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“The Good Wife” recap (5.11): You’re Gonna Hear Me Roar

The Good Wife is finally back after its long winter hiatus, and we pick up right where we left off, as if we never left Chicago at all: Marilyn Garbanza is telling Eli Gold, in her husky, nonchalant voice of gold that she’s naming her baby Peter. This prompts Eli to spit out his drink and hastily drag her away, hilariously going all kinds of eyes-popping-out-of-my-head Eli Gold crazy, even as Marilyn calmly informs him that the fact that her son’s name will be the same as Peter Florrick’s is just a coincidence.

This is all happening at the Florrick Agos Christmas/Debut Party, and our focus soon shifts to Alicia, who’s paying the band. The band happens to be fronted by Matthew Lillard, whose face I have been missing since The Bridge. His band’s happenstance gig at Florrick Agos prompts the legal storyline of the week, and it’s a doozy. Lillard and his amusingly silent partner ask if they can talk to Alicia and Cary for a moment after they’re done playing. They then watch a series of videos. The first is a rap video. The second is Lillard’s slowed down and melodic cover of that rap song.

And the third, well, the third is some actors on a TV show about a music and dance camp, who are dancing in shiny costumes and singing Lillard’s version of the song, which they used without Lillard’s permission. Lillard was going to let it go, but the TV show is now making millions off of it. It’s another ripped-from-the-headlines plotline, but instead of the headier political angles The Good Wife often tackles, this time the Kings are coming right at Glee. Take heed, Ryan Murphy.

In other Good Wife news, Will Gardner is still being an enormous prick! Over at Lockhart Gardner, they’re casting a vote in the meeting room about expanding LG to a Los Angeles office. Because they opened a New York office two seconds ago, so why not throw in LA, too? Why not Tokyo? Why not the moon? Will hasn’t really consulted Diane about any of this, but hey, he and Damian apparently hammered it out in a bar, so we’re all good. Diane does her best to stop the ridiculousness, but with douchebag Damian on Will’s side, it’s becoming increasingly apparent that she’s losing her power. I miss the Diane Lockhart from the first few episodes of this season, both for our sakes and for her own. And Will, your LG logo still looks stupid.

Will’s reign of foolishness and bitterness continues when Burl Preston, legal counsel for the TV network that airs the fake Glee, comes to the LG offices, thinking that Alicia still works there. Will takes him into his office and offers his own services in Preston’s battle against Alicia, because “an enemy of my enemy is my friend.” There is a lot of tricky stuff going on with the copyrights: Lillard et al had acquired the rights to cover the song, but not the complete set of rights that would protect them in this case, the derivative rights. Since Peter Florrick happens to know the original rapper-they spent some time in jail together, as one does-Alicia’s able to arrange a meeting and the rapper hands over the rights to Lillard, no big deal. So when Burl Preston comes to the offices of Florrick Agos, Alicia and Cary think they’ve got it in the bag. Until Will walks in after him.

As they walk to their meeting, Alicia advises Will to get over it. He asks, get over what? She replies, “Me.” As he launches into his smarmy response, she rolls her eyes and walks away. It seems Will has weaseled exclusive derivative rights to the song for the TV show, making Alicia and Matthew Lillard’s previous meeting with the rapper meaningless. Not only aren’t they going to settle, the TV show is now suing them.

When they meet in court, Will is an ass on purpose and Alicia lets it get to her, until Cary demands that she stop letting herself be played. It’s nice to actually see Cary say something meaningful once in a while. She realizes that he’s right, and when she comes back to court, she’s changed her outfit. Suddenly it’s Will who’s stuttering through his questioning (of a fake Ryan Murphy who is exceedingly obnoxious), and when he confronts her in the hallway, Alicia says, yep. “It’s what I wore the first night you banged me.” Will says that’s pretty low of her. She says that’s true. “I wasn’t so discriminating back then.” I am getting a little tired of this Will and Alicia game, but man, some of these burns are so. damn. good.

But enough of these hetero details, and onwards to the question we ask ourselves every Sunday night: what about Kalinda? Don’t worry, she’s here, bringing us back to the Who’s Marilyn’s Baby Daddy question. Eli has brought Kalinda to the governor’s office, where we first see her waiting in the hallway, staring at the enormous portrait of Peter’s face brought in by Jackie. And the beauty of Kalinda Sharma is that even though this scene only lasts a second, even though you hardly even see her face, you can always just sense Kalinda’s brain processing the ridiculousness of her surroundings, and it always makes me laugh.

Eli is hiring Kalinda to track down the father of Marilyn’s baby, even though I highly doubt that it’s Peter’s. There really hasn’t been that much of a relationship built up between Marilyn and Peter in that way, and Marilyn seems like too smart of a woman to both screw Peter and then name her child after him. And while Kalinda refuses at first, as the job breaks her no-working-for-Peter rule, Eli makes the sly move of insisting that it’s actually for Alicia, to protect her and the family if Peter does happen to be the father. This won’t be the first time this episode that the ghost of Kalinda’s friendship with Alicia rises up and haunts us.

The second Kalinda lolz moment of the episode is when we first see her on this beat, waiting next to Marilyn in the doctor’s office, acting as if she’s just another expectant mother herself. Kalinda Sharma, so excited about her first ultrasound! It appears that she’s getting good information from Marilyn, too, until Detective Jenna suddenly shows up, the police woman who’s buddy buddy with Damian and who Kalinda took a little tumble in the sheets with last episode. She plops down next to Kalinda and smiles, introduces herself to Marilyn as if she’s Kalinda’s other half. She can’t wait for the ultrasound either! Kalinda is not pleased.

