The Fast & The Furious!

From car chases to court cases, this week’s episode of The Firm has loads to offer…..

This week, Mitch takes the case of Nate, an overly insecure teenager accused of armed robbery and murder, but when Nate’s brother is named as co-defendant Mitch must convince both his client and the district attorney that Nate should be a witness for the prosecution in a twisted race against the defense of the brother for a plea bargain. Inspired by her daughter’s school project, Abby wants to get in touch with her estranged parents. Tammy turns up the heat on Martin Moxon to get him to explain his cryptic clue, but the hotel meeting she manages to arrange between him and Mitch goes horribly wrong before Moxon is allowed to explain himself. Noble Insurance’s Kevin Stack presses Alex to do something about Mitch. The flashbacks catch up with the present and Mitch is detained as a suspect in Moxon’s “murder”.

The episode starts with Mitch being interrogated about Martin’s death by a stereotypical blustery cop, who seems completely incompetent to handle the investigation. Mitch points out that the hotel room door was obviously kicked in, which he didn’t do, and yet the cop is happy to put that aside and continue to treat Mitch as if he’s already been proven guilty.

A week earlier, (now we’ve reaches to the end of our countdown…YAY!) there’s a smash and grab robbery (literally) at a jewelry store, in which one of the perpetrators is recognized by someone in the store, so therefore he has to die. A short time later, one of the trio arrested for the crime happens to be the kid who delivers sandwiches to Mitch’s office, so he uses his one phone call to interrupt Mitch’s dinner. Predictably, the case is damning; Mitch educates the kid on the felony murder rule, which for those of you who are not criminal law geeks like myself, means that it doesn’t matter which of the three pulled the trigger – by agreeing to the commission of the robbery, they all share responsibility for the death. This show wouldn’t be dramatic if it was easy, right?

Mitch gets called in by the prosecuting attorney handling the case, who shows him and the other defense attorney security video from the robbery. The store owner recognized the shooter because that guy happened to be dating the owner’s daughter – and the prosecutor wants insurance by getting one of the other two defendants to testify against the killer. He’s playing the two defense attorneys against each other, because he, like the cop, is pretty much one-dimensional.

Mitch once again lets his moral compass guide him, deciding to choose a third option: collaborating with the other attorney to force the prosecution to take their clients as a package deal. This would be a great idea if he wasn’t stabbed in the back by his co-counsel five minutes later. Confronted by the two clashing attorneys, the prosecutor tells Mitch to “convince me your client deserves this second chance more than his brother. I can’t save both.”From that moment on, it’s up to Mitch, Ray and Tammy to campaign for their client. They dig up teachers, friends, neighbors and even the boys’ excuse for a mother in order to make their best argument to the prosecutor. This is a perfect opportunity for Josh Lucas to make another impassioned speech, in which Mitch ends up talking not about his client, but about himself and Ray, giving his brother the credit for making him who he is. Unfortunately for him, it doesn’t work, but his client later reveals something that his brother didn’t disclose: that there’s a “switch car” with a few guns in it somewhere.

Mitch and Ray go looking for the car, which has already been picked up by someone else, resulting in an awkward but hilarious car chase (it’s worth it just to hear Josh Lucas blurt out “bitch”). Ray eventually cuts off the other car, causing it to crash, and Mitch finds out his co-counsel is behind the wheel. Mitch brings this information to the prosecutor, who reverses course and tells the judge that they’ll make a deal with Mitch’s client. “You’re going to be okay,” Mitch reassures him, because he’s been there. And then he goes to that ill-fated meeting with Martin… and the rest is His Story!

Addict Verdict: “Chapter Seven” presents an interesting moral argument as it plays the two brothers against each other, even if it’s not novel (as Mitch says, this happens all the time).

Fix-You-Eyes-On-Me Scene: The car chase scene with Mitch And Ray driving is probably what got me hooked to my screen during the entire episode! If only the show was called The Firm & The Furious!

You’re selfish, Your Honour!

