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The seventh episode of The Good Fight picks up from where we left of back in episode 5 with prosecutor Mike Kresteva (guest Matthew Perry) escalating his attack in Riddick, Boseman & Kolstad. The episode actually picks up exactly where episode six ended with Colin alerting Lucca to the “bribe” her law form accepted. Except there was no bribe and Maia’s worst fears were realized — her father was wearing a wire when they spoke.
This was all the ammunition Kresteva, and his associate Spencer Zschau (guest Aaron Tveit, reprising his The Good Wife role), needed to launch a Grand Jury for an indictment against the firm, subpoenaing all of the senior partners at RB&K, leaving everyone wondering why. Ever since Kresteva was ordered to stop going after the firm for their police brutality cases, he’s gone after every little thing he could find, but for what reason? As we are reminded several times, Grand Juries always indict since they don’t have to use reasonable doubt to come to a decision. Boseman says the only time Grand Juries don’t indict is on police brutality cases.
The firm’s lawyer Elsbeth Tascioni comes up with a questionable defense, one that the partners might be uncomfortable with but it seems the best way to derail this prosecution — play the “race card.” Any time Kresteve of Zschau asked a question, the response would always contain some reference to race. When Barbara Kolstad launched into an answer and Zschau told her that he never asked about race, her response was “but you said to answer in my own words, and these are my own words.” No way to get around that, and the partners were beginning to look quite successful in making it look like a racial attack on their predominantly African-American firm.
But Kresteva is a smart adversary, finding ways around the race issue. First he subpoena’s the firms only white employees, Diane, Maia and Marissa. Then he subpoenaed Elsbeth’s Alexa-like device, which she tried to erase before he took it but still had communication problems with it. Kresteva learned that the bribe story was a plant, which put his deal with Henry Rindell in jeopardy. Kresteva wanted Henry to talk to Maia again, and record the conversation, but she refused to speak with him knowing he was wired the last time. They both agree to turn off their recording devices and Henry tells her he’s doing all of this to keep her and her mother out of prison (apparently Maia’s signature was forged on some papers) and he’s cut a deal for himself for ten years instead of life so he can see any grandchildren Maia might have.
But knowing that she did nothing wrong, and feeling responsible for her employer coming under attack now, she tells Henry that if he pursues this plan of action and helps Kresteva come after Diane, his deal won’t mean a thing because she will never allow him to see any grandchildren she might have. This news hit Henry pretty hard, but the information Maia gained would be pivotal in the lawsuit RB&K was launching against Kresteva, dragging him away from his Grand Jury, attempting to prove that Kresteva is attempting to drive the firm into bankruptcy.
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After subpoenaing the two financial advisers who revealed that Boseman had information related to a police brutality case (from Diane), Diane becomes his target. With Diane on the stand, Kresteva produces Rindell’s Schtup List, something that Diane has never seen, but the mysterious numbers are the key to his case. SOme of them are her firm’s tax ID number linking her to Rindell’s Ponzi scheme. Fearing she’ll bring RB&K down, Diane offers to resign but Boseman refuses her offer.
RB&K counters Kresteva with a witness who confirms that Kresteva was attempting to drive business away, leaking information to one of RB&K’s clients about the Grand Jury weeks before it was convened. The courtroom was full of fireworks as Lucca was forced to face off against Colin (who was ordered to defend Kresteva even though he’s a prosecutor, and to break up with Lucca so there would be no conflict of interest … which he did not) with one last surprise witness to support their case — Henry Rindell. Under oath, Rindell confirmed that Kresteva offered him a 10 year plea deal for working with him to bring dowm RB&K.
Once that news was public, Kresteva’s Grand Jury was shut down and he was relieved of his duties. Paying a visit to Elbeth to return her device, she told him she was glad this was all over. To which he replied, “That’s funny.” Puzzled, she asked why and he said, “That you think this is over.” Has RB&K actually made a bigger, more dangerous enemy out of Kresteva? And while the episode ends with Colin and Lucca together again at her apartment, the road ahead is far from smooth for them.
Overall, one of the best episodes of the season with some great acting and some really good writing that balanced the drama with the humor.
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