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The fourth-year associates' plan to start a new firm is still going strong -- in fact, we rejoin the story at the precise moment we left it, with Alicia and Cary having their first real discussion of how it'll all work. David Lee's instincts ("I'm psychic," he explains to Kalinda) mean the brewing civil war is on the table from day one. While Kalinda has no plans of leaving for Florrick & Agos she's still completely sympathetic to their cause, which adds one more dynamic to the incoming storm. (Also, there is a remote employee buzzing about the place in a Segway-shaped robot, to whom Alicia is characteristically kind and whose existence rouses some of David Lee's most vicious ire yet.)
Ironically, the case of the week -- a death row appeal high on stakes but low on drama -- reminds Alicia of all that she loves about working for (and with) Diane and Will, and it's true that they're both at their best over the course of the case. (Staying a man's execution by using him as "evidence" in a separate class-action case about the ins and outs of lethal injections.) But in the end, Cary's enthusiasm -- "we are the new Will & Diane!" -- is just persuasive enough that she stays committed to the cause, and eventually lies to the faces of the senior partners about the project and her own involvement.
Eli helps Peter get his staff together as Illinois' new Governor, immediately seizing on the beauty of his inherited ethics counselor (Melissa George) as a danger zone. Smoothly getting her moved out of Peter's office -- but having accidentally planted the seeds of Peter's attraction to her -- they follow her first and final directive: Dumping the Chief of Staff they'd originally chosen because of the usual complications that come from everyone having hired Eli at some point for crisis management, and in a sweet but also worrisome twist, Peter decides Eli's the man for the job. Because when you want someone squeaky-clean with no skeletons in his closet your first thought is "Eli Gold."
It's interesting to see where the pieces go. What with Peter and Cary both settled elsewhere, the State's Attorney's office has become a considerably less fraught location, and pretty much the domain of Geneva Pine (and presumably Matan, and maybe Amanda Peet?) -- who provides some excellent drama before eventually helping Diane and Robyn Burdine (who's still planning to defect) with the death row case. While it's Will who ends the back-and-forth in his usual last-second Odyssean fashion, it's nice to see so many possible dynamics for L/G proper, moving forward. Diane's Supreme Court stuff barely comes up at all, but between David Lee's souped-up role and the coming civil war, it seems likely to be a huge factor.
So all in all, pretty low-key. Alicia's disappointment that Kalinda isn't coming is downplayed but sweet, and there's an intriguing subplot about Grace's burgeoning womanhood that could go some crazy places -- she's on a list of Hottest Politicians' Daughters that includes Bristol Palin and Meghan Cain -- but so far things are pretty normal on the homefront too. Mostly it's a lot of character work, with the fast-paced dialogue and seriously funny acting that you always forget is a big part of the show until it actually happens.
We won't really get the seasonal lay of the land until we see Peter and Alicia interact, I think, but even then we still have plenty of pieces to get in position. In the meantime, Alicia's privileged (and frankly unethical, as she notes) position at the center of the L/G shitstorm should provide more than enough of the angst, compromises and St. Alicia-versus-reality negotiations that continue to make the show so compelling. week is Bitcoin (Dylan Stack is always good) and then it seems like the fifth episode is when it all goes down, in what Graham "Zach Florrick" Phillips has described as the Good Wife's version of the Red Wedding. Quite a comparison to draw, but considering how many fingers are clearly about to get burnt, it seems likely pretty apt.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!PREVIOUSLY
L/G is a big enough business that their managerial methods can seem a little inhumane. Nobody knows this more than Cary Agos -- who is used to having everything handed to him because he is perfect, and thus has never heard the word no before -- unless it's Alicia Florrick, who was used powerfully and callously by the partners to scare and manipulate the shit out of their entire fourth-year cadre of disappointed youngsters in a variety of ways. Diane Lockhart still hasn't formally accepted Governor Florrick's offer for a State Supreme Court, but the fact that it's out there is only making things upstairs weirder and more hostile -- and seeing as how David Lee is now a cast regular and "weirder and more hostile" is the Latin on his family crest, that probably won't change.
NOW
Cary: "So, hey. Like, what are you thinking?"
Alicia: "I'm in."
Cary: "Really? Agos/Florrick is a go?"
Alicia: "Ha! You are too young to know what an old joke that is! But also in all seriousness, Florrick/Agos."
Wine, because of course wine. Wine now, wine always. Wine with Cary Agos in your gracious open-concept kitchen. What else is there in this world.
Cary: "We have Carey [Other Carey, Less Obviously Hot But Give It A Minute Carey, Carey-with-an-E, "the entire reason Jacob has seen every episode of Outsourced" Carey] in Litigation [even better], Jeremy for Family Law, Andre in Acquisitions..."
Alicia: "You are like a one-man rush chair. What about Kalinda?"
Cary: "Mmm. Robyn Burdine."
Alicia: "No I mean what about Kalinda, when is she joining our firm."
Cary: "She isn't, Robyn is."
Alicia: "I don't get it. I don't understand what you're saying to me."
Cary: "I know, I feel the same way so I'll go slow. Kalinda is staying at L/G, Robyn is coming with us."
Alicia: "But that SUCKS."
Cary: "You know all you'd have to do is drop a handkerchief and she'd come with us. Literally before you finished asking her, that ninja girl would have her shit packed."
Alicia: "More wine?"
Alicia: "Everything's ending. Or starting to. So like how do we -- hang on, I have to ignore Will phoning me after he kissed me, speaking of weird, and I disappeared on him to come meet with you at my house -- how do we tell Diane and Will?"
Cary: "Pshh, we just tell 'em. New day, honey. They can suck it!"
Alicia: "I always forget how little you are. You get drunk and brawly so fast."
Cary: "For real, though. Circle of life. They left their old firms to start L/G."
Alicia: "Yeah, that's true. Wait, I have this Death Row appeal on Thursday..."
