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There's a riot at one of end of a college, and a murder at the other end. The riot arises from an interfaith rally of Muslims and Jews; the murder involves a swastika drawn poorly in blood on a young Jewish student's forehead. One of Diane's friends, an Islamic politico, brings L/G what starts as a trumped hate-crime battery charge and ends up being about the murder instead. The same guy also brings Eli an anti-anti-Muslim bigotry campaign, which he works on just long enough to get business from/revenge on a Jewish charity that burned him in the past.
Alicia fucks up the battery case about sixteen different ways, including falling for a Cary trick where she gets the suspect to implicate himself in the hate-crime battery at the riot -- before the credits, she manages this -- which in turn serves as cause for his murder trial; later she asks the Jewish judge to recuse himself and be replaced... The day before Rosh Hashanah, assuring a non-Jewish judge will preside. (This last thing is so goddamn heinous of her that Peter's the only one gross enough to spot her agenda in time.)
Over at the SA's office, it's Peter's first day! He talks a good yarn about playing it clean this time -- going so far as to order that nobody allow any pleas for something like three months, I think. If by "clean" you mean "unbelievably slow-moving and annoying for everyone involved," then yes. On the other hand, he has a duty to recreate the image of the office, particularly with himself at the head, so big moves seem like a good idea.
He hires Sophia (Kalinda's married ex-fuckbuddy) as the SA's new investigator, setting up a bisexual love triangle among the three that's as scary as it is exciting to think about; and then spends the rest of the day trying to undermine his wife with spooky villain laughter. He's apparently not interested in thinking about governorship yet, but Eli's happy to do that for him -- and when he comes to Alicia's door to pick up the kids at the end of the episode, they're both polite, if not wholly friendly. Considering he wasn't even at his own election party I guess they've both had time to cool off.
Sophia eventually helps Kalinda nab the killer, but Alicia does a great job of helping her from the office. They're such good collaborators -- and so discreet about everything they do -- that only Diane manages to catch on to their hate vibe, and tells them to cut it out. Likewise, only Eli manages to figure out that Will and Alicia are pretending to be pissed at each other, but for whatever Eli reason he tells Peter there's nothing going on there. In fact, what is going on there is some outstanding secret sex.
It takes place in Will's living room, since Alicia can't handle going into the bedroom yet, and at the end of the episode we see even more of the toll it's taking on Alicia: Getting-pretty for a rendezvous with the kids of the house, she suddenly goes into a fugue state. Maybe she's just thinking about how cute her bangs look, but I doubt it.
Will cautions Kalinda to get more friends, or at least a dog, because even for Kalinda she's going pretty dark -- and finally admits he's as cold as we thought. They have a nice little talk about what it's like to be emotionless automatons, without even pets, that are pretending to be human. Then they both quietly wish this wasn't a total lie.
Anyway, the victim and murderer were actually just star-crossed gay lovers, and none of it was even remotely political. The swastika's even backwards, which just goes to show you about these kids today. And speaking of these kids today, Grace has made another excitingly weird friend, this time in the form of a tutor who's on the spectrum and loves nothing better than to film strangely aggressive dance videos in the middle of the subway like some kind of one-person flash mob. She gets that goofy face about this girl that she used to get about Black Jesus and I don't know, but it's possible Owen and Jackie were right about that girl after all.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Last season, Diane and Will got Lockhart, Gardner back and then allowed Eli Gold to set up shop in-house. Alicia got a corner office and Peter got reelected as State's Attorney, two happy moments overshadowed by the revelation that Kalinda slept with Peter several years ago. While Peter allied with Cary like some kind of supervillain group, Alicia: Bitched out her mother-in-law, kicked K out of her heart and Peter out of the apartment, and finally hooked up with Will Gardner.
I guess we're meant to assume wrongly that (or at least wonder whether) we're picking up the very day. That's lovely for the thrill of watching, but doesn't really help in written form, so let's just say that it's not the morning: Today is Alicia's first day in her new office, Peter's first day in his old office.
Alicia's got hot bangs and additionally such a sexual confidence about her that Chris Isaak's "Baby Did A Bad, Bad Thing" starts playing the second she's getting off the elevator.
(Tyler The Creator: "Somebody tell Alicia Florrick that I want my fucking swag back.")
As Alicia is arriving and we are getting a contact high from whatever she has going on, Diane's being treated to some gross violent jingo viral video about "Get Hamas Off-Campus" by the crazy hot Wasim Al-Said, who is a rich friend of Diane's that's had Young, Bachman & Meyers (a competitor but not one of the major ones we know about) on retainer for a while. Now he's at Lockhart, Gardner because of this video. Sort of.
Seems that a scheduled interfaith rally turned into a free-for-all, and Wasid thinks this is because of the video sent around campus by, he believes or assumes, The Jewish frat TKT. But of the dozen of kids involved, only one youngster is being charged: A Palestinian kid named Jimal Mifsud. A science-scholarship youth whose parents are in Jiddah and can't afford a lawyer (and, we'll learn, don't even know about any of this).
While the asymmetry is disconcerting, it's still just misdemeanor battery, which will end up with like court supervision at most... Except that Peter -- it being his first day as State's Attorney -- is charging it as a hate crime, which puts it at more like seven years. That's where we're at when Alicia shows up, having done one bad, bad thing or another:
Wasid: "Mrs. Florrick..."
Alicia: "Alicia's fine. You can totally call me Alicia right now. Firstly because it shows you're a special client, but secondly because I did a bad, bad thing."
Wasid: "Okay, listen. Your husband's always been chill with the Muslims, right?"
Alicia: "Um..."
Wasid: "Because he is burning us. He is burning our asses with this shit."
