In case it hasn’t been obvious enough, The Morning Show makes clear in “The Revolution Will Be Televised” that the dynamic shared between the series and its audience is very much the audience going “This show is insane, what could be more batshit than this?” and The Morning Show going “Hold my beer.” And then it does something like have the Iranian government go after Alex Levy with deep fakes. The Iranian government. The more bonkers this series gets, the more I enjoy it, and that is simply my truth.

Of course, it takes some time for the team at UBN to discover the Iranians have hacked into the CCTV footage of Alex trying to figure out how to help Iranian fencer Roya and her nuclear scientist dad escape the building and defect to the U.S. to make it look like Alex had planned this for them from the beginning — that she set up the interview as a cover for their defection. This fact, too, is laughable because wouldn’t at least one person bring up the fact that Alex just pissed off the Iranians like two days ago? Instead, Celine, Stella, and John from legal are just standing around looking at a panic-stricken Alex like she’s already guilty. Who would ever try to do this to you, Alex? Who would even have the capability? It’s wild that it’s Alex who has to point out that they literally just made AI tech with the ability to make it look like Alex can speak in over 40 different languages and not, I don’t know, Queen of AI Stella, who was all hyped up about welcoming UBN into the future with her pet project last week. Stella is also highly tech-savvy and, oh yes, was very much around for Paul Marks hacking into UBN just two years ago. She can’t give Alex just a tiny benefit of the doubt? They assure Alex they’ll look into things with their mouths, but their eyes definitely say we are going through the motions until we can fire you on Friday. Why does Alex work here again?

With even Mia telling Alex that she can’t get in the middle of this and let her wax poetic about deep fakes on TMS because she’s still waiting to nab that head of news position, Alex winds up seeking help from two unlikely sources. One is UBN’s resident douche, Bro Hamilton. Are these two going to hook up at least once before the season ends? It would certainly carry on the tradition of Alex’s terrible taste in men and their banter in the elevator — “It’s like the first act of a romantic comedy,” he tells her. “Or a slasher movie,” she responds — is pretty fun. I hope it happens and I hope it’s sloppy. Anyway, when Alex is all out of platforms to plead her case, she decides to ask Bro for a spot on his show. He gives her a lot of grief, but eventually agrees. He also warns her to never, ever search “Alex Levy deepfakes” online, which is sort of nice even if it means that is exactly what Alex goes home and does. I would’ve thought Alex Levy running internet searches of herself would be part of her bedtime routine, but sure, she’s never looked up her own deep fakes before. And Bro is right, of course. Alex stumbles upon true pornographic nightmare fuel.

Alex’s second ally in this mess is Cory. Cory has arrived at her place to chat about Bradley’s return and make a peace offering to thank her for “vanquishing Paul Marks,” but Alex is interested in neither of those things at the moment. She’s so distracted by the deep-fake situation that she has no real choice but to spill to Cory. When he hears how Celine and Stella are handling the whole thing, he tells Alex that she’s being gaslit, to which she responds as if she had never heard of gaslighting before. Again, like half of The Morning Show’s storylines are about gaslighting people, but yes, I guess Alex never considered that term in regard to this situation. He does offer some sage advice, though: If Celine is talking about a meeting on Friday, that means she’s bringing the situation to the board, and there is no way they don’t fire Alex. If she has any hope of surviving that, she needs to make nice with Cybil’s daughter, Leslie, since the Reynold’s family still owns 20 percent of the company. If Leslie has Alex’s back, she should be safe.

In some actual good news: Celine comes to see a post-tear-gassed Alex and informs her that hey, it’s a good thing they did look into the CCTV footage, because would you look at that, it was tampered with and most likely by the Iranians. It’s really not shocking that this network is constantly on the brink of bankruptcy. Everyone is terrible at their jobs.

All is not lost, though. Bradley does make some major headway on the Wolf River stuff. She enlists Chip to help her since they were such a great team when they worked together to bring Paul Marks down. He is hesitant, telling her that leaving the network behind has given him back part of his soul and he’s made his peace with what happened there; he doesn’t want to get involved with that place again. But once he remembers a meeting he had in 2019 regarding shelving the Wolf River story — he says a report from the EPA came out and cleared the chemical company, so Fred Micklen had them stop the story — he worries he was inadvertently involved and wants some answers.

The anonymous source winds up flaking on the meeting they had set up with Bradley, but she and Chip put a couple of details together and believe they’ve figured out who has been contacting them. (See? They are a good team!) Bradley believes whoever it is must be on the assistant group chat because they were apparently all talking about Bradley’s return before Mia even arrived in West Virginia. Chip realizes that some of the words in the messages to Bradley use the British spelling — like “theatre” — and there is one former assistant from the U.K. they both know: Claire Conway. Claire definitely has a deep hatred for UBA after everything that happened with Hannah, and Chip remembers that she was in that 2019 meeting about Wolf River getting coffee for everyone. She fits.

Those two aren’t the only ones who piece a few clues together for a major reveal. Cory has returned to catch up with Alex about Bradley, but he’s also back in New York for some self-serving reasons. (Are we surprised?) He wants to talk to Stella about funding for his “Oscar bait” film that he says, or rather monologues at her, will be perfect for audiences who “want to be numbed from the hellscape of America in 2024.” But Stella has no time for Cory’s monologues (no one does; it’s very depressing) nor his attempt to save himself from ruin. “It hurts, doesn’t it? That the whole world keeps spinning without you?” she tells him before chugging her martini and heading out.

Little does she know that she and Cory are connected in some surprising ways. She tells Miles about Cory hitting her up for some UBN money and Miles tells her he actually knows Cory from way back. He can handle him for her. So Miles has Cory over to the loft and after reminiscing about their drug-fueled days in Los Angeles, tries to persuade him that getting involved with UBN for his film is not the answer. It would be bad for everyone. As Miles fixes his friend a drink, Cory takes a self-guided tour around the studio, and what does he spot on the nightstand? The gold lighter Stella had been playing around with during their meeting at the bar. He realizes Stella is sleeping with Miles — the husband of the president of the board, remember — and he knows he has all the leverage he needs.