The Good Wife Dusts Off Her Old Routine For Peter's Trial

Just in time for no one left to care about it: the time has come for Peter's trial! We see that Diane has taken over from Mike as Peter's lead counsel as Connor Fox gives his opening statement. It's a lot of blah blah about how easy it can be for one to lose one's moral compass, and that Peter's life was "a pyramid scheme of moral laxity" enabled by people like Eli and Alicia -- which, if you've been watching the show, is kind of hard to dispute...

...and yet it's Diane's job to try: when Connor throws shade at the theatre Alicia's putting on -- "Now, Mrs. Florrick will be sitting behind her husband every day in court; in this way, the defense wants you to think warmly of Governor Florrick: if his wife stands beside him, he can't be that bad!" but that jurors need to resist the temptation to think that way because "Alicia Florrick is part of a criminal conspiracy" -- Diane objects: "If she were not here, you would point to that as suspicious." (Also, considering it's pretty inflammatory to say that Alicia's part of a criminal conspiracy, it's kind of surprising that it never comes up again?)

But our quirky jurist this week is Judge Cuesta, who is over all this shit already. He shows Diane that he's keeping a tally of how many times each attorney "provokes a round of cross-talk," with the worse offender being charged with contempt and fined $10,000 per day.

When Diane sits back down, Peter mutters to her that Cuesta has hated him for years. Diane agrees that this isn't going to be a cake-walk. And yet -- spoiler alert -- you're about to see the whole thing get wrapped up in just three outfits!

Do You Like Me? Check Yes Or No, Or Don't, Whatever

In the middle of Connor's direct on Lloyd Garber -- the Florrick campaign donor/father of the defendant in the case Peter's currently accused of having fixed -- Jason texts Alicia to ask how it's going...

...but she decides against answering thanks to a dirty look from a juror, leaving him back in the conference room at (for now) LAL to act, for a nosy Lucca, like it's no big deal. Considering that she has had basically no interaction with Alicia since the two of them ditched their own firm to join back up with Diane et al, Lucca seems very invested in matchmaking Jason and Alicia; when he says she didn't answer, Lucca immediately demands, "Did you piss her off?" "She's in 'Mrs. Florrick' mode for the trial, that's all," murmurs Jason. Lucca then asks whether he thinks Peter did it, which, considering we're about to see her acting as his attorney in court, seems like kind of an inappropriate question. Jason says he doesn't know, to which Lucca notes, "I think Alicia thinks he didn't, but if he goes to prison, that wouldn't be bad for you." But they don't really get a chance to dig into this matter...

...because a couple of construction workers stride into the room and start tearing down a wall. THE SHOW IS ENDING SO EVEN THE ACTUAL SETS ARE BEING DESTROYED, GET IT? "More expansions," Jason surmises. Since I have never worked in an office where even a routine fire drill wasn't announced several days in advance, he and Lucca seem pretty unruffled by and incurious about this very disruptive event?

Turn Down For What?

Who called the meeting? Connor.

What's it about? A plea offer he wants Alicia to bring to Peter: eight years. (That "three years" offer doesn't seem so bad now, huh.)

How'd it go? Bad, but at least it's fast. Alicia refuses to take the offer, though given that she's not Peter's attorney, I'm not sure she actually has that authority. "Your husband did it, Mrs. Florrick," Connor spits. "Then prove it!" Alicia shoots back. "Seriously. I've defended enough people to know how shallow those words are. I don't care what you believe. I care what you can prove. So prove it." "I have a surprise witness, Mrs. Florrick!" Connor calls after her as she stomps out. Alicia:

You're going to roll your eyes too when you see how utterly unsurprising this witness actually is.

And The Walls Came A-Tumbling Down

Eye-roll notwithstanding, the threat does land: Alicia immediately calls Jason about this surprise witness, which she assumes is going to be Cary. This is also the first she hears of the construction at the office -- literally, she can hear it in the background while she's talking to Jason -- so her next call is kind of a testy one, to Diane.

