This episode featured the most important thing to happen in this year of The Good Wife: the restoration of my beloved Alicia/Kalinda. But not without a red herring, of course. Kalinda poured her heart into that bottle of beer, and Alicia smashed it onto the floor, along with my heart and soul.
Alicia's searching for a home, but at last, she finds Kalinda instead. (Which may or may not have resulted in my jumping feverishly upon the couch like a small child).
THE BALLAD OF ALICIA AND DIANE
I can but hope this puts an end to a storyline I'd describe loosely as "Alicia's head is spinning out of control", and she's allowed to return to some level of confidence.
It's become apparent that many of the headwinds in Alicia's life have been caused by a lack of choice; she couldn't choose the direction of her marriage, she couldn't choose her friendships in a way that suited her, she couldn't choose to continue a torrid affair that brought her some amount of pleasure.
Having financial freedom will, at a base level, allow her some level of choice. The freedom to choose where you live is freedom indeed. And that freedom, that restoration of a certain amount of control, allows Alicia to make another choice (the best choice): letting Kalinda back into her life.
Contrast with Diane, who's nothing but the amalgamation of choices well-made. Importantly, they're not the right choices for some false ideal of womanhood, but the right choices for her. When she pulls out her little black iPhone for a booty call, we cheer, for she deserves real lovin' from real men.
Even so, it's becoming so tense, watching these two very different women stand in the same room as each other, recognizing each other as both equals and opposites. When Diane tells Alicia off, you have to know that on some level she's proud of Alicia, that Alicia's finally gotten tough and taken control of her life.
And because Diane's not a hater, she recognizes Alicia as her equal, and gives her the damned raise. Well done, Alicia. Harvard Business Review would be proud (and so, I assume, is Canning).
OTHER THINGS
-As always, brief interactions between Cary and Alicia set the heart aflutter. A weirder, truer friendship has never been seen on television.
-Oh, Canning, and his fictional chauffeurs.
-I for one hope that Diane doesn't make a choice between Kurt and Jack. She deserves all the ruggedly hot men she can get her hands on.
-Tammy...still sucks. Though she seems to be the catalyst that brought Alicia back to Kalinda, so I can't hate her too much. Add to the fact that she uttered the following sentence aloud: "Will never not responds." So much grammatical hate. Also she says "It wasn't over between Will and I." So much more hate. Alicia, throw a book at that woman. Preferably a guide to grammatical English.
-Whoever staged the direction of this scene is my absolute hero:
The Last Supper symbolism isn't lost on me. Does this mean that David Lee is Mary Magdalene?
The staging of that scene is wonderful though I totally didn't pick up on the Last Supper element until you pointed it out, such brilliant direction.
ReplyDeleteOne thing I love about this show (and you know there are many things on that list) is how there is so much chemistry between so many of the characters and as you pointed out the Cary/Alicia friendship is such a weird and brilliant friendship. I'm sad that he won't get to hang out at Will's suspended lawyer club now.
As I've said before the true will they/won't they of this season is between Kalinda and Alicia and that final scene was so brilliant in it's execution, especially after the beer rejection which showed Alicia at her coldest really. The photo you have used at the top of the article has me reaching for my S2 DVDs as well. I like that the road to this friendship getting back on track has been long and this episode was totally worth it.
I'm also totally for Diane playing the field and getting some and Will's reaction to her on the phone was hilarious as he looked so confused by her joy. Diane is such a fabulous character that they have managed to avoid the usual pitfalls of portraying a single woman in her 50s.
Thanks for your great comments, as always!
ReplyDeleteCary may yet hang out at the suspended lawyer club. Do you think he's actually happy where he is? I think the next big revelations will occur in the office of the state's attorney.
The main snowmobile lawyer's face was distracting me for ages until I looked him up on IMDB to discover the reason he looked familiar because he played the useless cowed husband of obsessed fan Mel in Flight of the Conchords.
ReplyDeleteThat aside that was indeed a wonderful episode. Things you didn't mention that I liked:
Kurt asking for direction after Diane kisses him, in my mind this is something he has learned to do after years of not asking and now he has reached the point where he's all 'screw deducing stuff, if you don't know, just ask' Also on Diane things, the perfect comedy performance on the phone to two men at once, pulled off with more understated comedy than any rom com will ever manage.
I miss Carey, I want him to get an episode to be cool in.
I hope I am wrong, but Kalinda's look of terror at Alicia's friendship offer ultimatum predicts a rocky road for your favourite team before the tequila comes back...
Also am I the only one TERRIFIED that Will is going to get taken down if he slips up even once? I can't tell whether it's a sort of storyline red herring/ light comic relief ('I obviously can't comment but it sounds like you're moving forward, ha!) or he is actually doomed.
Sports reporter lady gets one thing right though, he is still looking great without a tie/ 24 hr a day job.