I know I'm not the biggest fan of Chloe anyway, but I was also underwhelmed by the new direction for her character... for all the reasons you list. It felt like they were shoehorning her in a new direction but they didn't keep it consistent--she still investigates Davis? Meh.

I was really missing all the folks no longer in the cast this week. The plot seemed really thin to me with only three main characters
Same. There was a lot of time spent on Tess, Davis and Bette. Bette was a one-ep character, and Tess and Davis are finding their feet... it felt strained.