America may have missed out on its first female president, but Shondaland sure didn't. The seventh and final season of Scandal will finally see former First Lady Mellie Grant take up the mantle of President of the United States, in what has to be seen as a form of alternative timeline storytelling about how the actual 2016 election could have gone. But real-world parallels aside, we all know that Scandal is going to be pulling out all the stops for its final season, and some of the Scandal Season 7 spoilers already coming out of the woodwork confirm that the already insanely dramatic show is going to be even crazier than ever this season! And a lot of that is going to have to do with newly elected president Mellie Grant (Bellamy Young).
Young teased in an interview with TVLine that things are going to get explosive between Mellie and Olivia Pope, who is now serving as both Mellie's Chief of Staff as well as secretly running the newly rebooted covert agency B613. According to Young, Mellie trusts Olivia a ton... but maybe she shouldn't.
It’s so interesting to me that Mellie and Olivia are sitting on this big tub of kerosene just waiting for a match. There’s so much Mellie doesn’t know, and I’m not sure how or when they’re going to reveal it, but it’s waiting to explode. Mellie is so hopeful about making history with Olivia. She feels invincible with Olivia by her side. But I think it’s going to be seismic when she realizes what’s really going on.
Yikes — get ready for that blow-up! Young also spilled about Mellie's romantic future in the new season. She made a point to note that Mellie's election to office doesn't only make her the first female president, but also the first single female president. It might not stay that way throughout the whole season though!
Although her ex-husband (and former president) Fitz is out of Washington to work for his foundation in Vermont, Young says that he and Mellie still have a close relationship with one another, and that he may serve as a valuable resource to her this season. But in terms of romance, Mellie only has eyes for civil rights activist Marcus Walker. Though he left to Vermont with Fitz at the end of Season 6, Young said that things would just feel off if Marcus and Mellie didn't rekindle their relationship before the show ends this season.
I hope there’s a Chapter 2 for [Mellie and Marcus]. I hold out hope for them. It would be strange to me if that doesn’t come back around.
But with all the craziness about to happen in the final season, Bellamy Young also said that the show feels much less outlandish and soapy than it did when they started, which has a lot to do with the gigantic shift in political power that took place right before the Scandal team wrote and filmed the final season. Young views her portrayal of the first female president as a bit of a safe haven for fans who may have been disheartened to come so close to seeing the historic moment happen in real life, only for it to shockingly not occur. Now, Young says that reality has become so outlandish, that Scandal is actually kind of the tame, wish fulfillment alternative. But don't worry — I'm sure that doesn't mean there won't be insane melodramatics and shocking twists, as always.
The final season of Scandal will kick off with a bang on Thursday, Oct. 5 at 9:00 p.m. on ABC.
