The Good Wife 4.14
As Elementarya few episodes back also - though in a different arena - used this red team thing, i.e. an institution getting people to play enemy in order to learn from the mock attack - I assume this is something that actually happens in the US. Well, I can see the point as far as mock trials in preparation for the real ones (or in this case, leading the clients to the decision to settle pre trial) are concerned, and the Alicia & Cary versus Will & Diane scenario made for good watching, but what gave it emotional meat beyond a battle of lawyerly skills was its connection to the follow up to last episode's plot about the offer of partnership and the longer plot about the debt L&G had been in: the firm is finally debt free and bringing in the profits again and the partners promptly don't want to share the wealth. The episode keeps Will and Diane viable as not scum by showing them outvoted on this (i.e. they had intended to honor their offers), whereas David Lee of course never pretended to do anything else but look out for number one and the most profit. But that's a minor issue as the crucial decision of the episode has to be made by Alicia when after she, Cary and the other fourth year associates got organized Will, Diane and the equity partners practice the age old rule of divide and conquer by changing their tactics to offering a partnership to her, but not the rest of the used and baited fourth years. Just before that, Cary suggests to her what my favourite end game scenario for the show is, leaving L&G behind and found their own firm, Florrick & Agos. But alas.
This is one of the cases where a character makes the wrong decision - and given the melancholy music the show uses in the final scene and the staging of it, with Cary and Kalinda behind the glass window watching Alicia and the partners, and Alicia catching sight of them for a moment before they turn their back and leave, I think the show actually intends us to see it as the wrong decision, it's not just an emotional reaction on my part - for entirely in character reasons. It's ic for Alicia, whose children show up specifically in the episode to state their worry about her getting fired, to choose the safer and wealthier option over the risk of a few lean years and possible failure if she and Cary get a new firm. (I also the doubt that Cary, who has no dependents, had he been made the same offer, would have chosen differently, though I'm only 90% sure about this. He seems to indicate as much in his last scene with Alicia, in Alicia pulls a Tommy Carcetti in trying to claim she's doing this so that in the future, she can work on the other betrayed fourth year associates' behalf (rather than doing it for herself and her own career), but feels how lame this is and lets her voice peter out.
...I don't know whether the show has a fifth season guaranteed but I assume it has, given it gets good ratings, otherwise I would be sure that this is actually preparation for Alicia reconsidering her decision in time for the show finale and going independent with Cary after all (with possibly Michael J. Fox as their Jonah Stern/David Lee, the third partner bringing in the money, though I'm not sure whether that would work given that Louis Canning has his own firm and in all his wooing of Alicia as an employee has not indicated he'd make her a partner). But as I said, I always thought that was an endgame scenario, and doubt the show would be willing to risk shaking up its format enough to let Alicia leave L & G before that. It would be great, of course. But I doubt that the show is willing to do it.
The other plot, with Eli, Elsbeth and guest star Kyle McLachlan in a role that was surely written specifically for him (given he's playing a quirky FBI agent who is basically Elsbeth's counterpart), was entertaining, and I admit I didn't figure out the twist before the accordeon player showed up, so well played, Elsbeth, Eli & show. I also expect consequences from the gauntlet thrown here, i.e. Mr. Young Campaign Manager's claim that Peter if pressed doesn't need Eli anymore and would not side with him. Mind you, the problem here is that we have a clash between show and tell, i.e. the series keeps telling us Eli is a political genius (and thus that Peter would not only be ungrateful but foolish to let him go) but in actual fact, he's been the subject of too many comic relief scenes, and teenage Zach has been shown as more effective for the campaign than Eli.
Lastly: I so do not want a revival of Alicia/Will. Admittedly I'm biased here, but haven't we been there and done that? Please don't tell me we're in for a new round. Unless that kiss is part of an incentive for Alicia to reconsider and leave the firm after all, in which case, fine, though I didn't need it. The only thing I truly treasured about the Alicia/Will affair of early s3 was Diane making them the "sexual harrassment at the working place" video.
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