Deception plays a natural role in the art of getting away with murder, but it was not a skill demonstrated by the ABC promotional team.
Keeping the promise made in the commercials, ABC’s midseason “How to Get Away with Murder” finale indeed revealed Sam’s killer. But by the end of the episode, it had introduced a twist that assures the drama will not end with the revelation of the killer’s identity.
Set on the night of the bonfire, Thursday’s episode found Michaela attempting to bring the trophy to Professor Keating just as Rebecca was attempting to sneak into the house and download the phone logs from Sam’s computer. Frustrated about a massive fight he had with Annalise and still paranoid about the investigation into Lila’s murder, Sam chased Rebecca into his bedroom. She locked the door and began downloading the files off his computer.
Just as he broke through the door, Wes, Connor and Laurel–aware of Rebecca’s plan and briefed on the situation by a panicked Michaela–arrived. They attempted to calm the situation, but the savvy and suspicious Sam attacked Rebecca in the hopes of retrieving the evidence she stole (which was on her flash drive). A melee ensued, and a scared Michaela ended up pushing Sam over the main staircase. The impact appeared to kill Mr. Annalise Keating.
Still in shock, the law students began thinking about how to get away with the murder. The problem? He wasn’t dead. He attempted to strangle Rebecca, which prompted Wes to bash him over the head with the trophy. That blow killed him and set the wheels in motion for the flashbacks viewers had seen throughout the season. Wes was Sam’s killer.
The episode’s most significant reveal, however, came at the end.
Midway through the episode, “HTGAWM” revealed that after dropping Rebecca off at the motel, Wes went back to the house, retrieved the trophy and offered an apology to the Sam’s lifeless corpse. From previous flashbacks–and from a recap in this episode–we knew that he later re-returned with his fellow law students to retrieve the body.
At the end of the episode, the show flashed back to Wes’ initial return to the house. After he said sorry, the camera panned up to reveal a seated, collected Annalise Keating. “Don’t be,” said the professor and lawyer, who had seen the body and thus become aware of her husband’s death.
As has been the case so often throughout the show’s first set of episodes, Annalise and Wes are once again bound by a secret. And Annalise, as she does so well, has been quietly helping him get away with her duplicitous husband’s murder.