Thu 7 Nov 2019
TV Episode Review: GOLIATH “Of Mice and Men.” (2017)
Posted by Steve under Reviews , TV Drama[5] Comments
GOLIATH “Of Mice and Men.” Amazon Prime, streaming. 14 October 2016 (Season 1, episode 1). Billy Bob Thornton, William Hurt, Maria Bello, Nina Arianda and a large additional ensemble cast. Creators: David E. Kelley & Jonathan Shapiro. Director: Lawrence Trilling.
One of the unexpected benefits of obtaining my first Kindle and finding out how to use it was accidentally signing up for Amazon Prime. Since the first 30 days are free, I decided why not and started looking around to see what TV series might be available.
I don’t know why I happened to pick this one, but I’ve just watched the first episode on my large screen computer monitor (I have an even large TV screen, but it’s a smart TV, and it’s way smarter than I am), and all in all it was a good choice. Good enough that I’m planning on finishing up the story, another seven episodes. I reserve the right to bail out, though, if the story line goes off in directions too funky for me to stay with it.
Which, on the basis of one episode, I don’t think it will. There’s nothing basically new in what I’ve seen already. A burned out lawyer named Billy McBride (Billy Bob Thornton), and I mean down and out, is reduced to piddling jobs that he couldn’t care less about, but when he’s offered one that might give him a chance to get back at his old firm, he jumps at it.
A death at sea has been chalked up to suicide — by a man blowing up both himself and the boat he’s borrowed in an explosive fireball of flame — may be the key to his revenge. The man’s wife has already settled with the insurance company, but his sister. now two years later, still thinks there’s something that needs explaining.
Complicating matters is that Billy’s ex-wife is high in the hierarchy at the law firm involved, the same law firm that still has his name on the door. There are several other characters involved, including, in no particular order, Billy’s daughter; a lady co-partner in the lawsuit he initiates who is basically a real agent in the Valley; and a legal assistant who is basically a hooker who owes Billy Bob a favor; and so on.
Enough threads, in other words, to keep the story going for the full season, and then some, but here are a couple of things that annoyed me. The prologue is poorly done. That there were two boats, not just one, out on the water when the explosion happened was not at all clear — one that blew up, the other with two witnesses.
And while I’m no expert on what it is that women see in men, and while perhaps some women may succumb quickly to the attractive features of whoever Billy Bob Thornton may play, I found the possibility that Billy and his new client hop into bed together, no more than ten minutes of their first meeting, rather far-fetched.
Otherwise, at this point of my viewing status, all is OK. The first episode ends with Billy is a local jail, imprisoned on trumped-up charges of some totally bogus driving protocol. That this happens on the first day he is to be in court does not seem to be coincidental. But from here, as they say, to be continued.
November 7th, 2019 at 2:07 pm
Good actors, many from Broadway, and good acting. They lost me with the drug plot in series two, but I’m willing to at least try the new series.
November 7th, 2019 at 2:32 pm
Jeff, I should have mentioned in my review that the third season of GOLIATH premiered back on October 4th.
November 7th, 2019 at 3:02 pm
I thought Billy Bob was really good in Pushing Tin, then saw him in Bad Santa, and that may was the worst movie I ever stayed all the way through (went with friends, we still talk about it years later). Not sure I can ever see him and not think of that movie, so my view of him is skewed.
November 9th, 2019 at 2:40 am
I didn’t even bother. BBT is a turnoff and with the whole “his ex-wife is the DA!”-ish nonsense, I was out before I got in.
November 9th, 2019 at 9:19 am
Both points well taken, Viktor, with one small correction. Billy’s ex-wife is not a DA, but a lawyer in the high ranks of the legal firm he’s suing. (But DA-ish may cover it.)