S02.E11: Day 478

[Cranberry]

Heated debates occur at the firm when Liz and Maia represent a well-known photographer, Ron Williams, suing a woman who provided an account of their relationship to a website. Jay continues to investigate possible suspects in Adrian’s shooting while Diane receives surprising news from her accountant.

[Ms Blue Jay]

It wasn't as good as last week, but at least I have good reason to hate Maia now.  I don't care how much I was getting paid, I couldn't do what Maia was doing, or even the investigating the firm asked Marissa to do.  I'd quit.  

And when Adrian, or any man, have the motivation of saying "#MeToo has gone too far" or "We must destroy the Assholes to Avoid" list, it very obviously looks like to me that they think sexually predatory behaviour towards women extremely normal/acceptable, and may even do it themselves.  

As if Kurt didn't vote for Trump!  LOL.  I find that hard to believe... 

Quote

Director Polanski calls #MeToo collective hysteria

By MONIKA SCISLOWSKA

May. 09, 2018

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Oscar-winning filmmaker Roman Polanski, who fled the United States 40 years ago as a sex offender awaiting sentencing, says he views the #MeToo movement as "collective hysteria" and "total hypocrisy."

Polanski made the comment to the Polish edition of Newsweek before the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences stripped him of his membership, citing his 1977 guilty plea and conviction for unlawful sex with a minor.

The magazine published an account this week from an interview it said Polanski gave before the Academy's May 3 decision.

Edited May 13, 2018 by Ms Blue Jay

[Aulty]

I was not keen on the 'Assholes to Avoid' case (that was a carbon copy of the Aziz Ansari story, wasn't it?) and I am torn about how it ended, but what they did portray well is that there are a lot of different opinions, even among women.

Great that Lucca is in such high demand, but I think Colin will loose to the Nazi (because Trump) and there will be no need to move to DC. Still keeping my fingers crossed that they are together by the end of the season.

They finally disentangled the Kurt situation and yay for Liz and Diane as a power-couple - the latter, unfortunately, probably won't last. And how can that police officer Whitehead still be at work? I though Colin was working on the drop-gun case?

[bobbyjoe]

I feel like they botched the Aziz Ansari thing, mainly because it seemed way too schematic and just had characters acting like point/counterpoint debate stand-ins rather than feeling true to their characters.  Marissa is usually the one to go searching and uncover some unexpected angle no matter what the case is— she’s usually got to find out things on her own— and other than needing a “Side A” vs. Maia’s “Side B,” I don’t really buy her immediately digging in her heels and not being skeptical of both sides until she’s gone out and investigated everything herself.  Likewise, Maia has literally just been through watching her father lie and attempt to manipulate every woman in his orbit— including Maia and her mother— but here she’s not at all skeptical of the male photographer’s version of things?  Again, I don’t really buy it.

 

The writing on the show is usually terrific, but this plotline felt a little too “obligatory Law and Order:SVU-like ripped-from-the-headlines” and a little less “The Good Wife/Fight doing something actually interesting with a real case but really being about the characters.”

[Quark]

Not half as good as last week, but I am very glad that Diane and Kurt are back together.

I feel like something terrible is going to happen to Colin.

[Chasity]

I’m glad Diane and Kurt are back together, but are they ever going to talk about the Holly stuff?

1 hour ago, Quark said:

I feel like something terrible is going to happen to Colin.

 I hope nothing happens to Colin. He’s a nice guy and I love him with Lucca. 

I know Liz has a husband, but are they going somewhere with her and Adrian? 

[stonehaven]

It may have seemed like a noisy episode..but it's still my favorite drama on TV....and after all the backstage drama on NCIS, I am glad that Good Fight doesn't have that..although Wife really did.

[Steph J]

22 hours ago, Aulty said:

I was not keen on the 'Assholes to Avoid' case (that was a carbon copy of the Aziz Ansari story, wasn't it?) and I am torn about how it ended, but what they did portray well is that there are a lot of different opinions, even among women.

I thought it was inspired by the Shitty Media Men list.

[CrashTextDummie]

The details of the date were almost verbatim what was reported in Ansari's case. The only major difference I spotted was that Ansari received head and the dude in this episode gave head, which seems like the kind of change you would do to make it easier to have characters take the dude's side. Ansasi was, to my knowledge, not accused on a "Shitty Media Men" type list but on a feminist blog. So the storyline was perhaps an amalgam of two separate news stories.

I liked the episode a lot, even though it had a few issues. The resolution of "Who Shot Adrian" was a bit laughable. Even accounting for police corruption, I don't think there's any way dirty cop could have ever gotten away with it. The guy seemed to take specific steps to ensure he would be caught. Not very believable.