There isn’t much to say about The Firm this week. While an improvement over last week’s episode, the biggest thing about it was that we are now only two weeks (or episodes) away from catching up to those pesky flash-forwards. I’m really interested to see how the show will change at that point. Certainly being able to tell stories past a fixed point will free up the writers. Or will we just get another set of flash-forwards? I hope not.

The episode was pretty much stolen by Victor Garber as a politically-minded judge looking to pad his statistics for re-election. Garber just has that deep voice that commands attention even if he’s ordering at a McDonald’s drive thru. The best part of “Chapter Six” is the guest appearance from Garber, who was cool in Alias and flat-out amazing in Eli Stone. Watching him tangle with Lucas is a delight; he’s an adversary we love to hate. There have been plenty of smarmy judges, but Garber’s presence makes his all the more interesting. If this were Law & Order and he wasn’t an antagonist, I’d say he would be a perfect candidate to be a recurring judge.

When we last left The Firm, Mitch was being put in prison for throwing Martin (Sir Sniffs-a-lot) off of the hotel balcony.  We open this week with Mitch saying through the two-way glass, “I need to make a phone call.”  Mystery Man on the other side of the glass demands a swift conviction for Mitch.

This week, Mitch discovers ulterior motives when a judge offers leniency for his client; Claire tries to convince her parents she needs a cell phone; Tammy and Ray continue working on the Sarah Holt case.

As the opening credits rolled this week, I had a realization: I like this show.  I look forward to watching it each week. I am invested in these characters, and the mystery, and I want to know what happens!

In addition to what’s going on with Sarah, Mitch is also defending a man accused of burning down a nightclub that he was thrown out of. The man swears his innocence and claims that an incriminating fingerprint must have been planted. Judge Walter Dominic (Victor Garber) seems a little too sympathetic; he calls Mitch into chambers and convinces him to get his client to sign a jury waiver. Dominic unexpectedly convicts the defendant of assault and sentences him to eight years in prison. He insists to a livid Mitch that “I did you a favor.”

With help from Ray and Tammy, Mitch realizes that Dominic is trying to pad his stats for his re-election campaign, by sentencing only white defendants to prison time. How do they hold him accountable? While Mitch fakes an apology and Tammy distracts a secretary with a fake marriage idea, Ray sneaks his way into the judge’s chambers and narrowly escapes. Mitch then confronts Dominic, who realizes too late that he’s been bugged and all the incriminating stuff he’s just said has been heard by the FBI. Mitch’s client walks free and Dominic gets arrested.

We open with Claire giving arguments to her mom about why she should have a cell phone.  This feels very familiar to this former teacher, who often had arguments with her students about how cell phones weren’t really necessary at age 10.  Cute moment as Mitch smiles to himself at Claire’s use of note cards to lay out her argument—already a lawyer!  Later in the episode, when Claire gets lost at a museum, Abby realizes the importance of a cell phone, and decides to give one to Claire.  Bonus points: Claire didn’t bug me this episode!  She’s growing on me!

We are led to believe that Claire might have been taken by the Moralto crime family thug, who follows Abby, Claire, and the class to the museum, and proceeds to strike up a conversation with Claire. Turns out he is just continuing his spy mission, as he reports back to Moralto Jr. that the McDeeres are easy-to-reach. Junior says to leave them alone…for now.Tammy and Ray spend the episode working on the Sarah Holt more-than-it-seems case.  They find another piece of evidence that leads Mitch to a meeting with an insurance company.  In the meeting, Mitch meets Sir Sniffs-a-lot, and the Mystery Man from the beginning of the episode (who we learn is named Kevin). During the meeting, they brush Mitch off, but Sir Sniffs-a-lot passes on some secret numbers afterwards.

