The Good Fight :: The End of Everything

Paramount Plus

February 2017, relatively new streaming service CBS All Access debuts its first original scripted series. It was supposed to be Star Trek: Discovery but production delays put that show behind schedule. Luckily the service had another show already on the schedule to debut several months later so the premieres were swapped and The Good Wife spin-off The Good Fight premiered and it was an immediate sensation, unafraid to show its political bent with an opening scene that had to be hastily rewritten after the results of the 2016 election hadn’t turned out like everyone assumed, giving us the first word out of Diane Lockhart’s mouth as she watched the results: ‘Fuck!’ Over the past five years and six seasons, the show has not shied away from its liberal politics or its colorful language. And the fans embraced it all thanks to Christine Baranski’s performance, the sharp often witty writing, the supporting cast and parade of guest stars, some new, some carry overs from the flagship series, making the show a hit (bizarrely, the show lacked serious love from the Emmys — was it too liberal for them?).

And here we are at the end of the season and the end of the series. And it’s heartbreaking to say goodbye to these characters. It was already hard saying goodbye to the likes of Cush Jumbo, Delroy Lindo and Rose Leslie, but Baranski and Sarah Steele have been constants (as has Nyambi Nyambi and Michael Boatman), while Audra McDonald, Charmaine Bingwa and Andre Braugher have become part of the family, along with all of the actors playing partners and associates. And now we have to say goodbye to them all. The end of The Good Fight is going to create a huge void in the television landscape, especially for show’s that are fearless in delivering a specific message about the state of the country. Season after season the writers have managed to somehow keep a finger on the pulse of the political landscape with episodes almost seeming to have been produced the day they were first broadcast.

This season has been no different. The underlying theme of the season has been the riots taking place in the streets below the offices of Reddick & Ri’Chard, which escalated as the season progressed to the point where it all became intensely dangerous for the people in those offices. It was always the dream of Liz Reddick to have the largest Black law firm in Chicago, even when she toyed with the idea of an all-female firm with the very white Diane Lockhart. But over the course of time, Diane began to see that she was out of place, finally agreeing to take a back seat, agreeing to remain a partner but not a named partner so her name came off of the letterhead. With all of the drama in the world since the series began as we all lived through the Trump presidency, the weight of it all began to take a toll on Diane, driving her to microdosing and this season undergoing treatment with a drug known as PT 108. That also led to some turmoil in her marriage to the very conservative Kurt McVeigh, but that was something they were always able to deal with until things escalated on January 6, 2021. The political divide between them could seemingly no longer be resolved with pasta and wine, and in the penultimate episode it seemed like the two were about to throw it all away. Diane’s flirtation with her (now former) doctor Lyle Bettancourt gave her something she desired in a partner but could she truly live without Kurt?

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The final episode had tensions at an explosive level as the fear of the firm being targeted by white supremacists reached a fever pitch. The riots had grown, the elevators were out, and anyone on the 22nd floor was trapped until they were given the all clear. In addition to the lawyers and associates, Liz’s son Malcolm was there, as was everyone’s favorite nuisance Felix Staples, there with an unusual and incendiary claim — sexual assault in the workplace by his boss … Ron DeSantis. Diane immediately calls out Felix’s story as a lie, especially when he threatens to go to another law firm. His claim that DeSantis assaulted him at a CPAC convention in Texas did have some basis in fact, because Staples did work for DeSantis and was recently fired for mysterious reasons, and he and De Santis were at CPAC. Felix even had a stained T-shirt to prove his claim but how did anyone expect to get a sample of DeSantis’ DNA to prove that what was on the shirt came out of him? The whole thing finally fell apart when Felix was unable to verify the hotel they stayed in (he said the wrong one) and the room number. But the thought of actually running with a lie, that did have some basis in fact, to discredit DeSantis enough to put Trump in first position for the next election was still an attractive proposition to some in the firm. It was the question of which man would be better for the firm as president.

