#james fitzpatrick

@Calum5SOS: Trainin' hard with @luke5sos @bonnerjf7 to have as much energy on stage as possible. 💪🏽

Yeah, the whole thing was a bit of a shemozzle, huh? It's a shame, because I'm actually not adverse to the overall plot, and I even liked Fitzpatrick's sort of brightly callous energy. He was a really different character for the show, and when they utilised him well, I think he was a really great break-up of the usual dynamics.

In particular, I think the scene where he first starts to project onto Beth and completely misreads her, and Beth just lets him because she gains nothing through telling him otherwise, only for that to lead to him projecting a romantic relationship onto her too was actually a really fun and interesting plot. It made for a sort of grim mirror of Beth and Rio, but I think also underlined this part of Beth that's tired of playing into what men want in order to have any sort of power. She did it with Dean and with Turner, and her confronting Fitzpatrick on it I think was a really great evolution of that part of her arc.

Similarly, I genuinely loved the resolution where Beth manipulated Rio into taking him out. That scene in the bar in 4.04 is probably one of my faves of the season and I love that it was this totally twisted take on finally letting Rio do what he's wanted to do all along and kill her rotten egg. Just it was a rotten egg she'd hired to kill him, and her having tried to take people out via Turner, herself, Max, and knowing he was really the only person who could handle someone for her. Just - - perfection, honestly. I love it a lot.

But yeah, overall the storyline didn't really work, haha. I agree that Annie and Ruby were too okay with it, but I also think a lot of that was because we didn't get Ruby and Annie's reaction to Beth having shot Rio after 2.13. I think that was a huge miss on the show's part, and I think if we'd had the catharsis there, the processing, the moral grappling, them being lighter about getting the hitman would've landed better. After all, they'd felt the benefits of Beth having taken Rio out of the picture for a bit – being hungry for that relative peace, power and control again isn't something I blame them for at all.

I truly have no idea at this point. I didn’t expect, like, literally a single thing that’s happened so far this season to happen 😂 I’m not sure if our final showdown is going to center on Beth/Rio/Fitz, Beth/Rio/FBI, or Beth/Rio/Dean or what that might look like.

While I had an inkling Fitzpatrick was intrigued by Beth, I didn’t think he was going to come on so strong or make Beth feels so pressured. I think there’s still a possibility his “jilted lovers” warning comes back up, but while he seemed upset by how things shook out last episode, he seemed to revert to business immediately. While it sounds like it might be difficult to call off the hit, I’m not sure I see him trying to hurt Beth deliberately, and I’m not entirely sure I see Beth putting herself in harm’s way to save Rio yet either.

I was surprised by how quickly the FBI came in and shut down Boland Bubbles and how they focused on Dean instead of Beth. I thought Phoebe was going to infiltrate the group and that didn’t seem to happen at all. It’s hard to predict what the finale might look like in terms of the struggle against the FBI until we know what Beth chooses to do with the magnifying glass on her, but I’m tentatively hopeful that she loops Rio in somehow rather than working against him entirely. I’m not sure Beth might get hurt in a showdown with the FBI because so far, they don’t seem to be focusing on her too much, and they definitely don’t have the dogged obsession with her that Turner did.

I know there was a lot of speculation in the beginning of season 3 that we might see something with Beth, Dean, and Rio, particularly because we thought Dean’s purchase of a shotgun was significant, but I’m doubtful Beth’s going to get her furniture back or that it’ll reappear. I also think that Dean choosing to take the fall despite knowing that Beth was working with Rio behind his back and lying to him suggests that the culmination of that jealousy storyline might look really different than what I originally thought. I suspected that was going to cause Dean to call it quits on the marriage, but I’m no longer confident in that either, and I don’t think we’re going to see Beth and Rio explode apart in the finale, but come closer together.

To me, that sort of leaves open the possibility of finally introducing Rio’s boss in the finale? If things get bad with the FBI and Fitz, it’s possible he’ll be introduced as @pynkhues has been suggesting to clear the board and demonstrate his power—in which case I’m not really sure Beth gets hurt there either?

Basically: I have no clue, haha. What do you guys think?