I also thought it was a bit silly that random people in the law firm suddenly got speaking parts in order to present a more "balanced" representation of the #MeToo debate. Naturally, those random people had the more loud and extreme positions. Other than that, I thought the storyline was well handled.

Ultimately, the episode largely worked because Diane was on fire. I had to laugh when she was accused of being a bad feminist because I knew right then that this was going to be a great episode for her. And although I'm not terribly invested in her marriage, I thought Kurt's scene this week were the best we've had in a long time.

[vibeology]

3 hours ago, CrashTextDummie said:

I liked the episode a lot, even though it had a few issues. The resolution of "Who Shot Adrian" was a bit laughable. Even accounting for police corruption, I don't think there's any way dirty cop could have ever gotten away with it. The guy seemed to take specific steps to ensure he would be caught. Not very believable.

That bugged me. I get that sometimes witnesses won't give accurate information to the cops, but making up all that info wasn't going to end well for him either way. He would have just been much better off saying nothing. Canvassing for witnesses and finding nothing isn't notable but claiming to find a witness who contradicts the victim's account is something other officers will remember.

I guess I'm glad for Diane and Kurt. We've spent so little time on them that it's very hard to care one way or the other. I do care about Colin and Lucca. The show has succeeded there by making them feel lived in. And it would be hard to pass up on an offer from the Obamas.

My favourite thing this episode is to see Diane and Liz really coming together. Diane, in the past, has been supportive of other women to a point (the rude third wave feminist wasn't entirely wrong about Diane) but seeing her truly partner with someone on her level was thrilling and a huge step forward.

[love2lovebadtv]

On 5/15/2018 at 9:09 AM, vibeology said:

That bugged me. I get that sometimes witnesses won't give accurate information to the cops, but making up all that info wasn't going to end well for him either way. He would have just been much better off saying nothing. Canvassing for witnesses and finding nothing isn't notable but claiming to find a witness who contradicts the victim's account is something other officers will remember.

I guess I'm glad for Diane and Kurt. We've spent so little time on them that it's very hard to care one way or the other. I do care about Colin and Lucca. The show has succeeded there by making them feel lived in. And it would be hard to pass up on an offer from the Obamas.

My favourite thing this episode is to see Diane and Liz really coming together. Diane, in the past, has been supportive of other women to a point (the rude third wave feminist wasn't entirely wrong about Diane) but seeing her truly partner with someone on her level was thrilling and a huge step forward.

3

I was disappointed in the resolution of the who-shot-Boseman mystery. It felt like a copout. 

I care about the Lucca/Colin relationship, too. I hope they stay together. But then, it looked like Lucca was seriously considering the DC proposition. And it made me wonder if the show is setting the stage for her leaving. I haven't heard anything...just wondering. It would be out of character for her to leave because she's having a baby, so planting an offer she can't refuse (the Obamas) is believable. 

I think there is a lot of plot potential with Liz and I'm happy she and Diane aren't feuding anymore. 

I continue to love Diane Lockhart and want her to be my mentor, even though she isn't a real person lol. So if she's happy with her hubby, then I'm happy. What Kurt said made a lot of sense to me and I find their situation believable for a mature couple, given where they were in their lives and careers when they met.  

[babs1226]

On 5/14/2018 at 8:29 AM, Chasity said:

I know Liz has a husband, but are they going somewhere with her and Adrian? 

Adrian is her ex-husband.  Still some chemistry there.

[babs1226]

6 hours ago, love2lovebadtv said:

What Kurt said made a lot of sense to me and I find their situation believable for a mature couple, given where they were in their lives and careers when they met.  

I love Kurt and I want him and Diane to stay together.  It just shows what a great actor Gary Cole is.  I can't stand his character on Chicago Fire lol.

[love2lovebadtv]

18 hours ago, babs1226 said:

Adrian is her ex-husband.  Still some chemistry there.

Yep, makes for some interesting tension/drama/whatever. I'm here for all of it!

[SomeTameGazelle]

Is Lucca's pregnancy outpacing the conceit of the episode titles? It seems as if lately every week she is one month more pregnant than the last.

I loved the aikido instructor's conversations with Diane, and Liz "tricking" Adrian into eating, and Adrian welcoming Jay back.

[Guest]

The aikido stuff seemed cheesy to me.  Of course the Asian woman had mystical powers to know Diane really needed this in her life at this moment.  I suspect Diane will go to a month of classes and then be a master who breezily flips an armed assailant to save her life, or something.  