All of that became a moot point when the offices went into lockdown as things escalated outside, leading to power outages. Malcolm had been playing a video game given to him by Ri’Chard, part of a marketing plan to brand the law firm by highlighting prominent Black lawyers. Of course his grandfather was one of the ‘Super 6’ in the game (which was a first person shooter game where the player took out characters in Klan robes and hoods), and there were hyperlinks within the game to learn more about each of them. Unfortunately Malcolm clicked on the one about his grandfather and became upset when he learned about the sexual assault claims against him forcing Liz to try to explain that she never told him because she wasn’t even ready to deal with it. It was Ri’Chard who explained to Malcolm that they don’t have to like their heroes but they have to give them their due for the good things they did even while acknowledging the bad. Nobody’s perfect. Liz really appreciated this lesson.

Diane had been out of the office, on a trip with Lyle to the countryside, but when she returned to work she got caught up in the rioters, getting herself doused with tear gas. She managed to call Jay to help her and he got her inside the building but she had to take a shower and throw out her clothes. Luckily Carmen is her size and she had a spare outfit in her office, a black number with a leather jacket. Carmen even said it looked better on Diane than it did her. But while being forced to deal with Felix, the elevator situation, and the building basically being in lockdown, Diane had to cancel her dinner plans with Lyle but she accidentally called Kurt, who was in a meeting at the NRA. She hung up, but he still got the missed call alert and became concerned when he couldn’t reach her when calling back. More concerning was the news footage of the riots where he caught a quick glimpse of Diane in the crowd. Fearing that something terrible had happened, Kurt packed up his things and actually quit his job, even though his boss was begging him to stay because they were supposed to attend a convention in Atlanta and the flight was leaving soon.

Kurt’s boss called Diane to ask if she was with Kurt and he told her about him quitting the NRA, which actually surprised and maybe thrilled her a bit. He also told her that they weren’t going to a convention, it was a surprise ceremony where he was going to be awarded the Second Amendment Award, the highest NRA honor. Diane didn’t know that Kurt was in the lobby of the building at that point, and she also didn’t know that Lyle had just entered as well. As he went to sit and wait for the elevators to come back on line, Lyle watched Kurt — whom he didn’t know was Kurt — sneak off to the stairs, so Lyle did the same thing. A few flights up Lyle finally asked if he was Kurt, and Kurt asked if he was Diane’s doctor. Former, Lyle replied. They were both confused as to why the other was there, and Lyle asked Kurt if he though Diane was in trouble. Kurt said no but he kept walking upwards with Lyle not far behind. On the 15th floor Kurt’s phone rang and it was Diane. She explained to him that he was getting an award and that she wanted him to get on the plane which had been booked for him. She said she appreciated that he quit his job but he really needed to stick with it and do what was right for him. Kurt didn’t have much to say, but when they hung up Lyle’s phone rang. Diane told him she had to cancel their dinner plans because of everything going on and he told her he was on the 15th floor … with Kurt. Diane was shocked because Kurt didn’t say a thing about being in the building but she told Lyle that they both had to leave. After he hung up he asked Kurt if he was leaving and Kurt said no. Was Lyle leaving? Nope, so they both continued to climb. But they found something shocking on the 21st floor — a pile of chairs blocking the stairs, an obvious attempt to trap the occupants of the 22nd floor. Kurt called Diane and told her what they had found and she told Jay, who knew immediately that they were sitting ducks. He turned on the camera in the building across the street and saw an armed militia setting up, preparing to fire on their offices, the only floors in the building now without power, bathed in red emergency lighting. Jay had to call his friends at The Collective to tell them about the imminent attack. Jay ran around the offices telling everyone to hit the floor because they are about to be shot at, and then the bullets began blasting through the windows. In what was a frightening but nifty visual, there were several shots of items in the office exploding from the bullets in an homage to the usual opening titles … which were not part of the episode this week!