Cary: "We got time, we still need office space. Unless you're into the Sweeney offer?"
Alicia: "Imagine trying to pee in a bathroom Colin Sweeney paid for. Do you know how small they make cameras now?"
Cary: "Lol. Oh and hey! Congratulations, Mrs. First Lady!"
Alicia: "Ha! Can you believe I totally forgot that part?"
She's a little bit weirded out by that; moreso, though, it's thrilling. At that place it was all lights and cameras and handshaking and fake hugs and that's when Peter's most alive and she loves that about him. She loves congratulating him and watching the congratulations of others fill him, like a beautiful balloon taking flight. But here, now, in her gracious open-concept dining room with Cary and a bottle of wine: That's the future too. That's her part of the future.
DEATH ROW
Alicia and Diane have been waiting for two hours, ten minutes, while they try to get a line so they can give Eddie Allan Fornum his lethal injection. Two counts of first-degree murder during a carjacking in 1999. One of the moms turns around slowly to stare at Diane and Alicia, and it's bone-chilling, but this is the one time I don't think it's that shitty to do: She's been waiting almost fifteen years for justice, and these lawyers come alone with appeal after appeal after appeal. She's allowed to see nobody's side but her own on this one.
He's strapped to a table, just the other side of the window, when they finally raise the shades. They fuss with a microphone for a minute, and Eddie gives his last words.
"I'm sorry to everyone here. To my new lawyers, Diane and Alicia, I have a favor to ask of you both. Please, if you could go see my mom. I was her only son, and I was a disappointment. To the parents of Miss Henning and Miss Gore, I am sorry what happened to your daughters, but I did not do this. I wish I could say what was happening here tonight was just, because that might bring you some... Because that might make..."
His IV pops out, horribly, dropping blood onto the floor; they abruptly close the shades again and get to work trying to find a vein. Diane hops up to stare through the window and the screen, and the CO's try to muscle her back; she demands to see the warden, and eventually he produces himself.
Warden Barkin: "Lady, stop making trouble and yelling at me."
Diane: "No. Sir, this is an Eighth Amendment violation. Two and a half hours of poking holes in this man because his veins are all collapsed? That is not how you do this. This is literally the definition of torture..."
Barkin: "That's not for you to say, ma'am."
Diane: "Yeah, it's for the court to say. Which they did. Broom v. Strickland. You need to delay this execution until you've taken steps to keep it clean."
L/G
Robot: "Can you help me with the door?"
Alicia: "Okay but what the fuck are you?"
Robot: "I'm Monica, in Litigation. I'm teleconferencing from home."
Alicia: "Because you're sick or something?"
Robot: "I think just because it's funny."
Alicia: "So in the world of this show, that's a thing that would just happen. You don't have to be recovering from surgery or have an autoimmune bubble disease, you just... Feel like being a robot."
Robot: "The future is already here, but it is very fucking unevenly distributed."
Diane: "So my idea is, we take this time to rustle up evidence and appeal. I mean, as long as the guy's not dead, we are still working. Okay? Legal Aid is my baby, and Death Row cases are good PR."
Moaning Lawyers: "Everything about this is stupid. We want doughnuts. We want to be robots. We want Candy Crush Saga. Poor black guys dying unjustly is a super drag."
Diane: "Just put your big-boy panties on and get it done, okay? We have 48 hours."
Robyn: "To review, Eddie had an alibi for the murders, but was found in possession of one of the girls' necklaces, or a similar one that he bought at a flea market, and his hair was found on the body."
Diane: "Unless it wasn't, and that's where the appeal is. I don't believe it's Eddie's hair, and we're subpoenaing the forensic lab to retest it now that we have time."
Robyn: "Okay, and then what about the Snitch?"
Diane: "He died six years ago, so we would have to invent time travel, because it doesn't exist, and we don't have that much time."
Robyn: "But if we had time travel, we could make sure that we..."
Will: "Okay, break up into teams. Other Carey, you do the forensics. Other people that we don't need to have established as always being at the firm and just invisible, you do other things. Robyn Burdine, you investigate their experts in that kooky way of yours."
Robot: "[Garbled transmission; modem noises.]"
David Lee: "Yeah, fucking thanks for that, Monica. Great idea, Monica."
Will: "Okay, great everybody. Break! Cary, can I talk to you?"
Carey: "You mean me?"
Will: "No, I mean Cary-Cary."
Carey: "No problem. I will just be over here. Just like I have been... this whole time..."
Will: "Diane, I feel like actually 48 hours is not enough time to subpoena and test this hair."
Diane: "I know, right? What was I thinking."
Will: "You do your thing and try, and I'll get Cary and Alicia to help me postpone the execution even further. How, I do not know. Good thing I'm trickier than an oiled-up eel and I work best under pressure."
Kalinda: "Guess what? I was getting the hair subpoena and I heard somebody already retested it. Six years ago, in the prosecutor's office."
Diane: "Duh, that was for the appeal..."
Kalinda: "No, in Chicago. Prosecutor's office here, not in Indiana where this is all happening."
Will: "Cary, you know Barry Scheck, correct? Can you phone him? He's in town on an Eighth Amendment class action, I have an idea."
Barry Scheck: "Hey Cary, what's up?"
Cary: "Barry... I mean, Mr. Scheck, we need some help on Eddie Alan Fornum?"
Barry: "What? My judge won't let him join at this point."
Cary: "We don't want to join. It's a Will Gardner trick!"
Robyn: "Glad you're coming with us!"
Alicia: "What are you talking about? PS, stop talking about this."
Robyn: "No prob. Robyn Burdine!"
Alicia: "Oh my God, that girl. I would hate her either way because she's not Kalinda, but Jesus."
Carey: "...Can I tell the clients?"
Alicia: "I have no idea what you are shutting up about right this goddamn minute."
