A Televisual Feast

A concept episode. Woo-hoo. A documentary team follows the firm as they try to save a black guy on death row for killing a white girl. The dramatic problem? The format–the documentary team, who only get their boom mikes in the shot after commercial breaks–determines the conclusion immediately. I mean, is there any suspense to […]

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A solid episode, but a little too cute. It ties up loose ends and introduces big surprises in what appears to be an attempt to change the series ground situation. It’s pretty good–a couple decent surprises–but I’m not comfortable with “The Practice” pulling out big surprises, good or not.
A lot of the episode’s quality has […]

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Eugene and Bobby defend a black guy who killed (manslaughter) a white security guard during a store riot. The guard’s death is a story development, changing their defense tactics–and pushing everything else in the episode aside. Not that there was much else going on in the episode, just some more of Bobby dating Helen and […]

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The airing hijinks have left me suspect. This episode opens with ‘previously on’ references to both (production order) first season and second season episodes and I can’t figure out if Kelley wrote knowing the airing order or not. I’m not sure it matters, since most of the references have to do with dating between members […]

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Another messy episode. I paid attention this time and noticed no Lara Flynn Boyle in the opening credits, which means ABC just ran the first season leftovers during the second. It doesn’t really matter, except to show how little thought went into it (how many series did Kelley have on back then, four?). With four […]

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Big surprise ending as they burn off first season episodes (look at Bobby’s changing hairstyle). Besides Bobby’s big surprise case, there’s lots of Bobby bonding with Judge Linda Hunt, which is fine enough, but it really doesn’t do much. His case is interesting, but it just seems a wee bit too much for the show. […]

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A nice episode. Jimmy gets a case–oh, and I didn’t mean nice in the above adequate sense, but in the sentimental and pleasant sense–a girl bitten by a doctor’s dog, Eugene has to get off another guilty client (to win two more bets) and Ellenor and Lindsay get involved in jury tampering (technically). The end […]

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Hmm. Here’s an odd one. When Kelley has to pick between making Boyle and Bobby–I’m actually wondering if and when I’ll think of her as Helen–the protagonist of the episode (and maybe, in a “Crime Story” sort of way, the series protagonist)… he goes with Boyle. It’s an odd choice, out of place for the […]

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Kelley brings “The Practice” back up to snuff–in fact, maybe even exceeding any previous snuff–the second episode of the second season. It’s clever and emotionally affecting. Oddly, it does so well because Bobby takes a back seat to the rest of the characters. Rebecca, Lindsay and Eugene help Jimmy out with a case only Jimmy […]

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I always talk about stories–movies usually–shortcutting at the end, getting to a level they didn’t quite build to… I don’t think I’ve ever seen a TV episode try to do it before, but Kelley tries to get away with it here and it doesn’t work. It works okay (maybe a half point), but it doesn’t […]

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