Summary
“Sweet Bird of Truth” focused on characters over cases in a solid, funny episode that also had its share of seriousness.
This recap of All Rise Season 1, Episode 3, “Sweet Bird of Truth”, contains spoilers. You can check out our thoughts on the previous episode by clicking these words.
This week’s episode of All Rise, “Sweet Bird of Truth”, ran the risk of descending into ridiculousness. Correction: It did descend into ridiculousness once or twice, but managed to save itself by building to a rather sweet conclusion about friendship, insecurity, and how people choose to express themselves. But All Rise Episode 3 was also easily the most character-driven installment thus far, making any oddities in its case of the week a bit of a non-issue by allowing its various dynamics and burgeoning relationships to find their groove.
The platonic BFF banter of Lola (Simone Missick) and Mark (Wilson Bethel) remains the show’s strongest thread. In “Sweet Bird of Truth” their secret meeting spot is rumbled when Lola accidentally messages Lisa Benner (Marg Helgenberger) for a rendezvous, which the boss figures out immediately. We also get to meet their respective partners: Mark’s supermodel girlfriend Ria (Nadia Gray); and Lola’s FBI agent husband, who I can’t find a credit for (someone let me know in the comments!). It’s still noteworthy how totally unthreatened Ria and Lola’s hubby are by Mark and Lola’s friendship; we see them all interact at the annual Valor Awards ceremony, where Luke (J. Alex Brinson) is being honored for shooting a rogue bailiff in the premiere, and everyone gets along just fine. How refreshing.
Besides, there are bigger fish for everyone to be frying. At the top of All Rise Episode 3, Luke is arrested for jogging while black, which bothers him throughout “Sweet Bird of Truth”, especially when he encounters the arresting officer again at the Valor Awards. By the end, he’s able to open up about it to Emily (Jessica Camacho), which means they finally go on that date he wanted. It’s a nice moment, especially since Emily had a stressful day defending a young girl who was being accused of hacking into a popular MMORPG called Skyrise and murdering her friend’s avatar, which was worth a decent sum of money and so much more to its introverted creator, who had spent much of her real life role-playing this made-up one. Lola turned the case on its head by allowing the victim to testify as her murdered bird-queen avatar, since that was how she felt most comfortable, leading to a great deal of comedy and perplexity in court.
Mark, meanwhile, took on the seemingly hopeless case of a woman, Soraya (Nicole Santiago), who had almost been run over by Shane Spradlin (Ryan Brady), a nutcase racist who had bellowed “Go back to where you came from!” while accelerating towards her. This was, somehow, a case he had almost no hope of winning, especially when Soraya was too terrified to appear in court. But his passionate closing statement about what she was actually terrified of — not Spradlin, per se, but the incompetence of the justice system — was enough to win Soraya the case. It might have been a bit hammy, but it contained enough truth about why people like Spradlin feel comfortable victimizing minorities to get its point across.
And All Rise Season 1, Episode 3 did indeed get its points across, even when it threated to derail them with ludicrous courtroom theatrics. It continues to stand in stark opposition to its preachy NBC rival Bluff City Law, which wants to make the same points with pearl-clutching sincerity, and without this show’s refreshingly laidback approach to character development and humor. You can, as it turns out, have your cake and eat it too, as All Rise capably proves by being thought-provoking and fun. Although maybe it could stand to lose the in-character testimonies next week.