Carey: "The Governor's wife! Is joining our new firm!"
Alicia: "Seriously, I'm just trying to walk down a hallway here. Everybody needs to shut up. You go back to wherever you have always been for four years."
DAVID LEE
"My psychic powers are tingling. I'd better look around all sneaky... Hey, why are all the fourth-years shaking hands and smiling? We do our best to keep their spirits broken, this is bullshit. Oh, and now Carey is ducking his head and avoiding my gaze? In four years, the entire time he's been working here in our Litigation department, I have never seen Carey do that. Clearly we have not broken their resolve and they are going to start their own firm. How else can I fuck Alicia over to stop this? I just need a minute to think. To my evil lair!"
He grabs Kalinda by the hair as she's getting off the elevator, and drags her to his lair. The files she was carrying go everywhere. She sits down in a chair in the conference room that his evil lair actually is, and thinks about the various ways she could kill him.
David Lee: "I need all the phone numbers phoned by the fourth-year associates over the last three months. They're intending to leave, and taking our clients with them."
Kalinda: "That's a pretty developed theory you've come up with."
David Lee: "I am fucking psychic, Kalinda. That's why."
Kalinda: "Okay, well, what you're asking for is illegal."
David Lee: "No, because they're company phones. And anyway, I just want the metadata. I want to see who they're phoning in aggregate, not who's doing what. That comes later. And on that day, how the blood will run. Friends and lovers, turning on one another, dancing in the flames of my vengeance. If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a fourth-year associate's face -- forever."
ELI GOLD
Alicia: "Eli, I'm on a Death Row appeal, I don't have time for one of our little talks."
Eli: "But this is important!"
Alicia: "No I mean literally I'm at Death Row. Doing an appeal."
Eli: "I thought that was hyperbole."
Alicia: "Who are you talking to? I don't do hyperbole. Why are you phoning."
Eli: "So I've already delayed this twice, and you told me today at four..."
Alicia: "Sorry, reschedule for sometime after Saturday, I got lives to save. Through justice."
Eli: "Sunday at noon?"
Alicia: "Make it seven, and also what are we talking about."
Eli: "Basic ethics talk for the governor-elect's family. We're changing strategies."
Alicia: "If I were paying any attention to this conversation, the fact that Eli Gold just said he's changing his ethical strategy would give me the shivers. As it is..."
(Click.)
Melissa George, who only plays ladies that will scare you to death, is the new Ethics Counsel and the Executive Director for the Illinois Ethics Commission. This is Eli's first time meeting her, and he's grossed out the second he gets a look at her.
Eli: "Uh, who are you? My meeting is with Mitch Garbanza, who looks like somebody named that."
Mitch: "No, you have a meeting with me, who looks like me. Governor Quinn renamed me from Marilyn to Mitch, presumably so his wife would not leave him."
Eli: "Yeah, I don't think that'll be enough here. You're already fired and you don't even know it. So on the one hand you came down for no reason, since Alicia just canceled this meeting, but on the other hand I'm glad because now I know you are never going to work in my Peter's administration. Look at you, come on."
Is he being sexist? Yeah. But it's one of those things where... Like, I always said that Tyra Banks -- during her heyday, which was a while ago now -- was a genius not because she knows what people like, but because she happens to be so basic that what she likes, people like. Hollywood is full of people like this -- or think they are like this, disastrously -- where what they like will fly, because they like things that people like. For Tyra, it was stuff like, "What if I wore a fatsuit all day? What if you were homeless? Do dolphins rape people?" All very interesting questions, but they didn't come from a focus group: They came from Tyra, who is interesting by not being very interesting.
And so you have Eli Gold, whose job(s) have all clustered around the centrality of optics: Crisis management, spin doctoring, all of these things are about not what he feels, but how things look. And the more you do that, the more they come to mean the same thing. I heard a story once that Prince took a lady to the recording studio and played several songs for her and, as some kind of sex weirdness, asked her to pick which one was the single: This idea of internalizing what's commercial, what's visual, what's going to sell, is key to every industry and marketing venture that ever existed. Eventually it becomes a part of your heart, and your art, and that's when you become successful.
Eli sells because Eli buys; at some point, Eli became both observer and observed. So it's not exactly relevant whether he, personally, finds Marilyn attractive one way or the other: Only that her attractiveness tells a story. Is that story okay? Well, no. Peter's a philanderer with other ethics problems, and his staffing moves at the SA -- hiring hot-ass Amanda Peete, no black people ever -- are already a big thing. So inheriting Mitch, Eli's going to hate that. And Peter can tell him not to be a dick, but Peter has the privilege of worrying about different things than Eli does, because it's Eli's job to worry about whether Mitch is too pretty, which she is.
Also, Eli loves Alicia. I do think that's part of this. If Eli barks loud enough at every pretty girl in the world that they stay away from Peter, then Alicia will never cry again. I wasn't convinced -- I knew he admired her, but I thought it was mostly about her being a good Jackie O* to his Perfect Dream Candidate boyfriend -- but the delicacy and sweetness of their conversation about her affair with Will, and his shuddering relief when she said it was over, convinced me that he just loves her anyway.
Peter: "Eli! Marilyn here was just telling me she's concerned about your choice for Chief of Staff."
Eli: "Mickey? That's not official yet."
Marilyn: "Guess what? Like everyone else on earth, he's hired you before to do crisis counseling. And so like everyone else on earth, nobody connected to you can hire him."
Eli: "All I did was run the search committee!"
Marilyn: "Do you hear yourself? Anyway, not my job to veto, just my job to point out you already looked totally corrupt before you showed up, and now you're here being corrupt... Maybe it's hard for you to see the pattern from where you're standing, but let me tell you -- looking in from the outside? -- this same exact thing has been an issue in approximately one hundred percent of your storylines."
