggregating app, MyClone, to Grayson Global. After Nolan intentionally sabotaged the app’s debut party (Javier was supposed to partner with Nolan, not the Graysons), Daniel fired Javier and MyClone was ruined.
Season 3 Takedowns
Emily’s takedowns are the bread and butter of Revenge. This year, she took down several deserving people, as well as a few folks who got caught in the crossfire.
Ashley Davenport (Ashley Madekwe): Emily’s former friend and Victoria’s former event planner. After Ashley attempted to blackmail Emily into getting her a job, Emily and Victoria framed her for a plethora of incidents, ruining her and sending her back to Croydon, the South London hometown she desperately wanted to escape.
Father Paul Whitley (James LeGros): A former Grayson Global employee who was paid off by Conrad to keep quiet about Flight 197. Paul’s guilt led to him to become a priest, and Emily lured him to a hotel, knocked him out and took pictures of him in a compromising position with a woman. Emily eventually realized that Father Paul really had changed, and tried to “undo” her takedown, but he was killed in a fiery crash after Patrick cut the brakes on Conrad’s car.
Bizzy Preston (Ana Ortiz): A PR guru hired to fix the Grayson family’s image. After Bizzy started snooping into Emily’s personal life, Nolan (who she had outed to the press years earlier) took it upon himself to take her down by leaking all of her clients’ secrets.
Sheila Lurie (Kathleen York): Victoria ruined this art gallery owner’s career and took over her business after Sheila hired her and belittled her in front of the other socialites.
Luke Gilliam (Tim DeKay): A former Grayson Global employee, Luke started a highly successful eco-friendly gas company. Victoria lured him back to the Hamptons as a way to test Emily’s true intentions, and Emily took the bait. She proved that the gas was actually highly toxic during a benefit, which confirmed Victoria’s suspicions about Emily: she wants revenge for David.
Conrad Grayson: The big baddie (so far). Emily, Aiden and Nolan kidnapped Charlotte and forced her to watch footage of the Flight 197 bombing while proving to her that Conrad was behind everything, including killing Declan and Amanda. Charlotte was released and confronted Conrad, who lashed out at her, confessing to everything and telling her there was nothing she could do about it… Of course he didn’t realize Emily had planted a camera on Charlotte’s coat, broadcasting the diatribe to the entire world! Conrad was arrested.
What’s Next
On Sunday, May 11, the Revenge Season 3 finale finds Emily trying to get to the bottom of the “DC” ring mystery while attempting to take down Victoria. It has also been confirmed that one of the main characters will die. Make sure to watch — and read our Weekly Hamptons Revenge Recap on Monday, May 12!
We don’t know how Season 3 ends, but despite sagging ratings, we’re feeling cautiously confident that we’ll get a Season 4. But nothing has been confirmed.