It’s also nice to see some of the pieces of the big picture come out this week. We’re down to two more episodes before the show catches up to the flash-forwards, so it was definitely time for us to meet Martin. And there really wasn’t much move on the mob angle until now, although I’m still trying to get a bead on how we’re supposed to feel about Joey. One moment it seems like he wants to be relatively normal, the next he’s making not-so-veiled threats. It goes back to what I’ve said before about still trying to get a read on the show’s villains. It’d certainly be interesting if Joey turned out to be a more sympathetic villain, much like Andrew, but I can’t quite figure out where the show is going with either of them.

Addict Verdict: Overall, Chapter Six is a fair entry in the season so far. It seems to really be setting up the next part of the story, as nothing really mind-blowing occurs in any of the cases. We usually see more background for the Case of the Week story, to give us a little more emotional resonance into the defendant, but even that was light so that they could focus on Mitch’s investigation of the judge.

Fix-Your-Eyes-On-Me Scene: I definitely enjoyed the Mitch/Ray/Tammy tag-team of the judge’s office, and the satisfying way that it was concluded. The information that we were given this week in the Sarah Holt case seemed to be building blocks for what is to come, but it wasn’t very interesting information. At least we finally got to meet Sir Sniffs-a-lot and learn how he plays into the story.

How long before your luck runs out?!

The Secret Circle came back with a bang this week! As in, bang bang, you’re dead! Find out who bit it, who got really smart, and who really screwed destiny with my “Lucky” Review! Here’s what happened this week:

Remember when Faye burnt down the gym? Despite Chance Harbor’s booming witch population, no one’s decided to magic away the damage yet. That’s not cool, guys! Witchcraft does not excuse anyone from civil responsibility! Still, we’re glad that the school decided to raise gym-fixing cash by throwing an ultra-glam Casino Night fundraiser (featuring booze!) because big parties = big drama.

Oh, and also,whatever Melissa’s been doing on her out-of-town trips appears to be working. Every time she opened her mouth this week, she laid down the ‘Smack down of Truth’. Diana needed to get out more! Faye needed to go after what she wanted! Jake needed to stop mooning over Cassie! I don’t know what’s gotten into Melissa but I like it!

This week, Blackwell claims he wants to protect Cassie as they bond over some black coffee (“the blacker the better!”), and she takes the opportunity to grill him about her childhood. Blackwell admits that he used to be completely evil, and warns Cassie not to use dark magic lest she go crazy. To spite him, she bends a cup with her mind. Sigh, just like Keanu!

After hanging with her pops, Cassie heads over to the coffee joint for her shift and chats with the Circle about how lucky she is to have her dad back. (As Britney Spears would say: She’s so lucky, she’s a star, but she cry cry cries in her lonely heart.) Clearly, more investigating needs to be done about what John Blackwell wants, so Cassie wanders over to the clubhouse only to find him trolling around suspiciously. It seems like Blackwell is looking for something, but we were slightly too distracted by the way he turned over a table in a fit of rage to notice what it was. Move over Jake, you officially have competition.

Meanwhile, Adam and Cassie are head-over-“the stars” in love with each other, but Adam doesn’t trust John Blackwell. He’s convinced that John is trying to locate a Sway that Nick found in the clubhouse before the Circle was formed. So, what’s a Sway? Oh, just a magical device that drains other witches of their powers. When Cassie confronts her dad, he explains that the Sway temporarily harnesses power so muggles can use it. Apparently, it’s how Eben killed everyone 16 years ago!

We’re thrilled that Adam and Cassie have embraced their astrological fate, but what about Diana “Forever Alone” Meade ? Poor girl is in desperate need of a makeout sesh, so Melissa encourages her to date a “normal” guy. Melissa and Diana head to The Boathouse to pick up supplies for Chance Harbor High’s Casino Night, and they meet Grant, a random hunk/professional wine connoisseur who has his eye on Diana. Melissa invites him to the party, but sadly Grant’s boating out of town (presumably to break in a new polo shirt) and can’t come. Oh well, at least Diana got to flirt with something other than Adam’s discarded eyelashes.