Eli: "That bitch doesn't even know she's already fired! She's just accumulating my hate."
Peter: "She's doing her job, honey. Calm down."
Eli: "Don't you tell me to calm down! Oh, and now here we go. How did I know you were gonna take her side."
Peter: "I cannot talk to you when you're like this."
Eli: "Her name's even Marilyn! I will not have it."
L/G
Cary: "So Indiana doesn't have great guarantees about painless execution..."
Will: "Oh crap, I forgot the printer."
Cary: "On it!"
Will: "Wait, that means I'm about to get on the elevator with..."
Alicia: "Hello."
Will: "Uh, hi."
Robot zooming by: "Hiiii!"
Alicia: "So, robots now."
Will: "How is it being the First Lady of Illinois?"
Alicia: "Weird? Kinda like, First Galactic Princess. Hey, sorry I didn't call you back."
Will: "Well, between Peter's stuff and Death Row, it's gotta be..."
Alicia: "A very weird couple days. We'll talk?"
Will: "Sure, whatever."
Cary: "Got it, let's go!"
COURTHOUSE
Diane: "ASA Pine, hello. Weren't you in the South Bend Prosecutor's Office?"
Geneva: "Yeah, like a long time ago..."
Diane: "You were the assistant prosecutor on the Eddie Fornum homicide."
Geneva: "Yeah, I gotta go."
Diane: "You had Eddie's hair retested six years ago..."
Geneva: "Yeah, I'm not talking to you about this."
Diane: "They are literally going to put him to death, Ms. Pine. They tried once, and they're doing it again in 48 hours."
Geneva: "Yeah, and you had ten years to appeal his execution. Don't come to me with 40 hours left."
Diane: "You seem to think he's innocent, then?"
Geneva: "I think... You are out of time."
Diane: "So just give me the hair test!"
Geneva vanishes, but Diane calls Will to confirm that the evidentiary path is working out, if he can just get them more time, which is where Scheck's class action comes in.
CLASS ACTION
Scheck: "Your Honor, those dudes coming into the courtroom are suddenly my co-counsel, a Mr..."
Will: "Will Gardner."
Scheck: "Will Gardner."
Will: "Your Honor, if it pleases the court, we ask that the execution of..."
Lena Cesca, the opposition in the class action, jumps right up in there; the Judge is Jeffrey Tambor as Judge Kluger.
Kluger: "...Way ahead of you, Cesca. This is bullshit."
Will: "We're not asking to join the suit, we are submitting him as evidence."
Alicia: "Mr. Fornum's testimony is obviously relevant as to how much pain is suffered in the subject of lethal injection because he just had one."
Cesca: "Your Honor! Fuck this!"
Kluger: "Or not. This is kind of cool."
Alicia: "Executing him now is tantamount to destroying crucial evidence for the plaintiff."
Cesca: "They're trying to delay an execution!"
Kluger: "Yeah, obviously, she just said that. How long to depose him?"
Counsel: "[Various times, from a month to indefinitely.]"
Kluger: "You have until Tuesday, 48 more hours than before. You're not saving your guy with schemes, just buying time."
Counsel: "Time is all we need. But meanwhile, what a good thing to have in your big trial! Two birds, one stone. Um, so to speak."
ETHICS
Complete with PowerPoint, Eli looking on with a dreadful darkness.
"Four of the last eight Governors of Illinois have gone to prison. Four of the last eight. Which is why we need to remember that the spouse and the children are an extension of the governor. Your choices become his choices. Now, I've looked over your work at Lockhart/Gardner, Alicia. There shouldn't be any problem there, as long as you don't actively solicit clients who have business with the Governor's Office, and your relationship with the Governor isn't used as a lure to clients. It should not look like Peter is receiving backdoor remuneration through your business. And that your clients shouldn't believe that your spousal connection..."
Alicia: "SOOO BOOOOORED."
LATER
Alicia: "Eli, Peter, we need to talk. This changes some things. It is a secret. I'm starting my own firm with Cary Agos and about ten other people. I wanted to tell you before, but everything is insane, and so I'm telling you now."
Peter: "That is fucking awesome! You've wanted this since law school!"
Alicia: "I know! Thanks. But is this going to make your ethics stuff weird?"
Eli: "Hey, have you told Will? Um, or the other one? Or anybody? Not that I'm bringing up Will or anything..."
Alicia: "I like where your head is at, but don't do that. And no. Diane either. Just you two, actually."
Peter, so sweetly: "I am damn proud of you. Damn proud."
Eli: "Uh..."
Peter: "Do you not love Alicia? Why aren't you doing a leprechaun jig?"
Eli: "I'm still thinking this shit through, hang on."
CLASS ACTION
After Eddie runs through the whole procedural nightmare of the veins and everything -- Lena Cesca bitching nonstop, without any real purpose beyond bitching, because lawyers -- they seize on one detail: A female nurse who ran out of the room crying because he was bleeding so much and the situation was so horrible.
Back in the courtroom, Lena objects for a while because of the confidentiality for people involved in executions, and then -- after a short conference -- changes course and lets it slide. This happens only after Will does his best Litigation Gardner routine, making his faces and pulling his random BS and then suddenly striking with genius: You could say that, based on her objections, Cesca's the one trying to destroy evidence in her own case by expediting the execution any way she can. Which is amazing.
Judge: "How soon can you have that nurse available?"
Cesca: "Tomorrow afternoon?"
Will: "You mean, tomorrow afternoon after Mr. Fornum's dead?"
Cesca: "Coincidentally, yes."
Judge: "No, get her here this afternoon for a supervised deposition, or you're in contempt."
STATE'S ATTY
It's so weird to be at the State's Attorney's office -- the real one, where they rush around giant workrooms like sad cafeterias -- after spending so much time in Peter's office. It's weird also to think about what a strangely safe place it used to be, between Peter and Cary. Now it's just the house of the enemy.