Diane: "Okay well obviously Alicia can't influence him. I mean, ethically she never could, but they are both right now in the process of doing bad, bad things."
Alicia: "Um, plus I'm a really good lawyer, which is why I'm here. I'll go to his bond hearing in a sec."
Diane: "Okay, what else are you into that we can do instead of YB&M?"
Wasid: "Doesn't Eli Gold work here now, directly across from Alicia's office? Because I need crisis management, and I heard that his job description is like morbidly flexible."
Diane: "What's the crisis?"
Wasid, grinning: "Where's the management?"
Diane sends Alicia to find Eli and Will, so she wanders the halls making complex faces until she gets to his office: He's not in yet. When he gets there, the Chris Isaak will presumably start up again. Her phone phones, it's Grace's phone phoning, and the ringer is perfectly marvelously irritating: "Mom, pick up the phone. Mom, pick up the phone." I will never understand ringers like that.
Grace: "Mom, I have phoned to be irritating on the phone."
Alicia: "I love talking to you so much, thanks for phoning. Please don't be angry with me for separating from your father, or secretly doing bad bad things."
Grace: "I am way too into myself to care about any of that. Listen, I just phoned to tell you that I don't need a tutor. Jesus is my tutor. My hunky black tutor."
Alicia: "Grace, you're much too stupid to get by on just Jesus."
Punk Outside School: (Shoves past Grace like she's invisible. God, I hope she begs for attention in some dorky major way, resulting in shame for the whole family. Zach ignores his sister's systematic bullying and snags the phone.)
Zach: "In other news, you've been invited to dinner by Nisa's parents."
Alicia: "Um, just me? Or..."
Zach: "I'd like you both to come. Either way, rest assured I didn't tell anybody that you are separated."
Alicia: "Well, that's not happening, but I'll pretend to talk to your Dad about it. Please remind your sister about the no-dorking-out-on-camera rule. I feel like she's about to snap again."
She grabs Eli, who is just tickled pink that somebody named "Wasim Al-Said" wants to employ him, and explains more facts: He's a commodities trader that Diane's been trying to poach for two years, and he's got $10M in charity to spend. On, of course, a campaign against anti-Muslim bigotry which will obviously have great added value if it's run by the famous Eli Gold, Giant Jew. Eli sasses the fellow hardcore and they come to an agreement: That Eli is very sassy.
Alicia: "So that went well, you little leprechaun."
Eli: "I don't like being used."
Alicia: "That is a goddamn lie."
Eli: "He's just trying to get in good with me so that when the Jewish lobby starts pumping money into Peter's governorship I won't take sides."
Alicia: "Still don't understand why that's a problem for you."
Eli: "Alright, fine. I'm completely mercenary. But I feel like I should care about this. Meanwhile, why are you being so sassy back at me?"
Alicia: "It's certainly not because I am having an adulterous fling. Anyway, I have to go take care of yet more Muslims now. I'm off to court without answering your question."
Eli: "How come?"
Alicia: "Because I am a lawyer, Eli."
Eli: "See? Sassy."
COURT
The Honorable Very Jewish & Also Thinks He Is Down With The Sickness Presiding.
Cary: "This is a hate crime!"
Judge: "Bro, have you ever been in a street fight?"
Cary: "No, I clearly have not."
Judge: "Let me tell you that it changes a man."
Tired Bailiff: "Oh, here we go."
Months later, after the Judge and the mean and very windy streets of Chicago have explained a few things about a few things, Alicia finally arrives to apologize to Jimal for not being there during the opening of his hate crime trial.
Cary: "It was a hate crime because Jimal assaulted somebody for being Jewish."
Alicia: "Well, and -- based on the nothing that I know about this case, because I took my time staring at Will's empty office slash behind and then extra time to sass Eli Gold and just got here -- I'm going to go ahead and say that Jimal was attacked because he was Palestinian."
Cary: "That's the funny thing about a race riot. Nobody has a valid point, which means everybody kind of has a point."
Alicia: "Your Honor, there were twenty students fighting, and only one kid was charged. One Muslim kid."
Cary: "[Whining. But come on, as if this was really what he was after.]"
Judge: "Okay, I'm setting a low bond and telling the State to reconsider the charge that they brought because of how it is ludicrous. So ludicrous in fact that this could all be some kind of legal red herring none of us will see coming."
Cary: "Oh, we will, Your Honor. Mwah-ha-ha-ha-ha!"
Alicia: "Jimal, I'm sorry I wasn't here before this went down, but trust me, you have friends in very high places. Very sexy, very rich benefactors. So are you cool?"
Jimal: "I'm cool mostly, except I didn't do any of these things. It's embarrassing. I'm not the rioting sort."
Alicia: "Cary is trying to get you to accept a higher plea, by setting the bar at bogus hate crime to scare you. The Judge is already on your side with that, though, so we should be fine unless even this is just another level to Cary Inception-level games-within-games and actually this is about getting you to set yourself up for another crime entirely."
Jimal: "Mostly I'm just embarrassed. Also, I was not at the rally."
Alicia: "Cary, you hot little shit. What is really going on? Because Jimal wasn't even at the riot."
Cary: "Oh, really? What a mixup!"
Alicia: "...You are totally trying to get him to say that he killed that boy across campus!"
Cary: "Actually we have a witness that says Jimal started the riot."
Alicia: "A white one?"
Cary: "That feels racist when you say that."
Alicia: "No, cross-racial identification. Like remember how Kalinda can't tell white people apart? It comes up constantly on this show? Like that."
Cary: "Ah yes. Kalinda can't tell white people apart, I remember that now. Boy was she steamed when she found that out about herself. Okay, six months and a year of probation."
