The Good Fight is one of the best shows on TV right now. There. It’s been said. Where else are you going to find Christine Baranski kicking off her shoes and sauntering around an office, happily popping into an office and saying, “Hey. F—k you,” to Audra McDonald? Nowhere. You will only find that on The Good Fight, a show with some of the finest acting and whip-smart writing out there.
However, as fun as it is seeing Baranski’s Diane Lockhart flip the middle finger at Alan Alda (did you ever think that’d be a sentence you’d read?), the cable TV elements of the series are just a tiny part of what makes The Good Fight so f—king enjoyable.
The CBS All Access series, a spinoff of the Emmy-winning legal drama The Good Wife, made a splashy debut in 2017. There were timely stories and established stars, it was fine. Not the best, but better than The Good Wife‘s last chapters. Yep, going there. Deal with it. Then, in season two, something happened. Everything just clicked.
CBS
In season two, creators and showrunners Robertand Michelle King closed the Ponzi scheme storyline that was the backbone of the first season and serves as the introduction to Rose Leslie‘s Maia Rindell. Focus was placed back on Baranski’s Diane Lockhart and her marvelous brooches. Diane, like many out there, started having a hard time just, well, living in the current world. Nothing made sense to her. The political headlines came fast and furious. The world she thought she knew was in upheaval. It also didn’t help that angry clients were killing lawyers. Diane was lost. So lost, she started microdosing with hallucinogens (seriously!) in an effort to just find some peace.
Diane’s struggle (probably aside from the hallucinogens) mirrored many whom have/had problems dealing with the endless news cycle. A shooting snapped her out of her Trump-induced funk and suddenly Diane was elegant leader once again. It was a season-long journey that should be celebrated. Baranski deserves an Emmy nomination (and if we’re being honest, the win) for her work this year.
The Good Fight balanced Diane’s breakdown and phoenix-like return by smartly pairing up Sarah Steele‘s Marissa Gold and Maia (Leslie) for lighter, more comedic stories. Their adventures, coupled with Cush Jumbo‘s Lucca Quinn navigating the waters of a surprise pregnancy, plus the intriguing dynamic between Delroy Lindo‘s Adrian Boseman and his ex-wife Liz Reddick-Lawrence (McDonald), balanced The Good Fight in ways other TV shows dream of.
CBS
With a mix of real-world politics, social commentary (they did an episode based on the Bachelor in Paradise scandal), and just plain old good legal drama tropes, The Good Fight crafted a near-perfect season of TV that is just begging to be binged.
Come for Baranski dropping f-bombs, stay for the wildly insightful (and at times wickedly funny) stories you won’t find anywhere else on TV.
The Good Fight season finale drops Sunday, May 27 on CBS All Access. Get a sneak peek at the episode above. The Good Fight will return for a third season…so what are you waiting for?
COMMENTS