Geneva: "Oh, you two. How did you get back here?"
Robyn: "I had to go to the bathroom!"
Geneva: "I will call security, Robyn Burdine."
Diane: "Look, you quit Indiana a month after convicting Fornum. You know something's wrong with this case..."
Geneva: "I retested the hair, yeah. But it came back consistent with his... You know what, I'll get the file. Not to be helpful, just to make you go away. I don't like thinking about this, it was a long time ago and not a great time period for me."
Diane: "These results don't mean it's his hair..."
Geneva: "True. But it does mean you can't be convinced of anything."
Robyn: "But so why did you retest it in the first place? It's dated a week after the Snitch died, did you think he was lying?"
Geneva: "I don't have time for this shit."
Diane: "No, Eddie Fornum doesn't have time. And neither does America."
Sherriff: "Did you call security?"
Geneva: "False alarm. Listen, you. I was using that Snitch, Tommy Diehause, on another case. Which is the one where he traded for a new identity."
Robyn: "Robyn Burdine!"
Diane: "The Snitch is still alive, Will. We think he's in Illinois. Forget the hair, we're doing this now. Robbie Walker, former Snitch..."
KALINDA
Kalinda: "Robbie Walker... Got it, I'll find him for you."
David Lee: "What's the scoop?"
Kalinda: "The Snitch is still aliv..."
David Lee: "Like I care about that pro bono bullshit. I'm talking about the fourth-years."
Robot: "Do you need me in this meeting?"
David Lee: "GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE MONICA."
Kalinda: "I called the provider, they said they sent you the records already, so why are you bothering me?"
David Lee: "How about you just do your job?"
Kalinda: "You wanna complain, go to Will or Diane. I'm not hearing it."
David Lee: "Is this about protecting Cary?"
Kalinda turns into smoke and disappears through the cracks in the conference room wall.
David Lee: "...Or wait, are you going with them?"
The smoke forms a middle finger at him and says, "You are not very good at investigating things! She never dropped the handkerchief!" and then two middle fingers and then it is gone.
ETHICS
Peter: "I just love having my picture taken, I don't even care why. Say cheese!"
Marilyn: "Cheese!"
Eli: "Get out, I need to talk to Peter."
Marilyn: "Thank you, Governor-Elect..."
Peter: "Please, call me Peter!"
Eli: "Fuck you, Call me Peter. That girl is so fired."
Peter: "What is it with you and this woman?"
Eli: "The optics are not good. Do you hear me? You and that girl grinning like a couple of fornicators for a photo shoot. Do you realize I'm going to have to track that photographer down and drown him in a river now? I don't have time to make that an everyday thing, Peter."
Peter: "Never let it be said that I fired someone because she was too pretty. I mean, if she were too blaaaaaa..."
Eli: "I'm glad you heard yourself just now, but I'm gonna stop you there and give you a Plan B. Men like it when you give them pretend options that don't actually matter."
Peter: "It's true, I love picking between things that are the same."
Eli: "Right, so we're going to promote her. Or move her laterally..."
Peter: "That's three things I get to pick from!"
Eli: "Yep, and you can do whatever you want. But you cannot keep her. I cannot spin your sexual history any more. It is spun out."
Peter: "It's not an issue!"
Eli: "It doesn't matter if you actually want to fuck her, it matters that we have enemies. Enemies who would love to call anyone in this entire building your new bimbo."
Peter: "But she isn't!"
Eli: "I'm doing it, Peter. You choose how."
Peter: "Damn right I do."
Peter: "Oh man, now all I can think about is having sex with Marilyn Garbanza. It's like the elephant thing, but with sex. Eli is going to hate how bad this is about to backfire on him. I do not envy myself, in the future, after I blow everything to shit. Just his tiny little elf-boots, stamping on my face. Forever."
NURSE JOAN
Is wearing a bag over her head and is behind a screen sitting on a stool, getting deposed. This is very interesting, all the details. Like, did you know that medically-trained nurses and doctors can't be involved in executions because of the Hippocratic Oath? That is fascinating. It's both sad and comforting, that little fact. I am like Alicia Florrick in at least one way, where I can handle even very scary or bad or tough things if you do them correctly, like, understand fully what you are doing when you do the thing you're doing.
Alicia: "So you left in tears. This was your first execution, so that's probably part of it. Eddie said it was from the blood shooting out of his neck?"
Joan: "[Agrees with everything Alicia says no matter what it is; Alicia catches onto this way before I think most of us would.]"
Alicia: "Joan, did the prosecution prepare you for this testimony by telling you to agree with everything I said?"
Cesca: "Shit! Objection!"
Kruger: "No, girl. Overruled."
Joan: "She didn't say that, but she did say you were trying to create disagreement between Fornum and me, so Fornum would have to be kept alive as a rebuttal witness..."
Alicia: "So you're actively deceiving the court."
Joan: "I haven't found any areas of disagreement."
Alicia: "Was Mr. Fornum tortured?"
Joan: "The offender was ... in pain. He tried to keep from crying, and screaming out. I think... Yes, it was torture."
Alicia: "Just so this is slightly less of a farce, wouldn't you say that's a systematic problem of lethal injection?"
Joan: "No, this was the first time I know of. I think it was his veins. He has what you call rolling veins, because of being a drug addict?"
The lightbulb goes off and Alicia sends Will an ESP, which Cesca also gets: If he's an exception, which Joan just offered on the stand, then they demand a physical. They scream and yell, but the Judge allows it.
Outside, Alicia and Will whip out their phones with giant grins.
Will: "That was good."
Alicia: "No, you were good."
Will: "I'll allow it."
They grin, and call home.
BACK HOME
Zach is gobsmacked by the news, and cranks up his ChumHum to doublecheck the insanity while he's still on the phone with his bro: Yes, Grace Florrick is the #4 hottest kid on Maxim's Hottest Politician's Daughters. He drops the phone and just stares, trying to figure out his entire life, looking at a fairly lovely picture of his sister, and exactly what happens if he's not the hot one.