I feel like Baranski is super-human beautiful especially for a woman her age so it was kind of nice to see her with her hair slicked back and find out she has ginormous ears.  Also from the shallow end, I'm taken aback by Rose Leslie's incredible thin-ness, especially her face, and it's doubly noticeable in scenes with Steele.  Good for her for bagging the super hot Kit Harrington.  They're not Fisher Stevens/Michelle Pfeiffer-level of mismatch but ... an odd match, to me.  

Cole is in Chicago Fire, too?  He's busy.  He's also in Veep.  

I didn't really put much thought into Whitehead being the shooter but the explanation does seem kind of odd.  He just wanted a piece of the lawyer-killing action so he decided to just randomly in broad daylight shoot out of the elevator like that at the first lawyer he saw?  Pretty stupid plan.  

[SomeTameGazelle]

4 hours ago, Winston9-DT3 said:

I didn't really put much thought into Whitehead being the shooter but the explanation does seem kind of odd.  He just wanted a piece of the lawyer-killing action so he decided to just randomly in broad daylight shoot out of the elevator like that at the first lawyer he saw?  Pretty stupid plan.  

I think the idea was supposed to be that he was angry with Adrian specifically and thought that he could kill him and cast blame on whoever was on the lawyer-killing spree. Opportunistic copycat.

[love2lovebadtv]

On 5/19/2018 at 10:14 AM, Winston9-DT3 said:

The aikido stuff seemed cheesy to me.  Of course the Asian woman had mystical powers to know Diane really needed this in her life at this moment.  I suspect Diane will go to a month of classes and then be a master who breezily flips an armed assailant to save her life, or something.  

I feel like Baranski is super-human beautiful especially for a woman her age so it was kind of nice to see her with her hair slicked back and find out she has ginormous ears.  Also from the shallow end, I'm taken aback by Rose Leslie's incredible thin-ness, especially her face, and it's doubly noticeable in scenes with Steele.  Good for her for bagging the super hot Kit Harrington.  They're not Fisher Stevens/Michelle Pfeiffer-level of mismatch but ... an odd match, to me.  

Cole is in Chicago Fire, too?  He's busy.  He's also in Veep.  

I didn't really put much thought into Whitehead being the shooter but the explanation does seem kind of odd.  He just wanted a piece of the lawyer-killing action so he decided to just randomly in broad daylight shoot out of the elevator like that at the first lawyer he saw?  Pretty stupid plan.  

Asian woman? 

[Guest]

1 hour ago, love2lovebadtv said:

Asian woman? 

Is that un-PC or something?  I don’t know the actor’s ethnicity.   Or are you asking who I meant?  The woman working at the aikido dojo.  

[MdMaxx]

6 hours ago, Winston9-DT3 said:

Is that un-PC or something?  I don’t know the actor’s ethnicity.   Or are you asking who I meant?  The woman working at the aikido dojo.  

It's not; however, I think the OP was referring to the fact that the actress, Suzette Gunn, is black. 

[Guest]

Oh, I didn’t even notice.  I still think it was a  cheesy stereotype for an Aikido teacher..  

[love2lovebadtv]

On 5/21/2018 at 3:52 PM, MdMaxx said:

It's not; however, I think the OP was referring to the fact that the actress, Suzette Gunn, is black. 

I actually thought that was Jada Pinkett (who is black) so I thought I had missed something lol. 

[John Potts]

OK, these are people working in a law firm who have at least one drug dealer as a client - are they really going to get so worked up over defending a creepy guy? I get even lawyers(!) can't always get past their feelings on an issue (and sure, it was happening in their offices, not in court) but would the firm really turn into squabbling schoolchildren? Or are we meant to see it as being only because "daddy" was away? I wanted somebody (Diane?) to say, "even scumbags are entitled to legal protection - we have to do our best for them, we don't have to like them!"

On ‎13‎/‎05‎/‎2018 at 8:52 PM, Ms Blue Jay said:

As if Kurt didn't vote for Trump!  LOL.  I find that hard to believe

I dunno - I can see him voting Ted Cruz. Kurt seems a pretty principled guy. I get that people may find Cruz's principles objectionable, but he seems - to my non-US perspective - to be the sort of small government, gun supporting politician Kurt would agree with.

I can see Lucca leaving for the Obama Foundation(?) - hope she at least thinks about it (that was in Washington too, right, though I guess it could be in Chicago?) - it sounds like a good move for her career-wise. I think she & Colin make a cute couple - he clearly loves her (even if she completely exploits that).