Alicia: "For which of the three crimes he did not do are you offering this? Get lost. Also, tell my so-called husband to stop pandering to the Jewry with this anti-Muslim crap."
Cary: "See, that definitely sounded racist."
Alicia: "This episode has a heightened racial tension. Eventually everything will sound and feel racist. Even just some poor autistic girl doing a dance."
STATES' ATTORNEY
Peter: "It's a titular New Day and we are going to run a clean office. Not like Childs with those creepy investigators running around doing cynical shit all the time, just because of how the world is hard and not all wives are good. No. We will be clean, ethical, honest and strong. We have smaller budgets, but clearer eyes and fuller hearts. We will not bow to the red tape of bureaucracy or business-as-usual plea bargaining, no. In this New Day, we will endlessly complicate matters by refusing to plead. It will run the defense attorneys into the ground, until they are hares startling at every shadow. It will cost the State bajillions of dollars in unnecessary fees and wages, but so be it. You have to spend money for no reason to make money for no reason, and I have a governorship to not think about. Now let's get out there and refuse to work within the system we ourselves administrate. Who's with me?"
Sophia Russo: "I am. I am with you."
Cary & SA's Office: "Who said that? Are you invisible?"
Sophia: "No. I am stretched out on this chaise lounge like a housecat, because if you remember last season when Kalinda was going to work for me I said her first assignment would be working in Peter's office. She had a nervous giggle breakdown about it, so now I am here. But since I'm here to replace a Kalinda that never was, I have decided to strap on some thigh-high boots and dress like a sexy assassin and lounge around on things as though this is my personal home and not a public office."
Everybody: "That is very Kalinda. That is uncannily Kalinda."
Peter: "She's good, and she's cheap..."
Sophia: "-- Thanks!"
Peter: "...Relatively."
(Okay but where is Andrew Wiley? Does this mean no more Andrew Wiley? Because I liked how he and Cary liked each other more than they did Childs, and also how his dedication to detail came from his OCD demons instead of from being a superhero like Kalinda, and also how he carried around a baby. But then over here it seems like we're cruising for a bisexual adulterous three-way love triangle because Cary and Sophia are both obsessed with Kalinda, Kalinda likes to play with Cary like a cat with a mouse, and Sophia hurt her feelings by being married that one time in the middle of them fucking. So do you really need Andrew at this point? I kind of do, but you know what I mean?)
Cary: "Mr. Florrick, I already broke your first rule and offered a plea. On a case that is three domino-drops away from what I'm trying for, but we don't know that yet."
Peter: "What does the law say about hate crimes?"
Cary: "Three to seven."
Peter: "Fine. So follow the law. Pursue the case as though you're not being totally disingenuous, and lie to me about it until such time as you can bring me something amazing. That's how life works when you're a snake like you are."
Cary: "PS, the defense attorney is your wife, and she's going to accuse you of taking Jew money for Jew reasons and making that the basis of the case."
Peter: "So you follow the law. Alicia can separately suck it, but just stick with the plan."
Sophia: "Nice office, if you like the smell of government-employee desperation."
Cary: "Nice outfit, if you are Aeon Flux. What do you want?"
Sophia: "See this envelope? Slip it to Kalinda, if you know what I mean."
Cary: "I feel like you're threatening to have sex with me or kill me. That is totally what I am into."
Cary: "Hi, Kalinda. You're looking kind of soulless lately."
Kalinda: "I have made a deal with myself to not have feelings."
Cary: "Peter wants us to play clean, but I'm giving you this envelope for more complicated snaky Cary reasons than that."
Kalinda: "Thank you for the envelope. I have a lot going on."
LOCKHART, GARDNER
Eli, to his People: "You can't make Chicagoans feel good about Islam with pathos. You need to go positive. Link the Arab Spring to the American Revolution. Who is the Islamic George Washington? Who is the Islamic Paul Revere? Morning in the Middle East..."
Alicia: "Why the fuck are you in my new undecorated office?"
Kalinda: "Sorry, I was putting this envelope in here and I hoped you wouldn't be here."
Alicia: "Whatever."
Alicia: "Jimal, fifteen people have conspired to give me this envelope that shows security tape of you being on campus during the riot, so we know you weren't there."
Jimal: "That makes me nervous for reasons that will never be clear in this episode."
Alicia: "Listen to me, because I am using my defense attorney voice to warn you about what is going on. This document shows that the driver of your car, whoever that was, maybe you maybe not, was not at the rally slash riot. Do you understand what the tone of my voice is attempting to convey?"
Jimal: "Yes, because I am not an idiot."
Alicia: "I'm not sure that you aren't, so I am once again going to warn you that the answer to this question might incriminate you in an unrelated gay Nazi homicide. Are you driving this car?"
Jimal: "...Yes?"
COURT
Judge: "Really?"
Jimal: "Sure. This case is even less important to the episode than usual, on this show."
Cary: "Great, so under oath that's you driving your car and not being in riot, but also driving a very strange way from the library."
Judge: "Great, so we're done here."
Cary: "Hold up. Because first I'm sorry that we charged Jimal with being in a riot, but secondly I have to say that probably he killed this other kid on the other side of campus."
Judge: "Sure, that is often the way the law works."
Alicia: "I am not so sure about that! Objections! So many of them!"
Judge: "Wait, I'm confused."
Cary: "He said he was driving this car, and it puts him at the murder scene. Therefore his riot alibi proves that he killed this other kid."
Alicia: "He only said that because you overcharged him with a hate crime!"
Judge: "So you're saying he was lying, then."
Alicia: "No, just that he took my advice! To perjure himself!"