Alicia: "Zach, it's Mom. What are you doing?"
Zach: "Nothing! Certainly not looking at pervy pictures of my sister while my brain slowly melts inside my head!"
Alicia: "Okay well, I'm gonna be late. Need anything?"
Grace: "Is that Mom?"
Zach: "Don't look at my computer! It will weird you out too!"
Grace: "Tell her we need more juice. I'm a growing girl."
PARKING GARAGE
Alicia: "Why are you all climbing around on that car like a bunch of fourth-year feral cats? Are we doing West Side Story? Because David Lee is gonna want in on that shit."
Cary: "We found an office, inside the Loop."
Alicia: "Good."
Cary: "It'll take three weeks."
Alicia: "Then let's get temporary space. I want outta here."
Carey: "Actually, we want to stick around."
Alicia: "Three whole weeks?"
Cary: "ChumHum needs some work."
Alicia: "We can do that from our new offices. This secret meeting stuff is bullshit."
Robyn: "I agree, we need to go. Fast. I cannot keep myself tamed much longer."
Carey: "There's more."
Cary: "You're gonna hate this, but we want to wait for bonuses."
Alicia: "You are pieces of shit. You are honestly up to no good. That is robbery."
Carey: "It's like a million bucks, between all of us! We were counting on it for startup costs..."
Alicia: "We can't keep fooling the partners..."
Carey: "We can't keep fooling Will, you mean."
Of all the times -- I know I bitched about it, but -- remember that sound-effect thing they did a couple of times where they would honk over the bad words? Wouldn't it have been funny to have a sound effect of a tire squealing in the parking garage, like a record scratch? Rrrrk! Oh no he didn't! Any case, Alicia's face is every bit as funny and even more eloquent.
Alicia: "We gonna have a fucking problem, kemosabe? Because I will throw down. This could be Beat It just as easy as West Side Story."
Carey: "My bad. But I mean, you just said it was okay to wait one week, and now that it's our issue, suddenly you can't do it."
Alicia: "First of all, this is where Diane's headaches come from. I can already tell. Second of all, does nobody comprehend what I'm saying when I say Death Row Appeal? Do those words hold no meaning for you guys?"
Cary: "Not really, but whatever. Let's vote. Later, when we're feeling more normal. Two weeks versus the rest of our glorious lives."
THE SNITCH
Robyn Burdine, backing up Kalinda, looking tough, is the highlight of highlights. She's so great. She duckfaces, she scowls, she Robyn Burdines up a storm! The Snitch is breaking into a car when they find him, so the alarm is going off and the cops are on their way, and the whole time Kalinda is Kalinda and Robyn Burdine is Robyn Burdine, and it's excellent.
Kalinda: "New identity, and you still can't resist thieving and being a crumbum. Sad."
Tommy: "I told the truth, though! He was just trying to jack their car, but they fought him and pulled off his ski mask, and that's why he had to kill them. He told me."
Kalinda: "Why would anyone confess anything to you, ever?"
Robyn: (So many awesome faces.)
Tommy: "Why would I know about the ski mask? The cops never told anybody that."
Robyn: "Maybe you heard it from the real killer, ya snitch."
Tommy: "Um, I did. Eddie."
L/G
Cary: "Alicia! Alicia, talk to me. The Snitch is sticking to his story."
Alicia: "Damn."
Cary: "She doesn't believe him, and they think they can get to him another way. So that's good. Listen, are you okay?"
Alicia: "Who doesn't love a parking garage brawl? That kid's beautiful face, I couldn't wait to shove it into the concrete. One day perhaps I will."
Robot: "Somebody taped a smiley face to my robot face!"
Monica's banging into like every surface, really hilariously loudly, and so Alicia, because she is Alicia, rolls her eyes at Cary, rips the prank face off the robot's face, and stalks off without even a smile at the grateful robot.
Will: "Alicia, can you come in here real quick so we can all have a go at you?"
EQUITY PARTNERS
Alicia: "Uh, hey. Hi, everybody that is my boss. What's going on, guys?"
David Lee: "The fourth-years are phoning our top clients, like, continuously."
Diane: "Wouldn't it be weird if they left and formed a firm?"
Alicia: "That would be weird. What do the clients say?"
David: "Fucking nothing. They all say they're not planning on leaving at this time. I want to go full PRISM on these fuckers."
Alicia: "Uh, that sounds like a Kalinda thing. Also, I would sell you my own mother to get on up out of this room right now."
David Lee: "Kalinda is sympathetic to the traitors! She will be first against the wall."
Will: "Alicia, you and Cary are the closest because of the horrible foxholes we used to put you in, like bees forced to fight in a jar. Where's his head at?"
Alicia: "Ever since you used me as a weapon to destroy the fourth-years, we're not so close."
Diane: "Get closer."
Will: "Find out if they are happy. And how they can be destroyed."
She can't get the door open to leave -- pulling the push, that kind of thing -- and both David Lee and Cary are like, so suspicious of her. Oh, Alicia. Always in the middle of a bunch of bullshit.
Alicia: "Jeez, they gave me the business in there! Talk about torture. Am I right?"
CLASS ACTION
When the Judge notes that the two teams' medical reports are fairly different, Lena Cesca steps up and suddenly withdraws her report, stipulating to both Scheck's new report and everything in Fornum's deposition.
Kluger: "So wait. You've decided that it's better to execute Mr. Fornum than to win your lawsuit?"
Cesca: "We also have the warden from the Indiana State Prison who will swear to changes in the lethal injection protocol, so as to reduce the pain associated therewith."
Will: "Then we'll depose the warden, but..."
Cesca: "-- But there's no reason to fuck around anymore."
