Suits shows the extravagant side of courtroom dramas, showcasing type-A corporate lawyers save high-octane businesses bundles of money. Unfortunately, it doesn’t serve a much greater purpose than that.
A nice touch is its being filmed in Toronto. A friend of mine took a picture of the hotdog scene where spoils of the previous night’s labours were being divvied between drug-dealer Trevor and then then-fraudster Mike Ross when an envelope clasping Harvey Spector enters, only to be ridiculed for his success by the antiestablishmentarian youth. “If I ever look like that, shoot me,” says Mike Ross, ironically. The scene was filmed outside the Munich Re. Centre on 390 Bay Street with the iconic Seven Eleven on the southwest corner of Bay & Richmond duly noted. Elsewhere in the episode, Harvey interrupts Louis’s obsessive stares at a co-worker in Mercatto, the Bay & Adelaide location with the restaurant’s name still on the windows.
(See video @0:21)
Filming in Toronto
The series is fun and lighthearted but it falls apart way too often. For example, Mike has a connection with his date’s roommate, Jenny, when the two recite lines from A Few Good Men. The movie is a courtroom drama but the allegory ends there. Mike murmurs under his breath, “I love you,” wishing his date was instead with Jenny. Yet by the end of the night, Mike appears to have forgotten his earlier revelation and asks to go home with Nikki, with who after a full three course meal the dull conversation still relies on Mike’s eidetic memory. As expected, the relationship goes nowhere as Nikki asks Mike to write her LSAT’s. His actions are inconsistent and therefore not believable.
(See video @ 0:49)
Then there is the pragmatic and uncaring Jessica Pearson who ruthlessly fires Monaca for her innocent relationship with Daniel Hardman. The reason was no more than that Monaca was on the “wrong side.” Why Harvey and Mike seem devoted to such a heartless creature relies solely on their own well-being. This transactional nature of the show creates loose character ties and underdeveloped personalities centered around careerism and self-adulation. It also halts the Corporate Law profession to a standstill. It would be nice for Mike’s apotheosis to serve a greater purpose but the cases are increasingly one-dimensional with little societal impact. So while the show is a great fun to watch, it won’t win any awards.