S09.E02: Special Master

[chitowngirl]

The firm faces the repercussions of its actions; Samantha enlists Katrina to help an old friend.

[Dowel Jones]

Does Faye have a hologram?  She seems to be everywhere at once, interrupting conversations, making demands, and being a general pita.

Please excuse my obtuseness, as I didn't watch last season, but why exactly did Zane leave in disgrace?  That seems to be the crux of this season so far.

I don't get the secrecy of the bylaws of the NY State Bar, except for plot requirements, of course.  I typed in "California State Bar bylaws" in Google and they came right up.

[nittany cougar]

I still don't buy that the state bar would run the day to day operations of a law firm. They are involved in licensing attorneys, not running firms.  How in the hell does this Faye woman have time to study every detail of everyone's day?  Ridiculous.

Other notes - I wish Donna and Harvey had a serious talk about their relationship.  So far, their relationship has been played for comedy and one-liners.  It seems like there is no emotion between them.

I don't understand why they bothered to bring Thomas up and have him visit the firm if he was just going to leave again.  Although there was one very nice detail:  Right before Thomas leaves Donna's office, he looks at her cleavage for a moment like he was thinking of what he was missing. The actor was excellent at conveying his character's emotions.  Can we keep him around?

What the hell was Katrina wearing at the beginning?  Looked like a halter cocktail dress.  Wtf. Same thing for Donna's white dress with the jagged hem.

Edited July 25, 2019 by nittanycougar

[mommalib]

So I wonder if this Lucas guy is gonna be a love interest for Samantha? Is this the last we see of him?

And I don't know what to think of this Fey woman. But if Louis isn't managing partner anymore who will take his place? She doesn't trust Harvey, doesn't get along with Samantha, and it won't be Donna so that leaves Alex or Katrina.

[Chicago Redshirt]

14 hours ago, Dowel Jones said:

Please excuse my obtuseness, as I didn't watch last season, but why exactly did Zane leave in disgrace?  That seems to be the crux of this season so far.

My memory isn't what it was so I might get some of the details wrong, but the gist should be correct:

So the firm represented two clients in the same deal: Thomas (who we saw in this latest episode and who is now Donna's ex, but back then was her boyfriend) and then also a Skeezy Guy. Both sides waived any conflict of interest in the firm representing both of them in the same deal. Skeezy of course was skeezy and was never intending on going through with the deal with Thomas, and was just using Thomas to try to leverage a better deal from someone else. Our Heroes wrung their hands about how Skeezy was skeezy privately and how they were bound by attorney-client privilege to not tell Thomas that he was being screwed over. But Donna found out about Skeezy and told Thomas.

Old firm enemy Daniel Hardman popped up again and found out about attorney-client privilege being broken and tried to prosecute Harvey for it. In Suits-world, breaking attorney-client privilege is a disbarment offense, even once and even though both sides waived any conflict.

Harvey didn't defend himself by making the factual claim that he didn't break attorney-client privilege because he didn't want Donna to get in trouble for it. 

Around this time, Zane had something from his past come up. Years and years ago, Samantha was attacked by a criminal who got off on a technicality. Working with Samantha, Zane got him convicted of something else, perhaps using slightly shady methods to do so as Our Heroes are wont to do.

Back to the present, Zane found out the criminal died in prison. Instead of being indifferent or actually glad about this criminal dying, Zane feels guilty. And instead of atoning by doing pro bono work, donating to prison advocate groups, assisting the criminal's family or any number of things that might make sense, Zane decides that the best thing to do is to falsely claim that it was HE who broke attorney-client privilege with Skeezy rather than Harvey. 

So he enlists Alex in helping him sell the story that Zane really broke privilege, and the bar buys it and insta-disbars him. The bar decides to not pursue its case against Harvey.

2 hours ago, mommalib said:

And I don't know what to think of this Fey woman. But if Louis isn't managing partner anymore who will take his place? She doesn't trust Harvey, doesn't get along with Samantha, and it won't be Donna so that leaves Alex or Katrina.

Well, in the season premiere, there was the other guy from the bar who wanted to install Alex as managing partner for some reason. So I assume that either Alex will get the call or Louis will humble himself and get re-appointed. Katrina is too young to be elevated to the position.

In terms of Fay, I think part of the problem that the show has is that she's basically right. The show started with the premise that Harvey loved winning, and would always play by the rules to do so. He would bend things but would never break them (with the exception of knowingly having Mike work as a lawyer, of course.)

For the last few seasons, rules-breaking has been the crew's first resort, and usually its only one. If they couldn't blackmail or lie their way into a win, they couldn't win.