Diane's in the middle of a chat-up lunch with female attorney Shannon Janderman about joining this exciting new all-female-name-partner firm when she gets Alicia's call, and Alicia's report of walls getting sledgehammered is also news to Diane.

Okay, but for real, Diane doesn't have an assistant who would have called her in a frenzy the second the first fleck of dust hit the carpet? I guess we're taking a sledgehammer to realism in our last days in the office, too!

Flip Or Flop

Situation: The (for now) LAL offices have been smashed to pieces because no one who works there has any fucking sense. (Also because the construction workers are maybe illiterate: the work they were doing was supposed to have been done on another floor of the building.)

What makes it awkward? This Ms. Janderman, Esq. is supposed to come for another meeting with Diane the next day, and Diane seems to be of the opinion that the firm is not going to seem like a great place to work if it's covered in crumbled-up drywall.

How is order restored? Of course the firm has insurance, so this error will be dealt with sometime this millennium, probably. But, looking upward on her way back to court...

...Diane gets the notion to turn this crisis into a crisitunity, suggesting to Alicia that they expand into the 29th floor like they'd wanted to do eventually anyway. "We should expand because we decide to expand, not because someone accidentally destroyed our conference room," says Alicia. Diane: "Why not?" Because people still have to work there while the renovations are going on and you have no plan OH WAIT, I FORGOT THIS IS ONLY GOING ON FOR LIKE SIXTY MORE MINUTES OF AIRTIME AT THIS POINT, NEVER MIND.

Welcome To The Back Channel

Who called the meeting? Louis.

What's it about? The trial -- specifically, what part his client Cary may or may not play in it.

How'd it go? Alicia's a bit reserved, which is understandable given that Cary's former colleague Matan is currently on the stand reading Peter to filth for all his micromanagement of the Locke case. Also, people in the halls seem to recognize her and are giving her the hairy eyeball the whole time she's talking to Louis. But she stays on task, asking if Cary's going to testify against Peter. "Is Peter scapegoating Cary?" asks Louis. "No," says Alicia. "Then no," says Louis. Alicia thinks that means they're okay, but Louis tells her she has a problem: "Peter is guilty....The AUSA has proof. They have a witness not on the list." Alicia is dubious until Louis says it's Geneva Pine: "If she testifies, Peter goes to prison." Alicia asks what she could say. Louis: "Everything." I hope you like information getting dribbled out in tiny amounts you only see on TV due to people asking no obvious follow-up questions, because that's this episode in a nutshell!

Wayward Pine

Situation: Alicia needs someone to dig into Geneva -- find out what she might say, and whether there's any dirt Peter's defense team could use against her should she take the stand.

What makes it awkward? There's only one investigator in Chicago, and since he's fucking Alicia, taking work on behalf of her estranged-ish husband isn't his favourite thing to do. Also, Alicia has to muddy the professional waters by going straight from her request for Jason to do her this favour to the fact that she's still thinking about what he told her about not wanting to get stuck, but wanting to be with her. Does this have to be in the same conversation, lady? Damn. Anyway, she doesn't know how to reconcile Jason's seemingly opposite desires, and she needs time to think about it, because she doesn't like to be "untethered." And then it seems like she's going to try to get him to come back up and bone her on top of the rebar in what's left of her office but he's like, gotta go HELP YOUR SHADY HUSBAND, SORRY.

And help her shady husband he does, going straight to Emily Parkes, a Cook County's Assistant State's Attorney, to ask what the deal is with Geneva. She very readily tells him that the SA's office is like a family, with a papa and a mama and a bunch of kids; when Peter was there, he was the papa, and Geneva was the mama, and had access to all the cases. How? "She was sleeping with him....Longtime affair. From what I hear, she was sleeping with him up to a month ago. That's why she's testifying: he broke it off with her." So it's also awkward for Jason now to have what is, as far as he knows, a brand-new name to add to the list of Peter's sidepieces, and to have to decide whether he's going to tell Alicia when he's not sure whether she'll be hurt by it or what.