Kluger: "Yeah, sorry. Time to kill him."
LOCKHART
Diane: "Nothing, just musing out the window regarding my State Supreme Court arc this season. What's up."
Robyn: "Eddie didn't do it."
Diane: "I know, but we have to prove it. Because we are lawyers."
Robyn: "Okay, listen. So the Snitch knew a thing that only the killer would know, right? Except when I was at the Treasury, I remember this thing about prison brokers. They're system insiders that sell info to prisoners, so they can snitch from inside and trade info."
Diane: "You think a prison broker told Eddie about the ski mask?"
Robyn: "Yeah, not that he would admit it. So I was thinking, what if we put the squeeze on the broker himself?"
STATE'S ATTY
Geneva: "Diane and Robyn Burdine? Again? You guys make a pretty cute team, actually. So what is it now."
Cut to all three of them poring over files for the three different times Tommy snitched for them, looking for somebody that connects them. Geneva sits them down with the files and makes to take off, but then Robyn Burdine turns her big ol' sad eyes up to eleven, and before you know it, Ms. Pine is saving Eddie Fornum right alongside them.
PETER
Is signing things, signing things, and the whole time he is staring out into the center office where Marilyn is being sexy not even on purpose, and he's just like, "Oh, hell. Eli was right." So he goes to Eli to feel weird about everything.
Peter: "Why do you think she's leaving L/G?"
Eli: "To make something of herself? Because they are constantly dicking her over in their creepy power plays because she stands athwart every single division in the entire firm? She's old but young, a partner but a pawn, ethical and grounded but constantly tainted by her involvement in the highest realms of power, coldly and ethically rational but limitlessly compassionate, a human being but also a lawyer..."
Peter: "Not because of Will?"
Eli: "I don't know anything about that! Nothing!"
Peter: "And you say the optics are wrong with Marilyn?"
Eli: "The idea of you being in a photograph with that woman makes me want to bite through my lip."
Peter: "Time for a promotion, then."
STATE'S ATTY
After some of that "we're screwed" grumbling that is always a preamble to some eureka moment, Robyn Burdine finds the eureka moment: The clerk on all three crime reports is the same lady.
Ms. Munn: "What can I do for you? I mean, I'm a humble typist for the police, I don't actually catch bad guys..."
Diane: "I know how the police department works, Ms. Munn. You're here because we want to help you."
Ms. Munn, edgy: "With what?"
Robyn Burdine: "Help keep you out of jail. You tell your brother the prison warden secrets, and then he sells them to desperate inmates."
Ms. Munn: "Oh okay bye-bye!"
She gets almost to the door before Diane clears her throat, grinning back at Robyn Burdine.
Diane: "Ms. Munn? We're meeting with Diehause . One of you will be turning on the other."
Robyn: "That's the problem with snitches, Ms. Munn. They snitch."
Diane: "So you should talk first."
Robyn: "Thug lyfe! Robyn Burdine!"
HOME
Zach: "Grace, did Stiles talk to you yesterday at school?"
Grace: "That little bisexual kid that hangs out with the werewolf? Yeah, he said hey. He's kind of aggressive. Actually, all of your friends have been really nice to me lately. What is that about? Is this like Carrie? Can I be the mom?"
Zach: "I want you to see this website and then never talk about it again, okay?"
Grace is like, "Isn't this interesting," and then she's like, "Oh, how horrifying," and then she's like, "Why do I kinda feel like He-Man all of a sudden?"
Alicia: "Kids, your ride is here! Stop looking at sexy pictures of each other and here are your lunches!"
Cary: "Actually it's me."
Alicia: "False alarm! But still stop doing that!"
Cary: "So, partner meeting yesterday."
Alicia: "It was awful. We need to leave yesterday."
Cary: "What now?"
Alicia: "I'm a partner, I have a fiduciary duty to the firm. I am being illegal just by talking to you about this, and I hate it. We gotta GO."
Cary: "I hear you. But one of the things we don't like about Lockhart/Gardner is the way decisions are made by fiat, by Lockhart and Gardner. We are democrats at Florrick Agos. And the vote was for three weeks."
Alicia: "I'm malingering. Like I ask myself, Would we take this Death Row case if we were there already?"
Cary: "L/G didn't take huge pro bono cases like that for six or seven years. What are you doing in there, in your head?"
Alicia: "This is dumb but this case, it like... I found myself falling for them all over again. As lawyers. Watching them work, it was like when we were babies. Remember how big they were? It was like that. They care. They're still Will and Diane..."
"Alicia. You and I are the new Will and Diane."
Alicia: "Huh. And just like that, I'm good. Thanks. Oh hey, and don't use the company phones, they've gone from indexing the data to just straight accessing it."
Which struck some viewers as the moment that she actually crossed the line, as far as eventually getting hit with that lawsuit she just mentioned. I mean, when the calls suddenly stop what's going to happen? It's going to be Kalinda and Alicia, right? They're the only ones the partners have approached about this. And you know Kalinda's loyalty is to Will, or at least to his checkbook. Yikes. But also, what a nice moment and nice gesture.
DEATH ROW
Warden Barkin: "They were wrong about his arm, so now we're doing the foot, we're keeping him better hydrated, and raising his veins with warm compresses. All of which we were planning on doing last time when Ms. Lockhart ruined everything."
Will: "You weren't there, also?"
Barkin: "Part of it I had to sign for potassium chloride. Sometimes we have trouble getting enough, so I had to witness its removal from an overnight pouch and then placement in the intravenous tubing..."
Alicia gets an ESP from Will that a thought is forming, but he shakes his head; nothing just yet.
KLUGER
Kluger: "Wait, why are you guys here now?"
Diane: "Judge Manfreddi referred this appeal to you because you were already hearing the Eighth Amendment appeal."
Kluger: "Great. You're ten hours away from the execution I cannot seem to make happen. What's up."
