Gobi

No, you're not :). The tape is not hearsay. Hearsay is when a witness testifies to what someone else said. But that is always allowed when the person being quoted is a party to the case. There can be many reasons for objecting to the tape being admitted, but hearsay is not one of them . Chuck needed the break in. If he had taken the tape to the Bar, then the whole focus would have been on why Jimmy said what he said. And that would open the door wide for evidence of Chuck's condition. Wasn't it Howard who asked Jimmy to look in on Chuck (I could be wrong, but it was someone)? As for Chuck's ability to appear at the Mesa Verde hearing, as I recall, he was wearing his tinfoil lined suit for the occasion. Something else that could have been brought up. Chuck may have been trying to get Jimmy's MV shenanigans in through the back door with the tape, but the hearing was not concerned with that, only with the B&E and assault.

There's a saying in the legal practice: "Lawyers make the worst witnesses." Something Chuck demonstrated in this episode.

Am I the only one to think that the weapon that will destroy Gotham is Batman?

Apologies if this was mentioned upthread. I loved how the camera cut from the bell ringing over the free clinic door to a wheelchair. Hector's fate foreshadowed.

One out of three ain't bad (meaning Simon).

Sounds convincing.

In line with what others have said, Jimmy is what is known as a rainmaker. He has that gift of attracting people to him and getting them to put their trust in him. Someone like Jimmy is invaluable to a law firm. Chuck, for all his brilliance and expertise, probably has brought few, if any clients, to the firm. And that must anger him no end (even before Jimmy became a lawyer). As a colleague once said, you don't have to be a brilliant attorney to have a successful law firm. You have to be able to get clients in the door, then you can hire a brilliant attorney to do the work. Properly mentored, Jimmy would have been a real asset to HHM. Chuck, though, would never have accepted that.

If anything, one would expect a season finale to have an audience nearly equal to the opener.

Shiva definitely survived the first battle, you can see her at the end, lying next to the stage.

Especially if he was always bent backwards!

To a certain degree, I can accept it as a reaction to all the random deaths in the ZA. People may have become numb to sudden deaths, and realize that anyone can die at any time. Although, that isn't really how it's been portrayed.

Sole Annoyed - Solenoid. These are the jokes, people.

I guess I'm not the sole annoyed person by this.

How many of them were dressed in drag?

This seems as good a place as any to discuss this. I've been wondering what's happened with Darryl, once one of the most interesting characters in the show. I think the problem is that he is a non-comics character, and TPTB are having increasing difficulty shoehorning him into the comics' storyline that they are following more closely. In the past, I think they have had Darryl do things that some other characters in the comics did. Hardly conducive to a consistent character, either. Take the whole "Darryl goes to the Sanctuary and escapes" subplot out of the series, and what's changed? Nothing, really. And that's the problem. Either Darryl has to do something that a major character did in the comics (problematic), or he is reduced to a glorified extra. Even CDB's interaction with Dwight (a comics character) is not dependent on Darryl. There are times when it seems like Darryl is Bruce Willis' character from The Sixth Sense. He's there, but he's not really there. Think about it. Take Darryl out of the scene with Dwight in the cell, and you wouldn't have to change a word of the script. Dwight's dialogue could be the same without Darryl's knife in his face. Maybe that's why the GPK (non-comics characters) were introduced. So Darryl can go all Rambo on their backstabbing asses, without affecting the comics' storyline.

Rick is attracted to her junk.

I think Jadis gave a really quick explanation to Rick as to how the alliance with Negan came about, but I didn't quite catch it. Something about scavenging. In any event, why was Negan so willing to be nice to the GPK? When that ASZhat, whose name I've forgotten, hinted at replacing Rick, Negan gutted him like a fish. Yet, he treats the GPK as equals, no Lucilling or anything.

Even if Rick trusted the GPK, he would have been wise to position them outside of Alexandria for the ambush. Not just for trust purposes, but to set up an L shaped ambush.

Never. Once Negan called on the GPK, the jig would have been up. So far, Eugene hasn't done anything that couldn't be forgiven. I wouldn't blame him for the choice he made, I just wouldn't trust him anymore, either.

When Rick was sure of their loyalty, he could give them ammo. It would have thrown rather a large wrench into their plans. Even better, if they didn't realize their guns were unloaded (something unlikely to happen IRL, with people at all familiar with guns, but quite common in fiction).

Morgan started out with a gun, ran out of ammo, used his stick and then took the dead man's gun.

That just shifts it from Rick to Zeke and Maggie. They needed a way to distinguish the ASZhats from the Saviors, and themselves from the Saviors. At some point in the various meetings the issue should have been raised "Well, if you do decide to join us, this is how we'll recognize each other." And how about sending a rider on horseback (or in a car, both groups have them) ahead for some recon?

I did enjoy two small touches in this episode. The dead ASZhat lying in the street, wearing a red shirt. And the sign back at the sanctuary announcing how many days since the last workplace injury; guess that gets reset to zero, now. Why was there no plan for the Allies to recognize each other? Presumably, each group would know its own members (giving the saviors an advantage), but the Allies would not know the others. They should have been wearing colored armbands, or some other form of ID. And not the same color, but different colors for each group. Furthermore, Rick should have given the GPK unloaded guns, just to be safe. He could say "you get ammo when I'm ready to give it to you." Of course, either of those things would require, you know, planning.

I'm calling it. Vin Diesel isn't really betraying the others.

Well, someone finally thought of bicycles.