“The Good Wife” Is Leaving Us for Good This Time

What we will miss about one of our favorite shows

On Sunday, fans will say goodbye to one of most consistently high-quality dramas on network TV: “The Good Wife.” Over seven seasons, “The Good Wife” on CBS has pulled viewers in with gripping political and legal drama, and kept them hooked with dynamic characters and complicated relationships. Though the series opens on a discouragingly familiar scene — a loyal wife standing next to her disgraced politician husband, whose cheating and corruption have just been blown wide open in the press — the show quickly segues into a more interesting storyline: one of a woman in mid-life, faced with crisis, starting over.

Alicia, the “good wife” in question, starts over as an associate at a Chicago law firm, and it is there (and in the courtrooms where she argues her cases) that “The Good Wife” spent seven seasons delving into the same pressing and complex issues that dominate the A-section. From marriage equality and immigration reform to privacy rights and the death penalty, “The Good Wife” didn’t shy away from tackling front page issues every Sunday night.

And the showrunners did it well. As Vulture writer Lauren Hoffman noted in her series finale preview, “There are times when ‘The Good Wife’ tackles a social issue or thorny legal matter with amazing succinctness and clarity for an hour-long show.” “The Good Wife” unpacked some of the most important issues facing us today not by dumbing them down, but by giving them faces and names. Even when tackling complicated issues like patents, online-only currency, and unmanned drone warfare, the show’s writers, producers, and actors succeeded in imbuing those debates with compassion, humanity, and of course, humor.

The drama’s nuanced integration of legal and social issues into its scripts never failed to start conversations. In its final season alone, the show has sparked coverage of its take on abortion,plagiarism, and government surveillance. It was not only the salient storylines that made it the kind of show we love here at AndACTION — it was the discussions it spurred around water coolers on Monday.

Along with the policy and legal issues of the day, “The Good Wife” took on the big issues: love, loyalty, honesty, ambition. It took bold stances, refusing to cast its main character as a hero or a villain, leaving tensions unresolved, and forcing viewers to confront ethical dilemmas. A recent episode featured a backroom meeting of legal and military experts weighing whether or not to take out an ISIS operative who was also an American citizen. I found myself conflicted about the right answer, and realizing that while this particular person was fictional, similar decisions are being made every day by those charged with keeping our country safe. In true “The Good Wife” fashion, the episode left the “right answer” to the viewer.

The drama — and oh boy, has there been drama — kept fans coming back for more, but the big questions the show posed will continue to resonate after the final credits roll on Sunday night.

So this weekend, we at AndACTION will bid a fond farewell to “The Good Wife”: a conversation starter, an issue-raiser, and a damn good show.

Emily Gardner is a Senior Account Manager at Spitfire.