The Good Fight - Day 457/Day 464 - Double Review

This week's recap is going to be double the fun this week with a combined recap/review for Day 457 and Day 464. Day 457 was very lowkey after the previous episodes' jampacked story, while 464 picked the action right back up. Let's start with Day 457.

Day 457

This entire episode was almost entirely taken up by the case of the week, leaving only subplots for Diane and Jay. Diane's was pretty much same old same old, while we got some nice development for Jay; a character I really enjoy and don't know enough about.

An undercover cop, Rashid Clarkson, was shot by a fellow police officer, Detective Whitehead, in the midst of stopping an illegal arms trade. The injury has left him wheelchair-bound. Rashid says Detective Whitehead knew he was an undercover cop, having told him during the chase of a suspect, but Whitehead shot him anyway because, as Rashid believes, he's African American and the detective has a reputation of being racist. It is also rumored that he plants guns on unarmed African American suspects to frame them, something Jay picks up on, which sends him on his episode's journey.

See, Jay has a friend in prison, courtesy of one Detective Whitehead, who planted a gun on this guy when he was arrested for drug dealing. The firm is going to pursue the dropped guns rumor to help in their case against Whitehead, which is good news for Jay and his friend because it means getting justice. He brings in Maia and Lucca to help with this case. They do, with the help of Kurt, who discovers the gun dropped on this guy was taken from evidence on a previous case Rashid Clarkson was on. Somehow this gun went from Rashid to Whitehead. Hmm. Turns out, Rashid and some other officers gave guns to other officers to plant on suspects. Whitehead was one of them. Rashid now says Whitehead shot him because he thought Rashid would turn on him.

Jay thinks this confession is great for his friend, but Adrian instead decides to use this information to cut a deal with Whitehead's lawyer. Rashid (and the firm) agree to keep quiet about Whitehead's involvement in planting guns for eight million. But, That means they can't use that knowledge to help Jay's friend, infuriating Jay. In an amazing scene between Jay and Adrian, Jay angrily confronts Adrian about not caring about justice and only about money. Adrian fires back saying his obligation is to his client first, but it's not good enough for Jay. He's too upset about a corrupt cop getting away with a crime and the firm profiting off of it while an innocent man sits in prison. He calls Adrian a hustler, and Adrian tells him to get out of his office. But Jay will do him one better. He quits. I understand Jay's anger here, but I hope he's not gone for good. I like this dynamic between him and Adrian. The guy obsessed with moral justice versus the guy obsessed with money. It's good.

As I mentioned above, Kurt is back this week helping on the ballistics evidence of the case and to serve as a catalyst for Diane going off the rails again. All is going well with him and Diane as they work together until the defense lawyer (Alan Alda!) brings into the court a surprise ballistics expert; Holly Westfall (Megan Hilty!) AKA Kurt's former mistress. And maybe current. It turns out they had drinks recently, which Kurt failed to tell Diane, and Diane is devastated. It sends her back to the bartender that first gave her the means of microdosing to get a refill, and then back to the bed of Tully. Kurt does seem apologetic, although he insists nothing happened between him and Holly this time. When he's later called to the stand to defend his lack of bias in the case, he's forced to go over the hurt he caused Diane, which seems to give Diane some solace. She later tells Tully she doesn't want to see him anymore and needs to find some solid ground. I really hope that happens because this Diane storyline just seems to keep treading the same waters over and over again.

As you can see, not a lot happened in this episode outside of this case and the Diane and Jay stuff, so let's move on to Day 464.

Day 464.

Diane is tasked with helping a Russian student here on a student visa that's been arrested and is being deported for soliciting. Except it's not soliciting, she claims, it's because she's one of the women who was involved in the infamous golden shower scandal with Donald Trump. She's worried if she goes back she'll be killed by Putin. Diane, by the way, does not seem to have found solid ground. The only thing that's changed is before she was like, "I don't care about anything anymore" in a funny way, but now she's back to "I don't care about anything anymore" in a depressed way. Meh.

Diane and the other partners take a meeting with her. Her responses lead Diane to believe they are being set up. The woman claims she was told to speak to Diane because she gave a lecture at her school about immigration, but Diane never ended up giving that lecture, or so Diane thinks. But who's setting them up? Project Veritas. As in the organization James O'Keefe started. She thinks they knew the Democratic Committee came to them for impeachment help, and they want a video to show African American lawyers jumping at a chance to impeach trump, making them look like fools.

