Damages (TV series)
Damages is an American legal thriller television series created by writing and production trio Daniel Zelman, Glenn Kessler, and Todd A. Kessler. It premiered on July 24, 2007, on FX and aired for three seasons before moving to the DirecTV channel Audience Network in 2010, airing for two further seasons, and concluding in 2012.
The plot revolves around the brilliant, ruthless lawyer Patty Hewes and her newest protégée, recent law school graduate Ellen Parsons. Each season features a major case that Hewes and her firm take on, while also examining a chapter of the complex relationship between Ellen and Patty. The first two seasons center on the law firm Hewes & Associates in New York City, while later seasons focus more on Patty and Ellen's relationship and Ellen’s attempts to distance herself from Hewes & Associates, both personally and professionally.
The series is known for its depiction of season-long cases, from the point of view of both the law firm and an opponent. It is also noted for the technical merit of its writing, including its effective use of plot twists and non-linear narrative. It has received critical acclaim and various award nominations, with Close and Željko Ivanek winning Primetime Emmy Awards for their performances. Other established actors in the cast include Ted Danson, Tate Donovan, William Hurt, Marcia Gay Harden, Timothy Olyphant, Martin Short, Lily Tomlin, John Goodman, Ryan Phillippe, Dylan Baker, Janet McTeer, and John Hannah.
Plot
Series overview
Season one
The regular cast consists of Glenn Close, Rose Byrne, Ted Danson, Tate Donovan, Željko Ivanek and Noah Bean.A young woman, Ellen Parsons, is found running through the streets half-naked and covered in blood. During the ensuing police investigation, her fiancé, David, is found in the couple's apartment, bludgeoned to death, and Ellen is arrested.
Six months earlier, Ellen, a newly minted lawyer, is being courted for prestigious jobs. She turns down an offer to work with the defense attorney Hollis Nye. Ultimately, she chooses a job at Hewes & Associates, headed by notorious lawyer Patty Hewes. When Nye finds out about this, he warns Ellen of the dangers of working for Patty and asks her to sign his business card. Ellen later notices he wrote, "I was warned,” above her signature.
Ellen becomes engrossed in a major case that Hewes & Associates is pursuing. Patty has been retained in a class action lawsuit by the former employees of billionaire Arthur Frobisher. In a case reminiscent of the Enron scandal, Frobisher is accused of insider trading and lying to his employees about his company's health, even as he unloaded hundreds of millions of his own stock, depriving his employees of their retirement funds and benefits. Early in the season, Patty shows she is willing to go to extreme, unethical, and illegal lengths to win her case. As the season progresses, Ellen becomes increasingly involved in the case and in Patty's tradecraft.
Ellen deduces that one reason she was hired was her personal connection to the case; her fiancé's sister turns out to be an important witness. Throughout much of the season, Ellen skirts the edges of unethical behavior, and she eventually crosses that line. As Ellen becomes increasingly devoted to the case, her relationship with her fiancé, David, becomes strained. The situation worsens when Patty betrays his sister. Eventually, Ellen and David tire of Patty, and Ellen publicly leaves Hewes & Associates. Nevertheless, she maintains an interest in the case and soon becomes personally and professionally embroiled in it again.
Throughout the first season, the series plays with time. Instead of unfolding in the present and showing flashbacks of the past, the main narrative unfolds several months in the past and is interspersed with flashes of events that are taking place in the present. These flashes gradually reveal that Ellen's fiancé, David, has been murdered and that Ellen, while staying at Patty's apartment, appears to have been attacked.
By the finale of the first season, the past-tense main narrative of the show has caught up with the flashes of the present, and most of the questions raised by those flashes have been resolved. The murder charges against Ellen are dropped. The identities of David's murderer and Ellen's attacker are revealed to the audience, and the Frobisher case is resolved. As a result, Frobisher gives two billion dollars of his personal fortune to the employees, in exchange for a guarantee that no criminal charges will be filed against him. He is later shot and left for dead by a former employee, whom he had double-crossed earlier by manipulating him for information.
Season two
, Rose Byrne, and Tate Donovan return as regulars in the second season of the series. Season one recurring star Anastasia Griffith became a regular, while season one regular Ted Danson returned for five episodes. William Hurt, Timothy Olyphant and Marcia Gay Harden also joined the regular cast, while John Doman guest starred.Once naive young attorney Ellen Parsons talks to an unknown person off-screen. Suddenly, she pulls out a gun before pulling the trigger twice.