Jay watched as a canister of gas was rolled into the office that housed the gunmen and saw them all collapse to the floor unconscious. Jay got the word that all was clear and those men were on a scheduled flight … to Antarctica. But the events of the day made Jay question his position not just at the firm but in the world, so he decided he was quitting to join The Collective and make a difference in the world. They were happy to have him and they told him to bring Carmen too, but when he asked her to leave she said she was built to be a lawyer, not an activist, and she still had things to learn about the law and herself with Liz as her mentor. Diane also began to have her own doubts, feeling that she was just burned out by the law and things never changing and considered flying off to the French countryside. She had a heart-to-heart with Liz who told her about the office in DC that STR Laurie was planning to sell off. It specifically catered to the needs of women and Liz wanted Diane to take it over, fulfilling their dream of having a female-run law firm. Diane wasn’t sure if that’s what she wanted to do at this point, especially with Kurt and Lyle in the stairwell one floor down. When they were taking cover from the shooting, she, Marissa and Carmen were considering who Diane would end up with. Marissa called dibs on Diane. She had already guessed that Liz had offered her the job at the firm in DC and insisted Diane hire her because she already has connections in DC through her father (imagine a spin-off with Diane, Marissa and Eli!). Carmen knew Diane would pick Kurt because when they were in the elevator nine episodes ago and someone threw the fake grenade in, Diane said one word, ‘Kurt’. She feared her life was going to end and that was the person she thought of so how could she not stay with him? Diane, however, wasn’t sure about that but when they finally made their way into the office — just as the elevators returned to working order (also allowing Felix to scurry out) — Diane had a decision to make. Kurt walked away and let her greet Lyle first, and they embraced. Carmen and Marissa couldn’t tell if it was romantic or not because that generation was weird, but they didn’t hear Diane tell Lyle ‘in another lifetime’. Lyle accepted her decision and left. Then she embraced Kurt, happy that he quit the NRA and certain that they would find a way to work through their political differences with pasta and wine. Kurt went home to put the pasta on but Diane still had a lot to clean up at the office.

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With the streets now clear, Diane made her way back toward the building, meeting up with Liz who had just sent Malcolm off with his father. Liz again urged Diane to take the job in DC and Diane accepted. But before they could celebrate, alerts went off on both of their phones, their faces dropping. They looked up at the large video screen in the lobby of the building and it finally became clear what the significance of 11/10 was — it was the day Trump announced that he was running for president in 2024. After rolling their eyes, they both couldn’t do anything else but cackle at the thought … and The Good Fight ends almost as it had begun — making fun of Trump, showing clips of his ridiculous little dances he does to the tune of ‘Y.M.C.A.’

And as the end credits began to roll, they were the opening credits (still with ‘Y.M.C.A.’ playing instead of the show’s theme music), giving us a look at every single exploding item over the past six seasons (the credits did add and remove various items over the last six seasons). And then it was over, leaving us with the sad feeling that we won’t see these characters again (although some have suggested/hinted that a Jay spin-off with The Collective could be a thing), but satisfied that nothing terrible happened to any of them. No one died during the attack. Jay left to pursue his new goals. Carmen knew she had a place there, but she had to say goodbye to Marissa, who was almost definitely going to DC with Diane (even though Diane made no formal offer that we saw). Liz and Ri’Chard have developed a solid working relationship (though not romantic as some have speculated), and Diane has something new to look forward to, and on better ground with the love of her life than she had been all season (perhaps her move to DC will also allow Kurt to return to the NRA since that’s where he’d been based, causing that further distance between them). In the end, all was well for everyone, giving us a sad, yet hopeful and rewarding finale, allowing us to imagine the lives of these people as time marches on without them on our TV screens. Thank you to the cast and crew, the writers, the musicians, production designers, everyone who made The Good Fight smart, thought-provoking, often absurd (in a good way), funny, tragic, wonderful six seasons of television. You will all be missed.

What did you think of the finale? Give us your thoughts in the comments section below.

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