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[personal profile] shadowkat
Just finished watching this week's episode of The Good Wife or rather last night's episode.
Love this show. The women characters are so strong. Although I think I may be amongst the few women who watch it online that adores Alicia and Julianne Marguiles brilliantly understated performance.
Difficult role - since the character is so contained, she has to express everything with subtle gestures and mannerisms. Rather identify with this character, even though I'm not a Mom nor do I have children. She's the only character who is not interested in power and merely wants to do her job well and be able to look at herself in the mirror each morning (which means sticking to her moral code). Easier said than done in this ambiguous and complicated world.

Ah, there isn't a character in this show that I do not adore on some level. They are all so delightfully complicated. They finally got rid of the two one-note characters, which seemed to be more plot-devices than anything else - meant to move the story forward, which they did quite well, and high-tail it elsewhere.



The case of the week typically examines an issue the protagonist is grappling with. Here, Alicia is grappling with who to trust and whether to stay in her nice comfortable life, as an associate with Lockhardt and Gardner, and wife to Peter, or to jump ship. She's happy there. There's no reason to leave.

The court case tried first by Stern, former partner of Lockhart and Gardner, and now competitor who has attempted on numerous occasions to hire Alicia, and later tried by Stern's successor,
Canning (once again portrayed by the brilliant Michael J. Fox) - entails a class action lawsuit against an employer who bullied and fired them, without cause, in order to save her firm money.
Later we learn this employer...and her associates, looted the employees' pension fund. (I smiled at this, since it's a plot point that I used in my novel - one of my characters, a professional thief, embezzles from the companies on the verge of big lay-offs or mergers and hides the money in their pension fund, knowing that they aren't paying close attention, because they plan on bulking it up, then doing away with it before layoffs, in order to loot it. She transfers it out before the employer can loot the fund and takes off with 80%, the rest she gives the laid-off employees. You have to have had experience in Corporation human resources, finance, and legal departments to understand how this works. And yes, it's possible to do. Although admittedly most companies don't loot their pension funds.)

Anyhow for those keeping track? The cases and plots in the Good Wife are actually fairly realistic and often taken directly from US court cases. Granted not perfect. It's television after all.

How this plays with Alicia? Well like all episodes of the Good Wife, the case really isn't the focus of the story, and is more in the background. It's the C plot line. The A plot-line is whether Alicia will stay with Lockhart and Gardner, she's gotten another job offer - this time from Canning, who informs her at the end of the episode that he doesn't want to hire her because of her husband, but because of her own strengths, that she has the makings of a great attorney and it won't happen at Lockhart & Gardner, they are keeping her back. He's not wrong - you see it in bits and pieces with the case. She is clearly out of the loop on many things. Canning also challenges her moral code - stating that she hasn't figured out that you need to separate what you do at work from home, the two personas. Which is an interesting comment. You feel too guilty about it. In a way it is an excellent description of her husband, who had separated his two personas, work and home, when he allowed them to intermingle, things go wonky. She declares they aren't a good fit, but you wonder - Canning unlike Will or for that matter Peter or even Kalinda, has always been up front with her. She knows where he stands.

Kalinda, I feel sorry for. Because Carey is right - when he asks why she didn't tell Alicia up front. If you'd done it up front it would not be an issue. Unless, you became friends with her because of Peter? And Kalinda clearly upset walks away in a huff, making Carey and me wonder if that's what happened? If initially she had become friends with Alicia to spy for Peter? In the first season - it certainly looked that way. In which case...Peter and Kalinda may have a problem.
Because that is a whole other breach of trust.

Meanwhile Wiley cautions Carey, again, to not be so trusting of Kalinda. To stop protecting her.
He's putting himself at risk. Rather adore Wiley, and the funniest moment was Childs voice coming out of the stuffed Lion. LOL! Titus Wellver gets the gold star for voicing the oddest forms.
In Lost - he was smokey, and in Good Wife, he gets to talk out of stuffed lion puppet. I'm starting to feel sorry for Carey too, who like Alicia isn't quite sure what he's gotten himself into. They feel at times like the younger versions of Diane and Will, with Canning their Stern.
I can't help but see Canning acquire them both at season's end and possibly for the same reason: Kalinda.

Eli thinks he has control over the situation in the political realm. But clearly doesn't. And it's clear in this episode that the Florick that he cares and respects the most, is not Peter, but Alicia. Which is a weak point that may yet do him in. Enraged by the Democratic Party Leadership's actions, he finds himself caught off-guard by the reporter's allegations of Peter sleeping with a co-worker. If he only knew who it was. At the moment, he sees it as little more than unsubstantiated rumor.

