The Lincoln Lawyer – Season 1 Episode 4 “Chaos Theory” Recap & Review

Chaos Theory

Episode 4 of The Lincoln Lawyer begins with Detective Griggs showing up at Jerry’s office. He’s done a quick sweep and whoever it was outside, they’re gone now. We soon learn that this was all a set-up by Griggs, intending to test Mickey’s credentials. Now that he’s confident Mickey isn’t guilty of killing Jerry, he’s ready to open up and reveal what he’s found.

The police haven’t uncovered much, in truth, but Griggs does confirm that someone from the FBI was contacting Jerry a week before he died. So with this intel, Griggs intends to use Mickey to smoke out the real killer, making it seem like he knows more than he’s letting on. That way, Griggs can swoop in and arrest this guy if they show themselves.

With a surveillance unit tracking their car, Mickey eventually shows up to see Eli Wyms, concerned all the while about being used as bait. Eli is understandably suspicious of this new lawyer, given what happened to Jerry. He won’t talk until he’s out of the hospital, leading to a bit of a dead-end.

On his way back, Bruce Carlin rings Mickey after seeing his confident press conference. He has info on Jerry and Elliott’s case and he wants to talk in private, without a police escort there.

Mickey shows up at the place in question but Carlin rings first, claiming that he’s not alone and that “they were there.” Quite who “they” is remains a mystery but it would appear that someone got there earlier. As we know, Mickey’s car is bugged and this little development is enough for him to scout the car and find it. Mickey decides to leave it in for now and use this to their advantage.

Back at the office, Lorna appears to have found something. Checking the delinquent records, she’s stumbled upon a guy called Wayne Banks. Now, he’s been incriminated mostly for drug stuff but when Carlin head over to see him, the report claims that Banks died from an overdose. Every client had a death certificate but there’s no certificate for Wayne Banks, which appears to hint that this guy is a John Doe and that Wayne Banks is actually still alive.

Cisco poses as Banks and manages to find the last place his debit card was used – El Adobe Market in Riverside. As we soon learn, Bruce Carlin is actually using Wayne’s debit card to cover his own tracks. Cisco heads out to tail him.

Mickey heads back to Eli with good news. He’s managed to get most of the charges dropped, minus the one account of reckless firearm discharge. That would mean he’s behind bars for 3 years, dropped to 1 year for good behaviour. Eli reluctantly agrees to this.

Mickey brings up the potential link between him and Elliott Trevor’s case. Eli is incredulous to this, claiming he’s never seen Lara before, as he opens up and talks about what happened to him on the night in question. Eli’s wife kicked him out the house, he head up to the hilltop to blow some steam, where he ended up shooting cans and drinking beer. When he saw the lights, he blacked out.

Alongside this is another case involving Maggie. She’s involved in a human trafficking case with a guy called Angela Soto. When Soto wriggles from his charges, Maggie’s star witness ends up being shot. A coincidence? Highly doubtful. Either way, Maggie ends up feeling guilty, given she was the one who pressured him into testifying.

Cops pull over Bruce Carlin, leading to all sorts of drama. With Carlin’s identity compromised, he steps out in front of a car and allows himself to be hit, killing him instantly.

The Episode Review

The Lincoln Lawyer doubles down on the Elliott case this time around, as it’s becoming increasingly clear that Jerry had some big information pertaining to the case and someone high up did not want this leaked. It would also seem that the police could actually be involved in this as well, potentially with Griggs as the dirty ringleader. That’s just a theory at this point though.

The inclusion of Maggie’s human trafficking case feels a bit messy and almost an excuse to give her some busywork in this show. I’m not quite sure it clicks, given the emphasis on Mickey, but it does at least keep up the pretence of there being different cases each episode.