(chortle)
Now I’m worried that it was a brief continuity error that changes from shot to shot and I’ll look like a crazy person.
Well, yes, legally, having a mental illness would not disqualify him from practicing the law.
But Jimmy isn’t going after him in the legal sense - he’s going after him socially. We’ve seen that at least some lawyers are already starting to gossip about what happened at the Bar hearing. Legally, Chuck could still work as a lawyer, but practically, how many people would want a lawyer that they thought was crazy? How much business would he lose because other lawyers will now be reluctant to refer clients to him? And when that starts cutting into HHM’s business, how long will Hamlin last before trying to shuffle Chuck out the door?
And he’s doing it now rather than years ago, because now is when he’s realized how much Chuck hates him, and how much he hates Chuck back. As bad as some of the stuff Jimmy has done lately is, don’t forget Season One, where we saw him zealously defending his brother’s interests, and Season Two, where he hoped the Sandpiper lawsuit might snap Chuck out of his funk. Jimmy’s hate for his brother is a new thing, largely caused by Chuck’s actions over the last few months of show time.
Chuck is protected under the law, if he can do his job with reasonable accommodation from his employer. Since, as I mentioned earlier, only Jimmy, (maybe) Kim, and Dr. Cruz know Chuck’s problem is psychosomatic; everyone else buys into Chuck’s self-diagnosis of EM field sensitivity. HHM is providing reasonable accommodation by allowing him to work at home, at times when he is well enough to work. Dr. Cruz clearly thinks Chuck’s psychological problem is serious enough that he should be involuntarily committed (he is a danger to himself or others). If his mental condition impairs his judgement (presumably a key element of practicing law) than there may be no accommodation which enables Chuck to continue working as a lawyer.
Jimmy has way more patience than I would have. I would have been out of there right after the “monkey with a machine gun” speech…
Agreed on all points.
That’s what I love about this show and “Breaking Bad” - they make me think about them so much! I feel like I could write a thesis on Walter White alone. 
Agreed, but he is also going after Chuck’s law career, because that is the thing that Chuck values above all else, and bases all of his self-esteem on. There is a good argument to be made that most (if not all) of Chuck’s hatred of Jimmy comes from Jimmy practicing law - tainting it, in Chuck’s view. Only Chuck is worthy of practicing law, not Slippin’ Jimmy. It’s hard to know if Jimmy went into the insurance office with the plan of making a serious attempt at ruining Chuck’s law career, or if he just seized the opportunity when it presented itself, but either way, well-played Jimmy!
By years ago I meant his problems have been known all along, not that jimmy was more, or less angry then.
Somehow I can’t imagine going after him “socially” makes for riveting climax-every-50-minutes TV but I’ve been wrong before.
Known by whom, though? Not even his ex-wife seemed to know what was going on. Jimmy knew, the people at HHM knew, but we don’t know anyone else who was in the know about his condition. Some people probably knew he wasn’t working regularly, but there could be a multitude of reasons for that.
Everyone who knew what was really going on were either his family or close associates, who had no reason or desire to spread rumors about Chuck. Until, that is, Jimmy decided he’d had enough of Chuck.
Now that the cat is out of the bag, all bets are off on how this will affect Chuck.
Other than Howard and Ernesto (and whoever brings Chuck supplies now), I don’t think anyone at HHM knew that Chuck was crazy. They knew he was an eccentric senior partner who had a weird thing about cellphones, but I think they thought of it as ‘one of the guys with his name on the sign has some weird quirks’, they didn’t get the scale of it. No one at HHM is really going to comment on a ‘name on the sign’ partner working remotely or shorter hours, it’s not good for your career prospects to act like a nosy boss to the guy at the top of the food chain, and he could easily be doing some kind of legal research or special project that they aren’t clear to know about. He’d stay in contact with people via letters, which is a little eccentric but not that unusual for an older man fifteen years ago, especially a man who is rich enough to make people do things his way.
Jimmy and Howard had been working hard for years to keep Chuck’s condition a secret from everyone else, letting enough slip out when he needs to interact with other people that he seems eccentric but not dangerously crazy. An old guy who can’t stand cell phones of flourescent lights isn’t that scary, but a ranting man who wraps his house in foil and fills it with gas lanterns and newspapers seems a lot less stable. Couple that with his nasty rant on the stand, the serious blows to his credibility, and a doctor recommending he be committed, and all of a sudden you’re looking at someone who’s a significant risk. Couple that with HHM covering up his condition from licensing and insurance authorities, and you might even have something illegal going on.
In the first season episode when the Sandpiper lawyers come to his house for a negotiation the bearded senior partner indicates he is aware of Chuck’s problems. The Bar Association also knows of it. So hardly a secret.
The other thing is they haven’t made “secrecy” a part of the story the way it’s told. His problems have been front and center for the whole show.
Well, there’s “aware of the problem” and AWARE of the PROBLEM. Yes, Chuck can’t be around cellphones is an open secret. Couchbound, sick for days and wrapped in tinfoil is not necessarily part of the open secret.
But as an audience we don’t care what is secret to them and what’s not. The show has not spoken to us about how secret this all was at all.
That may be, but it would appear that his judgement not to mention whether this is a physical malady at all is now in question. Expensive clients will not want their fates determined by the seeming capriciousness of an attorney who cannot let go of his own personal demons. Would you?
They came over briefly during daylight hours into what seemed like a pretty normal house with a guy who had a sensitivity to cell phones. Chuck acted normal around them, and they could buy that it was a competent man with an odd condition and maybe some eccentricities. They didn’t see the ripped out wires, lanterns sitting on stacks of newspaper, or walls covered in tin foil. They don’t see Chuck wrapped in a space blanket shivering on the couch for days after he goes out. They don’t see how much work has to go into getting food, ice, fuel, and other supplies to keep him functioning. They probably weren’t aware of his arrest for stealing a neighbor’s paper. And they definitely didn’t see anything indicating that it’s entirely psychological, or the doctor’s recommendation that Chuck be committed for his own safety.
So yes, Chuck’s actual condition has been a very well-guarded secret. The fact that he can’t stand to be around cell phones is known, but the full extent of how crippling the condition is, the fact that it’s entirely a mental illness, and the danger he puts himself in routinely have all been kept to a few people.
ibid
I am part of the audience and you simply do not get to tell me what I care about. And I’ve pointed out how the show has spoken to us about how secret this was, while you’ve failed to demonstrate that any of it was incorrect or offered any counterexamples from the show. So there wasn’t any point in responding to what you quoted before, but now I’ll point out how vapid of a response it is in hopes that you stop pretentiously requoting yourself.
I pretty much agree with you.
I am going to jump in here to again point out that anyone who was not in the hospital room when Dr. Cruz turned on the electricity to the bed without Chuck noticing (Jimmy and Kim) thinks Chuck has an actual medical condition (EM sensitivity). Chuck has been corresponding with researchers around the world who are researching the condition. It is not until the stunt with the battery at Jimmy’s hearing that anyone else has reason to doubt Chuck’s stability. Nobody would believe Jimmy if he told them (at the time they would think he was trying to force HHM to buy Chuck out, later they would think it was part of the Chuck/Jimmy vendetta), and Kim wouldn’t dare talk about the mental health of someone who could crush her career like an empty beer can.
This goes back the the ability of lawyers to separate strongly suspect and know. Until the bar hearing, Howard et. al. may suspect that Chuck’s choo-choo has gone around the bend, but they haven’t seen any direct evidence that his condition is psychosomatic.
Was there an episode this week? My DVR missed it if it did. Wife blames me.
Nope. Memorial Day. And now we must sit back and covfefe until next week.