Contests, Movies, Reader Polls, Television

Fictional Lawyer Madness: Your Favorite Fictional Lawyers of the Past 30 Years

By Elie Mystal

onJune 15, 2011 at 5:58 PMJune 17, 2011 at 12:54 PM

2) Alan Shore (James Spader; Boston Legal)

7) Clair Huxtable (Phylicia Rashad; The Cosby Show)

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So Clair Huxtable maintains a thriving legal practice, and yet is home every night to take care of five children, feed them and put them to bed while her husband makes jokes, steals sandwiches, and has to be on call 24/7 in case one of his patients goes into labor? I’ll take unrealistic role models for women for $200, Alex. Still, Clair was one of the first African-American females to hold a job down that didn’t involve peddling syrup on broadcast television.

And it’s not like Alan Shore’s character is all that realistic, either. Sure, everybody might think that there are whip smart lawyers out there who are so versed in the law that they are able to take liberties with it without ever crossing a criminal line. But in real life, most lawyers who are that smart stay far away from ethical misbehavior, and most of the ones who are ethically challenged are like that because they don’t have the skills to compete on the straight and narrow.

Who is your favorite character?