Movies & TV
Suits Recap: ‘Normandy’ (Season 2, Episode 15)
Gina Torres as Jessica Pearson.
Photo: Christos Kalohoridis/USA Network
Are They Well Suited?
Pearson Hardman (actually, our law firm is now singularly entitled ‘Pearson’) is “out of money,” but Harvey (Gabriel Macht) has many cases in many different locations fast approaching. To win, the firm needs money for investigators and other essentials, so Jessica (Gina Torres) approves all expenses for any one case selected by Harvey. Likening it to winning World War II, Harvey tells Mike (Patrick J. Adams) that he’s going for “Normandy.” (Presumably, Harvey thinks that if Pearson wins D-Day, like the Allied Forces, the firm will be able to claim other victories in turn).
However, Donna (Sarah Rafferty) soon announces to Harvey, “There’s been a slight complication.” Harvey’s ‘friendly’ (very friendly) enemy, Dana “Scottie” Scott (Abigail Spencer), is in from her law firm in London, wanting in on the gender discrimination cases. Harvey realizes that Scottie works for a very wealthy firm, so bringing in such a firm will enable Pearson to fight all 45 cases against Hardman’s clients. Harvey asserts that Hardman will expect them to start with Bakersfield, so they should first fight the least obvious and most difficult case, Parkville, “…and when we win it, all the others will surrender.”
Harvey and Scottie travel to Parkville on her firm’s jet, (where, by the by, the no longer engaged Scottie succeeds in ‘seducing’ Harvey), but upon arrival, they are surprised to find Daniel Hardman (David Costabile) has deduced their plan by asking, “What would Harvey do?” It seemed almost sacrilegious and certainly bone-chilling to hear the catchphrase earlier created by Mike, who also affectionately shortened it to ‘WWHD,’ being used by the series’ villain, but it’s only a matter of time before good triumphs over evil in such series, so a phone call from Mike to Harvey sets the wheels in motion for the salvation of the fight!
Through information discovered by Mike and Rachel (Meghan Markle), Harvey realizes that there is evidence that the company accused of discriminating against female employees promoted one woman only after cancer left her unable to have children, removing the chance of future family concerns pulling her focus from work. Despite this seeming to put Pearson in the winning position, Hardman, especially upset by seeing his name having been removed from his former firm, still does not appear ready to admit defeat, so the possibility of his taking a last stand in the season finale remains.
In the course of the case, Harvey had been concerned about Scottie having a hidden agenda, and the ever-protective Donna actually warns off Scottie, even saying, “A woman who wants nothing. I distrust that.” However, Harvey thinks he has discovered her motivation for ‘asking on’ the case when he realizes that a big win would get her name on the door at her firm, and he understands she would have been reluctant to confide her vulnerability to him since he would “…respond to strength, not weakness.” Yet, later, Harvey observes Jessica with Scottie’s boss, and Harvey figures out that there is more that Scottie has failed to reveal. “It’s never the full story with you,” Harvey says to Scottie, and he soon learns that Scottie’s firm may be merging with Pearson, which is counter to Harvey’s wishes for his future and the firm. Harvey says of Scottie’s English boss, “His investment is only money. For me, it’s my whole firm.”
Unfortunately, Harvey’s “one office, the city” firm is still having problems within it. The new ‘Legally Blonde’ fifth year associate earlier went up against Louis (Rick Hoffman), but this week, she battled with Mike and Rachel, causing them to occasionally appear ineffective workers. The ‘will-they/won’t they’ duo ultimately prevailed, but only after initially inflaming Harvey and Jessica.
Of course, Rachel was also being distracted from her work by her thoughts of Harvard Law School. Mike caught her searching for fantasy places to live in Cambridge rather than doing her work, and later, unbeknown to Mike, Rachel’s normally high-quality work was negatively impacted by her receiving a rejection letter from Harvard. (Didn’t we all know that the show could not allow the character to relocate to Massachusetts?) By the copy machine, Louis finds Rachel looking depressed and acting angry, and assuming that waiting to hear from Harvard is getting to the paralegal, he offers words of sincere encouragement. Rachel tells Louis about the rejection letter, and Louis, fearing that his failed ‘relationship’ with the Harvard interviewer, Shelia Sazs (Rachael Harris), has prompted the rejection, vows to get Rachel into Harvard Law School. Louis goes to see Shelia, who is turned on by his commanding nobleness, but following their bizarre mating rituals, Louis learns from Shelia that Rachel’s rejection was not Shelia’s form of vengeance. Shelia touchingly reveals that although she liked Rachel, many deserving candidates cannot be offered places, and she advises Louis to tell Rachel the hard truth that “sometimes good, isn’t good enough.” Louis goes to Rachel to tell her as gently as possible that she will indeed not be going to Harvard, but attempting to spare her feelings, he lies about the reason. The episode ends with Rachel, alone in her office, crying over the loss of her dream of attending Harvard Law School.
The episode, “Normandy,” broadcast on Valentine’s Day, focused on many interpersonal relationships from within the boardroom to within the bedroom, but, as in most recent episodes, very little was seen of the ‘bromance’ between our leading men, Mike and Harvey. In fact, the consistently enjoyable interplay between all the main cast members in various combinations has been given noticeably less satisfying screen time, but nonetheless, the season finale teases that some major developments may occur in the working and personal relationships of the main characters.
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Mary Lee Costa experienced a transatlantic upbringing, being raised in both the United States and England, and she has been working as a writer since before she could pretend to spell (either American or English spellings). At age six, her first professional writing job was as a child film reviewer for the “Brooklyn Parent.”
While at the University of Oxford, where she gained an honors degree in history, her student newspaper theatre reviews placed second for the coveted Tynan Prize, as judged by theatre critics of the London broadsheets. Her historical writing has won The Duke of Marlborough’s Heritage Award, among other honors.
Being dyslexic herself, she especially enjoys writing historical and cultural articles for children or writing about theatre and quality television because she recalls the important role such outlets played in her own education and development.

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