How is order restored? The information will come to Alicia by other means, as we're about to see in just a second, but Jason doesn't know that, so when he reports to Alicia on his findings, he just tells her he has an affidavit that states that Geneva bullied her way onto cases she wasn't involved in, and that maybe she had some issues with back taxes. Alicia's like, "Nothing about her sleeping with Peter?" and Jason takes a long beat before saying there wasn't anything he could confirm independently. (What...would there be? Videos?) Anyway, Jason tells Alicia he's in an awkward position, adding, "And I think I'm done." "What does that mean?" asks Alicia, alarmed. "I can't be doing this for your husband anymore" is what he says, but although Alicia interprets this to mean only that Jason doesn't want to do any more investigative work for Peter and Jason doesn't correct her, I'm not totally sure that's all he's done with.

Geneva's Anything But Neutral

While Geneva takes the stand to describe the ways she saw Peter torpedo the Locke case -- claiming Locke was about to confess when Peter appeared and encouraged him to lawyer up; saying Peter pledged to hunt down the missing bullets that caused the mistrial, but that he never did -- Louis calls Alicia back out for another chat in the hall, where he is armed with affidavits.

What To Do When Your Client's Pulled Another Boner

Who called the meeting? Probably Diane.

What's it about? Trial strategy following Geneva's testimony.

How'd it go? Kind of cringey. While Eli and Diane discuss how they can undercut Geneva, Alicia zones out, gazing at Peter pacing in the hall, before snapping back to attention to advise that Diane try to impugn Geneva's motive. "How?" asks Eli. Alicia: "She was sleeping with Peter. These are affidavits from co-workers saying Peter broke up with her. And she's trying to get back at him. Goes to motive." Eli and Diane:

That's when Peter comes back in saying he's got someone looking into Geneva's background, oblivious to the fact that Alicia's just outed him as a whore (AGAIN) in his absence. Alicia serenely fills Peter in about the affidavits attesting to his affair with Geneva, which Peter denies...

...but then Eli and Diane are like WE'VE GOT A THING, leaving Alicia to take Peter to another shell of a room to urge him to use the affidavits against Geneva. Peter refuses, insisting that there's nothing to them, and sideswiping Jason by guessing this allegation came from him. The meeting ends with Peter standing firm in his defiance of Alicia's advice. But did he really not have an affair with Geneva or is he just a reflexive liar at this point? And will we find out before the series ends? AND DO WE CARE?!

Shoot First, Ask Questions Several Years Later

Who's causing a family crisis? Diane.

How? Since so much is being made of these missing bullets, she wants Kurt to testi-lie, basically, about the ballistics report he had prepared back then.

Which relative has a problem with it? Kurt, for a variety of reasons. For starters, he takes his reputation seriously. For another, his original report was "deliberately impenetrable," as Diane describes it, because he didn't get to do all the testing he would have wanted due to the bullets' having gone missing, so he's not 100% confident taking a position on them either way. He also doesn't agree with Diane that Peter -- "a Democratic governor being judged by a Democratic jury" -- is being "railroaded" in this case. But Diane implores him: "You're an expert witness. If your opinion arises out of your expertise, that's something....I'm just asking you to give your preliminary opinion in a manner that is helpful to my defense."

So then what? Kurt agrees to testify. With Lucca and not Diane questioning him on direct, for obvious reasons, Kurt very grudgingly admits that while his findings were preliminary, what he saw suggested that the bullets did not come from Locke's gun -- in which case, if the theory is that Peter was trying to torpedo the case against Locke, it wouldn't make sense for him to have "lost" the bullets that would have helped exonerate Locke.

But then Connor rebuts Kurt's testimony by calling Holly Westfall, who says that Kurt didn't get a chance to say that false negatives are very common, and to suggest that he massaged his testimony to benefit Diane. She also says that Cary was the one who handled the evidence, so: so much for any side deal Alicia may have thought she had with Louis.

