It’s Friday and it’s well past time for this week’s “Empire” season 2, episode 15 recap. Like we always stress in sharing these latest homemade Cliff’s Notes on Fox television’s very own “Game Of Thrones” gangsta rap remix, don’t read this if you do not want to know or if perhaps you aren’t quite sure. Just like Neo taking that “Matrix” pill from Morpheus, once you know you can’t ‘un’ know – just the rules of the game. But we will say that getting the lowdown on the most current aggressions and feral treacheries that we’ve come to know and love from the Lyons, their besties and their enemies… it’s pretty high up there on the guilty pleasures list, so if you slip and take a peek we won’t fault you. So, spoiler alert here it goes:
Anika Calhoun (Grace Gealey) gets vital support from Cookie Lyon (Taraji P. Henson) in her time of need. In the surprise twist of twists, Cookie, for the sake of Hakeem’s (Bryshere Y. Gray) unborn baby, actually calms down Anika when she is on her way to the hospital in an ambulance. When the paramedics can’t calm down Boo Boo Kitty’s crazy, Cookie is actually a maternal pillar of strength for the corporate side chick that she loves to hate. But wait a minute… why is Anika on her way to the hospital?
Anika has some sort of unexplained panic attack that puts her in the hospital. Right before Cookie is set to ‘handle’ the problem that Boo Boo Kitty poses as the new human incubator for the next generation of the Lyon dynasty, she runs smack dab into the paramedics taking Anika out of her house on a stretcher. Early on, Cookie calls it as a panic attack – but is it? Honestly, it’s hard to tell seeing as Lucious Lyon (Terrence Howard) has threatened Anika’s life and Anika has been known to stalk Hakeem’s fiancee Laura (Jamila Velazquez), the woman who in all likelihood will be her baby’s step mother. Only time, or perhaps the two remaining episodes up until the end of season 2, will tell.
Empire board members intend to elect Lucious Lyon and Cookie Lyon as the new co CEOs of Empire. Honestly, with all of the deft public mending that Cookie has done to keep the family together as a cohesive business entity, we could have seen this one coming, but it’s still pretty darn shocking. Even more shocking is that Lucious, upon hearing about it from the board holders, graciously declares that he thinks this is a good idea – to the slack jawed surprise of Cookie. Factual hiccup – when Cookie got out of jail in “Empire” season 1, didn’t Lucious say that per federal law, as a convicted felon Cookie could never hold the office of CEO in a company like Empire, let alone a publicly traded company? Hmmmm. However, no matter what the logistics, seeing the hug that Lucious gives Cookie after hearing the news, one can’t think that this hug has less of a relationship to celebration versus direct kinship with the kiss of death.
Soon after becoming Empire’s very public face for Bipolar Disorder, Andre (Trai Byers) learns that Lucious’ mother, Leah Walker (Leslie Uggams) is alive. Courtesy of the rage of yet another woman sexually scorned and betrayed by Lucious, this particular one being that shameless journalist Harper Scott (Annie Ilonzeh), Andre learns the exact details and location of his dear old departed bipolar grandmother, who is in fact not departed at all, as she is living just outside of Philly. With this revelation, it’s a good guess that there are more bombshell inconsistencies lurking in the dark picture that Lucious has been painting publicly and privately with regards to his complicated relationship from mother to son. And so the plot thickens….
“Empire” airs Wednesdays at 9:00/8:00 c on Fox.