Cary: "Cool, so you're a great lawyer then. Your Honor, the People charge Jimal Mifsud with first-degree murder."
Alicia: "How the fuck did I do this to everybody?"
LOCKHART, GARDNER
(Credits, and Will finally rolls in with that Chris Isaak song playing again. I am always creeped out by this Baby Boomer insistence that sex is bad and naughty and filthy and whatever, like you're getting away with something and not just having sex, which is awesome all by itself. On the other hand, Alicia is married, so it goes both ways.)
Will's Assistant: "Alicia dropped by looking weird and acting all vague about how long it's been since you guys hooked up. Do you want to talk to her about bad, bad things?"
Will: "No, not in the office. Don't worry about it."
Alicia: "Look, is that you in the car or not?"
Jimal: "You were woggling your eyebrows at me and talking all this means this and that means that and I thought it was the easiest way to get back to my studies. I thought that's what you were psychically telling me."
Alicia: "My bad, because that is what I was psychically telling you, but it turns out we were being trapped by Cary's evil. Also, there's suddenly a witness that says Simon Greenberg's murderer was driving your car. Do you know any murderers that drive your car around?"
Jimal: "I have two roommates. One of them is a Muslim hardliner who prays five times a day and is fairly rude, and the other one is a hot piece. I don't know which one was using my car."
Diane: "So let me get this motherfucking straight."
Alicia: "Yeah, sorry. I totally got him to perjure himself about a riot he wasn't involved in, and now he's basically admitted to killing some stranger."
Diane: "Wasid thinks we're amateurs now. Mostly because you got schooled by Cary Agos."
Kalinda: "It's my fault, because I let Cary slip it to me. The envelope. And then I slipped it to Alicia. And then everything went to hell."
Diane: "Great, you're all fuckups. And I am the Queen of Fuckuppia. Now fix it."
Kalinda & Alicia: "We're going to deal with his roommates and file a motion to dismiss his alibi testimony on the other case. Done."
Diane: "Good. PS, even though you are still being a great team without even looking at or acknowledging each other, I can tell from your vibes that something is going on. If there's a problem between you two, you need to fix that too. I am not joking."
Kalinda & Alicia: "Yes ma'am."
THE APARTMENT
Weird Tutor Chick: "I don't know what to do."
Grace: "I think you're supposed to tutor me."
Weird Tutor Chick: "No, I mean like period. I really don't know what to do."
Grace: "You have many tics and strange behaviors."
Tutor: "It has only begun."
STATE'S ATTORNEY
Cary: "Kalinda, nice to see you rifling through my desk when I'm not around. It's like the good old days."
Kalinda: "Hey, can see your crime scene photos of Greenberg's murder?"
Cary: "Maybe?"
Sophia: "Hey look, it's the three of us here in Cary's office dressed like contract killers. What a sexy situation."
Cary: "I seem to be babbling."
Kalinda: "Anyway, if you guys hooked up that would tie up at least two of my loose ends. While creating tremendous strife between all three of us and between our offices, too."
Cary & Sophia: "We love you, Kalinda! Please do not stab us!"
Kalinda produces a card table, shells three walnuts, takes out a small ball bearing and shows it to them: It is under the middle walnut shell. She moves them around, quicker and quicker, and in a strange Queens accent murmurs, "Find the lady. Step right up." They move faster and faster, and Cary and Sophia lean in closer and closer, trying to follow her movements. Suddenly the shells stop, and Kalinda is gone.
It is as if she was never there! The crime scene photos also are gone. As if they were never there either!
Cary & Sophia: "She is a hypnotist. She is a con man and a hypnotist. We are powerless."
LOCKAHART, GARDNER
The facts are these: Simon Greenberg, 22, was found in his dorm bound and gagged, and stabbed 45 times with a backwards swastika caved into his forehead. The cops think it was an execution, no sign of a struggle. Neighbor heard a scream, saw a possible Middle Eastern fellow running to Jimal's car.
Alicia and Kalinda manage to discuss these facts and brainstorm about them without looking at each other or communicating directly with one another. Who knew Alicia's passive-aggression could actually be a priceless skill.
Will: "Alicia, do you have a minute?"
Alicia: "Maybe we could talk about last night."
Will: "Last night like the season finale, or last night like it's been a while since that night?"
Alicia: "We are playing it so cagey it's still impossible to tell, but since that works better onscreen than in print, I will just say that I mean last night as in we are sleeping together."
Horrible Taub shows up: He is Michael something, a novelist and committee head of the $20M Jewish League Fund To Fight Intolerance, and he is there to yell at Eli for doing pro-Palestine propaganda.
Eli: "No, it is a campaign against anti-Muslim bigotry, which is well within my wheelhouse of crisis management and public relations and lobbying."
Michael: "No! It is you being a bad Jew!"
Eli: "Actually, no bigotry is good bigotry. This isn't Ultimate Frisbee where we only win by making them lose."
Michael: "Allow me to introduce you to my friend American Politics."
Palestine: "All news and American discourse unfairly support Israel."
Israel: "All news and American discourse unfairly support Palestine."
Santayana: "A nation that does not learn the lessons of its history is destined to relive it."
Shimon Peres: "I have become totally tired of history because I feel history is a long misunderstanding. The past interests me like last year's snow. There is nothing to learn from history."
The Truth: Like I'm coming within six thousand miles of this. Please.
Michael: "Wait, this is because I hired Tarkovsky & Associates to do the Fund's PR."
Eli: "Yeah, it totally is."
Michael: "This isn't Israel/Palestine to you, it's Gold v. Tarkovsky."
Eli: "Yeah. See how my motives and intentions don't actually change? That's what I've been trying to tell you. The fact that you came here appealing to my sense of Jewish unity is only slightly appalling, but in that context this whole conversation becomes risible."
