Alicia (Julianna Margulies) and Peter (Chris Noth) sit and talk in the prison yard. Photo courtesy of CBS.
After what feels like an eternity since the last episode (real time: 3 weeks), The Good Wife returns to CBS this Tuesday night. For those of you who have seen Season 1 so far, let's review what has been going on and think about what will happen in the back 9 episodes. For everyone else…why aren't you watching?!?!
Created by Robert King and Michelle King, The Good Wife is one of those precious few procedurals that balances fascinating cases with character development. In her best role since the empathetic nurse Carol Hathaway on ER , Julianna Margulies stars as Alicia Florrick, the wife of a prominent Chicago State's Attorney brought down by a sex scandal and criminal charges for bribery. We've all seen those press conferences of politicians issuing some statement about their indiscretions and human failings. For the first time, somebody is telling the story from the perspective of that woman standing next to the podium.
In the months since her world turned upside down, Alicia has been strengthened by her experiences. She has moved out of her elite, WASP-y suburban neighborhood, away from former friends who turned their back on her. She has become a figure of public speculation, such that strangers now look at her with pity in their eyes. What's great is that she doesn't even seem to care.
Alicia decides to put her Georgetown Law degree to use and joins the prestigious firm of Stern, Lockhart & Gardner as a Junior Associate. With every case she handles, she proves herself to be intelligent, capable, and honorable. One would expect this newfound self-reliance to accompany a divorce from her cheating husband. Instead, she decides to stand by him, even testifying on his behalf in his bail hearing. The situation is very complicated, and so are the wide-ranging emotions expressed by Margulies. There's a reason her performance earned her a Golden Globe and a Screen Actors Guild Award only halfway through the first season.
Diane (Christine Baranski) and Will (Josh Charles) give Alicia two very different pictures of what it means to be a lawyer in The Good Wife. Photo courtesy of CBS.
The rest of the cast is less in the spotlight but just as important in rounding out the show. All the characters at the law firm are teaching Alicia how to be a lawyer (and how not to be one). Josh Charles and Christine Baranski play Will Gardner and Diane Lockhart, the founding partners with polar-opposite ideologies but great chemistry. Matt Czuchry is Cary, the cocky but charming associate in competition with Alicia. The comic relief is provided by Archie Panjabi as Kalinda, the firm's sharp-witted investigator.
Chris Noth has great presence in the role of Peter Florrick. Here's a man who is broken down enough to realize how sorry he is and how much he loves his wife and family, and yet not so broken that he has lost his political ambition. He wants to win his appeal so that he can clear his name and get back to work. Undermining his efforts is the outstanding Titus Welliver as Glenn Childs, the guy who stole Peter's job as State's Attorney.
Some of the most memorable episodes have been "Conjugal," in which the firm defends a death row inmate convicted of killing a police officer and learn about the consequences of racial profiling; "Infamy," which showed the First Amendment case of an obnoxious talk show host (guest-star Craig Bierko) who may have caused a woman's suicide, as well as a big development in Alicia's gradual discovery about the truth of her husband's actions; and "Hi," the most recent episode that featured a tension-filled legal case about a murdered babysitter, and also saw Peter released from prison to continue building his appeal from home.
With Peter now living under the same roof, it will be interesting, and probably very awkward at first, to see him and Alicia get used to each other again. His constant presence (thanks to the wonders of electronic monitoring) might even drive her to work longer hours at the office, perhaps in the company of her old friend, Will…
This week's episode, entitled "Bang," has Alicia finally finding out about the mysterious packages being left at her doorstep that her son, Zach, has been hiding. At the firm, Alicia and Diane attempt to get a wife to testify against her husband in a murder trial, despite spousal privilege laws.
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