'Bluff City Law' Episode 1 has Jimmy Smits' Elijah Straight as its trump card amidst fight for touching social causes
This article contains spoilers for episode 1.
NBC's latest legal drama 'Bluff City Law' is not all that different from lead actor Jimmy Smits' other legal dramas from the past. That said, Jimmy Smits is also probably why the show is striking enough in its debut episode. There is the tension and legal jargon mixed with the thrill of the courtroom whilst idealistically "fighting for what's right." But there's also compassion and vulnerability and Smits' excellence as a TV lawyer and Caitlin McGee's skills oddly complimenting his aura.
The story's premise is set around Smits' elite Memphis-based lawyer, Elijah Strait, who earnestly wants to reconcile with his estranged daughter in the wake of his wife and her mother's death. His daughter Sidney Straight (McGee) despises her father's infidelity - something she still can't manage to overlook after all these years, but she eventually caves into his righteous law firm after having worked for vulturous companies through corporate law, or "the dark side."
Ahead of the show's premiere, the cast and creators had teased how the legal drama is going to blend emotions with burning issues such as wrongful incarceration and company fraud, and episode 1 doesn't disappoint in terms of that. Sidney dives headfirst into her father's cases, one of them being a terminally ill man who acquired cancer from exposure to harmful chemicals that happened on company grounds of the organization he worked for. The other one is that of a high school teacher who for some reason wants to plead guilty for the murder of a student, where he has obviously been framed.
Sidney - when not screaming during every bathroom break or being the overachieving lawyer whiz - also has a human side, revealed by an ex-husband's presence, one that those around her like to call 'not over her breaking his heart.' She is far from non-indulgent though, as she says one minute they have a habit of not mixing work in their current 'friendship' (he's a cop), but the very next moment doesn't mind reaching out for his help. Maybe it was the first time? Speaking of which, Sidney also has a not-so-pleasant first-time experience while arguing in the courtroom for the other case. In a fit of a spitfire, Sidney questions the judge's integrity for sustaining objections from the defendant - for which she lands in detainment. But as different from her father she loves to be, the fact that the two of them are 'alphas' becomes much more evident when they both engage in the same kind of heated behavior on the next hearing.
Of course, they win both the cases after inspiring speeches and before they exchange cute congratulatory post-it notes to each other for 'changing the world'. Meant to carry a latent tone of comedy, things get exciting at the very end of the episode when fellow law-firm colleague, the incredibly young Emerson (Stony Blyden) calls Elijah 'dad' in front of Sidney. She catches up on that real quick, almost as if an expository trope trying to pique our interest after a moderately enthralling debut episode. Here's hoping things get better from the next one.
'Bluff City Law' premiered on September 23 at 9 pm, only on NBC.
