ARTS & CULTURE
Monday, October 13, 2015 11
TV L Rev
A bi-weekly roundup of legal television
Week of 28 September – 1 October
henry limheng › staff writer
W
elcome to T V L Rev, a bi-weekly
review column of scripted legal television shows currently airing. Lawyers
and shows about them are an enduring staple of television content. Spanning genres from
serious dramas to comedies, there is always a legal
show somewhere on television. There appears to be
something inherently dramatic about the legal profession, the often cited “courtroom drama” where
conflict is naturally found. There are many juicy ideas
inherently in law: lawyers as both heroes and villains,
the murky idea of “justice,” and a stage where battles are fought with wits and words over brawn. That
said, most legal shows are rarely about the law and
legal peculiarities, but rather about the human actors
behind them.
Anyway, less pondering the cultural significance
of legal TV and more reviewing.
Being relatively early in the new TV season, heavyweights Suits and The Good Wife are yet to come back
to the airwaves leaving, only two relative newcomers
to hold down the fort.
Beware mild spoilers for How To Get Away with
Murder and The Grinder below.
How To Get Away With Murder
Airs: Thursday, 10pm – CTV; ABC
How To Get Away With Murder (HTGAWM) returns
for a second season. A modest success in its first
season with praise for its diverse cast and lead performance by Emmy-winner Viola Davis, the show
involves a disparate group of first year law students
interning with their intimidating criminal law
professor, competing with each other for classroom
glory and, oh yeah, trying to get away with a murder.
Full disclosure, I have only seen the first few episodes the first season, so I’m jumping into the second
season without the entire context.
Episode 1 – It’s Time To Move On
It’s probably impossible to summarize the plot given
the multilayer conspiracies going on, but here’s my
best shot: the convoluted story picks-up soon after
the end of the last season, the group has seemingly
gotten away with covering up a murder for the time
being (success measured by framing an innocent
person and causing someone else to get murdered)
and Professor Keating (Viola Davis) is trying to return
a semblance of normality to the shaken-up group…
while covering up yet another murder.
The main plot of the first episode is spent exploring
character threads, and a side-plot of the crew stealing the clients of a high-profile murder case using less
than ELGC-approved methods. And instead of drawing out the mystery behind the murder that occurred
at the end of last season, the killer is revealed in episode one and instead the show sets up its season-long
mystery as a dramatic flash-forward of— dun dun
duh—Professor Keating being left for dead, bleeding
out with a gunshot wound.
HTGAWM is a show I want to like more, primarily
because it’s about law students. Not the best episode
for new initiates as the story chugs forward seamlessly from the previous season, making a Netflix
catch-up mandatory to get the full enjoyment. That
said, the commitment to breaking conventional TV
diversity and the overly serious tone with the over the
top plot, makes the show an entertaining if not a particularly intellectual watch.
The Grinder
Airs: Tuesday 8:30pm – CityTV; Fox
The Grinder is a new legal comedy premiering this
Fall. It stars Fred Savage (best known for playing the
sick kid in the Princess Bride movie) playing Stewart
Sanderson as a young Idaho lawyer who has an encyclopaedic knowledge of the law, but is a terrible
courtroom advocate because he lacks self-confidence.
Rob Lowe (best known most recently for playing
Chr