And you know how Faye hates when things don’t go her way? Just imagine how pissed she was when she discovered that Lee’s ex-girlfriend Eva was not only alive, but still very much in love with him. Lee joins Faye on the dance floor for some real talk, and their argument about Eva quickly turns into a makeout session. Yes, please! Unfortunately, Evil Eva walks in mid-kiss and calls Faye a “coping mechanism.” Ouch, Eva better watch her back — we’ve seen Faye kill before and it ain’t pretty. (Nope, we haven’t forgotten you, Sally Matthews!) Faye was able to steal a kiss from him at Casino Night — thanks to her own brand of natural lady magic — but the after-party wasn’t quite as much fun. Eva put a nasty little spell on Lee that appeared to suspend him in some sort of full-body cocoon, or it’s also possible she killed him. I guess we’ll have to wait and see!

We grieved the loss of Lee and his hotness, but the arrival new boy Grant helped to ease our pain. He sauntered into town on his yacht and proceeded to court the bejeezus out of Diana with his awesome Aussie accent and general air of adorableness. She tried to play it cool but she was falling for him big time. I support Diana getting back into the dating game but I’m a little concerned about Grant. He wears a lot of layers, which probably means he has something to hide. Or maybe he has a thyroid problem. I’m totally cool with that, by the way. Diana’s in her party planning element, and is thrilled when Grant shows up with a wad of gambling money. They proceed to flirt all night, and Grant even buys Diana a stuffed monkey, which prompts her to lay a kiss on him when they say goodnight. Awwww! In other news,

Meanwhile, Cassie’s convinced that Ethan’s a traitor, and she ends up having a huge fight with Adam after revealing her theory. As Adam storms off, Cassie heads over to Jake’s apartment to complain, and as soon as she leaves he rats her out to John Blackwell. Way to narc on your crush, Jake.

Blackwell rushes over to the school to find Ethan, but runs into Dawn instead and they have an intimate reunion by some unsuspecting lockers. Dawn is clearly infatuated with Blackwell, and she breathily asks him to join in her evil quest for power. Unfortunately, Blackwell is busy searching for Ethan, so he slams Dawn up against a locker and swaggers down the hallway with his signature overcoat billowing behind him. Why do we get the feeling Dawn will be downing a cauldron of wine later?

As Blackwell leaves the party fresh outta luck, Cassie runs after him and catches up just in time to see him get stabbed by Ethan. Naturally, Cassie chases Ethan through the school football field and almost bludgeons him to death before Blackwell stops her. That’s right, Ethan is a traitor — or is he? Blackwell convinces Cassie that Ethan simply has a case of the jellies, but then he heads over to Ethan’s wine cellar, where Ethan promptly admits to working for the witch hunters.

Blackwell promises to keep Ethan’s secret, but only if Ethan keeps Cassie’s dark magic to himself. Poor Ethan is desperate to have the last word, so he tells Blackwell how much Amelia hated him and then goes off on yet another tangent about how Cassie and Adam are written in the stars. Wrong again, Ethan. According to Blackwell, the Blakes and the Conants are cursed! Hmmm, now that we think of it, maybe it makes sense that Blackwell asked Cassie not to do magic anymore. No good can come of it….

Meanwhile, Adam heads over to Cassie’s house, drops the L-word (which she doesn’t return, awkward), grabs her butt, strips off his shirt, and they proceed to have crazy sex while a bunch of creepy birds land on Cassie’ roof. Just take a moment to process it.

In other news, Lee heads home to break up with Eva, only to find her fatal attraction-style crazy. She also seems to have magical powers as a by-product of waking up from her coma, and promptly turns Lee into a dead old man with her mind. Apparently, if she can’t have him, neither can Faye. Sigh, time to pour some diet coke out for our fallen homie. Give Nick a high-five when you get to stud heaven, Lee! Prepare to shed a studly tear, because the vice-president of Chance Harbor’s hunk-squad has been taken from us!

Addict Verdict: Darkness is upon us! The Secret Circle is clearly not afraid of handling dead bodies on regular basis! Only time will tell how far this deliberation takes us!

