Empire: Cast of “Sinned Against”

“Sinned Against” was the 9th episode of “Empire” Season 2 (11-25-2015), part of a line from Shakespeare’s King Lear (“More sinn’d against than sinning”). We’re not even gonna try to guess who that is supposed to refer to in this episode.

Picking up from the end of last week’s episode, Candace (Vivica A. Fox) and Cookie hit the streets in Philly looking for their errant sister, Carol (Tasha Smith). But Candace and Cookie can’t get along to save their own lives, nevermind Carol’s. Cookie kept calling Candace a “bougie ass,” and also said: “Will you stop acting like Diahann Carroll, heffa!” After Candace got on her last nerve, Cookie contacted Pepper O’Leary, played by Rosie O’Donnell. Pepper was in jail for 10 of Cookie’s 17 year stretch and Cookie kept her out of a lot of trouble with Lady Athena the warden. They find Carol a lot quicker with Pepper’s help. Carol chooses to go with Cookie, but when Candace is alone with Carol, she points out that if Cookie knew what Carol did when she was locked up, “it wouldn’t be such a Sister Sledge reunion, now would it?”

Alicia Keys played Skye Summers, a popular singer, about to collaborate with Jamal on the first track of his “Black and White” album. She is unhappy because she feels like she is stuck in her lane. Jamal, the O.G. Skye Summers Fan, is thrilled to be working with her. Jamal gets rid of the old school advisors by suggesting that Lucious show Judith (Terria Joseph) his new Mickalene Thomas. He tells Skye that he wants to help her bust out of them chains that are holding her back, not from success, from self-fulfillment. So yeah, it’s not like we don’t have enough story lines going on at once, now we’ve got us another.

Lee Daniels played himself, directing Jamal’s video. Lucious thought he was going to run that show but Lee told him to fall back– he represented the past, and Jamal was the future. Lucious was furious.

More Notes:

• Laz decided that his feelings for Cookie were the real deal but it was too late to go straight. We sure Big Heavy had his own plans for Laz after Laz pulled a gun on him, but Lucious got there first and exposed him to Cookie and Hakeem. His longhorn tattoo was exposed, too. Cookie took Hakeem and left Laz to the not-so-tender mercies of Lucious and his goons.
• Lucious bought Andre and Rhonda a 6-bedroom mansion as a reward for perpetuating his dynasty via Rhonda’s pregnancy. Then he tried to bribe Hakeem to come back to Empire, but Hakeem would not be bought.
• Rhonda unwittingly lent support to Anika’s plan to get rid of Laura and live happily ever after with Hakeem and their child. Rhonda told her a story of getting rid of a rival who tried to steal Andre from her in college and said Anika shouldn’t let anything stand in her way. Anika crashed Hakeem’s party and disrespected Laura, telling Hakeem that his “Jenny from the block” lives in a hovel with 7 siblings and he could do so much better. She also brought up that Hakeem originally wrote the song he and Laura sang for Camilla. This led to a confrontation where Hakeem told Anika in no uncertain terms that she would never be a Lyon.

The Stars of Empire:
Terrence Howard – Lucious Lyon
Taraji P. Henson – Cookie Lyon
Bryshere Y. Gray – Hakeem Lyon
Jussie Smollett – Jamal Lyon
Trai Byers – Andre Lyon

Also in this episode:
Kaitlin Doubleday – Rhonda Lyon
Grace Gealey – Anika Calhoun
Jamila Velazquez – Laura Calleros
Adam Rodriguez – Laz Delgado
Victor Almanzar – Big Heavy
AzMarie Livingston – Chicken
Paloma Nozicka – Brenda