A wise man once said, “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.” In this week’s new episode of The Good Wife, that woman is Wendy Scott-Carr. Unfortunately, fury also tends to skew your judgment, as even a scornful prosecutor learns.
You thought I was going to say Alicia was the scorned woman, right? Well, she’s apparently done being the victim, as she continues on her journey of empowerment.
The Case in Evidence
Since I’m in the quoting mood, let’s harken back to that old legal bromide about how grand juries will “indict a ham sandwich.” And that’s where we stand in “Another Ham Sandwich” (sequel to last season’s “A Ham Sandwich”) because Wendy has finally brought her case against Will, hoping for that all-important indictment.
Though the inimitable Elsbeth is standing by to help Peter, grand jury rules mean she can neither enter the courtroom nor defend him against the charges. For now, Wendy–along with Cary and Dana–hold all the cards.
On the face of it, Wendy’s case seems pretty weak. She wants to prove that Will either bribed three specific judges or else hooked them up with bookies. One of her main pieces of evidence is that he won a “higher than average” number of cases when he tried cases in front of these judges. I called in my own legal expert–my Ph.D. statistician husband–who said that he could have torn apart that argument in about five seconds. So there, Wendy, the numbers don’t lie!
She then calls in Judge Parks, of the suspicious threesome. Unfortunately for Will, the judge takes the fifth on the advice of counsel (apparently the standard guidance for judges and attorneys during grand jury investigations). It doesn’t look good for Will. But when he takes the stand himself, he ignores Elsbeth’s advice and answers Wendy’s questions directly. He also makes her look foolish by showing that an email she’s using against him was apparently altered. Score one for the sports guy.
Hostile Witness
Frustrated at her attempts to sully Will’s reputation, Wendy calls in Alicia. After some preliminary questions about Will’s ethics, she starts to ask about our gal’s relationship with Will. Despite Cary’s admonitions to Wendy to drop this line of questioning as inappropriate–she blows him off in anger–she continues to push. Alicia makes it clear to the jurors that she believes this is all payback for her husband defeating Wendy in last year’s election for State’s Attorney.
After one nosy question too many, Alicia rises to leave. Wendy says she hasn’t been dismissed and can be held in contempt. “Arrest me,” says Mrs. Florrick, and she walks out.
When Wendy sums up her case for the jury and asks for an indictment, the jury members start asking their own questions.
Such as, why is Will, who responded under oath instead of taking the fifth, being charged instead of that judge? And who is this Peter guy all the witnesses mentioned? And once they learn Peter’s identity, then why does his wife’s sex life has anything to do with this? Maybe he’s the one who should be indicted, huh, huh?
Not what Wendy was going for, to say the least. Back at the State’s Attorney’s office, Peter–furious at Wendy for dragging Alicia into the case–dismisses her from her special prosecutor job. Despite his desire to just drop the whole mess, she says she’s going to bring this to the attention of the Illinois Bar Association. This ain’t over yet.
Friend of the Court
Though most of the episode’s time took place in the grand jury room, the main subplot brought back obnoxious lobbyist Stacey Hall (Amy Sedaris). There’s no cheese to be seen, however. This time she’s trying to beat Eli out of a gig representing GLAC–the Gay & Lesbian Alliance of Chicago. With young associate Caitlin’s help, Eli gets the info he needs to make a perfect pitch to the GLAC board and wins the job.
Despite being bested by him, Stacey manages to convince Eli that she “desires her.” He figures he’s got nothing to lose by hopping into bed with him. (They have zero chemistry, but what the heck?) Afterwards, Stacey lets it slip that she’s working for Vanessa Gold–Eli’s ex–on her state senate campaign. Um, who’s the loser now, Eli?
Legal Briefs
In both word and deed, this episode included some classic Good Wife moments:
- When Dana realizes that Kalinda slipped her some phony “evidence” against Will, our favorite PI offers to let Dana hit her. Dana takes her up on it, slapping Kalinda across the face in the hallway outside of the jury room. It’s clear from Kalinda’s face that she thinks helping Will was worth the pain.
- During Eli and Stacey’s verbal jousting, she tries to use some tactics from The Art of War by Sun Tzu on him. He catches on pretty quickly, saying, “The only problem with Sun Tzu–he never fought the Jews. We’re Masada, baby. We don’t’ mess around with mind games–we use knives.”
- Alicia and Peter face off about his office’s apparent vendetta against Will. Although he claims that Wendy works independently, Alicia knows that he could end it if he wanted. He says he won’t interfere; he doesn’t want to do that kind of thing anymore. Alicia points out that he never actually did anything wrong professionally in the past–instead, he hurt his family. Peter is unmoved by the request, because Will “isn’t my family.”
- Alicia walking out, daring Wendy to arrest her. Worth repeating. Enough said.
Summary Judgment
Excellent episode. It’s good to keep the Will-as-judicial-briber storyline moving, first into (and out of) the grand jury room, and now onto the bar association. (We also get a sense of a timeline when Alicia tells Wendy in court that her affair with Will ended “several months ago.”) And it was great to see that Kalinda was on Will and Alicia’s side all along. (I knew it!)
Less successful: The GLAC plotline. Although it offered Eli a chance to shine, I’m starting to find Stacey a little annoying. It was, however, interesting to find out that there’s some kind of bad blood between Eli and family-law expert David Lee. And I like how Alicia and Eli are coming to a new understanding, based on mutual respect.
Another TGW break coming up, what with that big football game next week. The preview for the next episode looks great, though. That Wendy definitely doesn’t know when to give up.
(Image courtesy of CBS)
Contributing Writer, BuddyTV
