Television

Standard Of Review: Why I Don't Like Law & Order

Please welcome Harry Graff (not his real name), a new columnist who will be writing about law and the arts.

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Ed. note: Please welcome Harry Graff (not his real name), who will be reviewing movies, TV shows, books, and other media related to the law.

Whenever I tell non-lawyers what I do for a living, I often receive a response that makes my skin crawl: “Oh, I love Law & Order.” I am then forced to sheepishly respond: “I actually don’t watch Law & Order.” Luckily, this usually shuts down any attempt by the other person to discuss the relative merits of Jerry Orbach. But what I always really want to say (but don’t say, for fear of being shunned) is: “I don’t like Law and Order.”

There, I said it. I don’t like Law and Order. Of course, everyone tells me what a great show it is. They tell me how watching episodes is like eating candy – once you start, you can’t stop. They tell me how the show references actual legal principles. They tell me that by regularly watching the show, I would have a much greater appreciation for the Community episode “Basic Lupine Urology.” That all may be true. I’ve seen somewhere between five to ten episodes of Law and Order in my life, and they all were well-made. But I find it extremely difficult to watch any show – legal, medical, or otherwise – that introduces a problem in the first minute and solves it in the fifty-ninth minute. Especially when so much of my life is spent in front of my computer researching legal minutiae for cases that last for years on end, I chafe at a TV show that suggests to neophytes that law is a tidy little thing that wraps up in an hour.

Moreover, I find the lack of character development and long-term plot arcs in these types of procedural shows to be extremely boring. Maybe I am weird, but I like to work hard when I watch my TV shows. I like being able to provide the first name, last name and defining characteristic of roughly thirty characters on Game of Thrones. I like spending so much time at work debating True Detective that I start to wonder if I should start billing it (I don’t, I swear!). By contrast, every episode of Law & Order is self-contained. I could watch a random episode from the fifth season and easily understand exactly what is going on. If a non-viewer watched a random episode from the fifth season of Lost, that person would be – for lack of a better word, and I truly apologize for this – lost.

With that in mind, I recently set out to actually watch an episode of Law and Order to see if I could stomach it. Unsurprisingly, because reruns of Law & Order air so frequently, I had plenty of episodes to choose from. I settled (somewhat randomly) on the Season 3 episode “Skin Deep” that originally aired on September 23, 1992. The episode opens with a model finding photographer Julian Decker murdered in his Tribeca loft. I almost squealed when I realized that the model was played by Gina Torres, better known as Zoë from Firefly. After seeing a young Torres, all I could think about was how instead of being a lawyer, I’d rather be part of a wisecracking crew of space outlaws that has wacky space adventures aboard a Firefly-class ship. Oh well.

Detectives Logan (Chris Noth) and Cerreta (Paul Sorvino) investigate the murder, and they discover that besides being a fashion photographer, Decker was running a prostitution ring on the side for out-of-work models. One of those out-of-work models – and the primary suspect – is Angela Brandt (Alberta Watson). As Logan and Cerreta question Angela, her daughter Tracy walks into the room. To my surprise, Tracy is played by none other than Carrie Mathison herself, Claire Danes! According to IMDB, this episode was only Danes’s second acting job ever and was two years before the premiere of My So-Called Life. Tracy is a fifteen-year old girl and wannabe model, but everyone believes that she has no future because of her legs. And I mean literally everyone. Her “pudgy legs” were mentioned by at least three different characters in the episode. No wonder Carrie drinks so much chardonnay.

Logan and Cerreta arrest Angela based on some spotty evidence, and I immediately suspected that Tracy was the real killer, only because Danes was the actress playing her. After Logan and Cerreta turn the case over to ADAs Stone (Michael Moriarty) and Robinette (Richard Brooks), Angela’s lawyer Shambala Green (Lorraine Toussaint) pokes holes in the state’s case, casting doubt on Angela’s guilt.

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Anyone who saw Toussaint in Season 2 of Orange is the New Black would be unsurprised that she is fantastic here. While the rest of the lawyers seem to sleepwalk through the episode, Toussaint breathes fire and brings life to a minor character. It saddened me to learn that Toussaint was in only seven episodes of Law & Order; they could have probably built an entire show around her.

Ultimately, Stone and Robinette discover that Tracy is indeed the killer. Tracy murdered Decker after Decker attempted to end their sexual relationship because Angela discovered it and threatened to stop being a prostitute. Danes has a great monologue where she explains that she wanted to be a model so that everyone will think she is beautiful. Even at that young age, it was easy to tell that Danes had a future in leading botched CIA operations . . . I mean in being a great actress.

Stone and Robinette are stunned that Tracy is the killer and are chewed out by D.A. Schiff (Steven Hill, who was apparently moonlighting as a district attorney when he wasn’t dropping passes for the Jets) for not realizing it earlier. Unlike me, Schiff and Robinette didn’t suspect that a fifteen-year-old girl would be the killer based on the fame of the actress playing her.

I honestly enjoyed the episode more than I thought I did, but mostly because of the notable guest stars that later became famous. It was also enjoyable to see how law was practiced in 1992 (the lawyers received a motion filed by their adversary by hand! In an envelope!). Aside from that, I didn’t care at all about the characters or the plot.

With that background about my (now not-so) secret about not liking Law & Order, I hope to write about film, television, books, podcasts or any other type of media that is completely, mostly or partially related to the law. I want to explore what makes these types of stories work, and what makes them not work. And hopefully, I will come across more stories containing an actor who later appeared on Firefly.

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Harry Graff is a litigation associate at a firm, but he spends days wishing that he was writing about film, television, literature, and pop culture instead of writing briefs. If there is a law-related movie, television show, book, or any other form of media that you would like Harry Graff to discuss, he can be reached at harrygraff19@gmail.com. Be sure to follow Harry Graff on Twitter at @harrygraff19.

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