BWW Recap: All Those Florricks On THE GOOD WIFE

Sometimes an episode of THE GOOD WIFE plays like a perfect day in bond court. That is to say, everything moves really quickly, and every resolution is neat - at least for one half of each equation. Tonight, loyal followers of THE GOOD WIFE, we got an episode Judge Schakowsky would be proud of. Battles were fought and won (and lost), and stakes were changed, all in the course of 43 minutes (which equates to roughly two days in THE GOOD WIFE universe, this time around).

This is not To Kill A Mockingbird

In Taxed, Alicia is back to her old tricks - that is, her habit of actually caring about her clients, which once again does not serve her well in bond court. She was on the verge of being accepted by her less caring fellow attorneys - they even included her in their office competitions - until she overhears one of her colleagues deliberately mislead a client, Maia, about her case. Because it's Alicia, and let's face it, no amount of snark from the dodgy Judge Schakowsky is ever going to touch her Atticus aspirations, she steps in and gives Maia advice. Hey presto! Alicia gains Maia as a client, which to the other bond attorneys is basically lunch-cutting, and so once again we have Alicia's halo restored, and new friends lost.

Because Schakowsky is dirty in every sense (even if he does have a working knowledge of Hogwarts), Alicia struggles to get a fair hearing for Maia, who maintains her innocence after being charged with stealing a stupidly expensive sweater from a high-end department store. We already know that the truth doesn't matter much to Schakowsky (definitely a Slytherin contender, don't you think?), and he proves he's nothing if not consistent when he puts Maia in jail for the night, rather than let Alicia finish her defence. Running out of time, Alicia calls on Jason Crouse to come investigate the case for her. She has enough money to pay for three of his crumpled, gorgeous hours; proving he too can work at bond court pace, Jason comes up with the goods. It looks like the department store has a nasty habit of targeting and arresting African American women. The Kings like to base their cases on real life issues, and Jason tells us there was a recent cast in New York just like this (cue research from me on where NEVER to shop in Manhattan, as soon as this recap is done).

Alicia has enough on the department store to start a class action, which would not only be the right thing to do, it would put her back in the lawerly game. Unfortunately, security tapes obtained from the store show Maia is indeed innocent, but only because it was her mother who stole the stupidly expensive sweater. Maia chooses Matan Brodie's offer of 6 months probation, rather than see her mother convicted, which effectively shuts down Alicia's class action options. In the meantime, we know of one more dodgy thing that corporations do in real life.

We also learn that Jason is disbarred, and that he once punched a judge. Which only makes him more appealing right now. When Alicia asks him if she needs to be worried, and Jason answers yes, it's all but concluded that she'll fall for him. Why start making smart choices now, Alicia Florrick.

Oh, but she does make one clearly good choice by the end of the hour. She asks Lucca to come join her in fighting the good fight. Now that Lucca is actually sitting down at the bar with Alicia, I think she might answer with her very own yes.

My head is hurting from the wrongness here

Diane is making some interesting choices too, and she's fully aware of it. Dipple is now Lockhart, Agos and Lee's biggest client, and he has Diane's personal ethics on a very tight leash, which is good for his right-wing interests, but certainly not for hers (Sidebar: Dipple? Who's Dipple?! It took me a good while to realise that's R.D. Reese Dipple. Hmmm). After paying Diane to play devil's advocate on a physician assisted suicide case, R.D. sends his impeccable henchman Irving (Oh hello, Peter Gallagher!) to request that she now argue against assisted suicide in court. No matter that Diane believes in a patient's right to end their suffering - what R.D. wants, R.D. gets.

When Diane soon realises she's really being asked to help scare off doctors sympathetic to assisted suicide by raising the likelihood of malpractice suits, she finds herself between a rock (ethics) and a hard place (money. Always, the money). Still, she does her job, and she out-cannings Canning, her opposition on the case - a man whose courtroom tricks she's well used to. Canning wins in the end however, because this particular case was predicated on the woman who died not knowing about a potentially life-saving alternative to her cancer, but it turns out she did know about it. She just made her own interesting choice on the matter.

In the current left/right fight for the hearts and minds of soon-to-be-voting Americans, I expect we'll see more of this kind of case played out on THE GOOD WIFE. Bring on the healthy debate, I say.

It's Eli!

Eli's also interested in stirring up debate. In his ever-increasing quest to take down Ruth Eastman, Eli brings in the big guns, i.e. the Florrick women (cue dramatic music!), to stir whatever it is he's trying to cook. Grace is still a Christian, so he enlists her to lobby Dad to vote against an upcoming assisted suicide bill (I forgot to mention - R.D. wants Alicia to advise her husband against the bill, and "Remember me?" Cary is sent to offer her a potential place back at her old firm if she does what he asks. She doesn't). At the same time, Eli brings in Jackie (she of the cleavage and budding Howard romance) to argue the other side. While we don't see Stockard Channing on screen (boo!), we do know Veronica has also been brought into the mix, because she calls a harried Peter to discuss the bill.

The idea perhaps is that Peter will think Ruth can't handle all the women in his life, but Eli underestimated his opponent. Ruth gets Grace on side by quoting bible verse, and she wraps Jackie around her finger by telling her just how needed she is in this campaign. One can only assume Ruth took equally good care of Veronica, too (maybe she bought her a drink?). Game, set and match to Ruth Eastman.

For these 43 minutes, at least.

How nice was it to see more of Diane tonight? Now we just need Cary to join Alicia and Lucca, don't you think? And Jason to tell us more ...

Image credit: CBS

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