Suits - Season 2 Episode 13 - Recap and Review - Zane vs. Zane

“Zane vs. Zane” kind of pitted father against daughter on Suits! If you’re like me, you probably assumed that Rachel (Meghan Markle) would have played a bigger role in the closing of this week’s gender discrimination case, considering the fact that the opponent was her somewhat inappropriate and kind of misogynistic mega-lawyer of a father. Mike Ross (Patrick J. Adams) and Harvey Specter (Gabriel Macht) took a backseat to the leading ladies this episode, and scorned women are always fun to watch, especially when Louis (Rick Hoffman) is involved.

The episode opened with Harvey and Mike playing a game of wastepaper basket Horse, only to have Jessica (Gina Torres) appear from the ether of whatever futuristic dimension of perfection she normally exists in. As it happened, a $10M settlement agreement they’d recently reached surrounding a gender discrimination case would be tossed aside. The man who made the offer had died, and the new lawyer, Robert Zane, was not one to go down without a tremendous fight.

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Meanwhile, Zane and the other Zane, his daughter Rachel, were out for her birthday lunch. Things turned sour quickly, though, as her father made it clear through a series of digs and quips that Rachel wouldn’t be able to hang as a lawyer at Pearson Hardman. Basically, it went something like, “heads up; you’re beautiful not smart!” Rachel wasn’t having it, of course, and stormed off in a huff. Back at the office, she pleaded with Mike to let her sit in on the deposition. In other words, she wanted the case to become “Zane vs. Zane.”

When Robert arrived at the office to discuss the settlement with Harvey, he made it clear that his predecessor was a total doofus and, as they put it several times, “a dick.” The $10M settlement was taken off the table, as pretty much all were on the same page that they’d gotten extremely lucky with that amount, and instead, Zane offered a meager $2M; a huge drop, but not yet incredibly insulting. Rather, just kind of insulting. As Robert put it to Jessica one-on-one, they’re firm is floundering, and a win is a win. Why would they care if their client took a massive hit, so long as they got the win on record? Suddenly, things seemed more personal.

Meanwhile, Louis had made it his business to ruin Harvey’s new recruit Katrina’s new life at Pearson Hardman. Still suffering from the burn of losing his incredible new employee to Harvey’s scheme, Louis attempted to force his way onto Katrina’s case. Clueless as to whom Louis even was, Katrina bought a minute’s worth of Donna’s (Sarah Rafferty) time with an incredible batch of homemade cookies. Seriously, it goes without saying but Sarah Rafferty always lights up the screen. I’m sure this has been stated thousands of times in recaps, reviews, and comment sections alike, but I’m still fairly new to Suits.

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In an attempt to pull one over on Louis, Katrina played the role of “dumb damsel in distress” while he juiced his kale, and managed to coyly coerce him to take the first chair on her case. Only, she somewhat outsmarted him by purposely giving him the wrong date for the court hearing, leaving him with a big fine and a heap of embarrassment. Louis doesn’t lay down easy, though. In retaliation, he showed up to Katrina’s next hearing feigning nice and offering her the files she “left” mistakenly. Files in hand, Katrina thought she’d thwarted his next scheme, only to realize she’d already been duped. He’d swapped out the files earlier, leaving her with a ridiculous folder of photoshopped pictures of Louis’s face on the bodies of the presidents! I’m assuming Katrina’s fine was significantly larger.

The deposition was kind of a total disaster, no? Rachel sat across from her father while he absolutely obliterated Harvey’s client. If you ask me, and Mike Ross, things got borderline rude! The female client had worked for a food company for several years, only to watch less experienced and less talented men progress past her position time and time again. The case seemed fair enough, but Robert Zane badgered the woman into oblivion, rendering her speechless. To Rachel, it seemed as though her father were directing his barbs directly towards her; calling her pathetic, a quitter, useless, etc. To me, that made perfect sense. In any case, any man should have pulled aside his daughter after the fact to clear the air. Harvey had anticipated that Rachel’s presence would shake things up due to her rocky relationship with her father; however, things weren’t going as planned.