Fix-Your-Eyes-On-Me Scene: The hot steamy sex complimented with the creepy crows circling the Blake Mansion, makes for quite awaited scene!

Is what we have worth the pain?!

This week on Ringer,
Bridget fears that something has happened to Malcolm when she cannot get in touch with him. In an effort to find him, Bridget visits the hotel where Malcolm was staying and discovers on security footage that Andrew was the last person to see Malcolm before he disappeared and she suspects that Andrew may have killed Tyler as well as Malcolm. Meanwhile, Juliet discovers that her mother played a part in the attack on Tessa. Siobhan admits to Henry the reason she faked her death.

A lot of secrets were revealed and a lot of truth bombs were dropped in this week’s episode of “Ringer”. We finally have the background on why Siobhan went to all this trouble to disappear. After weeks of being the most inert, least melodramatic nighttime soap in recent memory, Ringer continues its upwards trend. ‘What We Have Is Worth The Pain’ is fast paced, leaves us with dangling questions (including a cliffhanger), and only insults our intelligence as viewers a few times (instead of the usual dozen).

Oh sure the reliance on flashbacks to remind us where and why objects and events are important is condescending (the hitman! the cell phone from the hitman! Ioan Gruffudd’s Andrew’s dutch angle entrance into Mike Colter’s Malcolm’s hotel room!), but let’s be honest: many of the events that set this story into motion occurred nearly fifteen episodes ago, so you just gotta have the refresher. I’ll admit that I’d forgotten about the cell phone Bridget (Sarah Michelle Gellar) took off the hitman at the party in episode 2 and I’m freakin’  recapping the show. Lord only knows how casual viewers are keeping up (which is sorta saying something considering there are still only about six characters on the show)!

The mystery of what happened to Tyler, where the flash drive went and what happened to Malcolm still loom large however. This week also gave Agent Machado something to do other than fall in love with clichés in sepia-toned flashbacks, and for that I’m glad. When Malcolm goes missing he freaks out, as once again his only witness has vanished into thin air. Machado has some pretty rank luck. Soon he’s realizing that all is not right at Martin Charles, where Andrew and Olivia are giving off a particularly strong whiff of serial killer today. By episode’s end, Malcolm is still in the wind after his cell phone is discovered on a homeless person and a text purporting to be from him lures Bridget to her near-death.

Just to add a little something, For all I know, during all this mindful mayhem, the actor who plays Malcolm, Mike Colter gets his agent on the phone to yell about how he’s only ever kidnapped or missing on this show. I can’t imagine that’s the way his part was originally pitched to him. What would that pitch be like do you think? “You’re going to spend the first part of the season tied to a chair and then the next part missing! It’s a very meaty role of sitting and not being on screen!” SOLD!

Now that we finally know of Siobhan’s evil plan, the show makes sense. You see, after Siobhan threatened Andrew with her knowledge of the Ponzi scheme six months ago, he threatened to kill her. So Siobhan was instrumental in setting Bridget up to take her place, even going so far as paying off the police officer that got Bridget to run in the first place.

She was under the belief that Andrew would kill Bridget and Siobhan would get time to gather evidence and then go to the police. With Bridget’s death proving that Andrew was willing (and able) to kill her, Siobhan would manage to have an iron-clad defense against Andrew’s money, power and lawyers. Also Bridget would be dead because of that time she agreed to go to a carnival and indirectly–yet not at all– killed Siobhan’s son.

Again, I’m disappointed they made Bridget’s role in the death of Siobhan’s son such a non-entity. This would be a much more compelling story if Bridget was indeed more directly responsible. It would make the story less of a black-and-white, good-and-evil tale and more ambiguous shades of grey. Siobhan’s actions still wouldn’t be justified, but they would at the very least be more understandable.

During all this plotting Andrew spends the episode finding every shady, scary looking corner in every room that he inhabits. Anywhere Bridget’s at, Andrew’s there lurking in a shadow somewhere about to say something ambiguously evil. So we’ve officially found out, it seems, that Andrew is not a good dude. Watching British television has sort of primed me to hear a British accent and imagine that I will be suddenly transported through time and to “Downton Abbey”, so this was slightly shocking for me. Yet there’s still some hope for him.

