Television series

The Good Fight

Name: The Good Fight
Genre: Drama, Legal
Released: 2017
Cast: Christine Baranski, Sarah Steele, Nyambi Nyambi, Michael Boatman, Audra McDonald

Courtroom drama

A legal drama that inherits The Good Wife's DNA but rewires it entirely. Sharp, angrier, formally inventive—it uses the courtroom as a lens for contemporary chaos: tech monopolies, political extremism, systemic racism. Christine Baranski leads a ensemble of lawyers trying to survive professionally while the world burns around them. For anyone hungry for smart drama that argues with itself.

TVMaze rating

3.9

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you enjoyed The Good Wife's knowing mix of courtroom cleverness and office politics and want it sharpened by current-events bite, with a case-of-the-week structure that still pays off across seasons.

Skip it if you want a tidy, self-contained legal procedural, since its plots run loose, often chase the headlines, and lean into absurd turns that can feel like a tonal lurch.

What it asks of you: Settle in for a long haul of six seasons, roughly an hour an episode, and expect it to shift between sober courtroom stakes and sharp, sometimes jarring satire without warning.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

The Good Wife2009

The spiritual predecessor that taught this show how to balance courtroom procedural with ensemble character work. Seven seasons of lawyers navigating marriage, ambition, corruption and friendship. If you loved The Good Fight, you already know this exists—but it's worth revisiting for the roots.

But Slower pacing in early seasons, and the central relationship dynamics may feel dated after watching the sequel's sharper, more fractured perspective on modern life.

Succession2018

Obsessive, formally restless drama about power and loyalty in a corrupt institution. Like The Good Fight, it's less interested in resolving cases than in watching smart people navigate impossible moral choices. The same dark comedy about competent people drowning.

But Relentlessly bleak with no character you'd want to befriend. The Roys are monsters; The Good Fight's lawyers are trying to be better, even when they fail.

Damages2007

A high-wire legal thriller that uses the same fractured chronology and moral ambiguity. Glenn Close as a ruthless attorney building case and empire simultaneously. Shares The Good Fight's obsession with how power corrupts the pursuit of justice.

But More plot-driven and less interested in character than The Good Fight. Some seasons collapse under their own twists. The pacing demands can exhaust rather than satisfy.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from The Good Fight

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

The Morning Show2019

Both use institutional settings to explore moral compromise under pressure. Both are formally restless, refusing tidy resolutions. Same DNA—lawyers and journalists both chasing truth inside systems designed to obscure it.

Institutional power drama dressed as prestige television. Lucca Quinn's actor, Cush Jumbo, leads a ensemble wrestling with corruption, complicity, and survival at a news network. Same formal inventiveness, same interest in how systems protect the powerful, same structure of smart people trapped in impossible positions.

But Prioritizes scandal and celebrity over substance. Oscillates between brilliant and self-satisfied, often within the same episode. Requires patience with its own importance.

Better Call Saul2015

About a lawyer becoming someone worse while insisting he's becoming someone better. Shares The Good Fight's interest in how professional ambition corrodes moral clarity. Exquisite direction and a tragic protagonist you can't stop watching.

But Operates at a slow-burn deliberation that rewards patience but punishes channel-flippers. Some may find the methodical pacing precious rather than powerful.

The Practice1997

The ancestor that showed legal dramas could be about moral philosophy disguised as courtroom drama. A public defender's office fighting for clients and principle with no budget. The DNA runs through everything that followed, including The Good Fight.

But Genuinely of its era—dialogue, aesthetics, and storytelling assumptions feel dated now. Without nostalgia, it reads as earnest rather than urgent.

Suits2011

Glossy, efficient legal drama about ambition and loyalty at a Manhattan firm. If you want the procedural satisfaction and ensemble bonding of The Good Fight but lighter, sharper, and less interested in the world outside the office, this delivers that.

But Fundamentally unconcerned with moral complexity. It wants you to love its characters' wins without asking what those wins cost. Becomes repetitive as it ages.

Goliath2016

Billy Bob Thornton as a washed-up lawyer fighting corrupt institutions. Shares The Good Fight's skepticism about justice and its portrait of lawyers as fundamentally alone. Tonally uneven but genuinely unpredictable in where it goes.

But Tonal whiplash between noir and satire can jar. Some seasons prioritize melodrama over the sharper character work that makes The Good Fight stick.

Designated Survivor2016

Political drama where institutional corruption is a constant pressure on the protagonist's morality. Like The Good Fight, it's interested in how power and ideology shape what people become. Keri Russell brings weight to scenes about compromise and survival.

But Thriller mechanics sometimes overwhelm character work. The show is more interested in plot momentum than the glacial moral reckoning that makes The Good Fight fascinating.

L.A. Law1986

The progenitor of ensemble legal drama: brilliant lawyers, big cases, genuine stakes both professional and personal. If you want to see where the template came from and appreciate how The Good Fight updates and complicates it, this is essential archaeology.

But Unmistakably '80s and '90s in sensibility—slicker and less interested in systemic thinking than modern viewers expect. Relationship drama dominates more than legal philosophy.

Trial by Fire2019

Both are convinced that the legal system is broken but that individual lawyers can still fight. Both derive their moral urgency from real cases and real failure, not invented drama.

A documentary (disguised as narrative) about a wrongful murder conviction and the lawyer fighting to overturn it. Not a courtroom drama—a forensic investigation of how justice fails. Jack Black plays a man convicted on junk science. Shares The Good Fight's fury at institutional indifference and its belief that lawyers matter.

But Devastating and slow. No procedural satisfaction, no wins that feel clean. Documentary rigour makes it resistant to the satisfying dramatic arcs you're used to.

The Newsroom2012

Both are about professionals discovering that their field is compromised. Both structure themselves around arguments rather than resolutions. Both believe that intelligence and principle matter, even when they fail.

An ensemble of brilliant, furious people trying to do their jobs while the world deteriorates around them. Jeff Daniels and company wage arguments with themselves and institutional pressure about what truth means. Same energy as The Good Fight—formally inventive, structurally complex, orbiting around people trying to be ethical inside corrupt systems.

But Aaron Sorkin's dialogue can feel writerly and self-satisfied. The show romanticizes its characters' moral superiority. Some find it insufferable; some find it necessary.