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“The Good Wife” recap (5.3): Babies and Betrayal

This week’s episode of The Good Wife begins with Diane sitting in her office in heavy silence, stoic and, as always, goddamn gorgeous. She takes a deep breath; makes her way to Will’s office to spill the beans of what she’s just done: talked to Mandy Post, divulged dirty business secrets about Will, did it all for her own gain, for that Supreme Court justice seat, just like Eli told her she had to. She is somber, and ready for Will’s wrath, but trying to take whatever sort of high road she can here by letting him know about it first. But when Will’s face hardens and he walks out in the middle of her apology, her own face still looks like she’s found out a loved one has died-a death you knew was coming, a battle with cancer, but one that still hurts.

As she steadies herself to walk back to her office, an aide stops her and gives her a message. Eli called, she says. He said to not worry about giving the interview-he’s found another way. Like they found a cure for the cancer a minute after you’d already pulled the plug. Diane. Baby. Let me hold you.

Will attempts to de-stress by taking a run along the shores of Lake Michigan when he gets a call from Mandy Post, just, you know, wondering if he’s stolen any more money from clients since the $45,000 he took 10 years ago. He politely blows her off, storms back into the office, and calls Kalinda to his side. And because Kalinda clearly doesn’t have much else going on, as far as we know, he asks her to spend her time digging up any dirt she can find on Diane. Because an eye for an eye is the way to win this thing, obviously. Blindness is apparently still preferable to a bruised male ego. He tells Kalinda that Diane has hurt the firm, and they need to ask her to leave.

The case of the week is a heart ache-y one, but there is one exciting aspect of it: It stars Janel Moloney, also known as Donna Moss from The West Wing, and anytime there’s a new member from The West Wing on my TV again, I get to believe that President Bartlett and C.J. Cregg are real, so. There’s also a brief moment where I got to believe that Donna was a lesbian here, as she sits on the couch of a doctor’s office, comforting and holding the hand of a girl who is receiving some extremely bad news about the baby in her belly.

Alas, the two women are not lovers, which is a bummer because Donna Moss would make an excellent lesbian. The younger woman is in fact just the surrogate for Donna and her husband. And now that they know the baby has a very small chance for survival because of some rare and devastating medical thing, Donna and Hubby want the baby aborted. Buuut hold up, the surrogate decides she doesn’t want to, because she has felt him kicking and FEELS that he actually is healthy and stuff. Hence, lawsuits and an episode full of hard and sad things.

As usual when The Good Wife tackles these things, they show the complexity of the issues so well while dismissing the hyperbolic, unreal views that we normally see strewn across the media. It’s not necessarily a simple pro-choice, pro-life issue. The real world is deeper than simply saying, “All life is precious!” Donna and Hubby have previously dealt with a sick child who died after five months and ten surgeries, and they have taken a vow to never again subject another child, and themselves, to that kind of pain. Makes sense to me. And especially in light of the fact that the surrogate has signed contracts, she does seem, as Donna later calls her, selfish. But then again, I’ve never felt a baby kick inside of me, so who am I to judge? But in the end, because of technicalities about trimester timing, the surrogate wins. Well, “wins.” Win isn’t always necessarily a triumphant word.

But there’s not enough time to talk about the troubles and ethics of surrogacy because there is so much drah-mah concurrently happening at Lockhart-Gardner. Most importantly, there is also a heartbreaking scene with Kalinda. But first let me take a moment to really bitch about Kalinda’s presence, or lack thereof, so far this season, because I don’t think I’ve done that strongly enough yet. I know The Good Wife has a long season, and we’re only three episodes in. But Kalinda fans already have a lingering bitterness from last season of the The Husband Storyline That Shall Not Be Named. The Kings acknowledged that they messed up with it; they were aware that people were upset. So they promised us a new love interest for Kalinda this season. So I know it is coming.

But in these three episodes thus far, she is practically a ghost. And there is so much drama going on with Will and Diane-which, don’t get me wrong, I love-that I don’t have any hope of this love interest coming into play any time soon, or when it is, any faith that it will really be given a decent amount of screen time. Even though the husband storyline was awful last season, at least it did help to further Kalinda’s character, at least in my opinion. We had chances to question her dark and mysterious past; she seemed alternately strong and vulnerable; she had a depth beyond just taking orders in the Lockhart Gardner offices. And the pairing of her with Robyn at the end of last season was really genius; watching her work with the yin to her yang was both hilarious and satisfying, somehow. It was nice having someone on her side again that didn’t just want to seduce her, that made her feel a little less alone, especially in light of the fact that her and Alicia’s relationship seemed to be fading fast.

