Oh my God, what an hour of television. Definitely the best episode of the year, and quite an emotional ride as well.

Eli takes his David Lee fight to the next level, commandeering his niece Caitlin into performing scut work while he tries to get a job working for a Chicago gay defamation league. Of course, Caitlin uses blogs and twitter and whatever to figure out the whole deal, and gets on his good side -- but not before Eli and Amy Sedaris's Stacie Hall find themselves in a hilarious Postman Always Rings Twice game of sexual chicken that ends with some seriously effed up-looking hair and a new revelation: Stacie is going to be running Eli's ex-wife's campaign for governor. So that's a bunch of shoes dropping at once.

Meanwhile, it's Indictment Day. Wendy brings in some of the major players for the Grand Jury -- whom we know, and are reminded several times, always indict -- but, thanks to the long-term strategies of Will and Kalinda that you knew had to be going on, Wendy eventually goes shit-nuts. It's stuff like, the emails in the file Kalinda slipped Dana were falsified to give them false leads in questioning -- which earns Kalinda a hard slap in the face from Dana -- and another setup where Andrew Wiley photographs Will handing Judge Parks an envelope full of money... For UNICEF.

Anyway, Wendy effectively loses her mind and calls Alicia to testify to the various stuff Cary has told her about Alicia and Will. It's damning... But not as damning as the conversation Peter has with Alicia where she basically asks him to call this off, he admits that it's totally personal and he just wants to hurt Will, and then -- worst of all -- Alicia confesses to having always turned a blind eye to Peter's shit because she was selfish. Like she actually says, "The problem wasn't that you were doing terrible things, it was that you did them in a way that hurt our family." It's a gut-punch, especially with the impression you get that she didn't really know that about herself, either, until she said it.

After some really gross questioning about her sexual morals, Alicia tells Wendy (and, tacitly, poor Cary) to go fuck themselves, and wanders off in contempt of court. Realizing that the indictment will make the transcripts -- in which she just admitting to sleeping with Will -- public, she rushes home to confess her sins to the kids.

...But the Grand Jury, confused by a brilliant Elsbeth strategy of tossing Peter's name around so often and with regard to every question, begins to think that somehow the State's Attorney is the guilty one, and tries to indict him instead. It's pretty adorable. So just in time, Kalinda calls Alicia and tells her the indictment is off, everything's going to be fine, and Alicia gives her just the tiniest bit of love in return. It's sweet, Will and Diane dance together, Elsbeth is adorable, and even Kalinda cracks a fraction of a smile.

But in the State's Attorney's office, things are not so rosy. Between Dana's fuck-up with Kalinda and the fake McDermott file, the conversation with Alicia about the real facts of this case, Cary's total shame at being used against Alicia, and the fact that ultimately Wendy crossed a line by even calling her, Peter fires Wendy and that's the end of that.

All good? Not really, considering that Wendy Scott-Carr is still out of her goddamn mind and will now be reporting Will to the Bar Association in hopes that they'll Lifeguard him to death to protect their judges. It's a master stroke, and one that we'll see play out in three weeks, February 19, when the show comes back and Will must stop practicing law... And start playing baseball with some fools' heads, from what the trailers suggest.

I am, even more than usual, profoundly grateful to have this story in my life. I hope you enjoyed this episode as much as I did, and we'll see you in three weeks.