The Adrian shooting was resolved way too quickly - was he meant to be the lawyer shooter, too? I would have cut most of the "Diane does aikido" scenes and "lawyers arguing about defending sex pests" to give that more space.

YAY! Diane & Kurt are back together. It gives me hope that people more than a decade older than me can find love (even if it IS only in fiction)!

[Sesquipedalia]

I think Kurt would have written in Evan McMullin, a principled conservative and actual 2016 write-in candidate, but probably not enough viewers would know who that is.

[statsgirl]

I like the complexity of Diane and Kurt's relationship. It's messy and true to who the characters are.

The 'Assholes to Avoid' case makes me feel old.  When I was dating, you didn't go to a guy's place unless you knew and trusted him because going there was tantamount to agreeing to sex, and you didn't have sex with someone because " I didn't want it but let's get it over with".

[John Potts]

On ‎01‎/‎06‎/‎2018 at 3:37 AM, statsgirl said:

The 'Assholes to Avoid' case makes me feel old.  When I was dating, you didn't go to a guy's place unless you knew and trusted him because going there was tantamount to agreeing to sex, and you didn't have sex with someone because " I didn't want it but let's get it over with".

Maybe I'm odd, a prude or just old fashioned, but I found the attitude of, "Well, it was easier just to have sex even though I didn't want to" bizarre. Neither side claimed the lady hadn't ultimately (reluctantly) consented - couldn't she have just walked out? He might then have trashed her on Facebook ChumHum as a "Frigid [Sexual swearword]" which could have resulted in her suing him.

But maybe I'm living in the past!

[Milburn Stone]

One highly interesting moment to me was Diane's reaction to finding out the Trump tax cut benefitted her hugely. It was a realistic reaction. Not "the man is a menace, I'm going to donate all my tax savings to the Democratic National Committee," but rather "the man is a menace, but hey, nobody's perfect--I like being rich!" She didn't even have to think about it.

Edited January 11, 2021 by Milburn Stone

[Irlandesa]

On 5/13/2018 at 2:52 PM, Ms Blue Jay said:

As if Kurt didn't vote for Trump!  LOL.  I find that hard to believe... 

The way he delivered it made me think he was lying.  But then the way he delivered "I wrote in Ted Cruz" before kissing Diane made me think maybe that was true.  I don't know what to think. 

On 5/15/2018 at 4:33 AM, CrashTextDummie said:

The details of the date were almost verbatim what was reported in Ansari's case. The only major difference I spotted was that Ansari received head and the dude in this episode gave head, which seems like the kind of change you would do to make it easier to have characters take the dude's side. Ansasi was, to my knowledge, not accused on a "Shitty Media Men" type list but on a feminist blog. So the storyline was perhaps an amalgam of two separate news stories.

In the end, three stories because Liz and Diane realized that their financiers were willing to put a lot of money behind the case not because they thought they could recoup money but because they could shut it down either through a settlement or by burying them in legal fees.  I believe it's a reference to the Hulk Hogan/Gawker case that was funded by Peter Thiel but there are other examples out there. Mega rich people can bury smaller publications in legal fees until they are bankrupt.

On 5/31/2018 at 9:37 PM, statsgirl said:

The 'Assholes to Avoid' case makes me feel old.  When I was dating, you didn't go to a guy's place unless you knew and trusted him because going there was tantamount to agreeing to sex, and you didn't have sex with someone because " I didn't want it but let's get it over with".

 

On 6/2/2018 at 7:18 AM, John Potts said:

Maybe I'm odd, a prude or just old fashioned, but I found the attitude of, "Well, it was easier just to have sex even though I didn't want to" bizarre. Neither side claimed the lady hadn't ultimately (reluctantly) consented - couldn't she have just walked out? He might then have trashed her on Facebook ChumHum as a "Frigid [Sexual swearword]" which could have resulted in her suing him.

So I don't think her going over to his house is consent for sex.  But I wanted to slap the runner of the website when she was chastising Diane for how her generation of women shut up and now her generation of women would not.  I'm in favor of enthusiastic and straight forward consent and yet, I'm also in favor of advocating for what you don't want.  Ironically, the sex the woman didn't want but "gave in just to get it over with" wouldn't have happened if she just said "no" or if she left when he seemed to have a one track mind.  It feels like it encourages passivity. 

[Anela]

I was trying to think of the celebrity the case resembled. I also remember a website of shitty men, listed to warn others. 

I'm glad they caught the cop who shot Adrian, but it also pissed me off that he said Me Too had gone too far. I even heard that from a few friends who were women, and not all were older.