On the evil side he’s running a Ponzi scheme and he threatened to kill Siobhan six months ago. On the good side, he still loves his daughter and even when Siobhan-pretending-to-be-not-pregnant-Bridget-pretending-to-be-Siobhan (take a moment to get that!) told him she didn’t love him and she was turning him in, he still wanted to fight for their relationship. But, on the not-so-good side…what was he doing with Malcolm before he disappeared? Was he or Olivia responsible for Tyler’s death? They had the flash drive, after all, just not the correct one. Also there’s that Ponzi scheme and those death threats and all those mysterious shadows he keeps skulking into. Consider me on the fence in regards to Andrew’s evil.

Meanwhile, when Siobhan is not playing Bridget who is playing Siobhan (give it time, it grows on you),
Juliet finally figured out that her mother was behind Tessa’s attack and also that her mother is a horrible person. It took her a really, really long time to come to this conclusion. Now Mommy Dearest’s hired thug is after Juliet for more money.

Also, one of the most interesting developments in the plot arrives when Siobhan/Bridget’s driver Solomon now officially becomes the smartest person on this show. He immediately realized that Bridget wasn’t Siobhan because of how her behavior was all weird and then he collected her fingerprints from a glass to confirm his suspicions. A random driver managed to figure this out but Andrew is still totally in the dark. I really hope at some point we find out that Andrew has known all along. I’m not sure someone can be a criminal mastermind and a straight-up idiot at the same time.

At episode’s end Andrew takes a bullet intended for Bridget while Olivia flees out of town and Malcolm is still missing. So, Who tried to kill Bridget? It could be anyone or everyone on this show; she’s a popular person to want dead. Who did Olivia call on the phone? And, WHY was Henry pouring Siobhan a drink when he KNOWS that she’s having his TWINS??!

Addict Verdict: Ringer threw all of its characters into cars and had them follow each other in pursuit of Martin/Charles financial records and flash drives. It was entertaining, and slightly silly, but there was an energy that I’ve missed so much on the show. Is this the beginning of a new golden age of Ringer?

Fix-Your-Eyes-Me Scene: Siobhan reveals her true agenda behind her vengeance towards her sister to Henry! This scene shows why Sarah Michelle Geller is a force to be reckoned with! Her vulnerability stands out!!

Gather around people, its time for an American Horror Story!

American Horror Story is about a family and a house. The family consists of the Harmons (Connie Britton, Dylan McDermott, and Taissa Farmiga, Vera’s sister, who plays their teen daughter). They buy a big old house in Los Angeles that may be haunted and was definitely the site of some murders. The Harmons are troubled even before they move into the Big Scary House: Britton’s Vivien caught McDermott’s Ben (a psychiatrist) screwing one of his students a while back, so they’re still working through their trust issues. On top of that, Vivien is still trying to overcome the trauma of having recently delivered a stillborn child.

The above does not come close, however, to conveying the storytelling methods employed by creators and Glee exec producers Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk. Unlike most scary TV shows (and movies), which rely upon the rhythm of a few quiet scenes followed by a boo! fright every 20 minutes or so, AHS is pretty much all scare, all the time: a whole lotta screams, sex, jolts, mashed faces, psychotic behavior, and dead babies. On the basis of this and his Nip/Tuck, it’s difficult to escape the idea that Murphy has a thing about women’s bodies. He and his collaborators find endless ways to distort, alter, or torment them. A maid played by Frances Conroy (Six Feet Under) changes bodies with a younger, sexier version of herself (Alexandra Breckinridge). Taissa Farmiga plays the Harmons’ daughter, Violet, is a cutter. Jessica Lange eludes pain — thus far — as nosy next-door neighbor Constance. Indeed, she’s a malicious hoot, far more colorful than the morose characters McDermott and Britton play (McDermott with futile effort, Britton with cunning ease).  Add to this the dire warnings from a badly burned former occupant of the house (True Blood’s clever Denis O’Hare), and the murderous fantasies indulged by Ben’s teen patient Tate (an effectively troubled Evan Peters), and there’s a general air of moral rot and emotional ugliness permeating AHS.