Meanwhile we have Will and Tammy, the sportswriter, and as an aside - isn't it wonderful how the women in this series have traditionally male jobs and the men often have female jobs? Wiley is the caregiver and investigator, while his wife is the aerospace engineer - designing a rocket. Tammy's a sports-writer. Ah. A show I can love. Tammy wants to know if Will wants more. And Will realizes he needs Tammy in his life, that the alternative is unpalatable - to die alone, with earbuds in his ears, in his office, asleep on the couch. I got news for you bud even with Tammi, that's liable to happen. He does however provide the episode's best line - "we'll die with nothing remaining by a wikipedia entry" - actually not everyone has one, and I'm told they aren't that accurate. The new obitiaries - wiki entries. Actually, I hope not everyone has one. Can you imagine having a wiki entry? Ew. Remind me not to become famous. At any rate, Stern's death and his own musings on mortality, lead him to tell Tammy to stay. Alicia helps pave the way by telling Tammy that she's married, and moved on. As has Will. And I love this line - because it demonstrates how well Alicia knows Will: "He thinks he's still a child, but he really isn't."

It's definitely building to Alicia finding out the secret of Kalinda and Peter. Not sure what it will do. For a bit - I was thinking it would drive her into Will's arms, but that now seems highly unlikely. It may well drive her into taking Canning's offer, costing both Will and Peter, if only to get away from Kalinda. Actually, the relationship I see being at greatest risk here is the Alicia/Klalinda one but not in the way you'd expect. Kalinda doesn't want Peter. If anything Kalinda and Peter are both afraid of the same thing - losing Alicia. And of the two, it's difficult to know who has the most to lose. I feel the most for Kalinda. Peter is a bit of an ass in some respects, and typical of American male politicians. The plot thread is working better than expected and could have some serious fall-out for all concerned, because I'm not sure Lockhart &Gardner want to lose Alicia either, nor for that matter does Eli. For someone who doesn't want nor is interested in power, she appears oddly to have the most - which makes her fascinating to me. I find those who reluctantly obtain power, who do not want it, or are oblivious to it, far more interesting than those who relentlessly seek it out and desire it.

Never a dull moment with this show, I'm always rewinding, and always have to pay close attention.
Well deserving of The Peabody Award it recently won.


On a final note - congrats to the Good Wife, Justified, and Stephen Moffat's Sherlock Holmes: A Study in Pink - Masterpiece Mystery Theater Presentation via the BBC for getting a Peabody. (Nice to my excellent taste in television validated by an outside non-fandom related source.)


The intent of the Peabody Awards is to recognize the most outstanding achievements in electronic media, including radio, television and cable. The competition is also open to entries produced for alternative means of electronic distribution, including corporate video, educational media, home-video release, World Wide Web and CD–ROM. Programs produced and intended for wide theatrical motion picture release are not eligible for a Peabody Award.

The Award is determined by one criterion – "Excellence." Because submissions are accepted from a wide variety of sources and styles, deliberations seek "Excellence On Its Own Terms." Each entry is evaluated on the achievement of standards it establishes within its own contexts. Entries are self-selected by those making submissions and as a result the quality of competing works is extraordinarily high. The Peabody Awards are then presented only to "the best of the best."

The entertainment programs selected included The Good Wife, a CBS dramatic series about a political spouse's life after her husband's scandalous downfall, and Justified, FX's modern-day Western set in the wild, wild hills and hollows of Appalachia. Peabodys also went to Sherlock: A Study in Pink, Masterpiece/Mystery!'s ingenious 21st Century update of Sherlock Holmes, and Temple Grandin, an inspirational, visually creative HBO movie about an animal-rights activist who is autistic. Degrassi, the long-running youth drama, was honored for My Body Is a Cage, a two-part episode that dealt sensitively and forthrightly with a transgender teenager.


http://www.peabody.uga.edu/news/event.php?id=73

Date: 2011-04-07 11:35 am (UTC)
chani: (Default)
From: [personal profile] chani
I think that Alicia won't forgive Kalinda, not for the one night-stand per se but for having lied to her about Peter (she did ask her if she had sex with Peter and Kalinda said no), so she will tell Will and Diane that she can no longer work with Kalinda but Will will have Kalinda back so Alicia will leave the firm being hurt by the three people she love.

Date: 2011-04-07 03:09 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] dlgood.livejournal.com
I used to have a Wikipedia. Once my RL friends saw it, they started making frequent humorous edits, and Wikipedia eventually deleted it for relevance.

Date: 2011-04-07 09:35 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] shadowkat67.livejournal.com
I looked up my name on it and discovered a professional tennis player who married a Brit. LOL!
I have a very common name. Particularly in England.

Wiki isn't completely reliable - you have to be careful with it.
I have tricks to determine if information on the net is reliable or not...they don't always work, but 85% of the time...

Date: 2011-04-07 04:00 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] louise39.livejournal.com
I liked the phone call between Alicia and the reporter. Margolis has a restrained but not-poker face reaction to the next bomshell into her life!

Date: 2011-04-07 04:09 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] shadowkat67.livejournal.com
Yes. It was more of an "eye-roll" - not again. And a humorous reaction to Eli who could not contain his emotions and got very upset on Alicia's behalf. This whole thing is going to blow up in Eli's face - because he's missing some key bits of information. If it was another bimbo or some woman Alicia didn't know...would not be that big an issue. But it's Kalinda.

Date: 2011-04-07 09:35 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] shadowkat67.livejournal.com
Okay snagging your icon. ;-)

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