Michael, as a sort of last-minute Hail Mary (so to speak): "4000 years, and we are always our own worst enemy."
INVESTIGATING
First the hardliner roommate, Amir.
Kalinda: "So you were driving his car around that night, carving up Jews?"
Amir: "Racist. I was busy praying. Toward Mecca? Look at the time code."
(They say "time code" so much in this episode; it's the new "phone.")
Kalinda: "Can anybody corroborate this? Any witnesses to this prayer?"
Amir: "Yeah. The Prophet Muhammad? Peace be upon him?"
Kalinda: "That was kind of a good one. That was a pretty good burn, Amir."
Now the hot piece, Tariq.
Kalinda: "Is Amir totally praying all the time code?"
Tariq: "Yeah. It really cuts into his online role-playing time code."
Kalinda: "Okay, did you yourself see him praying at this time code?"
Tariq: "No, I was too busy stabbing my Jewish lover Simon Greenberg about a million times in a jealous gay rage."
Kalinda: "And so... Wait, what was that?"
Tariq: "I said, I was at the interfaith rally."
Sophia has been following Kalinda around all day, investigating her investigating these various roommate leads. She has been doing this in Marx Brothers nose-and-glasses, and speaking in an absurd Russian accent. Kalinda is not fooled.
Kalinda: "Sophia, this is not how you do your job."
Sophia: "Sometimes. Sometimes it is. Like today, I just thought you'd probably be able to track down the roommates and figure out the best lead, so I sort of hitched myself to the back of your boat and have been enjoying the wake. The wake of your professionalism. Also, are you sleeping with Cary? Does that mean I'm going to have to start sleeping with Cary just to freak you out? Because I will do it. Anybody would do that. It's Cary."
Kalinda: "Don't you try to fathom me."
Sophia: "Are you still mad at me?"
Kalinda: "Are you still married? Anyway, do you want the address I'm going to, or do you just want to creep along behind me on your tiptoes doing Nosferatu hands while plinky-plink piano plays in the background?"
Sophia: "I prefer to think of them as Tyrannosaurus hands, but yes."
COURT
Judge: "So you're saying that you counseled your defendant to perjure himself with an alibi... And somehow Cary's the one that did the bad thing?"
Alicia: "Yes! Because they threatened him with bogus hate crimes!"
Judge: "Okay, but on paper that's actually believable even though we both know Cary is a little shit that would totally do what you're suggesting. Whereas you are trying to dismiss testimony that puts him at the..."
Alicia: "But there's not even any evidence that Jimal knew the guy! What's the motive?"
Cary: "Racism! Swastikas!"
Alicia: "BARF, Cary. Anti-Semitism isn't some cookie cutter motive you can apply to any dark-skinned..."
Judge: "-- See, now it feels racist again. Look, nobody likes a streetfight better than me..."
Exhausted Bailiff again: "Good Lord, here we go..."
Judge: "... But that's for in the street, not here. Mr. Agos, do you have any further probable cause? Because if it's just that statement, I am prone to overturn."
Of course he does. But in a case that's already radically not the point and with the sex still to get to, we'll go over the finer points: The new witness is a Professor Noah Fineman, who teaches Poli Sci and who is radically anti-Zionist and strongly against our American interests in Israel, and has this whole agenda that is just about as unsympathetic as you can get no matter which side you're on, and the point is that there was one student whom Fineman supposed to be intensely interested in a particular talk he gave on how 9/11 was America's fault because of the Zionist regime, and the whole thing is creepy and weird, and we talk a lot about Israel's failings, and really he just cares about shilling for his book -- Zionist Occupation: The Need For Realignment & New Thinking -- and Alicia quickly uncovers that the guy rarely even teaches his own class and, thanks to cross-racial identification issues, doesn't know that the kid he thinks was radicalized by this isn't even Jimal, but in fact Tariq, the hot piece.
Anyway, with Fineman discredited for the purposes of this crime, we recess. Peter stops Alicia outside in the hallway and laughs like a supervillain in her face, talking about how the last two seasons of this show have been a picnic for her because nobody knows how she thinks, but he does. It's kind of sad, like how kids get jerked around in a divorce not because the parents love the kids any more than usual but because they want to hurt each other.
The thing that makes you awesome is the thing that makes you suck, always. Alicia's higher standards of personal behavior and development make her awesome, but they're also the main sucky thing about her. Peter is a good lawman and leader because he cares, a great deal, cares always just a little more than he is a cynic, which is how he survives. But the suck side of that is, he's never really been able to curb his emotions, his passions, and every time he gets in trouble it's because of that. It's why they were a good team, but it's also why Alicia should right now be very, very scared.
MORE COURT
There's this MMORPG (and since it's CBS, get ready for a ten-minute explanation of that which barely even makes sense anyway) based on the Gaza Strip -- which is so fucking sad and so fucking realistic that that would exist, which is also so sad -- and it turns out that the three roommates are players of this game, Battle ME: Gaza Strip, which is like if they took Grand Theft Auto and thought, "What's the creepiest way we could do this?" and then settled on an armed conflict going back thousands of years.
The hot young fellow from the game company shows the court a video of Jimal's avatar Samson5 (nice) running down the street shooting people; at one point he runs through a suicide vest power-up and then into a civilian school for Israeli kids, which explodes. The reveal on this is pretty neat later in the episode, but essentially the vest is just sparkling in the air like any video game power-up, a first aid kit or extra ammo, and when he runs through it, he is equipped with it. If you know video games this will make sense -- even the Judge is more interested in dorking out and asking questions about the various "cool" weapons in use -- but if you don't then I can see it looking super fucking creepy. Either way, watching it happen is pretty harrowing.
