The Good Wife has become somewhat of an interesting phenomenon. Always listed right alongside its night-mates (NCIS and NCIS: LA) as best this, or top that, the show is also something that most popular procedurals cannot claim to be — intriguing. The reason, of course, is because disgraced former State’s Attorney Peter Florrick (Chris Noth) still casts a big shadow over the legal profession in Chicago. And his wife, Alicia (Julianna Margulies) just happens to be one of the profession’s newest associates.
While the ever-present subplot is key to the story, I sometimes feel as if it can rear its ugly head a bit too often for me. Time and again it’s, “If something corrupt happened it was because of Peter,” or even better, “Alicia is out for revenge on the man who disgraced her family.”
But key in this week’s episode was the most frequent “get the inside track from Peter.” I’m enjoying the show a lot, but in the case of a man potentially wrongfully accused of, prosecuted for, sitting in prison for six years because of, and on death row as a result of the murder of a cop, making a conjugal visit the preferred method of passing information without being monitored was a bit of a wrong vibe, as far as I was concerned.
The reality is that the episode really left me with only one thing to say, and it’s kind of broader than the episode itself. So to finish up with the night: a point was made of how popular Bulls’ paraphernalia was in 2003, when the murder occurred. Would that be following the 2001-2002, when they went 21-61, or after 2002-2003, when they improved to 30-52? Yikes.
What I was left with after this episode was Clarence Wilcox (Curtiss Cook). Now what for him? Yeah, he’s out of prison, but how does the justice system give him six years back? How do they negate the ugly stigma that currently clouds his name? Guaranteed that more people knew about his conviction than will learn of his release. How do we as a society make this up to him?
The deputy chief from the State’s Attorneys office told the press that no restitution discussions had taken place. What? How can the city of Chicago, the state of Illinois, and whoever else wants to get in on it not be falling over themselves to at least pay Wilcox’s way for the rest of his life? Or for his daughter, too? Because, not only was he wrongfully convicted, but it was due to intentional police misconduct that he was arrested in the first place.
How do we as a society make it up to people like Clarence? Even when we do our best, but more importantly when we don’t bother to. When we say, “good enough,” and then go on with the rest of our day. How can we wake up in the morning knowing that we stole so many days from someone unlucky enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, or fitting the wrong description on the wrong day?
I know we can’t not be tough on crime, but we need a better system in place to ensure that we don’t prosecute the wrong person due to sheer laziness, or in the event that a conviction is overturned, that we have a better system in place for making it up to the wrongfully convicted.
We’ll never get it 100% right, but it’s a cause worth the effort, no?
Clacked by Aryeh S.
on Nov 05, 2009 @ 11:00 EST5EDT
I do enjoy this show… almost didn’t watch it because I’m not a real fan of Chris Noth, but Julianna Margulies got my attention, so here I am after the first few episodes enjoying the story.
I understand that since the storyline is ‘The Good Wife’, we’ll hear a lot about why she is called that. I agree with you that wrongful convictions are frightening when the police are so intent on getting a conviction that some (and I hope not most) will try to turn the evidence toward their favor just to get that conviction, as was the case in tonight’s episode.
I didn’t like the fact that the judge gave them the out to blame the mistake on the predecessor (even tho that would make it Chris Noth). How did they deal with the detective who actually ‘lied’ about the evidence. Does that mean he got a free pass to do it again??? When does this type of person get removed from his job…when does it stop!
*POST AUTHOR*
I thought “The Good Wife” referred to a spouse who stood by their disgraced partner in the wake of a scandal. I think in this case it’s actually a question of whether or not Alicia will do so once he’s among the free again. Do you get the impression that there’s more to it yet to come?
I’m with you on blaming the predecessor, and what now for the cop … unfortunately I believe that’s true to life. The former is an easy scapegoat who’s suspected of all of that anyway, and the latter was “just doing his job.” It’s a shame.