I feel like we should talk about what actually happened, so that's what we'll do first. The main case is this biomed device where the lady had problems, and the whole thing's in mediation, back and forth between the two conference rooms, which are hotel rooms. The mediator is that guy from The Wire that keeps playing the guy from that show.
And then the opposing counsel is Celeste, née Cuddy, who used to date Will. So there's a lot of wiggly-piggly about them having dated, and will Alicia be weird about that -- uh, no, she's Alicia -- and will they use that to rattle Celeste in turn -- yes, but not that much -- and I guess she's here for at least three episodes? Which I like, because I like Lisa Edelstein, and she could do better, and this is her doing better.
Meanwhile, Eli gets pulled into this dairy thing where they're supplying listeria cheese to kids, so there are these -- fucking awesome -- things on TV where the kids are barfing and sliding down the walls and going zombie and it's so cool. They keep showing it over and over, like this endless footage of barfing and eyes rolling up in the heads and you're like, "I love my kids, but that's hilarious." And so it is, right until the (not so charming like usual, way more hair than a person should have) reporter contact makes Eli part of the story.
So suddenly it's about "This is getting spinned by Eli Gold, famous racist and otherwise spinmaker" and then it's not so funny anymore. Which is what Diane was trying to head off, in a way, when she went head-to-head with him, at the beginning. Anyway, he's suddenly tainted and you've got Kalinda trying to deal with it and also trying to deal with the Lockhart, Gardner case of the week, and failing on both, and really it's just a whirlwind of dysfunction for a bit. I honestly don't know if we'll hear about it again, but I am thrown and thrilled by this idea of Eli effing up this soon in the season. I don't like it, but I love it. You know?
Meanwhile, there's a really heartbreaking scene where -- out of nowhere, from where I'm standing -- Cary Agos rips Kalinda a new one about using his heart to get info. (Which, did he just start watching this show? Because it's always been both.) Which is what she stutter-speaks (considering she never says one single thing) but he's not having it, so finally she just has to bust a move, and it's actually really sad. I don't want Kalinda to be sad, but I certainly don't want Cary sad. Which is funny, because I thought we hated his ass; obviously it is just awful to see this go down from any angle at all.
What else is going on is, Brother Owen is taking care of the kids -- a goodwife for the Good Wife, if you will -- and is first to hear Zach's "theory" that Peter fucked another lady besides Amber, which Alicia only realized lately, which et cetera what's going on. He Owens it up about getting the real info, which he already knows and how Alicia is boning Will -- one very sexy kiss this week, if one were keeping track -- but mostly what's going on with Owen is that he is embroiled in a non-intercoursy tantric relationship with one of -- if not the -- most stupendous, fabulous, awesome humans in this entire universe, Michael Arden, whom I've adored, literally, since we were in junior high. You will not find a finer or a more talented man. He's so damned amazing. We have a godson and a best friend in common, the man is legit. Love that kid. Literally did circus flips tonight when I saw him, like a damned poodle. Keep your eye on him. Sings like an angel. Can't say enough; will say more.
Anyway. In the end, somehow, Owen's able to rip himself away from this Finn -- whom will hopefully be joining Owen as a major character involved in all aspects of Alicia's life so we can talk about him all the dang time -- long enough to ask the one question I feel like none of us were awesome enough to ask, thank you Owen, which is:
"Is this rebellion? Or is this love?"
Which is awesome enough, on its own -- haven't you wondered? -- but not as beautiful, or as necessary, as Alicia's answer, which is essentially, "Well? It's ... not love." Oh girl. We love you twice as much for saying it, even as we've found a whole new way to love Will Gardner for our own selves.
So let's fucking hear it for rebellion!
Want more? The full recap starts right below!
ACCIDENTS ARE UNINTENTIONAL
Alicia and Will are engaged in a court-ordered mediation, the kind where everybody stays in a hotel and meets in a central area; the mediation is administrated by Senator Clay Davis from The Wire, due almost entirely to the breadth of his moral character but also to the fact that this show will eventually cast every single person that was on The Wire. The res in which we find ourselves medias, bouncing back and forth between both rooms, establishes opposing counsel (Lisa "Cuddy" Edelstein as Celeste Serrano) as playing hardball, quite familiar with Will Gardner's tactics, and both sides trying to exhaust the mediator.
Celeste: "This was an unfortunate accident..."
Will: "I know Celeste works under the mistaken impression that if she says something enough times it'll make it true, but this wasn't an accident. This was fraud."
We skip around in time a little bit, throughout the case, which is one of the good things about this episode. There are some junky, awkward bits, some telegraphing and a fair amount of show-don't-telling that makes the now-classic "Alicia is confronted by moral bendiness" denouement pretty much unearned, but the guest stars are great and the cases themselves are fairly interesting. And no amount of slippery-storytelling would ever outweigh the stupid things CBS is doing to our timeslot anyway, so be grateful for what you get.
Will introduces text from a deposition, and then we jump around inside that deposition and out again, and it's easy to follow but not boring: The plaintiff, Maggie, was in a car accident four years ago which gave her a little misaligned-vertebrae bummer called "Degenerative Disc Disorder," which means chronic pain that basically ruined her life. (Will's constantly like, "Is it too painful to go on, Maggie? Are you hurting too much to continue talking right now?" which makes everybody's eyes roll but especially Celeste's.) A Dr. Farland suggested implanting a medical device called a Spinal Cord Stimulator, or SCS. He showed her a list of 12 FDA-approved options, and she assumed that he'd implanted one of them, but after the pain came back threefold she noticed the invoice for the device: The inventor was one Dr. Farland. He'd implanted his own SCS model in her, she says, like "a guinea pig."
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