Snitch: "Yeah, I'm the snitch. I withdraw my testimony that he confessed, and testify that to my knowledge he is innocent."
Diane: "And that lady over there? Leslie Munn?"
Snitch: "Nothing to say about her."
Diane: "Well, fuck it."
Kluger: "That's your appeal? For a case I hate and didn't want, you bring me a snitch who has changed his story after a decade? Ms. Lockhart, I really am sorry, but an appeal of actual innocence? After years of appeals and decisions and delays and..."
Diane: "Your Honor..."
Kluger: "No, seriously I'm calling it. Eddie, you're done."
GUB'S OFC
Mitch: "Mr. Gold? You asked for me?"
Eli: "Marilyn, how lovely to see you. And to promote you! To the Transit Authority Board. Effective immediately, goodbye."
Mitch: "Hang on, what?"
Eli: "Isn't that so great? You'll have so much authority! Over TRANSIT!"
Mitch: "This is some bullshit I think."
Eli: "It's a step up. You didn't do anything wrong, obviously because of this crazy rictus smile on my face it's a good thing! See my teeth? See my gleaming crazy eyeballs?"
Mitch: "I'm talking to the Governor about this..."
Eli, stepping literally in front of her: "This was Peter's call, Marilyn. If he wanted to chat about it with you, he would have, Marilyn."
Mitch: "This is a stupid mistake you're making."
Eli: "Maybe. Goodnight now!"
If she was gay, that's what you should be doing. Ask her if she's gay, or if she would mind being gay. That's how you turn this around. We don't burn targets, we make 'em assets. "Oh, that gorgeous woman on the Governor's right? She's getting married to a lady June. So sit on that, ya hoser."
Peter: "How did it go?"
Eli: "I was incandescent."
Peter: "She's right that we need a new Chief of Staff."
Eli: "She's not right about anything, she's anal."
Peter, verbatim: "Anal's what we need right now."
Eli: "You're tellin' me, sir."
Peter: "Lol. Maybe that should be the new state motto."
Peter: "Eli, can I ask you something? Will you do it?"
Eli: "Not since that Santa Claus statue in college have I..."
Peter: "No, you doofus, I mean will you be my Chief of Staff?"
Eli: "As if it's even possible for me to get even more into your clothes with you than I already am at all times. Plus, I am running your campaign?"
Peter: "My campaign is here, though. What I do in this office. So really it's just two jobs becoming one job."
Eli: "Okay but if I fuck up then that's two jobs I just lost."
Peter: "Plus Marilyn Garbanza will take us both the fuck out when she hears this."
(Somewhere the palms of Wendy Scott-Carr's hands start itching and she's like, "What is that motherfucker up to now? Crows! To me!" And a flock of ravens flies up to perch on her and they become a cloak and she tosses the hood up and heads out the door like, "Marilyn Garbanza, hang in there. I am coming and I am bringing all my shiny knives and smoky potions.")
LOCKHART & GARDNER
Diane: "So you going to this thing, or..."
Will: "Ugh, no way. I feel like Thor without his hammer."
Diane: "You were on it for all of five seconds, you arrogant cutie-pie. Trust me, we did everything."
Will: "Not everything, or he would be alive."
The second she's gone, the lightbulb goes off and he figures the whole thing out.
DEATH ROW
They hook it up, hook it up, I hate this so we're skipping this part, and then randomly the Warden gets busted in on by DEA agents who question him about transporting/receiving toxic chemicals through the USPS, in violation of 49 U.S.C. 5101, and then confiscate all the potassium chloride, and before you know it the Indiana Governor has stopped the execution because a third miss is too much, so now he's just in jail forever for a crime he didn't commit, instead of dead.
L/G
Alicia watches Will and Diane and their victory dancing, for a while. Just sort of loving them, and the idea of them, and the idea of them being the mommy and daddy but also really respecting her, as much as they use her. How good it felt to be a part of this, to do good work, pro bono, to save a man's life together using their brains and their quickness and their strength and yeah, their love. The unspoken signals and power that comes with long intimacy, that was it too. It wasn't the last thing, it wasn't what saved him, but it was the best thing.
She wants so much to be a part of it, to race into the middle of the room and throw herself on them, into their arms, to thank them for everything they've done, for believing in her, for the Bakeoffs and the Partnerships and the Blue Ribbon Committees. For the awe. She has never loved them more than she does today; never admired and respected them so fully. She shakes with it. But she doesn't move.
Will: "Good work, Alicia. Have a drink."
Alicia: "Were you the one that called the DEA?"
Will: "Heh heh heh."
Alicia: "It was awesome. I need to tell you something. I can't handle it anymore. I need to be above-board about this, and..."
Carey was right. But Will saves her.
Will: "Alicia, it's fine. I'm on a gambler's high right now but trust me, I'm feeling magnanimous. I'm not going to tell you I love you, or that your mother begged me to save you from your husband again. I'm just... I know why you didn't call, and it's fine. The merry-go-round was killing us. Both. It's off, it's fine, come have a drink."
Alicia, quietly, to his back: "...Don't end up hating me."
Will: "What?"
Alicia: "Nothing. Have a good night."
And so they do.
WEEK
Tambor's back for a second engagement, and Veronica's going to be around. Alicia and Cary sue the NSA for ChumHum, and find out they're already under surveillance. Veronica "takes steps to support her daughter" -- a terrifying phrase, whatever it might mean -- and Eli works on Diane's judgeship. I am really looking forward to all of those things! This season is tremendously exciting.
JACOB CLIFTON is a freelance writer and critic based in Austin, Texas. He currently recaps The Good Wife, Homeland, Hostages, Ravenswood, and Masters Of Sex for TWoP. Jacob can be found online at jacobclifton.com, Twitter, and Facebook, as well as a regular column for Tor.com, Geek Love.