The Televangelist: ‘The Good Wife’ Season 3, Ep. 5
I’ll go ahead and ask what everyone was thinking as last night’s episode came to a close: Are you are Martha or a Caitlin?
- CBS.com
- “I didn’t want to be the one to have to tell you this, but you’re not really pulling off those bangs”
?I’ll go ahead and ask what everyone was thinking as last night’s episode came to a close: Are you a Martha or a Caitlin? And was Will correct in identifying Alicia as a Caitlin? (Who was the Martha, Cary?) “Marthas and Caitlins” was about compromise - Alicia leans to work with Celeste, Grace’s crazy tutor is told that to continue seeing Grace she needs to tutor her in physics only, not in the ways of being a social outcast, the COTW staring recurring creeper Colin Sweeney (who made two appearances in the first season of the show) and of course Alicia having to acquiesce to the selection committee choosing Caitlin over Martha. It was a splintered episode, but I often feel that the less Alicia the better. Alicia is dangerously close to a Mary Sue, or what I call “Everybody Loves Alicia!” syndrome. “The Good Wife” is at its best when those around Alicia are left to shine. Eli, Diane, even Celeste (who really grew on me in this episode); Cary too, who is becoming more nuanced and Glenn Childs-like (to his benefit). Cary has the amazing ability to always seem slimy without actually doing anything particularly slimy. In fact, most days he’s making the right choice and getting a favorable outcome from it, rather like a post-affair Peter Florrick. Speaking of Peter, I don’t know how he found out about the videos of Grace’s tutor, but I applaud his vigilant parenting. Apparently Grace doesn’t do so well as a latchkey kid.
?The COTW was pretty nebulous material - a plane goes down and the firm teams up with Celeste’s litigation team and sues the negligent manufacturer on behalf of the families (a rare moment where Lockhart Gardner is taking the moral high ground, with a reforming Diane at the lead no less). Marginally more interesting were the machinations of Colin Sweeney, Wife Killer, and his conversations with the legal teams to procure his own freedom. There was always the chance that he might get shivved in the yard while he was pressuring the white supremacist, but in the end (thanks to Cary’s patience) everyone seemed to get what they wanted — fine and dandy, not a bad little procedural moment.