"Paul Levinson's It's Real Life is a page-turning exploration into that multiverse known as rock and roll. But it is much more than a marvelous adventure narrated by a master storyteller...it is also an exquisite meditation on the very nature of alternate history." -- Jack Dann, The Fiction Writer's Guide to Alternate History

Friday, October 19, 2012

The Good Wife 4.3: "Template Based Link Analysis Algorithm"

Another sassy, technologically hip episode 4.3 of The Good Wife last Sunday, featuring Dominic Chianese, of Sopranos Uncle Junior fame, as an elderly hard-of-hearing judge trying a high-powered case at the cutting edge of social media and how they can operate in our society.

It was a good night for Chianese, with simultaneous appearances in The Good Wife and Boardwalk Empire, both on at 9pm Eastern (see my review of Boardwalk Empire).  Chianese was especially excellent as the judge on The Good Wife, turning out to be totally on top of the high-tech courtroom action, signalling his command with a comment about "a template based link analysis algorithm".

The case involves manipulating Google searches to bury adversaries in the search results.  Like all the episode on The Good Wife this year, last Sunday's was ripped from the headlines, to borrow a phrase usually used for Law and Order.  With  Presidential election day just a few weeks from now, last Spring's Republican primary, and the possible ascendency of Rick Santorum in that process, seems long ago.  But when Santorum looked to be riding high, a manipulation of Google to give an unpleasant result in searches on his name - a piece of clever, nasty work which actually had been done a few years ago - achieved more than a little attention in some places.

On The Good Wife, Will gets a lesson in what can be done to anyone with a sufficiently technologically sophisticated adversary.  Will's  not only buys off his clients, but rigs Google so that searches on Will's name bring up a "disbarred lawyer" tag.  Not likely to help the firm in its quest to become financially solvent.

Fortunately, Alicia has better results in her personal affairs.  Not only does no one have evidence of her and Will's affair, but when an intern claims she slept with Peter, Kalinda gets her to unwittingly reveal that she was lying.  This leads to a  great next-to-last scene in which Alicia kisses Peter (the last scene was Will searching on his name).

But speaking of reunions, Kalinda and her husband's is wearing thin already.  I'd much rather see Kalinda working cases, than going through lame kinky scenes with the husband.

Hey, if you like Dominic Chianese, he's an lengthy video interview I did with him several years ago, about his work on The Sopranos:




transcript
of the interview




See also The Good Wife 4.1 Meets Occupy Wall Street ... The Good Wife 4.2: Reunited

And see also The Good Wife 3.1: Recusal and Rosh Hashanah ... The Good Wife: 3.2: Periwigs and Skype ... The Good Wife 3.7: Peter v. Will ...  Dexter's Sister on The Good Wife 3.10  ... The Good Wife 3.12: Two Suits  ... The Good Wife 3.13 Meets Murder on the Orient Express ... The Good Wife 3.15: Will and Baseball

And see also  The Good Wife Starts Second Season on CBS ... The Good Wife 2.2: Lou Dobbs, Joe Trippi, and Obama Girl ... The Good Wife 2.4: Surprise Candidate, Intimate Interpsonal Distance ... The Good Wife 2.9 Takes on Capital Punishment ... The Good Wife 2.16: Information Wars

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