But that's less important than the idea that Diane may have finally pushed her advantage with Kurt waaaaaaay too far.

How is order restored? Diane tearfully crawls into bed with a sleeping Kurt and promises, "I will make you happy every day of your life, but please forgive me. Please."

Phew! Love is not dead. Not even after an unwelcome middle-of-the-night wake-up, which is probably more than I could say for my own marriage. (Pulling a Diane on me while I was sleeping would be a good way for my husband to get his arm ripped off.)

Proud Cary Keep On Burnin'

Holly having failed to keep Cary's name out of her mouth, Cary's been called to testify, and he confirms that the assistant SAs did discuss the bullets in the Locke case: "We knew the bullets damned Peter." "...You mean Locke," Connor checks. "Yes," says Cary after a moment. "My apologies. Locke." CAREFUL, CARY, YOUR BIAS IS SHOWING. On cross, Lucca asks whether Cary doesn't hate the Florricks, and he's basically like, doesn't everybody? But when she asks whether that doesn't suggest that all his testimony is suspect, he doesn't agree: "I'm telling the truth." "As you see it?" Lucca asks. "Yes, of course," says Cary. "That's all I have to offer here. The truth as I see it." And afterward, Alicia and her most wounded expression find him in the hall.

Dear Mister President, Lucca Makes A Better Romantic Prospect For Jason Than Alicia Does. I Am Not A Crackpot!

I am not a crackpot, but the more Lucca keeps trying to nudge along Alicia's relationship with Jason, the more it shows how much better Lucca and Jason get along. He's a no-drama guy, and that's, like, all Alicia brings to the table. To wit: Lucca and Jason meet for drinks and to chat about Peter's case. Lucca thinks Peter's in trouble and may actually go to prison. When Jason comments that Peter's supposed to be Lucca's client, she says she knows, but that "the facts aren't co-operating." She adds that Alicia is a rock, but adds, "If he goes to prison, she'll need a looooooot of comforting." But Jason has a different take on the situation: "He goes to prison, she'll never divorce him. Ever....She will visit him every week in prison. She will slowly drift away from me. And she will be the stoic spouse." "And if he doesn't go to prison?" Lucca asks. "She'll divorce him," says Jason immediately. Lucca asks, then, which outcome he wants. Before he can answer, she lays out the situation: though he tries to fit the mold of a hard-bitten PI, he's actually fallen in love with Alicia: "Tell me it's not true, and I'll leave you here drinking, all by your lonesome." "It's not true," says Jason. But Lucca doesn't believe him: "Stop playing it cool. You want her? Go to her and say, 'I want you. I'll protect you. You don't owe your husband anything. Be happy. Come to me! Make me happy.'" But is it possible that Lucca might actually be feeling all this for Jason HERSELF?! I just like these two together! I am not a crackpot!

Prep For Landing

Peter having decided he needs to testify on his own behalf because the jury hates him and thinks he's a coward, Alicia has agreed...and volunteered to prep him herself. They cover all the obvious points, with Alicia giving him helpful direction: at one point his answer is, she says, too belligerent, and she reminds him that he's the governor and should be dignified. She then goes for the jugular: "As a man who was convicted of using state funds to pay for prostitutes, why should we take your word for anything?" "My conviction was overturned and I was fully exonerated," says Peter. "So are you saying that you never paid for prostitutes, never cheated on your wife, never broken every promise you ever made?" she asks. When he doesn't answer -- just glaring at her, seething -- she turns off her combative prosecutor voice and calmly explains, "It goes to character. To your trustworthiness."

But then it turns out Peter does have a good answer: "I believe I've been upfront about this. I did pay for prostitutes, I did cheat on my wife, and I've worked every day to make up for those indiscretions....And that is one of the reasons why, when I was voted back into office, I spent every day trying to make sure there was not a single bad conviction. Because I saw what bad convictions did to families. Did to me. Did to my wife. And I swore that I would never let that ever happen again."

