'The Good Wife' Winners and Losers: You Can't Compete with a Dead Man
We'd like to take this moment to thank everyone on the cast of The Good Wife to rising to the occasion of filling the Will-shaped void.
.We'd like to take this moment to thank everyone on the cast of The Good Wife for rising to the occasion of filling the Will-shaped void. (Spoilers ahead!) At the very least, the show is performing a lot of fan service — there was drunk Alicia and Diane gossiping about Will's family, David Lee scheming, Kalinda outsmarting everyone, Peter getting put in his place, weird references to current TV shows, and the continued presence of Matthew Goode.
But the best part of The Good Wife post-The Incident has been its ability to avoid being melodramatic. The opening scene is a great example — some people aren't interested in the pageantry of death, in pretending that the deceased person was a certain way, or a better person than he actually was. And yes, Alicia spirals out of control by the end of the episode, but not before imploring of Diane, "If I die before you, please don't let them read 'Wind Beneath My Wings' at my funeral." This week, Alicia's grief entered the 'I'm obviously not fine but I'm fine' stage, followed by the 'dead to the world' stage, which Peter interrupts because why not? And finally, Alicia did the one thing we've all wanted her to do since September 22, 2009: she pushed Peter out of her life.
Winners: Diane & Kalinda
Losers: David Lee and Damian
Kalinda seduced her police officer friend —Detective Jenna Villette — to get dirt on Damian and convince him to quit the firm, costing David Lee one of the votes he needed to oust Diane, and more importantly (fingers crossed!) ridding The Good Wife of Damian altogether.
Winners: Alicia and Finn
Losers: The new State's Attorney & Jeffrey Grant's dad
Cary should have known that Alicia would be more loyal to the man who held Will while he died than the father of the man who killed him. Finn and Alicia's new friendship is one of the best things to come out of The Incident. At the end of the episode, after Zombie Alicia bailed on his meeting with no warning, Finn visits her and they have a moment. "If there's anything I can do," he says. "I mean, I know people always say that, but I mean it." Alicia needs more friends.
Winners: Alicia + Will
Losers: Alicia + Peter
Where to even start? Peter revealed the full depth of his obliviousness last night. "Look, you lost a friend. You didn't lose a child. You didn't lose your husband," he says. Alicia's reply: "I lost my husband a long time ago." And it goes on from there. Alicia says her cheating "meant something," Peter says he "can't compete with a dead man" (you couldn't compete when he was alive either), and continues to dig himself into a hole.
But the worst line of the entire exchange comes after Alicia tells Peter to stay out of her life and sleep with whomever he likes as long as their children don't find out. "Is this because you want to sleep with someone else?" he asks. Who, Peter? Who?!
Winners: The Good Wife
Losers: Scandal
Shots fired. The fake, super dark TV drama the Florricks are always watching has previously been styled like AMC's high-profile flop Low Winter Sun, and last night sure seemed to have an air of True Detective about it. But there was also a dollop of Scandal-talk in there, perhaps a jab at network TV's other female-driven political-flavored must-see-TV:
People just think there are black hats and white hats, but there are black hats with white linings. And white hats with black linings. And there are hats that change back and forth between white and black. And there are stripped hats.