The latest series from creator Ryan Murphy is a deeply disturbing adrenaline attack in which a haunted house provides metaphorical backdrop to a troubled marriage. Infused with a “Dark Shadows” and “Rosemary’s Baby” vibe, “American Horror Story” is one scream after another. So much creepy stuff happens in the first episode that viewers will be left asking: Can I possibly watch an entire series of this? Followed, of course, by a more obvious question: Why do they stay in that house?

Overdoing things is one of Murphy’s trademark flaws, but this show has a captivating style and giddy gross-outs. It also has Jessica Lange, who’s terrific (in both senses of the word) as a sinister neighbour.

Produced by 20th Century Fox; created and written by Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk; directed by Mr. Murphy; Mr. Murphy, Mr. Falchuk, Dante Di Loretto, executive producers; Jennifer Salt and James Wong, co-executive producers; Tim Minear, consulting producer; Chip Vucelich, line producer; Alexis Martin Woodall, producer; Jessica Sharzer and Brad Buecker, supervising producers.

Here’s a fact, even with all the zombies and the vampires, there’s always room for a good “American Horror Story.”

American Horror Story unravels in India with its Series Première on Thursday, March 15, 08:30 P.M. exclusively on FX! 

Loyalty & Lies!

This week’s The Firm starts off with a bang. In the present day, Mitch is being followed by the bad guys as he is on his way to meet up with Andrew. Mitch calls Andrew his friend, so hopefully in the past storyline we’ll see more of that develop in the next couple of weeks. Just before the bad guys catch up with him,  two men are about to pull guns on Mitch until BOOM!—a cop tackles him and arrests him for throwing Moxon off the roof, (which is not what actually happened). The scene is short and impactful and makes me wonder how exactly Mitch discovered the truth about Moxon, Sarah Holt and the shady firm he now works for. (On a side note, how effective is the APB system in Washington, DC? One was just put out on Mitch, and not 20 minutes later, a lone police officer is able to recognize and arrest him? DC must be the safest city in the nation!)

After the superb music and title sequence, “Chapter Five” transitions to 3 weeks earlier—at this rate, we are going to get to the present day quickly! We are visiting 3 cases this week: the Althea Sanderson heart stent case (the big medical settlement case which motivated Mitch to join forces with the firm), the Sarah Holt more-than-it-seems case, and

The Case of the Week: Mitch is defending Jud, a lawyer who also owns an illegal gambling bar. Jud is accused of killing the local loan shark, who had earlier paralysed his best friend over some money. Mitch is trying to get Jud acquitted based on the self-defence argument. There was a small moment where the Prosecuting Attorney congratulates Mitch on his rebuttal questioning that I really enjoyed. It reminds us that at the end of the day, both the prosecution and the defence are lawyers, and though they may be on opposite sides of the case, they can still appreciate each other’s skills in the courtroom. In an interesting twist, we learn that Mitch’s client really is innocent, but willing to go to jail for the crime anyway. “You can never know what the jury is thinking” is the overriding sentiment throughout this week’s episode, and I really was unsure how the jury was going to rule in the case.

His characterization helps forgive the usual plot twists in a typical dramatic trial. The prosecutors bring in a surprise witness to stab Mitch’s client in the back. Then in another twist, Jud reveals his friend who was paralyzed by the gangster actually is able to walk and was the one to shoot the gangster. Wait, what? It’s a little hard to believe that someone is faking paralysis and that Jud still refuses to admit that he might be going to jail for life. That’s where the unique luster at the beginning of the trial turns sour.