"Is that true?" asks Alicia, dropping out of character again. Peter says it is: "It's also true that I micromanaged this case. Guilty. But that's what you should want from a State's Attorney: someone who won't accept excuses for failure to mirandize, or allow for bad evidence collection." "Someone who loses bullets!" says Alicia, getting back on task. "That was just a mistake," says Peter wearily. "You say that you have worked hard every day to make up for the indiscretions of the past," says Alicia, bringing up the affidavits. Peter says Diane would object, but Alicia reminds him that Judge Cuesta hates Peter and would allow it. Peter gets heated: "At what point are we playing husband and wife here and at what point lawyers?" "All points!" hisses Alicia. "Because here's the thing! You get up on that stand and every past indiscretion will be determined admissible!" She enumerates his recent (alleged) intercourse friends -- Geneva; Marilyn Garbanza; Ramona Lytton -- while he denies them (...well, the first two, at least). When Peter tries to clap back with her affairs with Will and with Jason, Alicia snaps, "I'm not on trial, buddy."

But Peter is, and we slam straight to him on the stand, being cross-examined by Connor. It hews, of course, very closely to what Alicia went over with him, and when Connor asks whether Peter's actually learned from his mistakes, including the ones in his personal (sex) life, and why anyone should believe him ever again, it perfectly sets up Peter's own closing statement: "Because I went to prison. Because I was wrongly convicted....Am I a flawed individual? Yes. Have I done things in my personal life that I regret? Yes. Deeply. But I never wanted anyone to go through what I went through, and that is why I was a hardass State's Attorney. That's why I threw out bad confessions. That's why I micromanaged. But that's when I was at my best. That's when I was most honourable." Alicia:

And then I guess the trial is over because Judge Cuesta is charging the jury!

David, who's been bitching throughout the episode about Diane's discriminatory choice not to staff up with male lawyers, interrupts Diane's meeting with her architect to try to get her to sign an EEOC complaint: "What? I have just as much right to complain as any minority." Lucca:

Exactly. But I'm going to miss this little jack-o'-lantern.

And then Greg Cady from the Department of Buildings appears with some bad news! Those construction workers weren't only so dumb they couldn't read which floor they were on: they were also so dumb they knocked down a load-bearing wall! Everyone on this floor's going to have to evacuate!

With immediate effect, apparently!

Connor wanders into the zoo-y (for now) LAL offices to find his way to Alicia and offer a new deal: two years! She should know, he says, that the jury could sentence Peter for a lot longer! He urges her to sell it to Peter before the jury comes back!

And then Eli, Alicia, and Peter are discussing the offer -- or, rather, Eli is talking a lot while Peter silently gazes into his shitty future! Alicia notices and sends Eli out, getting glasses and pouring them each some red wine. After Peter confesses that he never liked wine and only drank it because she liked it (which, weird, the Alicia of Season 7 would have obviously far rather he stuck to scotch or club soda or tap water if it meant she got to keep more booze for herself), he breathes, "Two years. I was in there for only eight months and almost died." "Wait for the verdict, Peter," Alicia advises. But he replies that if he does, he might get ten years and ACTUALLY die in prison. He asks what she thought of the jury, and she tells him honestly that she thought they were judging not just him but her too, but that his speech went over well. "There's no good answer, is there," Peter mopes. "I don't know what to say," says Alicia. "I'm not good at gambling. Don't decide yet, Peter. The jury's retired. Just sleep on it."

But he doesn't need to: "I'm going to take the deal. It's the smart thing to do. Two years. I'll get out, write a book, start over. You gonna come visit me?" "I will," Alicia promises, and I guess she does think there's a good chance the jury's going to convict him if she's not even kind of trying to talk him out of this. "The hardest thing is being forgotten," Peter tells her. "I won't forget," she replies. So Jason was right. Oh, Alicia. You...good wife. (If that ends up being the point of all this...god, what a bummer.)

And then Alicia's phone buzzes. "The jury's back." AND WE'RE BACK ON A CLIFF. HANGING. It feels like I should care what the outcome is? But wow, I just really, really don't.