Alan goes to jail for contempt of court (not the first time, I’m sure), while a man holds the lawyers at the firm at gunpoint over an issue with Denny.
What’s the footage of young Shatner from? 
Damn that episode has emmy written all over it. What a great weaving of Shatner’s first great role and his current one.
My wife think’s there is something wrong with me as I identified the footage immediately. I saw it a few years back. A very young Steve McQueen was in it.
The Alan subplot distracted from what was otherwise the best episode of Boston Legal I have seen.
I really liked the Ken Doll “almost SEAL” getting caught in the duck. This little toss off silliness really cracked me up. Great music for the episode, it really worked.
Jim
Wally reminded me of an older John Candy. He even had the voice. I thought his story was sad and affecting. It was nice of Alan to buck him up at the end, but I’m not so sure Alan was right about Wally’s wife.
I wish they could have done the retrial without the explosives. We knew they wouldn’t be detonated so there was no tension. Nice acting job by Shatner and Earl though. Was that his name? Earl?
And as for the music, as I said to VeryCoolSpouse after the episode was over: “For a story that good, they brought out the big guns.”
Best episode ever. And Billy Joel. I was in tears–but we all know I’m a big mush anyway. And I was totally sober at the time.
Fantastic episode, and made all the better for me because I was coming away from such a crap episode of House.
Definitely EmmyTM material. Using the old TV footage of Shatner to tell Denny’s story was a stroke of writing genius!
Alan’s subplot was actually pretty compelling. I think he insulted the judge a second time with the intention of giving the carpet guy and his wife a little more time to talk out the whole situation. Don’t really think they resolved anything, though.
And regarding the bomber: is he the go-to guy for plots involving explosives? IIRC, he was the security guard/bomb expert on the serial bomber episode of CSI , wasn’t he?
That was a damn good show! Great job by the guest star/distraught bomber guy, and Shatner’s interaction with him towards the end was powerful stuff.
Will Shatner get his third Emmy for the same part? I mean, the jury might think that he’s got enough as it is, but it was really a beautiful performance. I guess ‘poignant’ is the adjective of choice here.
The comedic part worked really well, too. Shirley: “What are you going to do, send a dwarf in there? There’s one there already.”
“I’m almost a Navy S.E.A.L.”
All in all it was a very dark episode, which is why it worked so well. With great comedy, the darkness is always present.
And vice versa.
I missed a couple of episodes this season, so to me this was the first introduction to Denny’s past. It worked very well because up until this point I never knew Denny had to sacrifice anything to become a great lawyer.
The explosive vasts weren’t necessary and a bit distracting. It would have been better if the guy had a bomb in a bag or something. He did a great job in this episode too, you could really believe he was tortured by the verdict and the way Denny tried the old case.
Denny was a young, noble lawyer at one point. It makes his mad cow disease even more painful.
<nitpick>Bolding mine. Repeat after me; Pipes are round, ducts are square, ducks don’t echo.</nitpick>
BTW I also liked the Ken Doll stuck in the duct.
It is worse then you think. I was an HVAC Mechanic and Navy Electrician in the past. I do know better and still screwed it up.
Nitpick of your nitpick. Many ducts are round or rectangular. 
Jim
<hijack continues>Hehehehe, you’re right of course. My response was a take-off of an old ME joke, paraphrased: “Mechanical engineers study incredibly hard subjects for four years. The first day on the job after graduation they learn that the only thing they really need to know is: Pipes are round, ducts are square.”<bye jack>