Fictional Lawyers

Bloomberg Names The Best Legal Movie Quotes of All Time; Can You Handle the Truth?

By

Tom is really excited because he made the list twice.

Regardless of anyone’s opinion about people who work in the legal industry, it’s hard to deny the fact that many of the greatest American movies revolve around attorneys. When I watched Bloomberg Law’s new video compiling the “The 10 Greatest Legal Movie Lines,” it was cool to see that several of the featured movies are among my favorite films of all time. It’s because there is something timeless and intrinsically cinematic about the work lawyers do, which allows for great stories, and great TV and movies.

But cutting the massive catalog of great legal-themed films down to only ten is tough. A lot of people have to get left out. Only two of the ten characters in Bloomberg’s video even made it into the Elite Eight of our fictional lawyers bracket from last year. And lawyers are not the only ones saying the “greatest” quotes in question.

So the selection might cause a little bit of controversy among ATL readers. Let’s see who made the cut…

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Bloomberg Names The Best Legal Movie Quotes of All Time; Can You Handle the Truth?”

37 Comments

Size Matters: Yet Another Reason To Go Solo

By

In a column entitled Start-Up of You, Thomas Friedman of the New York Times made the case for a new model of career development. According to Friedman, this job market is “not your parents’ job market,” in which you could expect to move up the corporate ladder at a single company and then retire. In this job market, things are no longer so stable. To be competitive in this new market, Friedman suggests that you treat your career as if it were your own business. This means that you should constantly experiment and adapt, search for growth opportunities, and be resilient.

This is great advice for lawyers (both Biglaw and small-firm lawyers). This advice, however, can be taken even further. As many solo practitioners will tell you (and as one in fact did), having a law degree means that you can do more than treat your career as if it were a business; you can actually have a career where you have your own business….

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Size Matters: Yet Another Reason To Go Solo”

89 Comments

Fictional Lawyer Madness: The Winner

By

Perhaps the winner of our Fictional Lawyer contest was never in doubt. Perhaps it was always obvious that the main character from the longest-running legal drama in the history of television was going to win this thing.

Perhaps, it was all about the eyebrows.

The most popular fictional lawyer in the past 30 years is Jack McCoy from Law & Order. Here’s the updated bracket.

Our CEO here are Breaking Media had a bracket that looked a lot like the final version. Mine? Not so much…

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Fictional Lawyer Madness: The Winner”

27 Comments

Fictional Lawyer Madness: The Final

By

Down goes Frazier, down goes Frazier!

And by “Frazier,” clearly I mean Lionel Hutz.

From my perspective, Lionel Hutz losing in the semifinal round was a huge upset. I don’t want to take anything away from Jack McCoy — whose face is probably next to the word “lawyer” in the dictionary for a generation of people — but I thought Lionel Hutz would walk away with this thing.

And in the other semifinal, there was another upset of sorts. Apparently Elle Woods is human after all.

You can see all the action on our updated bracket. And now, on to the Fictional Lawyer Madness final….

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Fictional Lawyer Madness: The Final”

40 Comments

Fictional Lawyer Madness: The Final Four

By

I hope you all maxed and relaxed over the holiday weekend, because things are about to get serious. We have reached the final four stage in our Fictional Lawyers bracket. We started with 32 lawyer characters, but the top four shouldn’t really surprise anybody.

We’re giving you the rest of the week to vote on this one. We expect these match-ups to be close so it might be time to call on some friends to champion your favorites…

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Fictional Lawyer Madness: The Final Four”

30 Comments

Fictional Lawyer Madness: Regional Finals Part Two

By

I want the record to show that I tried. In our Fictional Lawyer Madness contest, I really tried to find a lot of female legal characters to put into the bracket. Of the 32 lawyers in the bracket, eight were female. One fourth is not a lot, but given the preponderance of male lawyer characters this was a good representation.

But here we are, just in the Elite Eight, and we’re down to only one woman. Hey, we all know that if ladies voted as a bloc (like African-Americans or NRA members), they’d be the most powerful force in American politics. And therefore we all know that women don’t vote as a bloc.

But are we really living in a world where Elle Woods is one of the few things women will rally around?

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Fictional Lawyer Madness: Regional Finals Part Two”

16 Comments

Fictional Lawyer Madness: The Regional Finals, Part One

By

And now our Fictional Lawyers Tournament gets serious. We are into the regional finals. The Elite Eight. People have handicapped the tournament. I’ve bet on the tournament (at least I would have if gambling were legal). And now we are here. Powerhouse v. Powerhouse.

As usual today we’ll vote on the left side, Thursday we’ll vote on the right. But because of the upcoming holiday weekend, you’ll want to make sure to vote early…

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Fictional Lawyer Madness: The Regional Finals, Part One”

17 Comments

Fictional Lawyer Madness: Sweet Sixteen Part Two

By

At this stage in our Fictional Lawyer Madness bracket, the very, very young ATL summer intern has a perfect bracket so far, and mine is tanking. I picked based on who I thought you crazy readers would vote for. The fetus picked based on the lawyers he had actually heard of.

The lesson, as always, is that Millennials are really the worst generation ever and I can only hope to be dead before they take control of the government.

In case you missed it, here is part one of the sweet sixteen.

In any event, on to part two of the sweet sixteen.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Fictional Lawyer Madness: Sweet Sixteen Part Two”

17 Comments

Fictional Lawyer Madness: The Sweet Sixteen, Part One

By

We’re into the next round of the Fictional Lawyers Tournament. Most people here in the Breaking Media offices have filled out a bracket, and so far I’m getting crushed. I picked based on who I thought you guys would pick (not who I voted for myself), and I’ve been very wrong so far. It turns out the readers and I have more in common than I thought (which should probably scare the bejesus out of many of you readers).

But I’ve still got all of my final four lawyers alive. As we get started on the sweet sixteen, we should start to see which characters really have the juice to finish this thing.

Check out the full bracket below and then click through to vote on the match-ups from the left-hand side of the bracket. On Thursday, we’ll vote on the right side (CLICK HERE for part two of this round)….

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Fictional Lawyer Madness: The Sweet Sixteen, Part One”

27 Comments

Fictional Lawyer Madness: Round 1, Part 2

By

Yesterday we kicked off the Fictional Lawyer Madness by starting the voting on the left side of the bracket.

Today, we’re opening up the right side. On this side of the bracket we have more movie characters, and more female characters.

And there has been one big change from yesterday’s bracket. I forgot to add a fictional lawyer everybody loves.

Voting closes on Sunday, June 19 at 11:59 p.m. So don’t waste any time…

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Fictional Lawyer Madness: Round 1, Part 2″

33 Comments
Page 1 of 212