LOCKHART, GARDNER
Diane: "Um, Wasid just left and he is firing us for sure. Defending a youth who makes light of a suicide bombing will undercut Eli's pro-Muslim campaign, which is more important to everybody."
Alicia: "Diane, you are not down with the gamerz. It's just a game. Don't be such a n00b."
Diane: "Be that as it may, however n00b I appear to you, we are fucked."
Alicia: "Um, to review, Jimal was looking at misdemeanor battery. We helped him into a murder charge."
Will: "Word choice."
Alicia: "Fucking okay, I personally helped him into a murder charge, while representing this firm. We made a commitment to him."
Diane & Will: "Wasid is going to pull out, and Eli is going to dance a tarantella of rage. Which is not going to be fun, although it could be cool to watch. But she is right. We broke it, we bought it. Alicia, please get him out of all of these various crimes, okay?"
Alicia: "I'm on it!"
Wasid: "Hi, Eli. You are fired."
Eli: "Nope. Already cashed your check. You know us Jews!"
Wasid: "Stop making me look racist! Stop trying to dick me around!"
Eli: "To be honest, it's because you are hot when you're mad. And besides, you can't fire me. I already created a fantastic campaign for you and you are going to love it."
Wasid: "It will not be clear at the end of this episode, but it seems like we're done here."
Wasid: "Did you hear the one about the Arab and the Jew?"
Eli: "No! But I'm sure it's very funny."
Wasid: "An Arab and a Jew walk into a bar. And then they kill each other."
Not funny! Not funny, Wasid. Grim and scary and awful and sad! Why are the hot people on this show always the creepiest ones? I bet I can come up with something right now. An Arab and a Jew walk into a bar...
An Arab and a Jew walk into a bar owned by a racist white Republican. He pretends he doesn't hate them both equally; he keeps pouring them both free drinks until they barf. Everyone acts like assholes, and in the morning everybody is embarrassed, but the racist white Republican gets to keep all the money. And that, my friends, is fucking hilarious.
SUBWAY
The tutor chows down on junk food and babbles about black-body radiation; Grace finds her terrifying and fascinating. A soccer team gets on at the stop, and suddenly because of the color of their uniforms -- and maybe their skin -- the tutor is suddenly inspired to make a viral video and puts some booty-shaking music on the boom box she apparently brought with them.
The song goes, "I'm not a rocket scientist... Don't take no astrophysicist / To make your ass throw fits/ Now sisters, kick it / I keep it cool like Eskimo chicks on Discovery Channel..."
The weirdo tutor makes Grace videotape her doing a very aggressive dance. Grace makes that face she makes whenever she falls in love with some fresh hell, and decides she is no longer anti-Israel or pro-black Jesus. Her new agenda is being off-putting and weird, because irritating her mother is not something she can ever stop doing. The weirdo tutor is, in real life, a talented dancer who actually does things like this. The Good Wife is Tosh.0 for moms, sometimes.
COURT
The hot video game guy is back now to explain about power-ups and how you never turn down a power-up: That whatever you think is offensive about the suicide vest is already offensive about the game in general, so it all bears equal weight. But that's not all. Apparently Peter's creepy chuckling fit has lit a fire under Alicia's shapely self.
Alicia: "So everybody who plays this game eventually grabs a vest. Like for example lots of the ASA's in Cary's office..."
Cary: "Objection for some reason!"
Alicia: "...Lots of them have used these."
Sartori: "Yeah, it's a part of the game? It's not a thing?"
Alicia: "So you're saying the Assistant State's Attorneys of Cook County probably murdered Simon Greenberg in a gay jealous rage."
Cary: "AH!"
Alicia: "Okay, I was just dicking with you. My actual point is that the roommates also played this game. And in fact Amir, the rude one, he was dunked by a moderator for being a jerk in this online game. Yes?"
Sartori: "That's what this subpeona'd document says."
Alicia: "And he was in a fight with whom? Who was the other person who got dinged in this fight?"
Sartori: "It says Simon Greenberg."
And you're like, Man, how Good Wife would it be if a hardliner Muslim and a fractious dead Jewish kid got into a fight over a video game and it ended up in stabbings? Not very Good Wife, because the show's whole philosophy means that this will end up having nothing to do with Palestine -- If Alicia's kid is anti-Israel then Eli's kid is pro-Israel; if Grace is going to start yelling about the flotilla disaster then Pastor Isaiah is going to stay too classy to discuss it; etc. -- but still more Good Wife than anything thus far. Every crime's a Find-The-Lady.
LOCKHART, GARDNER
Alicia: "So it's looking like Amir killed the kid, since we can't find a connection between Tariq and the victim. Yet. And he's not political like Amir is."
Lockhart, Gardner: "Make it work."
Diane: "Will, why are you being so weird to Alicia? It seems like you're holding something against her. It seems like you're being hard on her. Super hard."
Will: "I'm going to be vague because the viewers still don't know if we slept together, are still sleeping together, or what day it is. But yeah, I'm being plenty hard on her."
Diane: "You're holding something hard against her?"
Will: "She's a third-year Associate on a partner track and she's treating us like peers."
Diane: "All of you people are assholes. Why is everybody being ridiculous about Alicia today? FIX IT."
THE SEX PART
Alicia hangs out against the wall of Will's house, enjoying herself after a hard day. Will arises from the bottom of the frame, grinning, and they fuck against the wall.
Will: "Are we overdoing it? Diane thinks I'm going too hard on you. Am I? Going too hard?"
Alicia: "Forming sentences is not what I'm all about right now."
