The Good Wife does build slow; I got into the show by watching episode 6 or so and then backtracking to get the rest. What I like is the ambiguity of a lot of what's going on: what does Alicia actually feel for Peter? Is Peter guilty? Did Childs frame Peter? What is Kalinda's game (and orientation)? Why did Will hire Alicia? Is Cary as skeevy as he appears? Will the firm go down in flames, and if so, will Alicia go with it?
The acting is excellent, and the casting top-notch; recent guests have included Alan Cumming, Gary Cole, Joanna Gleason, Peter Reigert, ad Joe Morton. The legal stuff is simplified for tv, but still smarter (messier) than in most legal dramas--they spend time on unglamorous stuff like depositions and motions, and they often don't have all the information they need when they need it. There's a lot of believably frantic running-about as deadlines approach.
Finally, the show ultimately is, I think, about the conflicts faced by a lot of working women: balancing demands of motherhood versus the intellectual rewards of professional life, the danger of relying on a male partner for financial security, the conflicts that can arise from the use of outside child-care, the interference of office politics with personal relationships (and vice versa).
But on the surface, the show is about a big-old conspiracy and how that affects this one woman and her family, without making any of the effects simple.
So, that's why I like it. I am not fannish about it, I just think it's smartly done and well-acted.
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The acting is excellent, and the casting top-notch; recent guests have included Alan Cumming, Gary Cole, Joanna Gleason, Peter Reigert, ad Joe Morton. The legal stuff is simplified for tv, but still smarter (messier) than in most legal dramas--they spend time on unglamorous stuff like depositions and motions, and they often don't have all the information they need when they need it. There's a lot of believably frantic running-about as deadlines approach.
Finally, the show ultimately is, I think, about the conflicts faced by a lot of working women: balancing demands of motherhood versus the intellectual rewards of professional life, the danger of relying on a male partner for financial security, the conflicts that can arise from the use of outside child-care, the interference of office politics with personal relationships (and vice versa).
But on the surface, the show is about a big-old conspiracy and how that affects this one woman and her family, without making any of the effects simple.
So, that's why I like it. I am not fannish about it, I just think it's smartly done and well-acted.