As Kalinda walks to her car, Jenna jogs up behind her, suggesting lunch, as if she hasn’t just interrupted Kalinda in the middle of her work, as if she hasn’t done it all because Damian told her to. When Kalinda demands an apology instead of accepting the lunch invitation, Jenna rolls her eyes and says there’s nothing she hates more than when someone loses their sense of humor. Ugh, which is my LEAST FAVORITE thing anyone says ever. It’s the most perfect way of casually dismissing someone’s feelings. Kalinda replies that what SHE hates more than anything is disrespect. Word, Sharma. But then Jenna apologizes. Kalinda says, “Dinner.”

We next see them in bed again in Detective Jenna’s dimly lit apartment, with Jenna leaning over Kalinda’s shoulder, incredulous that Kalinda not only doesn’t like Katy Perry, she has no idea who she is. Hahaha, Jenna! You think Kalinda would like Katy Perry! You are hilarious! Yet Kalinda does seem at least semi-charmed by Jenna’s purring of “Roar” as Jenna roams her lips down Kalinda’s back, until they’re interrupted by a phone call. Jenna makes a series of vague responses into the receiver while Kalinda waits with suspicious eyes in the dark. When she asks who was on the phone and Jenna responds, “My mom,” it doesn’t sound convincing to anyone. In response, Kalinda suddenly and angrily flips Jenna on her back, forcing her hands over her head, and then smoothly makes her way down her torso. This is, unfortunately but predictably, where the scene cuts off.

I don’t know how I feel about this whole situation. It’s not that I dislike Jenna, because I don’t, but I also don’t feel like she’s on par with Kalinda, and there’s none of the chemistry that existed between Kalinda and Lana Delaney. I also can’t tell if Kalinda actually likes Jenna or not, or if she’s just playing along in Damian’s game. Yet she clearly likes her enough to giggle at her poor Katy Perry impression, and to aggressively sex her up at the possibility of betrayal. Maybe this is always how Kalinda is, though: mysterious, guarded, but in the end, at least when it comes to women, always somehow vulnerable.

Kalinda’s doubts about Jenna might be coming true when Damian approaches her at the office a few days later, opening with this line: “So, you don’t like Katy Perry?” Ooh, Damian. Ooh, we hate you.

Kalinda asks if he and Jenna tell each other everything. Well, he says, they’re friends. And then he asks, maybe knowing how much the question will hurt, and maybe not: “Don’t you have friends?” Kalinda only responds with an unsteady, “Um,” which seems uncharacteristic, before walking away. As she does so, Damian remarks to her back, “She likes you.”

This friends theme is brought back up when Jenna pulls over Kalinda a few nights later, using her police prowess to track her down after Kalinda hasn’t been returning her calls. Kalinda says she thinks they should cool it. She doesn’t know if she likes her or not. Jenna seems thrown off for half a second, but responds that no, she thinks Kalinda does like her. Kalinda clarifies. She doesn’t like how much she talks. To which Jenna sighs and asks if this is about Damian. Clearly this is about Damian. Look, Jenna says, she just doesn’t like losing friends. Lovers, she doesn’t mind. “But friends? They come through.”

Kalinda asks if she can leave now; Jenna lets her go. Kalinda drives away with a sad Jenna face in her rearview mirror, and it’s unsure exactly what Kalinda is thinking about right now: Jenna, Damian, or the idea of friends-and how, for a long time, it seemed like she had one. A good one. But now, we can’t even remember the last time they spoke.

The most heartbreaking scene of all for me in this episode was a final one between Will and Diane, where Diane attempts to talk Will out of his frantic pace, and discuss the clear disconnect that’s building between them. Will brushes this all off, naturally. He’s fine! None of this is about Alicia! Nope! He then brings out the big knives. You walked away from this firm, he tells Diane. I didn’t. You have to step aside and let me lead for a while. Diane takes a deep breath and says that he’s right. The sting of her recent humiliations is still strong enough to make her humble, humble enough to let Will win. When he asks if she’s going to finally vote with him about the LA office, she sighs and simply says, as she walks away, “Whatever you want.” Sad, submissive Diane Lockhart is breaking my heart.

Back in Matthew Lillard, fake-Glee, copyright war land, it seems at first Glee‘s stealing-while obviously being theft, no matter what fake-Ryan Murphy says-is a weirdly legal theft. But have no fear, Robyn is here, and she comes up with a last second save that proves they didn’t just steal the melody, they literally used the same track, before they could record their own for sales on iTunes. This is legit theft that can’t be covered by technical copyright maneuvering, and we get to see a very happy Matthew Lillard hug a very awesome Robyn. Which I am not jealous of at all. Just kidding I totally am. Suck it, Will and fake-Ryan Murphy!

The Marilyn Baby Daddy Mystery is also finally solved when, after a decent amount of harassment from Eli, Marilyn finally reveals the father to him: famous movie director Peter Bogdanovich. He and Marilyn are clearly adorably sweet on each other. I find myself liking Marilyn more and more.

Yet as they hug in the hallway in front of Eli and Marilyn asks Eli what he thinks, he just walks away. Eli’s mind is in other places right now, far away from baby drama, because he’s just had a meeting with a reporter who had some interesting footage to show him-footage of people carrying some ballot boxes out of the back of a van late at night. Footage that might prove that Peter Florrick stole his election.

What were your thoughts on the first Good Wife of 2014? What are your own thoughts on Jenna? Should Kalinda trust her?

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