I hope before the show ends Our Heroes realize how ethically compromised they are, and actually start to repent. If the season is all about how upset they are that they have to actually follow the law and how mean it is that Fay is reining them in, it's going to be a long one.

[mommalib]

35 minutes ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

My memory isn't what it was so I might get some of the details wrong, but the gist should be correct:

So the firm represented two clients in the same deal: Thomas (who we saw in this latest episode and who is now Donna's ex, but back then was her boyfriend) and then also a Skeezy Guy. Both sides waived any conflict of interest in the firm representing both of them in the same deal. Skeezy of course was skeezy and was never intending on going through with the deal with Thomas, and was just using Thomas to try to leverage a better deal from someone else. Our Heroes wrung their hands about how Skeezy was skeezy privately and how they were bound by attorney-client privilege to not tell Thomas that he was being screwed over. But Donna found out about Skeezy and told Thomas.

Old firm enemy Daniel Hardman popped up again and found out about attorney-client privilege being broken and tried to prosecute Harvey for it. In Suits-world, breaking attorney-client privilege is a disbarment offense, even once and even though both sides waived any conflict.

Harvey didn't defend himself by making the factual claim that he didn't break attorney-client privilege because he didn't want Donna to get in trouble for it. 

Around this time, Zane had something from his past come up. Years and years ago, Samantha was attacked by a criminal who got off on a technicality. Working with Samantha, Zane got him convicted of something else, perhaps using slightly shady methods to do so as Our Heroes are wont to do.

Back to the present, Zane found out the criminal died in prison. Instead of being indifferent or actually glad about this criminal dying, Zane feels guilty. And instead of atoning by doing pro bono work, donating to prison advocate groups, assisting the criminal's family or any number of things that might make sense, Zane decides that the best thing to do is to falsely claim that it was HE who broke attorney-client privilege with Skeezy rather than Harvey. 

So he enlists Alex in helping him sell the story that Zane really broke privilege, and the bar buys it and insta-disbars him. The bar decides to not pursue its case against Harvey.

Well, in the season premiere, there was the other guy from the bar who wanted to install Alex as managing partner for some reason. So I assume that either Alex will get the call or Louis will humble himself and get re-appointed. Katrina is too young to be elevated to the position.

In terms of Fay, I think part of the problem that the show has is that she's basically right. The show started with the premise that Harvey loved winning, and would always play by the rules to do so. He would bend things but would never break them (with the exception of knowingly having Mike work as a lawyer, of course.)

For the last few seasons, rules-breaking has been the crew's first resort, and usually its only one. If they couldn't blackmail or lie their way into a win, they couldn't win.

I hope before the show ends Our Heroes realize how ethically compromised they are, and actually start to repent. If the season is all about how upset they are that they have to actually follow the law and how mean it is that Fay is reining them in, it's going to be a long one.

Come to think of it there must be a reason they had Alex and Louis be so buddy buddy. Maybe Alex becomes managing partner and it causes conflict with him and Louis.

[marcee]

I miss Mike. This show has become so cringeworthy. Nothing makes a lick of sense.

[lorbeer]

I know Faye it's the bad guy but that whole story it's kind of funny. 🙂 They really do break the law right and left and act like puppies and now they're mad someone is calling them out on that.

[Joimiaroxeu]

Louis' mankini. Oy. I gotta give Rick Hoffman points for being willing to appear on screen like that.

Is Katherine Heigl pregnant? She looked a lot fuller in the face to me.

When your ex-lover is being represented by your current lover, the one your ex knows you cheated on him with. Donna is so messy.

I'm about over Faye. I know she's pretty much right about the way that firm has operated with impunity for so long but she's starting to seem like a case of poison ivy to me. Just want her to be over.

[Orbert]

I couldn't believe that Faye actually bought Donna's story and backed off about Thomas.  It didn't make sense that this cold-hearted woman who would fire her own husband would be moved by Donna's crappy love triangle.  Then it occurred to me that Faye already seems to know everything about everyone, so she knew (or strongly suspected) about Donna and Thomas, so Donna actually telling her the truth worked because Faye already knew it, and it fit.  Points to Donna.

But I'm still so busy thinking "Can she actually do that?" to be impressed by her and instead she's just this magical person who knows all and can be in many places at once (like a female Kwisatz Haderach) and wants to destroy the firm.  Wait, no, she doesn't want to destroy them; she just wants them to actually follow the law.  Holy shit!  She's actually the good guy here?

Edited July 29, 2019 by Orbert