It has been in my experience that someone who makes a point of telling you about their humble beginnings usually is anything but. It wasn’t a surprise to me when, in the cold open, billionaire Andrew Withrow’s skybridge collapsed fifty-nine stories up. He was set up as a slimy land developer long before he actually appears.
Luckily, Bull isn’t representing this particular client. Instead, he’s been called in by Assistant US Attorney Olsen to help convict Withrow of fifteen counts of manslaughter due to the skybridge collapse.
Olsen is confident. He has a signature that proves that Withrow signed off on an engineering flaw to speed along construction. Olsen is so confident that he declined to consult Bull, his jury consultant, until after jury selection. Bull’s confused “What?” is the best moment of the episode. Why do you hire a jury consultant after voir dire?
The team is automatically working at a disadvantage. Marissa is concerned about the jury already. On one side they have a dyslexic juror who’s inclined to believe Withrow when he says he didn’t read the documents before signing. On the other side is a former member of Occupy Wall Street who hates suits but loves billionaires. It’s going to be a tough road ahead.
It gets even tougher when Withrow lies his way into a trial extension and brings in Diana Lindsay, Bull’s rival from Callisto, Texas. The episode in Texas was a highlight of the first half of the season and it’s nice to see Diana again, even if she has shown up sans southern accent. She says it’s to adapt to New York culture, but it seems like a strange directorial decision to change an established character.
Bull knows that bringing in Diana is a power-play by Withrow, a man who loves his power-plays. He purposefully forgets Bull’s name every time they meet and once outbid him in a charity auction only to give him the expensive item as a sad little consolation prize. Bull notes that Withrow’s emotional reactions are always a fraction of a section too late. He figures out the truth immediately. Withrow is a sociopath. He can mimic emotion, but it doesn’t come naturally to him.
The team has another problem. Withrow owns their building and cuts their power. Bull invites everyone to his place which, according to Chunk, is furnished in whatever is below minimalist. It does have its own rock wall.
Despite the difficulty of the case, Bull is delighted that Diana’s in New York and Withrow is quick to use that to his advantage. It’s annoying that Diana, who was a formidable presence in her first episode, becomes a point of possession between two of the ambitious men she claims to admire. Her agency is diminished in the games Bull and Withrow are playing with each other.
Diana does, however, have some power-plays of her own. She bribes the mirror jurors with a bus to Atlantic City. Bull and Diana later get into a fight over who can strike the most real jurors. Diana removes one. Bull removes two and gets his power back. Literally and figuratively.
Withrow then shuts TAC out of their elevators. Benny uses the long climb up twenty-two flights of stairs to ask Olsen about the letter he received from the Us Attorney’s office. Olsen can’t disclose any information, but Benny seems worried about a potential corruption investigation. Olsen later hints that it concerns a case Benny tried eight years earlier. I’m sure that will come back in a later episode.
Bull meanwhile sends Danny to talk to Sean Laheri, the underling that Withrow is trying to blame for the collapse. Withrow’s strategy is showing that his business is so large, he can’t possibly check every decision each of his employees make. Danny warns Sean about what’s to come. The guilt-ridden man later confesses to Danny that he was paid off to keep quiet about shoddy building meterials. Danny convinces Sean to testify, which momentarily throws off Withrow. Diana negotiates a plea deal.
Then Sean turns up dead. Withrow pulls his plea and Bull finds it more than a little convenient.
Diana defends Withrow so well that it looks like the case has been decided. Withrow takes the opportunity to show up at TAC headquarters just to gloat and offer Bull $10 million to work for him. Bull doesn’t take it, but does gain more insight into what makes Withrow “tick.”
Bull urges Cable to dig deeper and she finds a series of coded messages between Withrow and an actuary. Withrow previously bragged that everyone has a number and he actually found out how much money each life was worth. To him, lives weren’t worth more than completing the project on time. When Olsen presents this new information, the jury immediately finds Withrow guilty.
Withrow doesn’t concede defeat. Instead, he immediately uses Bull’s and Diana’s relationship as grounds for an appeal. It was his backup plan all along, which means we probably haven’t seen the last of this sociopath…
Juror of the Week: Poor Bryan. Couldn’t even keep it together long enough to claim he wasn’t stoned out of his mind.
What did you think of the episode? Let me know in the comments!
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