The Good Wife Recap: The Bit Bucket

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Julianna Margulies and Stockard Channing play a singular mother-daughter pair on The Good Wife.


While last week’s episode was action packed, this week’s was a slow-paced build up for next week's heated Lockhard/Gardner hour. But let's not get ahead of ourselves, we have our hands full with "The Bit Bucket", the season's second episode. Continue reading at the risk of being spoiled (and learning about the adventures that come after representing a suspected terrorist).

We start off by eavesdropping on a handful of phone conversations that have been tapped by the NSA (National Security Agency). One of those calls is one between Cary and the titular Good Wife as she checks out their potential new office space. The crazy kids are still planning to start their own firm behind their employers' backs. The space is incredible and all of the fourth-years meet Alicia there because nothing says “we’re up to no good!” like disappearing from work simultaneously.

The tedious case of the week involves Chum Hum and, gasp, the NSA. The NSA has subpoenaed user information from the Hum’s social networks. There’s a glaring caveat, however: Neil Gross, Chum Hum CEO/professional jerk, can’t tell his users about how little information he’s handed over to the NSA because of a standing gag order that’ll ship him to jail if he talks. Alicia tells Neil to sue the NSA. Cary-with-an-e (who I should probably just call Carey) suggests he sue for prior restraint because this show likes to make me look things up.

There’s a pair of geeks at the NSA that are unfortunately essential to this episode. Remember suspected-terrorist Danny Marwat from season 3? He hired Diane and Alicia to defend him back in the day. Naturally, this is the origin of the NSA listening to every phone conversation that Diane and Alicia have. The NSA has a two-hop warrant (ugh), which means they can only tap the phones of the person of interest (Marwat) and his lawyers. Anyway, the geeks tell their boss that Chum Hum plans on suing them and he looks half as confused as I do. After he processes what I can’t, he decides to extend the warrant to a three-hop to get to Alicia’s husband—you know, the Governor of Illinois—to watch out for any illegal activity.

Speaking of Peter, he’s still trying to convince Chief Justice Ryvlan that Diane is the best choice for the judgeship. Ryvlan won’t approve until Diane publically trashes Will. Eli suggests he hasn’t approved because he’s a “sexist old fool”, but maybe he’s just a sexist old fool who lives for drama. He’s out of luck because Diane has no time for this. She sabotages an interview with Chicago Law and avoids denouncing Will’s sins. Eli does the unforgivable and berates Diane for not hanging Will to dry during her interview. Before slamming her door, he threatens to look for alternatives for the judgeship. Cue a terrified Christine Baranski.

Alicia’s mom, Veronica, is back in town and you can hear exactly zero people complaining. Her presence, as always, is anything but gratuitous. The fourth years couldn’t buy their office space. The bank wants to talk to their current employers before they approve their loan. Did they really not see that one coming? Against David Lee’s advice, Veronica winds up investing in Alicia’s firm-to-be and loans her the money to buy the space. More importantly, Alicia and Veronica meet for drinks and get personal. Alicia confesses her mother didn’t like her as a kid, despite being a “likable child”. The assertion with which she says it is so poignant and Veronica doesn’t even try to deny it. They, and I, tear up after agreeing to start over.

Patric Edelstein goes on the stand and reluctantly admits that after the NSA subpoenaed user data from his company, Sleuthway, he never got a gag order that banned him from discussing details of his cooperation with the requests. After SCIF, something-boring-that-tried-to-not-be-boring-by-being-abbreviated happened, our plaintiffs sued the government for interfering with Chum Hum’s economic gain. Chum Hum is claiming 3 billion dollars in damages because the rich just wanna get richer, y’all!!

Neil Gross challenges your awareness of current events by testifying that his company lost 20% of its users after Edward Snowden’s leak and the NSA’s respective subpoenas. Then, an Auschwitz survivor testifies that he participated in a boycott of Chum Hum because it hosted Holocaust denier sites the same day as the Snowden leak. Ah, television: the hometown of convenient coincidences. Turns out, the government has been investigating Neil because he equipped North Korean Freedom Fighters with software for $14,000. So, Chum Hum wins the suit and is awarded $14,000 in damages and a respective gag order to avoid any talk about said damages.

The episode closes with Peter telling the Chief Justice that his opinion is basically worthless and that Diane is his choice for the nomination, canceling out his support. Eli calls Diane’s office to make sure she doesn’t do the interview again as Mandy Post leaves her office and thanks Diane for what she calls a “great interview”. Oops.

 Honorable Mentions:


★ David Lee's never been married! Can we, as an Internet, do something about this?

★ Zach must be a great gift-giver because neither one of his girlfriends seem to be over him. Becca (Dreama Walker) returns, this time with Grace as her oblivious liaison, and manages to steal an engraved gold (!) gavel the Chief Justice had given Peter. Ever the conniver, she has something to blackmail Eli with and if you doubt she’ll juice this opportunity, then you must have fallen asleep during most of season 2. Nisa (Rachel Hilson) is also back and her sobbing voicemails to the Florrick residence do nothing but justify the NSA’s three-hop warrant by providing recent terrorist connection. Nisa’s dad is a Somalian nationalist who had history with a terrorist suspect. I have a feeling that won’t help your chances with Zach, girl.

★ What's the word on Kalinda and Cary? They don't seem to be canoodling anymore. Kalinda is as distant as ever and she seemed pretty out of the loop with Cary's firm plans. Most of us were pretty thrilled to watched them sort-of get together last season. We'll see where this one goes.

★ A while after David Lee warns Will and Diane that he’s on to the fourth-years restraining themselves from using the company phones, there’s a funny bit where Alicia juggles two phones before figuring out which to answer. Ah, scheming!

★ As of last season, TGW had a fun episode-naming formula where the amount of words in the episode title was equal to the season it belonged to. Episodes from season 1 all had 1 word, episodes from season 2 all had 2, etc. I guess they’ve stopped doing this now because both episodes have had 3 words. Maybe they’re just trying to save some ink. 

★ “Jesus has no problem with Grace looking her best.” Words to live by, courtesy of Veronica.

Thank you for reading! Please stay tuned! I'll be posting a screecap of the episode soon! It's a recap, but with screencaps. Don't miss it!

Photo Credit: CBS Broadcasting Inc.