‘Matlock’ Recap: Where’s the Real Wellbrexa Study?

[Warning: The following contains MAJOR spoilers for Matlock Season 2 Episode 2, “Another Matlock.”]

Matty (Kathy Bates) and Olympia (Skye P. Marshall) are operating in truth now in Matlock. Well, sort of. More truth definitely came out in the second episode of Season 2, but so did more tension. Olympia took the upper hand in their complicated feud by the end of the episode, wresting control out of Matty’s hands after she had been controlling the narrative since Season 1.

Matty and Edwin (Sam Anderson) were excited about getting in contact with a New York Times reporter at the top of the episode. They worked together to steal the Wellbrexa study from Olympia’s safe in her home in the Matlock Season 2 premiere (read our recap here). Matty soaked in every detail of her supposed last day at Jacobson Moore, but after a dance in the courtroom that featured Bates doing impressions of Andy Griffith‘s Ben Matlock from the original Matlock, a mid-episode plot twist changed everything.

Olympia realized that Matty had taken the document and called her out for it. Matty didn’t hesitate for a second to admit the truth when Olympia cornered her. Matty offered to bring Olympia with her to her meeting with the Times to go on the record and try to protect her family.

While Olympia confirmed that her ex-husband, Julian (Jason Ritter), hid the study in a safety deposit box for all those years, she soon revealed that the study in her safe was a decoy to keep Julian from trying to destroy the damning evidence. Olympia is desperate to pin the scandal on Julian’s father, Senior (Beau Bridges), who ordered his son to hide the study to protect their big-money pharmaceutical client.

“I care about justice, too, so let’s work together,” Olympia urged. Matty wasn’t buying the “durress” argument her friend was posing. Julian could have refused to follow his father’s order, an act that could have saved countless lives, including Matty’s daughter.

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Matty and Olympia fought back and forth for the entire episode, trying to convince the other to see their side of things. Olympia kept getting the upper hand on Matty whenever they squared off, showing how equally quick-witted she is in comparison to Matty (she’s clearly the other Matlock the episode title references). She made Matty miss her meeting with the Times, and she took Edwin on a road trip to get the supposed real Wellbrexa study, which she said she had left in a different safety deposit box in Connecticut. On this trip, Edwin said that Matty “saw through [Olympia’s] lies,” but neither of them really did.

Olympia took Edwin’s phone and left him stranded on their road trip (he got back just fine). She handed Matty a fake study with blank pages, saying that Matty doesn’t have the leverage she thinks she has. Matty pushed back, but Olympia revealed the list of crimes Matty and Edwin committed in their secret investigation at the law firm. All of this was to trigger Matty, just like they had with a criminal in a court case earlier in the episode. Olympia pulled a Matty by recording this conversation in secret.

This damning audio file is what Olympia emailed Matty when she was supposed to be emailing the Wellbrexa document. And now, Olympia has control of the chessboard, and viewers still don’t know if the real Wellbrexa study is in Connecticut like Olympia claimed — or if it’s even real, for that matter. Matty will have to find this key evidence if she has any hopes of getting a proper investigation into this scandal. That, or find a new way to prove Jacobson Moore’s guilt.

Elsewhere in the episode, Matty and Edwin agreed to help Alfie’s (Aaron D. Harris) father, Joey (Niko Nicotera), with his sobriety by paying for his place at a rehab center, but it’s up to him to decide if he accepts the help.

Matlock, Thursdays, 9/8c, CBS