The heart stent corporation is offering a $200,000 settlement to Althea’s family, which seems like a great offer when you’ve got bills to pay, like Althea’s daughter has. Abby becomes the bulldog, telling the daughter to wait one more week to get a larger settlement. Abby gets convinced by Andrew that the firm is working hard to find the smoking gun that will get a large settlement for Althea’s family. Don’t be fooled, folks: Abby is still a teacher. Turns out, she handles most of the finances for Mitch’s business—and as a former elementary teacher, I can tell you that if she is a good teacher, she does not have time to handle lawyer billing as well. It does give her a little bit more reason to be involved in the cases, though. This case has a nice “In Yo Face” moment with a pompous medical attorney, and a great, emotional moment with the daughter when the case is resolved.

Ray continues to work on the Sarah Holt case while Mitch is working on the CotW. I hope he gets a good salary from this! While visiting Sarah in jail, he comes to the realization that Sarah might not be all that she claims to be. He also investigates Sarah’s apartment and finds evidence that Sarah might not be quite as removed from the murdered woman as she has led everyone to believe. Could Sarah have been hired to make contact with the dead lady? It is interesting to see the twists each week as this case gets more and more complicated.

Back in the present day, the unrelenting action comes to a grinding halt, as we watch Mitch being led into a witness interrogation room at the police station, and we get an end title.

Addict Verdict: Quite a unique case this week that presents many different facets. First, Mitch struggles to convince Jud, his client, to take a plea bargain. The client claims he’s innocent and only killed the gangster out of self defense. Second, the client’s background and motives are murky. A lot of police procedurals try to present confusing backgrounds, butThe Firm does a great job of shrouding clients in mystery.

Fix-Your-Eyes-Me Scene: For the first time in the series Mitch’s humorous flare in the courtroom shines through. So far he has been a sharp-witted lawyer, but while cross-examining a medical examiner he becomes cocky and almost treats the doctor in a demeaning way. Perhaps that’s why The Firm is able to compel a niche audience to return week after week.

Unforgettable…….. Literally!

Stop me if this sounds familiar: A former police detective who left the force after being unable to get over or solve the murder of a loved one is still a valuable consultant to the police because of freakish powers of observation, and is still driven by a determination to find that loved one’s killer.

It’s just possible the new cop procedural “Unforgettable,” starring Poppy Montgomery (“Without A Trace”), will be the female equivalent of “The Mentalist.” With a twist.

Did I just hear you wonder, “Someone has brought back ‘Monk’?” No, instead, someone has given Mr. Monk a sex change and replaced the humor of his show with a simmering romance. The series, which has its premiere on Thursday on STAR World, is called “Unforgettable,” and because the structure and plot points are so familiar, whether it succeeds will depend largely on the appeal of its star, Poppy Montgomery.

And she’s reasonably appealing, at least in the previews. Ms. Montgomery knows something about police work from her years as an F.B.I. agent on “Without a Trace.” Here she moves up to the central role: she is Carrie Wells, who has a bizarre ability to remember everything. You can almost hear Adrian Monk saying, “It’s a gift — and a curse.”

Montgomery plays Carrie Wells, a former detective who has a special ability and also, of course, a special curse. She has a rare condition called hyperthymesia, which allows her to recall in precise detail every moment, conversation and detail of her past. She can replay these memories, zoom in for clues and replay dialog in her head while walking around in the virtual scene-a cool trick neatly dramatized with digital technology onscreen.

As the promo suggests, when her neighbor is murdered, and Carrie is the only witness, it appears her special skills will be called upon. She doesn’t want to open herself to that painful morass again. That’s when Dylan Walsh appears as Al Burns, lead investigator in the neighbor’s murder case. It seems Al and Carrie were an item back in Syracuse; he knows her involvement would be key to solving the case. He is able to lure her back into detective work, and the chase is on.

Another well-crafted cop procedural. Providing a neatly wrapped week-to-week caseload plus an over-arching personal mystery, “Unforgettable” seems to have the formula down pat. Maybe too pat.

Unforgettable premieres, Thursday, March 8, 9PM, exclusively on STAR World!