I've almost caught up completely now; there are just two episodes left, and then I can turn my attention to season 5, whose episodes are sitting on my TiVo as I write this.
[SPOILERS for the last third of season 4]
The first episode I caught up on was the one where Lena Dunham plays a political intern who writes a tell-all book about her sexcapades with over a dozen Washington insiders, including the current white hat Attorney General (David Rosen) - a storyline vaguely reminiscent of the Washingtonienne scandal from 2004. I'm not a fan of Dunham, and I vaguely remembered that her presence may have caused me to delay watching this episode back when it first aired. Notwithstanding Dunham, this was quite an enjoyable episode, because Olivia Pope was in her full "I'm in charge" mode, especially as she dealt with the collection of men who'd been with Dunham's character, trying to get them to see that paying collectively the $3 million that Dunham was demanding was the best option for them.
The next four episodes continued the "Gladiators" trend - that is, political fires that Pope is called on to put out, in addition to the continuing storyline about the effort to stop the covert black ops unit B613 that Pope's father commands. I was reminded of how fast and funny this show can be, as long as it doesn't turn Olivia Pope and the President into a pair of weak and whimpering creatures who want to be together but can't do what it takes to achieve that for good. From what I've picked up about season 5, the President is divorcing the First Lady, so perhaps Pope and the President will get some sort of happy ending - and the viewers, too. They can be together; please just spare us the forlorn glances and all that.
