The Good Wife 3x06: Affairs of State

Original Air Date: 30 October 2011

Storyline: While Alicia wades through diplomatic loopholes to defend a Taiwanese national, Eli is approached by his ex-wife to vet her for a possible political campaign.Review: Sometimes you win and sometimes you lose. And it wouldn't be believable if Lockhart/Gardner won their every case or if all of their clients were innocent, would it?

I welcomed the change, as well as the case itself: it played on my favorite subject when I was in law school: international law, more specifically, the issue of diplomatic immunity and the One China rule. It's an issue I could have liked to see developed a little bit more, let's say maybe instead of the office war going on at the DA's office between Cary and Matan or instead of promoting yet another useless character - Dana Lodge, one of Cary's "ethnic" crushes. Let's say that the office war was necessary to point out his special status as Peter's protege, but, as much as I might miss Lie to Me, I didn't see the need of Monica Raymund's presence, unless the writers are trying to make Cary into some kind of male whore with a very specific preference for women. I guess the main complaint is creating these characters - Imani, Dana - only to drop them without an explanation two episodes later. 
What I did enjoy, in terms of one-time appearances, was Eli's ex-wife arc. We always knew he had been married and meeting the woman who made him settle down was almost mandatory. The best thing about this was casting Alan Cumming's good friend, Parker Posey, in this role. The two of them have played together multiple times and have that kind of chemistry that makes a character of its own. Giving Vanessa a political career was yet another reason to throw in some popular topics, though I think the connection to the Bin Laden family was a bit of a stretch. But all in all, this is one of the few shows where I actually welcome the political angle, because of the natural manner in which it's presented.
The last sub-plot we need to touch on is the relationship between Alicia and Will. Inevitably, it's always somewhere in the background and the main discussion this week was whether Will should meet Alicia's children. His encounter with Zach was absolutely hilarious. Josh Charles is an amazing actor and played the awkwardness of the moment to perfection; Will was lame in his inability to say something even remotely coherent - something one rarely hears from a lawyer - and later on, when Alicia refused to formally introduce him to her children, he was clearly hurt. While she's still keeping the distance (not blamable, giving her unique situation), Will is a lot more invested in the relationship and I don't see how this can go well on the long term. Add a young blonde lawyer with a crush on the boss into the mix and The Good Wife has all the indicators of turning this into a soap. This is definitely not something I want to see here - so far, it's the only show on TV that didn't have to recur to cheap tricks like this to stir things up.
So, as you can see, I have a lot of complaints about this particular episode. I already miss Lisa Edelstein's character, but on the bright side, Grace's tutor was nowhere to be seen.The Good Wife 3x05: Marthas and Caitlins Back to Season 3