The Good Wife “The Bit Bucket” Review – “I’m going to start drinking”

Sometimes I watch an episode of television and it make me sad. Not because it was bad, but because it was so well written that everything I’ve ever written seems like total garbage in comparison. That’s how I’m feeling about this week’s episode of The Good Wife.

Julianna Margulies and John Benjamin Hickey (Photo courtesy of CBS)

Click through for my reaction to this masterfully crafted episode.

As things continue to shake up behind the scenes of Lockhart/Gardner, it has been interesting to watch all our favorite characters navigate through it. Diane thinking of taking the State Supreme Court seat. Alicia, Cary & Co leaving the firm. Who knows, who doesn’t, who suspects, who will be hurt – both are leaving a wake of destruction in their path.

While all of these secrets are sure to cause enough problems on their own, what made this particular episode work especially well was the the new angle… the NSA is listening and they are really interested in all of it. Lockhart/Gardner’s connection to ChubHub (which has it’s own NSA issues, as we learned this week), to the Governor and several other red flags have a couple of NSA techs listening in not only to L/G office calls, but everyone’s calls, including Alicia and Diane. As the scope of their interest gets wider the things they may discover are sure to cause repercussions for all our favorite characters. I applaud the writers for coming up with such a compelling way to tie a lot of the stories that have come in and out over the past seasons into one major story that will impact everything. It is also amazing to me just how timely this show can be.

(Side note – my husband came to me the other day talking about how he was reading about Bitcoin. I told him I knew all about that because of The Good Wife. Even he was impressed with how on top of it this show can be!)

While I enjoyed what this episode did with the two big secrets – Alicia’s mom investing in Cary and Alicia’s firm, and Diane eventually selling out Will (which it turns out she didn’t need to do) in order to get her Supreme Court seat – I’m dying to see what happens with both those stories next week. Poor Will. First his partner, his scotch drinking buddy, his friend, sells him out to further her own career. But now he’s about to find out that the woman he loves and can’t be with is now leaving him to start her own firm. I see some great stuff coming down the line for Josh Charles because after a season where he was put a bit on the back burner at times, he is going to be front and center with a lot of this drama.

Alicia may be dealing with a lot of drama in her work and with Peter becoming governor, but she will also be dealing with more home drama. Her moment with her mom in this episode was breathtaking. These are two women who, while they clearly love each other, have a very hard time communicating and almost didn’t know how to deal with their brief flicker of honesty. It was so moving and well done. As Alicia starts to deal with her own issues with Grace and her rising popularity with boys (and friendship with the manipulative Becca) I wonder if that moment with her mother may come back and impact her decisions.

Only two episodes in, The Good Wife is on full throttle. Weaving in familiar faces and clients with the constant new drama is something that have been able to do remarkably seamlessly. It’s frustrating to watch as a writer, but amazing as a viewer. I can’t wait to see what they bring next!