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After the mind-bending season premiere of The Good Fight, the fourth season proper actually kicks off with the season’s second episode which is also acts as a series reset as well. Apparently after Diane regained consciousness after the SWAT attack on her home, she took nine months off to ‘recover’ from the trauma, during which time the firm became a subsidiary of a larger corporate conglomerate, STR Laurie, and the offices get an expensive makeover, complete with spiral staircase to their ‘corporate overlords’ above. And there are dogs. Running all over the place at RBL, doing their business where they please … which does not please Adrian or Liz. Diane meets it all with a bit of bemusement.
But she barely has time to settle in before she’s summoned from above, not to meet Mr. Laurie (he’s in London), but to meet Gavin Firth (John Larroquette in a completely uncredited role). Firth seems to know all about Diane, about her time off, and about her passion in court. And, in fact, he knows her passion will help the firm’s PR as he puts her in charge of the pro bono division, to fight for the ‘little people’. Diane relishes her new position because she’s always been a crusader. This has been exactly what Diane has wanted, and needed, ever since she joined the firm.
Lucca is also summoned to Firth’s office, asked to assist on a high profile divorce case. The lead lawyer on the case is not meshing well with the client, so Firth wants Lucca to help smooth some of the edges. But she’s in for a big surprise when she meets the lead — David Lee (Zach Grenier), who we last saw in the series premiere four years ago (the character was also featured on 62 episodes of The Good Wife). Lee is not very subtle with his bias and bigotry, so it’s no wonder he didn’t vibe well with the client, a young black woman who married into wealth, founded her own makeup empire, and is now facing an ex who wants to nullify the pre-nup he forced her to sign in the first place.
After meeting and bonding with the client, Lucca is quite aware that Lee is dragging things out, assuming he’s attempting to get more billable hours out of the client. The client, Bianca Skye, whisks her legal team away to St. Lucia on her private jet — Lee is not a good flyer and Lucca relishes teasing him — where she and Lucca bond more over pictures of Lucca’s child and trying to find Lucca a date on Tinder. No work is getting done, but when the two sneak away from Lee to walk on the beach, Bianca asks Lucca if Lee is stretching out the case. Lucca says he would do nothing like that, but she’s not very convincing. What Lucca does tell her is that it’s time she tells her ex to fuck off, and when they finally have a sit down, she does exactly that. And she also agrees to a payout to settle the divorce so she can move on. Feeling proud of her accomplishment, Lee informs Lucca that he wasn’t stretching the case out for billable hours, he was doing it for tax reasons. Under the current law, Bianca can’t deduct alimony so she’ll be screwed out of $10 million in taxes while he ex gets even richer. Lee just wanted to delay the tax bill until next year. Oops.
Adrian and Liz force themselves into a meeting with Firth to bring the dog situation to his attention. He claims he had no idea the dogs were shitting all over their offices and promises to take care of the situation. And, in fact, he’s also going to have the special elevator for high-powered clients stop on their floor as well. The pair are pleased with Firth’s reaction but they also know that it was all too easy.
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For her first case, Diane is assigned a property dispute between a local diner owner and a real estate developer, Rare Orchard, claiming eminent domain on the property where the diner sits. The diner owner, Marta Tecades, is surprised that someone from RBL is suddenly interested in her case, but when Diane hatches a plan to help — which includes setting up a food truck outside the courtroom that will start cooking as the hearing begins — Marta is sure Diane will help her win the case. Also in Diane’s favor, Julian is the federal judge randomly assigned to the case.
What she doesn’t count on is Louis Canning (Michael J. Fox) working for the defense or a client, Tucker Nugent, who defies a subpoena. Canning isn’t much help in identifying the location of his client, so Julius sends a pair of marshals to retrieve him while putting a stay on the demolition of the diner until the case is settled. When the marshals return empty-handed, telling Judge Julius that Nugent was too busy playing golf to come to court, he’s apoplectic. Julius consults with Judge Hazelwood who sends to of her own marshals (both female in this case) to retrieve Nugent. They do, he refuses to talk, only telling Julius that at this point he needs to let him go and apologize. Julius responds by sending him to jail until this is all sorted out.
Returning to his chambers, Julius finds an envelope on his desk marked Urgent. His secretary has no idea how it got there or what the message inside, Memo 618, means. Julius pays a visit to Hazelwood at home and she also claims to have no idea what Memo 618 is. He also spies Adrian’s blazer on a table and Charlotte knows he saw it. Now she and Adrian have to decide whether to make their relationship public, but when she goes to see Julius the next day he assures her the secret is safe with him. But that’s not what she’s there for. Instead she urges Julius to release Nugent and apologize. She doesn’t say why and she doesn’t tell him what Memo 618 is, so he wants her to repeat what she said while he records her words on his phone. She grabs the phone and flings it against the wall, tells him again to release Nugent and apologize, and that the court will replace anyone’s phone if they should get broken. She also gives him an address if he wants to know what Memo 618 is and there is an Uber waiting for him outside. The driver takes Julius to the middle of nowhere and the Julius recognizes the driver as a judge he had a case before. But how did he end up an Uber driver? He got the mysterious Memo 618 and was forced to leave his position on the bench … with no pension. Now he works for tips. That was enough to shake Julius to his core.
With everyone back in court and Diane ready to question Nugent, Julius interrupts the proceedings by ‘admitting’ that he’d made a terrible mistake by putting Nugent in jail and that he was free to go. Nugent addresses Julian and asks him if he’s sorry for what he did. Julius reluctantly says yes, but Nugent presses him to actually speak the words, forcing Julius to say in court and on the record that he was sorry for what had transpired. Julius then said he was recusing himself from the case. Diane is in shock and barges into Julius’ chambers to find out exactly what is going on and how he, as a newly installed federal judge, could so easily flout the law. Julius is not in the mood to engage with Diane and orders her out of the chambers. In the hallway she gets a call from Marta — her diner has been torn down while they were in court, even though Julius promised his stay would remain in place. As Julius exits his chambers, Diane tells him the diner has been demolished. His response: ‘It’s not my case anymore’, and when Diane tells him this is on him, he angrily shoots back that he’s a federal judge and she’s not to speak to him in that manner.
So … what is Memo 618 and why is everyone so afraid of it?
We won’t be back next week with a new episode, unfortunately, but the delay won’t be too long. The Good Fight is another series that has been impacted by the COVID-19 production shutdowns and the people behind the scenes need a week to catch up with things like editing and music composition, so the next new episode will premiere on April 30 (be sure to check out the video from the cast and crew at the end of the episode). Stay tuned!
What did you think of this episode? Give us your thoughts in the comments section below.
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