The Good Wife – “Getting Off”
“If you love someone, don’t you set them free?“
I’ve found myself struggling to write something about this episode. It’s not that there’s nothing to say, there is, but part of me is just not sure how to say any of it (this could be fatigue from due to coming up on the end of the television season and what has become a very long week). The episode is decidedly sticky, and I’ve enjoyed more an actual discussion of the episode than I feel I’d enjoy writing a review.
Some of this is simply that the episode does beg for a discussion, not a monologue, about how everything plays out. One woman I follow on Twitter finds the affair, assuming she means between Peter and Kalinda and the fall out, to be “chick lit“, and a betrayal of the show’s complex characters and stories.
I’m not entirely convinced that this is the case (I’m not sure the “chick lit” even applies here). Because as Karen noted, “For me, cheating is most painful for how it makes you look foolish: wounded pride is dangerous.” And she’s right. Alicia is very dangerous right now (just ask Jackie), but she’s also in a very dangerous place as the season moves into its last episode.
The conflict between Alicia and Kalinda has been simmering now, so to have it erupt is at least mildly cathartic. Alicia is madder at Kalinda than she seemed at Peter last week, and perhaps because the betrayal from Peter is nothing new, but the betrayal of this friend, this oasis in a sea of loneliness and self-reliance, is truly devastating.
And it’s devastating for Kalinda, too. Breaking down in the elevator, with the motif playing us to a shortened title card sequence was really effectively done, and in a show where both of these women wear masks, to watch Kalina’s mask slip is a big deal (Alicia’s serene, impenetrable mask is gone, replaced with one of laser-focused anger and intellect (again, just ask Jackie)).
But after that initial confrontation, what’s left for the show to play out in this episode? We rehash it briefly near the end, but nothing new comes out of it. And while Kalinda’s decision to run away makes internal character sense, there’s no tension here since Kalinda is a non-character without the firm. Going into the private security business wasn’t going to work since there’d be no intersection of narrative (without feeling really forced), and while I might’ve been cool on the SA’s office appointment, there’s not much drama there. As a result, Kalinda’s beats in the episode are feints that don’t amount to much more than setting us up for whatever happens next week.
And what is next week? That is where I am left. Alicia is demolishing her relationships due to the reveal of the affair, and if she ends up sleeping with Will (what happened with Tami?) as a result, I’ll be fairly disappointed in the show. Will’s part in this I suspect will be the focus of next week (this week was Kalinda, last week was Peter), and I hope that the maturity both have shown, and showed in finale last season, still shines through next week.
FINAL THOUGHTS
- The case of the week got way out of hand very quickly. I’m always happy to see Mamie Gummer not in a jungle and I thought that Sarah Silverman did well here, but the case’s ups and downs (turns civil to criminal awfully quickly, with minimal explanation of that shift) were just a little too much in an episode where, much like last week, perhaps more emotion was necessary.
- “I imagine if Jimmy Hoffa’s penis was found in an ice bucket…” [There was more said, but it really doesn’t matter.]
- “You like plans, you like lists.”
- Not having Eli in an episode is a harsh thing to deal with. At least David Lee was there to help ease the pain: “I round up.”
- “But your honor, I was just getting to the best part.”
- The hearts on the legal pad. Really sublime touch.
- I think Alicia needs Owen.
- May 12, 2011
- Noel
- Episode Review
- The Good Wife