They bring Dominika back to question her. They catch her on her not possibly being at that hotel in Moscow at the same time she was working 1,700 miles away. She is incensed by what they're implying and leaves. Marissa follows her to a rundown apartment building where she is living with her roommate, Miss Haiti, the Miss Universe contestant who introduced Dominika to Trump. She shows Marissa her purse. There's no camera.

Marissa reports her findings. That, with Diane suddenly remembering she did speak at that school and the others discovering Dominika had that weekend off from her job and could have been at the hotel suggests to them that she may be telling the truth. They bring this to Ruth Eastman, but she tells them not to do anything. It would be embarrassing for the Democratic party to look like they're grasping at straws. Diane's not satisfied with that because she wants to help Dominika. But she can't help her alone. Enter Jane Lynch again as the FBI agent Madeline. Yay, Jane Lynch. Not a fan of Madeline but I like Jane Lynch.

Diane brings Dominika to meet with Madeline. Madeline asks very specific questions about the night in question, questions Madeline knows the answers to (or thinks she does) and comes to the conclusion that Dominika is lying. Their only saving grace would be Dominika's friend Olga, who was also there that night. They arrange a meeting with Olga but Olga doesn't show up. Rachelle, Miss Haiti, calls and reveals that Olga was taken by the INS. However, she was able to send them what looks to be the golden shower tape. They bring it to Ruth, who says she'll look into if it is real and what they can use it for.

Julius talks to a Republican friend of his with a contact in the FBI who knows they have the tape and wants them to ignore it. That's how they know there's something to it. But Ruth says they have evidence the video is fake and tells them to drop it again. But something about this "evidence" smells fishy to Marissa so she investigates it. She finds evidence that is contrary to Ruth's. She thinks the tape is real and Diane should do something about it.

She does. She gets Julius to tells his friend, who tells Madeline, that Dominika is going public about the tape and is releasing a statement that night. In exchange for Dominika not getting deported, she has to pretend the tape isn't real and is just a porno she made with actors. She does and hands over the USB stick with the tape on it. They say there aren't any copies, but we know that's a lie because in the very last scene we see that Ruth has one too, ready to be used for the 2020 election.

In the B plot, we pick back up with Jay's incarcerated friend, Craig. Jay, Maia, and Lucca are pursuing his case but they can't legally represent him because of the conflict of interest with their firm representing Rashid, the corrupt cop helping to drop guns on innocent suspects. So, they need a front lawyer who will do everything they say. In comes Gabriel, a Saul Goodman-like lawyer who is both messy and unethical. He agrees to take the case but only because he's in love with Maia. He's been in love with her ever since she walked through his door two minutes earlier. Gabriel goes to court to get the arrest records of Rashid and Detective Whitehead. He doesn't get them, but he does get some time for leave to file an application determining that Craig is being held illegally. It's a smoke show to get them more time to do something else. Before I go into what happens next, we need to talk about the episode's C plot.

Colin needs Lucca's help in his campaign. He has a problem with his Republican opposition, Davey Lion. Normally an election like this would be easy for Colin to snap up because virtually no one cares about it, but this guy's racist, anti-Semitic rhetoric is bringing a lot of attention to it. The Democrats want to make sure they nominate someone who is going to look good to the public. Lucca agrees to pretend to be his loving, wholesome girlfriend in front of Chairman Frank Landau of the Cook County Democratic Party. But as it turns out, they are not worried about Colin's personal relationship, they are worried about his prosecutorial record. 90% of all the cases he's won were against African Americans. He also tends to plea bargain with white defendants and prosecute African American defendants. Uh oh. They think he has a racial bias, whereas they don't think the other possible Democratic candidate has none.

Lucca has come up with an idea that solves both Craig's and Colin's problems. Gabriel and Craig go to court for his appeal. Colin steps in for the prosecution. He tells the judge the Department of Justice is looking into Whitehead's cases and requests the release of Craig. The request is granted. Craig gets his freedom and Colin looks good for freeing him and 30 plus other African American inmates.

Day 457 was clearly a filler episode, but Day 464 made up for it I think. I do think all of these Trump storylines are overshadowing the show a bit, but they are well put together and I enjoy watching the characters work within these confines. How did you folks enjoy these episodes?