Will's Neighbors: Yelling about things. If we can hear them, they can hear us, so any volcanic orgasms you're about to have in three, two, one...
Will: "Please come to the bedroom."
Alicia: "First of all, absolutely not. That would make it real. Second of all, we are not going anywhere for the three, two, one... Don't move."
She bites down on his finger. It is amazing. A win for Alicia Florrick is a win for us all. What a wonderful little sex scene that was!
BACK HOME
Alicia and Grace chill on the couch, watching some cooking show that Alicia finds inspiring.
Alicia: "We need to eat better."
Grace: "I like what we eat."
Alicia, indicating the cooking show: "No, I need to cook."
They laugh; it is cute.
Grace: "You're happier without Dad."
Alicia: "No, I'm happier with you."
Grace: "Barf, first of all. But secondly I'm being serious. You are happy now."
Alicia, considering: "Is that okay?"
Grace: "I love you, I love Dad. Don't worry about it. I like you happy."
Alicia: "Telling me not to worry about something is like telling a normal person to worry about something. In other news, I have found you a new tutor that is not creepy."
Grace: "No, actually I am totally into my weird tutor now."
Alicia: "You said quote that she was 'too different.'"
Grace: "Oh, she is. But sometimes different isn't always bad."
Alicia reviews everything she knows about Grace; obviously something fucked up is going to happen here but she doesn't know what it is yet, so she's going to monitor the situation. That should work out fine.
Grace reviews everything she knows about her mother; obviously something is coming, more changes are coming, but she doesn't know what they are so she's going to monitor the situation. Eventually the shells stop circling and you tip one back and see what you've won.
Alicia: "Please tell me you're learning something, and that this isn't all pointless."
Grace: "I'm learning something."
Yeah, to be super weird. Or maybe Jackie and Owen were right and Grace is becoming a lesbian and Jesus was just a gateway drug and Weird Tutor is the new Becca.
Which reminds me: What I want is for Owen to start dating David Lee. There's something simultaneously sexy and Gilmore Girls-neurotic about hooking those two up. Plus, they're the only two other people involved in the (possible) divorce and the only two people on earth that could ever even hope to manage Jackie Florrick.
MORE INVESTIGATING
Sophia's still haunting Kalinda, which comes in handy when they head back over to ask Amir about how he got in trouble online for fighting with Simon and how he didn't feel like that was relevant. Amir tells her to get out of there because she's got no authority, and she summons Sophie -- who's hanging out by Kalinda's car like a freak like usual -- to come in and be the muscle.
Well, as it turns out it wasn't Amir that was actually playing that day he got busted: It was Tariq. "These roommates," Alicia burbles, "They share everything!" So then what's the motive, now that you have a connection between Tariq and Simon? It's pretty left-field, but Alicia gets two-thirds of the way there just by being sensible: "I wonder if we're making a mistake thinking it's about Middle Eastern politics. These kids, they're just college kids."
COURT
The Judge finds that there's sufficient evidence for a finding of probable cause, but before he can set the case for trial, Alicia speaks up and... I feel like she's being creepy. Because the only explanation comes to us through the unreliable narrator of Peter Florrick, I guess it's possible she's not about to do what he'll say she's doing, but I can't figure out what other reason she would have, because what she's about to do is very hardcore and something that you would only do if you were willing to never ever deal with a particular judge again. Which is not the only confusing thing about this part.
Alicia asks Judge Karpman to recuse himself from the trial, because of demonstrated bias, because he has given money to Zionist organizations and cannot be trusted for a fair trial. I mean, it always makes me nervous on law shows when they do the recusal route, because it's so sticky with contempt, but to do it this way just seems racist like everything else. The judge is, of course, horrified -- although he would be either way, of course -- and barely remembers to bang his gavel he's so intent on getting the fuck out of there.
But then Peter calls Cary over and says that the Judge will most certainly recuse himself, because he's terrified of getting turned over on appeal, so it's going to start over... But Peter says that the real problem is even deeper, because she has specific heinous reasons for doing it today, which we'll find out in a sec is that today's* specifically the Thursday before Rosh Hashanah, which means no practicing judges available tomorrow. Yuck.
So is this because he knows his wife terribly well, or because he judges everybody by his own secretly creepy standards? I don't have a good answer, because I don't like either option. There's not a walnut shell on this particular card table that I want to look under.
*(I thought maybe we could estimate the time since the finale based on the time between the election and the holiday, but the forums are telling me it just doesn't add up regardless, so that's one more thing I'm not going to worry about.)
LOCKHART, GARDNER
Jewish League Taub: "Mr. Gold."
Eli: "Well hello! Listen, look at this amazing campaign I'm doing for the Muslims. Arab Spring! Sort of like Irish Spring, but with Arabs."
Which: Also sounds vaguely racist. Everything in this episode gives me hives now. The world is a vampire.
Taub: "Look, please let me bring the Jewish League Fund over here. I'll pay what I was paying Tarkovsky, and you will stop pitching a fit, and you will have to drop Wasid."
Eli: "Okay, but also you have to pay some additional money to defer the cost of lost business."
Taub: "You are the worst."
Eli: "That is why you're here."
COURT
Judge: "Alicia, you have managed to shame me out of doing a competent job I know I can do, which makes you an asshole. So I'm going to recuse myself."
Cary: "First, can I point out something that Peter told me? Tomorrow is Rosh Hashanah."
Judge: "I forgot that, because I'm a champagne liberal who gives money to Israel because it's the right thing to do, and takes holidays when I'm reminded I can."
Cary: "So even though you're not even a hardcore Jew, what Alicia's doing is making sure that no super-Jewish Jewish judges will be on the bench. It's not even about you."
