What I’m Watching: The Good Wife

The Good Wife: Season 7, Episode 5 “Payback” (B)

This was a perfectly fun and engaging episode, but some parts of this show feel hopelessly cyclical in an irritating way. The main offender is Eli, who every episode tries to butt in and get back into Peter’s good graces, and even after being proven wrong following his childish standing on his desk to eavesdrop on Ruth and Peter’s conversation and Alicia actually firing him, he’s not going anywhere. Instead, he’s only making things worse, whispering in Alicia’s ear so that she’ll incite a debt strike and turning down his pushy daughter’s very helpful procurement of a cushy job running an Israeli campaign. I hope that this will be the last of the rivalry between Howard and Cary, since it’s been entertaining but also a distraction. Howard’s eagerness to classify Cary’s every comment as a slander against his old Jewishness was amusing, but ultimately this seems to have gotten him to work harder, which is what everyone wanted anyway. The case that Alicia and Lucca took on was the most interesting part of the episode, as they first realized that it was a scammer who got their client’s money when she insisted that she paid it, and then it spiraled into an attempt to paint the school as an illegitimate and illegal organization with a whole horde of disgruntled, unsuccessful students ready to testify and try to get their debts forgiven. The most intriguing element of this show at this point is Jason, whose smirk says so much. His investigative tactics truly do rival Kalinda’s, and now it seems that he’s about to embark on a more intimate relationship with his grateful employer.