Quantico Review: Cover (Season 1 Episode 3)

There are so many mind twists in this week’s Quantico, I’m having a hard time trying to figure out where to begin.

The major theme in “My enemy, myself” is betrayal. So much betrayal, that it makes my heart hurt.

The show is doing a great job of slowly, but effectively developing the characters, in ways that makes them both interesting and suspicious, but it does have me wishing they’d focus more on Alex. We are told time and time again that she’s the first in her class, and that’s great (we can see that when she outsmarts every exercise Miranda gives the recruits) — but I’d like to see more of her secrets, and mysterious ten (or nine?) years in India; more of her personal life; more of her family life.

Either way, this episode’s MVP is Tate Ellington for playing Simon. As the recruits turn to profiling each other, which makes them also turn against each other, we see that everyone thinks Ryan is a drone, Alex is a brown-noser, Nimah is weak, and Simon is creepy.

And creepy he is.

Tate plays his Simon Asher — ex recruit, and guy with a huge secret to the tee. The scene where the alarm goes off with Simon smirking at Alex– one eyebrow raised, not a twinge of regret on his face for handing her over to the authorities, had me covered in goosebumps with my jaw on the ground!

Speaking of this scene, I’m starting to think it’s extremely sketchy that every single person that is helping Alex is telling her they believe her (she’s not a terrorist!) but they still need to make it look like she’s guilty. My idea right now is there’s more than one person behind this cover up/ frame job.

I may be right, considering the last ten minutes of the episode is split between not only Alex’s mom giving a press release of how she thinks her daughter is guilty, but also of Simon taking a call from the FBI Director — revealing that he’s actually an agent under cover. (I guess the FBI offers jobs to recruits even after they’ve been kicked out?)

See. Betrayal everywhere.

Things are getting exciting as we meet more recruits in present day. I like that the writers are taking their time with this, and I like that we are learning something each episode—something important, and something major—but just enough to keep us wanting more. Personally, I’m looking forward to Alex’ meeting with Nimah — only because I’d actually like to see how Nimah did without Raina.

All in all, the format of the show has a very How To Get Away With Murder vibe to it, but I’m not complaining. It’s keeping me intrigued and guessing and wanting more every episode. My only hope is that everyone’s secret, or weakness (Nathalie’s family, Raina leaving, Shelby’s phone calls) is somehow tied to this terrorist attack. That would make it mind baffling, and probably the biggest TV rival to Shondaland.

What did you think of “Cover”? Tell us in the comments below!

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Quantico airs Sunday’s at 10/9c on ABC.

Smriti Jasra

Smriti (a.k.a Sim) is a TV and comic book enthusiast, and has been since the days of Angel and Alias. She watches over 20 shows a week, and her perfect idea of a date is sitting on a couch with some pizza, while having the ultimate debate of Marvel vs. DC. When she’s not live-tweeting her favorite shows or working at her day job, she’s usually writing fan-fiction. Her favorite shows include: Arrow, The 100, Suits, The Flash and Kingdom. Follow her on Twitter: @simjasra