Fashion

So, Is He Dead?

by Christine DiStasio

I guess if the CIA says it, it must be true. Right? ABC's Revenge still hasn't given fans visual confirmation that Conrad Grayson died after the Season 3 finale. Well, until Sunday night. On Sunday night's new episode, "Meteor," a CIA agent revealed that Conrad is really dead on Revenge during the interrogation on the recently returned to society David Clarke. But I'm not necessarily inclined to believe that and if you're a Revenge fan, you shouldn't be either.

On Sunday night, David Clarke made his big return to society. I know, it seems so soon in Revenge Season 4 for David to be reintroduced to society. But, I guess it's as good a time as any, considering David's name is technically cleared. Basically, David got arrested as a suspect in the break-in at Emily's house during last Sunday's episode and this whole can of worms sort of exploded. The police got an ID on him after he was fingerprinted, the CIA came in, and while David was telling his treacherous story of how Conrad kidnapped him from jail and tortured him until he escaped, the agent revealed that Conrad wasn't a concern to him anymore.

Yes, Revenge straight-up revealed to fans that Conrad Grayson is dead. And I mean really dead, as in, he won't be coming back in 20 years to wreak havoc. But can we really believe that and still maintain our self-respect as television fans? I think not. First of all, this was such an unceremonious and unfulfilling confirmation of Conrad's fate. Revenge spent three seasons on Conrad's treachery, to just have a random CIA agent reveal his death is such a cheap giveaway.

There's also the fact that this came out in the middle of David Clarke's elaborate and almost terrifying lie that he was Conrad's prisoner this entire time. It just can't be that simple. I refuse to believe that Revenge has really changed its colors that much and that the true answer to the Conrad question would come from the lips of a random CIA agent during an almost inappropriate time.

And, to be quite honest, I'm still not over the fact that Revenge's entire premise was based on David Clarke being dead and he just magically wasn't anymore. That just doesn't sit well with me — if David could reemerge after all of this time, Conrad absolutely can too. He's just not going to go down like that.

Image: ABC (screengrab)