Judge: "That makes sense, actually. Grody. Alicia Florrick, I hold you in contempt. Not contempt of court, just regular."
GAY BAR
Since Alicia has well and truly fucked herself, it's time for Kalinda's patented move where she solves the case in five seconds. She and Sophia track Tariq to his favorite gay bar, toss around some Chicago-centric gay bar chatter, tackle him onto a barstool and force him to confess:
They were together, Simon dumped him, Tariq lost his shit, stabbed him a bunch of times and then tried to make it look like a hate crime by stabbing him a bunch more times and adding the piquancy of a swastika. (See, I told you Alicia was onto something. This is exactly the kind of drama queen shit a college student would pull.)
Kalinda: "One thing, though. When you set it up as a hate crime, why did you draw the swastika backward?"
Tariq: "What do you mean? Isn't that how you draw it?"
Kalinda & Sophia stare blankly into the camera, dumbstruck with the callowness of youth. Some found this resolution unlikely, but honestly I don't know that I would be able to draw a swastika the right way on a normal day, much less after stabbing my boyfriend 547 times. Probably your graphic design skills are the second thing to go, right after your marbles. Cool thing is, the likelihood of me ever having to find out for sure is nil. First of all because I would never stab a person, it's too biological, and secondly because I think Nazis are super tacky.
AFTERMATH
Peter and Eli are all about the clever wordplay, at the end of the day. "Is it good for the Jew...ish League Fund?" is one very funny, subtle little joke, and then it goes: "Well, I dunno. The Muslim was the killer, but he was also gay and sleeping with our guy, so..." There's an edgy little thing about finding out whether he was a top at least, which God help you if you tried to explain that one to your mom who watches this show, but straight people talking about gay sex -- or, more precisely, thinking they have any idea what they're talking about when they talk about gay sex -- makes me want to throw up anyway. (No hate, I just think there are several issues of privilege that come into it, which aren't really in our jurisdiction to talk about at this time, that make it more otherizing and fetishizing than you might understand in how it comes off to those of us for whom gay sex isn't actually a punchline. John Mayer's hood pass was eventually rescinded, etc.)
Anyway, Peter doesn't want to talk about becoming governor yet, and Eli's like, "That's what I'm here for anyway," and then Eli does another confounding thing. At some point in the episode he noticed the Will/Alicia weirdness vibes and, being Eli, one assumes he put it together correctly, but then this is what he says: "If you're worried about Alicia and Will Gardner... I think that whatever was there is no more. They barely look at each other." Which, Peter's spent the last fifteen or twenty years paranoid about that, it's his go-to when he's feeling attacky, so that's crazy to bring it up at all. But then when Peter giggles at him and accuses him of trying to hold the Florrick marriage together for the sake of future campaigns, Eli blushes and takes off. Curious. He's got so many walnut shells he could be juggling them, and all of them are disguised as something else.
Speaking of setting things up for the coming season in a way that provokes many questions, Will runs into (or possibly meets, like in the old days with Alicia?) Kalinda at that bar, and they have a weird talk:
Will: "You need a friend, K. Or a dog. Maybe you need a dog. Kalinda & Pooch, out investigating."
Kalinda: "I'm fine, Will. Really. What's wrong with me?"
Will: "We're not like normal people, are we? Emotional."
Kalinda: "You're emotional."
Will: "No. Sometimes I'm in the middle of an emotion, and I just look at myself and realize... I'm not feeling anything. I just like acting like someone who feels something."
Kalinda: "You want to stop acting and actually feel?"
(Kidney punch! They laugh. I wonder if he knows what she really means.)
Kalinda: "That's what it feels like."
He leaves her there, for a very specifically 8:45 appointment, and tells her to be good. I hope she drinks just enough and goes home and goes to bed, because how sad. How sad that you finally had a feeling and it burned you so bad that you refuse to have more feelings, ever again. How sad that Will -- who is a questionable dude in a lot of ways, and I mean, how shocking was any of what he said above, really -- is not only her only friend but the only person Alicia's actually close to, in her orbit, at this point. I am glad she has a friend and I think they are a good match for friendship, but it's still lonely.
THE APARTMENT
Alicia and Peter are friendly, a little wary but not dead-eyed or anything, when he comes to get the kids for the weekend. Alicia runs down the bullets -- Grace likes her new tutor but we're not sure we do; Zach's girlfriend Nisa's parents will be sad to know you can't come to dinner -- and she tells her children that she loves them, a dozen times. Like every word's a link in a chain that will keep them from leaving. Keep them from leaving her alone. With a clock that's ticking; that in fifteen minutes will read 8:45. This is what it reminds me of:
"Love After Love," Derek Walcott:
The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other's welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you
all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.
She's looking in the mirror when the knock comes. It's 8:45. No kids, no Peter, no neighbors to hear her. Nothing standing between him, them, and the bedroom. And she's been feasting on her life; she's been saying this is about her. Finally, first and forever, not about her kids or her family or her duties or her goodness or her badness or anything other than watching those walnut shells shift around again and coming up with one thing she knows she wants, just for her: The feast.
Every crime's a Find-The-Lady, but most of all this one. They go around and around but when the knock comes at the door, you have to stop. It's time to look. Just tip it back and look underneath, and there you'll be. Where you always were.
So why can't you open the door?
JACOB CLIFTON is a freelance writer and critic based in Austin, Texas. He currently recaps Gossip Girl, The Good Wife, Pretty Little Liars and True Blood for TWoP. Jacob can be found online at jacobclifton.com, on Twitter, and on Facebook. IRL work appears in BenBella's SmartPop series of anthologies, most recently A Friday Night Lights Companion and Fringe Science.