The series finale of ABC’s “How to Get Away with Murder” answered the season’s burning question: “Who killed Annalise?”
It also tossed in a few more bodies, for those keeping score at home.
Warning: Spoilers follow!
Annalise’s twisty murder trial seemed to go sideways several times. Annalise (Academy Award and Emmy winner Viola Davis) seemed to think she deserved to be punished for all her misdeeds, even though murder was never one of them.
The remains of the Keating Five (sob, Asher!) struggled to keep it together. Connor (Jack Falahee) was offered a better plea deal, but realized it came with hubby Oliver (Conrad Ricamora) lying on the stand to help convict Annalise.
That was just a line Connor would not cross, and he demanded a divorce from Oliver, telling him he had only ruined him.
“Death, murder, and trauma, and that’s going to follow us always if we stay together,” he told him. It was a moment of rare acknowledgement of the twisted co-dependent nature of their relationship.
Frank (Charlie Weber) and Bonnie (Liza Weil) also imploded. Frank couldn’t forgive Bonnie – for now, he conceded – for telling him he was actually Sam’s son. Of all the HTGAWM twists, that paternity reveal has to be just the most damn silliest.
Annalise’s bared her soul to the jury in her summation, and that prompted Tegan (Amirah Vann) to bare her heart: She loved Annalise, and promised to make her happy. Annalise just couldn’t promise her the same.
The verdict was in at last: Not guilty on all counts.
As Annalise held an impromptu press conference on the steps of the courthouse, we finally saw the full bloody shootout we’d been teased this season.
Frank slipped through the crowd, pulled out a gun and assassinated the governor (Laura Innes), the mastermind behind the conspiracy against Annalise. Her bloody body turned out to be the one we had been seeing in those flash-forwards.
In the ensuing crossfire with law enforcement, Frank was shot.
With his dying breath, he told Bonnie he had done it for Annalise. Annalise rushed to Bonnie’s side and realized to her horror that Bonnie, too, had been shot. Bonnie died cradled in Annalise’s arms.
So who killed Annalise?
Father Time.
That funeral turned out to be the ultimate flash-forward, set decades in the future. That young man walking through the crowd wasn’t Wes, but his dead-ringer of a son, Christopher (also played by Alfred Enoch).

Eve (guest star Famke Janssen) gave a eulogy, accompanied by flashbacks, that revealed Annalise’s life had gone on, just as complicated as ever. She found joy for a time with Tegan, Eve, a few others. She lost her beloved mother (guest star Cicely Tyson). She struggled with her sobriety. She remained as much a magnet for others, up until her dying day. Give credit to series creator and writer Peter Nowalk for acknowledging that there are no true happily-ever-afters in life. There’s always a struggle in our nature.
Michaela (Aja Naomi King) became a judge. Nate (Billy Brown) broke ground on a criminal justice center to honor his father.
An elderly Laurel (Karla Souza) scanned the mourners and spotted Connor, looking like a major DILF, and Oliver. They apparently found their way back to each other after Connor was released from prison. Yay?
The series ended much as it had opened in 2014, with Christopher, like his father before him, riding his bicycle to the first day of classes at Middleton Law School. Only Christopher wasn’t a student. He was the professor for the class “How to Get Away with Murder.”
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