The Good Wife

The Good Wife

Episode 5: Waiting for the Knock

Episode 6: The Art of War

By: Carlos Uribe

The Good Wife is a show about Alicia Florrick and her career and scandalous personal life.

Spoilers Ahoy!

Waiting for the Knock:

There really was no weekly case this episode. It was an episode that practically took place over one day. Lemond Bishop begins the morning by finding out that his accountant got arrested. He has no idea if he's in legal trouble and whether it had to do with his legal or illegal business. He calls both law firms to try and discover the truth. It takes them a while but they eventually discover that he's under investigation because a criminal informant has gone missing. Bishop himself didn't have anything to do with the murder but he's blamed for the informant's death when the body is discovered. The way that the episode was about trying to figure out if Bishop was in any trouble, rather than getting him out of it, was an interesting idea for the show to have. I especially like how Bishop keeps trying to keep his lives separate but failing. His legal and illegal businesses are supposed to be separate but he finds out one of his health clubs has been dealing steroids. He's also trying to keep his home away from business. His kid's friends are refusing to come to his kid's birthday party because of his reputation. His house is searched and he's arrested there as well. Bishop keeps trying to keep his life nicely separated but they can't help but mix. It's this drama that his worlds keep colliding that helps to form the core of this week's “case”.

The most interesting part of the episode is the entire campaign plot. It's the day of the straw poll and we begin where the previous episode had ended. Jackie is still seeing bugs but she quickly goes to the background in the beginning of the episode. It instead deals with the blogger who wants to release his story. Eli tries his best to kill it by telling the blogger that the story has no basis of truth. He even tries to get Will to threaten the blogger with a cease and desist letter. The blogger doesn't care and he releases the story regardless. Peter wins the straw poll with a massive majority (96%) which clears out his current primary contenders. The story wouldn't matter except the blogger posts a photoshopped picture of the girl accusing him of sleeping with him. This means that it gets attention from Maddie and she decides that she's not going to be contributing to Peter's campaign. She is no longer going to support him because of this false allegations. That she talks to the lying girl was a hint of that along with perhaps a sign of something else going on. She's hoping to remain friends with Alicia despite this. All Alicia can say is “sure” without any real conviction behind it. This was the best part of the episode and it's really what I'm excited to see the consequences of in The Art of War.

This would have been a pretty great episode if it was just the campaign sub-plot and the Lemond Bishop main plot. What drags down the episode? Kalinda and Nick. The relationship between the two has yet to be well defined and it just seems to be creating drama for the sake of it. It's not only dull but it's taking away time that could be going towards more worthy plotlines. All that pretty much happens is Nick breaks into Kalinda's girlfriend's apartment and proceeds to take some pictures of Kalinda. It looks like the agent is continuing her investigation into Kalinda. That there's a picture of Kalinda speaking with Eli might be important. That the investigation becomes the only part where I wasn't bored in any scene he was in simply speaks volumes about how badly this story has been handled. That's because the investigation is the promise of a different story and it's one I would prefer over this Nick character.

The Art of War:

The Art of War is this season's military episode. Considering how good these tend to be, I was pretty excited for it and I was not disappointed. What helps to make this episode work without making the military plots old is that it takes place in a civilian court. It's about a female soldier who is accusing an employee of a private military firm of attempting to rape her. The problem instantly becomes clear. The private firm is trying to hide behind their status as a defense contractor in an attempt to circumvent the law. The argument is that you can't sue the military or private contractors in a court of law. The first is legal and the second is only legal because of a Supreme Court ruling. Alicia is brought on to this case and she attempts to challenge the second. She tries to prove that because the private contracting firm wasn't court martialed for insubordination, they can't be protected legally. It then becomes a competition between Alicia and the defense. She keeps finding ways to try and get the case to move forward but the opposing lawyer always presents Alicia with enough evidence to force her to look for more. She ends up losing the case but the client is happy because they went farther than the client had anticipated. The case was about the immunity that the military can hide behind and how sometimes this immunity can get in the way of justice.

The Art of War deals with quite a bit of sub-plots. The governor's election gets more complicated when Maddie announces that she's going to run for Governor. She has the money, the connections, and the will to become a credible threat to Peter. What's worse for him is that she hasn't had a recent past of going to jail and sleeping with prostitutes. It is difficult to root for her. She befriended Alicia and had promised to help her husband. The first signs of problem and she jumps ship. She decides that she'll run since there needs to be a woman in the election. She's hoping to remain friends with Alicia but considering that her type of support is betrayal and it's hard to imagine anyone wanting to be friends Maddie. She does offer Peter the chance to be her running mate but he doesn't want to run with her. She might be right in that it would be the smart move in the short-term. She has all the advantages. Peter knows better than to agree to this deal because he knows it would be an impossible deal in the long-term. He can't be a political ally of someone who couldn't even support him through false allegations. The Art of War gives an effective primary challenger to Peter. The one note I have is that this political plot seems timely now, but now that the real-life election is over and I'm left wondering if it'll quickly become less relevant. Oh, who am I kidding? The 2014 elections are right around the corner and people are already talking about Presidential candidates for 2016.

The show also deals with the entire news story that's supposed to come out. Eli gets Kalinda on it and discovers that the reporter who wrote the piece might have had a personal vendetta against him. This is because Peter had been the State's Attorney when her cousin was convicted of being a pedophile. Jackie Florrick is having trouble with her care assistants until Alicia recommends hiring a male nurse. The two are getting along pretty well by the end of the episode. Kalinda's husband Nick is really relegated to the background but his story moves forward a bit. Here's hoping this move is to get him off the show. Finally, the trustee is trying to emulate Steve Jobs in his management style. Overall, the Good Wife had a wonderful episode that revolved around the military.

Other Notes:

Cary practically stated he's not being used in criminal investigations. It's as if the show itself is admitting that they haven't properly been utilizing him.