I know there’s a lot of other things for the Kings to play with right now, but I also feel that they have to know how much people love Kalinda. That she’s as essential to the show as Alicia or Diane or Will for it to really give the dynamite punch that The Good Wife can give. Because I was trolling the Internets after last night’s episode, and it seems that even the straights are noticing, and bemoaning, her absence. So bring her back to us, will you?

Anyway. We do see a flicker of Kalinda as a real person in this episode, at least for a moment, but what a moment it is. Robyn and Kalinda are together in the conference room, and Robyn’s all, “Help meeeeee, O great one, I’m stuck on this case,” and Kalinda’s like, “Nope, not since you went over to the dark side of Cary’s bat cave.” Remember that lovely and brief period of time I just mentioned, when Kalinda and Robyn were on the same side? Man, that was lovely.

Robyn counterpoints, “But Alicia’s leaving too, and you helped her.” Kalinda looks up sharply from her orange notebook, uncomprehending. “What?” Robyn repeats herself: “Alicia’s leaving, too. And you helped her with the death row case.” Kalinda’s face continues to be hauntingly uncomprehending.

Robyn says that she thought she knew, and Kalinda stutters, “Well, I-” her voice uncharacteristically faltering as her eyes happen to glance through the glass and come to rest on Will.

“She didn’t say anything,” she finishes, and then gives Robyn the information she needs. Robyn, oblivious and Robyn-esque, smiles and bounces away, while we all sit and watch Kalinda’s heart break as it all becomes clear: of course Alicia’s leaving, because Will. And of course she didn’t tell Kalinda, because she doesn’t tell Kalinda anything, anymore.

It’s only a moment. But a thousand fan fictions could be written in that moment.

Other things: Super Sexy Ethics Commissioner is back doing the job she’s actually trained to do, because Peter realized her removal looked bad. Eli, never one for ethics, continues to be even more of a jerkface than his normal lovable level of jerkiness when she has the gall to actually do her job and bring up possible ethical issues. Watch yourself, Eli. This woman may have a ridiculously husky voice, but she means business. And she is clearly going to lead to your and Peter’s next downfall.

Grace’s storyline of I Am Hot Now continues, as she wears the respectable but tight outfits Mama Channing purchased for her last episode, making every man in her vicinity unable to look away from her ass apparently, and making her mother increasingly paranoid and flustered. This was feeling rather gross to me for a while. I mean, Grace has never had very fleshed out storylines, but is her sudden hotness literally all she’s going to be given this season? But when Alicia finally confronts her daughter about her new foxy ways, we’re actually presented with a rather tender scene. First of all, the dashing young man that had come to the door asking for Grace this episode and who Alicia had kicked to the curb is actually her pastor, because Grace loves Jesus and pastors are hip now. Duh, Mom. But then she says: “I want to be pretty. Just let me be pretty.” And even though I’m not necessarily a huge Grace fan, even my eyes begin to mist a little. Neither Alicia or Grace are wrong here. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to protect your daughter, and there’s also nothing wrong with wanting to be pretty. Being a teenager is hard. Being a human is hard.

The real heart and soul of this whole episode, though, is Diane being a badass as the men folk of the office-“ghouls,” as Diane appropriately calls them-attempt to push her out of the business she built with her bones as fast as they can. At their first termination offer, she demands they get out of her office. David Lee, Head Ghoul, says it’s not her office anymore. She says it’s her office until the security guards drag her away. Damn straight. When they come back with a “final offer,” she rejects it again, saying it’s not a final offer until she accepts it. Damn straight. Every time she talks back I want to hug her. But the final scene is just between her and Will, and she lets some of her guard down. Will, however, is having none of it. He is hurt, and cold, and mean. I hate when he is like this. She says, “I must have really hurt you, to make you want to hurt me like this.”

Will makes Alicia witness this conversation, as Alicia has been witness to all of this, reluctant and quiet but clearly struggling to understand it all. Will even makes the offer to Alicia of her taking Diane’s place when she’s kicked out of the joint, as if anyone could ever take Diane’s place. After this final Will and Diane confrontation, though, Alicia marches to Cary’s office to say, “We have to leave-this week.” End scene.

While we all know Alicia has been itching to leave sooner than later because it gets harder for her each week, I don’t exactly know why she demands this so vehemently right now. Because Will is being an awful human being and she wants to get away from him? Because Will is being an awful human being and it somehow turns her on so she knows she needs to get away from him? Because she doesn’t want to watch Diane’s fall? Because she just wants to get out of dodge before it all explodes?

According to previews for the next couple of episodes, explosions are, unsurprisingly, indeed on the horizon. But first, Emmy-winning Carrie Preston returns as Elsbeth Tascioni next week, and Diane shoots some guns. Yes, please!

What are your thoughts on the fifth season thus far?

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