Six months earlier, an old acquaintance of Patty's, scientist Daniel Purcell, convinces Patty to take a case involving a conspiracy between Purcell's scientific firm and a huge energy corporation, Ultima National Resources. Patty's initial refusal to assist Purcell is understood better when it is revealed that Purcell is the father of Patty's son, Michael, a relationship she abused to win a case during Michael's childhood. Currently, Purcell is having an affair with Patty's opponent in the courtroom, Claire Maddox, the attorney of UNR's CEO. On a similar note, a partner in UNR, Dave Pell, conspires against her with Patty's husband, Phil, while Phil is also having an extramarital affair. When Phil's affair is anonymously leaked to the press, Patty kicks him out of their apartment. Ellen, still believing Patty had tried to have her killed, deals with her past by attending group grief counseling sessions and working with the FBI to bring Patty down. Patty's partner Tom Shayes, whose wife is pregnant with a son, continues to be in the dark on certain issues regarding cases. Eventually, Ellen uses Tom to further the FBI investigation, causing him to get fired in the process.
Similar to the first season, the majority of the narrative is past tense, with glimpses of the present. This season gradually reveals it is Patty that Ellen held at gunpoint, attempting to force the truth out of her. Several minutes after Ellen fires the gun, Patty is found bleeding in the elevator.
In the season finale, Ellen convinces Patty to bribe the judge to accept evidence that would otherwise be inadmissible, in a setup to incriminate Patty. At the same time, Patty makes a deal with Pell to call off the FBI and hand over the data proving UNR is using toxic chemicals. In return, Patty will drop the energy trading angle of the case. She also sets up Ellen to take the fall for bribing the judge. Ellen, meanwhile, procures a handgun. After destroying the FBI cameras in the room by shooting them, Ellen confronts Patty about her actions from season one, leaving to bribe the judge after Patty confesses that she was responsible for the attempted murder of Ellen. Soon thereafter, Patty is found bleeding in the elevator. Here, it is revealed that before her confrontation with Ellen, Patty was stabbed by Fin Garrity. When Ellen bribes the judge, her FBI handler arrests both her and the judge. As they leave, US Marshals arrest the corrupt agent Ellen was assisting, freeing Ellen.
One month later, Patty is recovering at home, Tom is returning to Patty's firm, and Ellen has a new job offer. Patty says Ellen will return.
Season three
, Rose Byrne, and Tate Donovan returned as regulars for the third season. Season 1 regular Ted Danson returned for five episodes. Martin Short and Campbell Scott joined the cast. Lily Tomlin and Keith Carradine special guest starred.Patty is the victim of a car crash. The other car belongs to Tom Shayes, who is found dead in a dumpster. Ellen is implicated in Tom's murder because her blood-stained purse is found in the hands of a homeless man near the dumpster. When a detective questions Ellen, they discuss what the homeless man said, and the detective asks whether Ellen and Tom were romantically involved. Ellen replies, "We were starting a law firm together".
Six months earlier, Patty Hewes is tackling a new case. Appointed a trustee by the US government, she is tasked to recover billions of dollars lost to the largest investment fraud in Wall Street history: a fraudulent Ponzi scheme run by Louis Tobin, a Bernie Madoff-type. Patty believes Tobin has hidden the money and that members of his family, specifically his loyal son Joe and daughter Carol, secretive wife Marilyn, and trusted attorney and family friend Leonard Winstone know much more than they claim. Tom has a personal involvement because he invested in the Tobin fund and lost his savings and those of his parents and in-laws, which makes his work on the case a conflict of interest. Ellen, meanwhile, has stayed true to her promise not to return to Patty's firm and has avoided contact for the past year that she has been working at the District Attorney's office. Ellen runs into Tom, and she mentions she is having trouble cracking a drug case. Soon afterward, Ellen's case is suddenly resolved under suspicious circumstances, and she receives a package from Hewes & Associates containing an expensive Chanel bag from Patty. Believing Hewes & Associates is more capable than the D.A. to bring about restitution for the victims, Ellen begins to secretly cooperate with Patty and Tom, and they all get drawn into the Tobin family's world of deceit.
Patty and Ellen's bond resurfaces as they work on the case together. Throughout the third season, Ellen tries to prove that she can get to and manipulate Patty, which Patty figures out through Ellen's manipulation of her replacement at Hewes & Associates: a young, ambitious lawyer named Alex.
Ellen and Patty each deal with family crises. Patty learns her son, Michael, and his girlfriend Jill, who is at least 15 years his senior, are expecting a baby. At the end of the season, Jill finds herself in custody for having sex with a minor and about to lose her freedom and custody of the baby. Toward the end of the season, it is revealed that the car that hit Patty was driven by Michael, who was enraged by Patty's having Jill arrested. Meanwhile, Ellen's sister is arrested on a drug charge. Also revealed is an old and painful secret Patty has been keeping for years, about her daughter, Julia. Through memories and dreams Patty repeatedly sees herself, highly pregnant, walking up to a ranch with horses and a man she briefly talks to. He asks what she's doing so far away from her home in her condition, and Patty replies her doctor said she'd be okay. However, the doctor actually told Patty she must stay in bed and avoid any physical activity, or else the baby will die. Following Tom's funeral, Patty indirectly admits to Ellen that she brought on a miscarriage so she could go to New York and accept an important job offer, thus beginning her climb to the top of the legal profession. Ellen then asks, "Is it worth it?" Patty does not reply, and Ellen leaves.