Summer sleuthing: The Firm season 1, episode 1 rewatch

The Firm was NBC’s imperfect crime drama, but the John Grisham adaptation starring Josh Lucas is worth a summer watch. Return to The Firm episode 1.

With TV crime dramas winding down their seasons, what should genre fans watch over the summer? In our Summer Sleuthing series we’re going back to old favorites, starting with one you probably missed the first time: NBC‘s The Firm.

The Firm was largely ignored when it premiered in 2012. It was a follow-up to the John Grisham movie of the same name, with Josh Lucas assuming the role of lawyer Mitch McDeere. But it was not a lawyer show; it was a crime thriller with strong performances and a few plot twists.

Every Friday we’ll revisit an episode from The Firm‘s first (and only) season. You can rewatch the entire series on Hulu. This week, we start from the beginning with Episode 1.

The Firm season 1, episode 1: “Chapter One” (originally aired Jan. 8, 2012)

When The Firm premiered as a midseason series, many were quick to brush it aside; others didn’t have a frame of reference for it, because almost 20 years had passed since the movie. And even the star later called it a “very difficult experience.”

But though the show had several flaws, it was also much better than anyone gave it credit for—with a cast doing their best even in the more eyebrow-arching of moments, and full of untapped potential brewing just underneath the surface.

One of those more odd moments is the pilot’s opening sequence. We join the action in media res, as a panicked Mitch McDeere (Josh Lucas, in his first TV series regular role in 17 years) is running from a pair of mysterious pursuers. This sounds more exciting than it actually is; it drags on quite a bit, with Mitch having just enough time to warn his wife Abby (Deadwood alum Molly Parker) from a pay phone before he makes it to a hotel room where another mysterious man is waiting.

How the hell did he get himself in this situation? Well, that’s what the episode wants you to figure out.

We learn that it’s been ten years since Mitch toppled a mob-connected Memphis law firm from the inside, and he’s spent that time in witness protection with Abby and their daughter. This is also obviously hard on his career, and he’s struggling to run a small firm with help from his cavalier brother Ray (a scene-chewing Callum Keith Rennie, Battlestar Galactica) and Ray’s girlfriend Tammy (Juliette Lewis of Secrets & Lies).

So Mitch isn’t in any position to say no when the judicial system assigns him work. The Firm has certain “cases of the week” and other storylines that continue over multiple episodes; the former is the murder of a high school kid by one of his classmates and the latter is about Sarah Holt, a woman accused of the murder of elderly neighbor Margaret Whitaker. Both look like losing cases but in true TV fashion, Mitch is able to realize there’s more than meets the eye.

This is where “Chapter One” hooks the viewer. The script from Lukas Reiter (The Blacklist) is a bit too clever for its own good, jumping around in time and space, and it ends with a pretty typical TV crime drama scene. But the characters are people you can’t help but root for, and when it’s about the actual cases being investigated, it’s good stuff.

Lucas is a great Mitch, able to play him as someone who’s jaded and worn down by fighting for a decade-plus in one way or another. He just wants to get through the day. And yet, when the show allows it, he can also be very charming and somewhat funny. You understand from the way he plays the part that there’s a damn good lawyer hiding underneath Mitch’s cynical, burned-out exterior, and that he just needs something to get him back to himself.

Rennie and Lewis are an unexpected combination, but a fun one; they’re sort of Abbott and Costello with an edge. It’s hard to believe either one would last long in a real law firm, but this isn’t a typical law firm and they’re so entertaining that you really don’t mind. And as Abby, Parker is a bit underused, but her role develops later on.

If you look at The Firm as an ongoing conspiracy thriller, you might not get it. But if you look at it as a TV crime drama, and enjoy what the cases have to say and the new perspective that Josh Lucas has on Mitch McDeere, you’ll be pleasantly surprised. Most of this first episode, like any TV pilot, is backstory—but it’s important information to enjoy the journey that Mitch is about to take.

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The Firm is available on Hulu, iTunes and Amazon Video.

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