With his client ready to collapse, Harvey had no choice but to track Zane down during a golf outing. After some seemingly friendly banter, Robert called him out on what happened to be the truth; they were about to lose. Still, he decided to twist the knife, as Harvey had dared to question his power to begin with and because Rachel was willingly dragged into this mess. Over the course of about thirty seconds, the settlement vanished entirely, leaving Harvey only the option of bashing heads with him in the courtroom if he wanted a win.

Rachel had opened up to Mike while the two researched past examples of females being treated unfairly by the same company. As it turned out, Rachel hadn’t even bothered to tell her father that she’d scored very highly on the LSAT because her father would only consider anything less than absolutely perfection to be laughable. After doling out some characteristic words of encouragement, Mike struck gold by discovering that there had been over one hundred and thirteen cases of women being let go for the same excuse as their client. Actually, the company used the same belittling terms to terminate each female employee. Basically, they had found extremely legitimate proof that the company had amassed their entire female staff into one maltreated blob. Robert Zane was not happy with the discovery but came up with one last power play in an attempt to destroy Pearson Hardman. As described to Jessica by Robert, they could possibly divide the case into many cases with evidence such as that put on the table. Therefore, Pearson Hardman would have to sift through, at least, forty-five versions of the same case, draining all of their resources.

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Donna went to bat for Katrina, defending her against Louis’s personal brand of torment. Still, it didn’t seem as though he were willing to budge. Maybe he should have, though, because the next time he walked through the courthouse metal detector, he ended up cuffed and arrested for attempting to bring in a weapon. In truth, Katrina had planted his gold cuticle trimmer in his jacket pocket and tipped off her buddy, the security guard.

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From the comfort of a jail cell, Louis got an earful from Katrina about how he was discriminatory towards women. Louis is many things, but he doesn’t degrade women. He loves women, his grandma included. Katrina, having heard the truth about why Louis was upset with her hiring, made amends with her superior. The two called a truce. Donna, on the other hand, wouldn’t let Louis off the hook so easily. After wallpapering his office with his mug shot, she glued his pants to the seat of his chair. Louis, oddly happy that he and Donna had presumably patched things up, was in for a rude awakening. She’s not finished with him yet!

Rachel confronted her father at his office in an attempt to gain a better understanding as to why he can’t believe in her. In short, Robert remembered a story from her childhood in which she lost a part in a school play and never subsequently tried out for another. Basically, she didn’t take failure well back then, and it hurt him. Rachel, not buying this at all, informed her father of her exceptional test score, to which he seemed at least somewhat proud. Still, what would really impress him would be seeing her kick the ass of a lawyer like him someday, and she knows that. She still has legwork to put in.

Zane’s final offer was none other than another opportunity for Pearson Hardman to merge. Gross. Whenever one of these opposing firm representatives attempts to swoon Jessica with threats of a merger, it always comes off like a perv trying to woo the hottest catch at the club, and she’s so over it. There will never be a shotgun merger while Jessica is on watch. She’d rather watch the firm fold by clawing her way tooth and nail through a ton of the same damn case. In fact, she turned the tables on Zane. As a female leader, it would make for good press considering the material at hand. Plus, it would end up draining Zane of a lot more money than he’d even anticipated.

Zane ended up dropping the case, as anticipated. Maybe it was entirely about the money, or maybe his daughter had a little something to do with it; however, there was a massive catch. He passed on the case to a close colleague of his, Hardman! Well, he’s back, everybody. Meanwhile, Mike was busy charming Rachel with a framed print of her LSAT score to remind her to keep kicking ass and taking names. Happy Birthday, Rach!

What did you all thinks of Suits Season 2 Episode 13, “Zane vs. Zane”? Would you have liked to have seen Rachel give at least a little something more to the conclusion of her father’s involvement in the case? Will Mike and Rachel work things out? When will Harvey get his name on the door? (Forget “Specter,”; just take the “-dman” off of “Hardman” and throw in a “-vey”! I know the firm is strapped for cash.)

Thanks for reading my Recap and Review of Suits Season 2 Episode 13, “Zane vs. Zane”!