TV Review: Suits Season 3 Episode 11 "Buried Secrets"

I"ve decided to pick up and review Suits as it returns for the end of season 3.

I've always loved Suits since the pilot. The meshing of the two worlds - Mike's brilliant but slacker druggie life with the life of Harvey Specter the best closer in New York City - makes for compelling television.

Each character, from Donna to Louis to Rachel to Jessica have all shined alongside the leads. Throw in some guest stars like David Constabile, Wendell Pierce, and Abigail Spencer, and you have a recipe for a great show.

Suits quickly took over as my favorite USA Network show, replacing White Collar. White Collar to me burned through too much plot too fast, and started to spin their wheels.

After Neal escaped one season finale then somehow comes back, I just stopped caring. On Suits they burn through just as much plot, but are able to keep it compelling with their story structure.

Now I won't recap the first half of this season because A) that would take too long and B) it aired all the way back in September.

I have no idea why USA takes so long to air the 2nd half of Suits every year, but they do. It's probably a ratings ace in the hole for them, so they most likely pick and choose carefully.

The episode starts off all happy.

Scottie finally got Harvey to admit that he wants her to stay because he wants a relationship, and Rachel decided to not go to Stanford deciding to be with Mike instead.

After some flirty talk, things have been reset for the second half of the season.

The case this week revolved around a villain from Mike's past, lawyer Nick Rinaldi.

Rinaldi was the lawyer who strong-armed Mike's grandmother to accept minimal money (one year's rent roughly) for the death of Mike's parents. So Mike naturally wanted to wipe the floor with him.

Mike would represent a medical company being sued after one of their patients died of heart failure after getting a procedure done. Rinaldi represented the client's family looking to get money from the company. Mike wanted to take the lead, so he and Rinaldi went head to head like a heavy weight battle. Rinaldi rattled him in the deposition by using a similar script that he used on Mike's grandmother, which Mike remembered with his remarkable memory.

Mike fired back with a photo he found of the client drinking champagne after his surgery, which he wasn't supposed to do. Ultimately, it would have gotten the case thrown out.

Rinaldi pulled out his last card, which was claiming Mike was no different than he was, then showing him a report saying Mike's father had two drinks the night Mike's parents were hit by a drunk driver.

With Rachel's help, Mike didn't spin completely out of control. Instead he found a way to save his client, and get Rinaldi out of his life.

This was done by giving Rinaldi another company to sue - the company responsible for the medicine that coated the old heart stent. When Rinaldi found that not to be a fair deal, Mike told him how to get rid of the picture of the client drinking.

Mike ended up celebrating his first date with Rachel by candlelight, which was set up by Rachel after she heard Mike say his dad always celebrated the little things with his wife.

She even brought the ugly Panda picture given to Mike by his grandma that Rachel orginally said they couldn't take to their new place. God dammit, that's adorable.

The C story this work involved the cliffhanger from September - Louis finding that Mike Ross didn't have a file in Harvard's file room. Louis debated in typical Louis fashion (into his Dictaphone) whether he would accuse Sheila his now girlfriend of misfiling it or not.

He finally goes to Donna with his theory: Mike Ross didn't have a file in Harvard's film room because he went to a second-tier law school and is hiding it.

This was fun to watch Louis circle around the truth by only having half of it right to begin with. It builds the tension more than if he would have just outright guessed it.

The other piece of evidence he presents Donna is the interview list for the day Harvey interviewed Mike. Donna spins her way out of this by saying that Sheila most likely misfiled and Mike wasn't on the list because he was late to sign up and talked his way into an interview. She also told him to go call for his transcript, something a hacker from an earlier episode set up for Mike.

At the end of the episode it would flare up again after Louis gets the transcript and reviews it. After seeing Mike got an A+ in a class taught by a professor who famously never gave A+'s, he is suspicious again.

This back and forth with Louis getting closer to figuring out Mike is supremely well done. It should make a great showdown.

The B story revolved around Scottie and Harvey finally attempted to have a relationship and her being brought into the firm. They run into a snag where Jessica wants Scottie to front her $500,000 buy-in, something that usually is paid over a 6 month trial period. Naturally this ups the stakes for Harvey and Scottie's relationship, where if it fails Scottie is out of a job, relationship, and half a million dollars.

Harvey tells Scottie how she can get around the buy-in - by landing a huge client. Scottie pushes it even further, saying she is going to land a higher client than Harvey could get.

Enter Olympic Medal winner Michael Phelps, who Harvey apparently had a bad history with.

Scottie lands him with a "I don't give a shit about how fast you can swim I only care about how fast I can make you money." With Phelps, Scottie would land Speedo, and a pair of clients big enough to skirt around the buy-in.

When I heard Michael Phelps would guest star on Suits, I was very worried. USA Network often has big name athletes or WWE Superstars on their shows in the most rediculous ways possible.

Since they aren't actors, they usually are over the top and not believeable.

Luckily, Phelps only had one scene. And he was actually quite good, playing off his bad history with Harvey and his ability to be seduced by Scottie quite well.

Harvey tells Scottie that Jessica agreed to bring Scottie on after Phelps was signed as a client, if Scottie signs a non-compete. This would set up what Scottie really wants - her name on the door later on down the line. However things hit a wrinkle after Scottie asks Harvey why Jessica demanded something that was standard in all their contracts.

This forces Harvey to reveal he fronted her buy-in himself - something he viewed as a romantic gesture. Scottie on the other hand viewed it as manipulative and sneaky on his part.

This forces a full honest conversation, where they joke about all the shenanigans they pulled on each other back in the day.

All in all, a great episode of Suits. They packed quite a bit into this episode. Episodes are usually better when it's full of personal relationship stories, and light on the case.

Not light in a bad way, because this certainly felt like more of just the highlights. People come for the lawyers and stay for the personal stories. Suits understands this well.

For the love of god I hope Suits keeps Abigail Spencer around.

She's the female Harvey in a lot of ways, and one of the few people that Harvey thinks is on his level.

Jessica is the boss, and Mike is still the young pup understudy - although he's slowly evolving out of that.

Scottie's character, besides being a romantic interest for Harvey, is one of the few lawyers Harvey shows respect to. When you have a character like Harvey who is the self-proclaimed smartest man in the room all the time, you need that admirable opponent in the room. They've done that numerous times with villains, but this time making it a character in their firm, who is a woman and romantically involved with Harvey, is fascinating.

It's always more interesting when they scheme together on a case. The show likes to make their arcs splinter the lawyers on the roster.

I'd like to see a big case take on Jessica, Louis, Mike, Harvey and Scottie. That would make for an epic second half of the season.

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