Everyone In The Morning Show Acts A Fool This Week, But Alex's Terrible Decision Trumps Them All
Has Alex Levy learned nothing?
If you have watched The Morning Show for a while, you'll recall that the fallout from the glossy-haired UBA anchor's affair with former co-worker Mitch Kessler made her tabloid fodder in Seasons 1 and 2. Her marriage ended. The viewing public couldn't stand her. Hell, she had to sweat and hack on-air from a global pandemic before she was exonerated in the audience's eyes.
And now that she's back on top, Alex decides to celebrate by... sleeping with one of her interview subjects who JUST HAPPENS TO ALSO BE HER NEW BOSS. It's journalistically unethical. It's a poor career move. And it's just so damn pathetic, given all that's happened.
But don't worry, Bradley also makes a boneheaded move that could blow up everything she's tried so hard to hide since Jan. 6. Chip says the absolute wrong thing to the wrong person. And Laura shoots her mouth off with some editorializing absolutely no one asked for. Jackasses, the lot of them!
Read on for the highlights of "The Stanford Student."
STAY CLASSY, ALEX | There are a lot of critics of the burgeoning UBA/Paul Marks deal — including Laura, who comments on it from the YDA news desk — but Cory's not worried. "Everybody's jealous," he sniffs. Paul decides to meet with the network staff in person, asking them to fire questions at him about any of their concerns. He's very reassuring as he pins the data hack on Russia, says he wants to expand — not gut — the news division and promises that he has no interest in weighing in on editorial affairs, even if Hyperion or its clients are in the news. Alex, in particular, seems intent on making him squirm. That makes Cory irate, but it seems to pique Paul's interest. During a conversation in Alex's dressing room later, Paul easily agrees to an interview on Alex Unfiltered. She's flustered, both by his acquiescence and by the flirty vibe that's building between them... and he knows it.
The interview takes place two days later at Paul's home in the Hamptons, and the afternoon is all over the place. Paul can't tear his eyes away when Alex's midriff is exposed as the sound guy mics her up before the shoot. But then he's increasingly testy when the questions get started, particularly when Alex brings up a tech incubator Paul ran during the dot-com boom. A Stanford student at the time claims to have written a code that evolved into the data-analytics system "that you sell to governments around the world," Alex says, calling it "a billion-dollar idea that you bought for $50 grand." Eventually, she states it plainly: "Are you rich because you stole someone else's idea?"
Sure, the student signed a non-disclosure agreement, but then later acknowledged that they didn't fully understand what they'd signed. "Debilitating depression, as well as a suicide attempt" followed, Alex says. And that news seems to take Paul aback. He says he didn't know about any of that, and then tells a story about how his singlemindedness to build Hyperion made him blind to many things — including how his then-wife was leaving him. After, "I took a pretty hard look at myself, the way I treated people, the costs of what I was doing. And I have since changed my company's policies as well as my own personal behavior and beliefs," he says, adding that he owes the student "at the very least, a conversation." It's a masterful answer to what could've been a nuclear question, and Alex seems deeply affected when he's done.
When the shoot is done, Paul is impressed that Alex asked him so tough a question. She says she can't reveal her sources, but admits she does not know the identity of the student. And once everyone else has left, that flirty spark from before blazes into all-out flames. He kisses her. She kisses back. Pretty soon, they're in bed. She stays the night, and when Cory calls Paul to check in, Paul just can't stop himself from being all double-entendre-y, saying that Alex "blew [tiny pause wink wink IKYKYK gross] my mind." Eww.
Even more eww: Can we PLEASE get a journalism-based series in which a female reporter DOESN'T sleep with an interviewee?
OH LOOK, HAL'S BACK | Since I've got my grumpy pants on, let's deal with Bradley next. Hal, his lady (played by Midnight Mass' Samantha Sloyan) and their baby come to visit. Everything is going well until Hal whispers to Bradley that he's planning to turn himself in "for what I done at the Capitol." His wife doesn't know anything about it. "You don't need me to tell you how stupid that is, do you?" Bradley says. He's thinking that the feds will go easier on him if he turns himself in, but she points out that she'll be charged with destroying evidence and making a false statement; both are felonies. But Hal won't be swayed.
So Bradley does what any sane, normal person would do: manipulate an interview subject into unknowingly driving home her point while Hal watches. She invites her brother and his family to come to the studio while she pre-tapes a segment in which she interviews a man awaiting trial for assaulting a Capitol police officer on Jan. 6. She gets him to say that, knowing what he knows now, he would've never taken part in the proceedings that day. He's lost everything. And while she patronizingly points out that no one pays enough attention to the collateral damage from the insurrection, she looks directly at Hal. Off to the side, Cory fumes. Afterward, he tells her to "fix" whatever is going on with her and her brother, "or I will."
Bradley has a weird dinner with Laura in which Laura knows something is off, but Bradley can't say anything. Then she runs into Alex and thanks her for always having her back cough except for the entirety of Season 1 cough, which a puzzled Alex correctly reads as a goodbye. Meanwhile, Laura goes to Bradley's to talk to Hal and apologizes for inadvertently encouraging Bradley to cut Hal and her mom out of her life. She asks for his support in reuniting with Laura, and he says he'll think on it.
The next time Bradley comes home, no one is there, and there's a note waiting for her. "Changed my mind (about a lot of things)," Hal wrote. Welp, that's that, then! Bradley hightails it to Laura's place and apologizes about being weird over dinner. "I just miss you. I really miss you," she says. They kiss.
WHO IS THE STANFORD STUDENT? | If you hadn't guessed by now, the Stanford student that Paul screwed over was Stella, a point made clear when he confronts her near the end of the hour. You should've talked ot me. I had no idea you felt that way," he says. "I wasn't sure how I felt," she counters. Then she announces that she's planning to leave UBA, but he's got another idea: She should take Cory's job once Paul takes over. She's surprised, and points out that there'll be pushback. But Paul is undeterred. "What do you think, Stella?" he asks. "You wanna run this place?"
AH, ROMANCE | Lest I leave out Chip's bumbled maneuver, let's deal with it here. When he realizes that Alex is kinda into Paul, Chip immediately asks Isabella to marry him in Niagra. She's on the verge of tears as she turns him down, which stymies him: Hasn't she been dropping clues for months? "I want you to ask because of me, not because of her," she replies. He says that she's being ridiculous, but he definitely knows what she's talking about.
Now it's your turn. What did you think of the episode? Sound off in the comments!