User Reviews

A separated man was about to commit suicide after a phone call with his former wife when he noticed an arson coming from the church placed across the street. Fireworkers came in to put out the flames, taking a dead body out of the sacred place. The firestarter used gasoline to enhance the flames. The victim was a school teacher but he was beaten to death before being burned. Two metalheads were the prime suspects because they set other churches on fire but detectives ruled them out due to lack of evidences. So police began looking into the victim's personal life, there were rumors....another wrong track. A born again christian (Jeffrey Donovan), whose daughter was one of the teacher's pupils, hated the non believers, but he caught the wrong guy....

District attorney vs God: that's how the press describes McCoy. Hilarious. Nothing to add in my point of view; anyway at the end I felt a little relieved about the motive.

Expectations were mixed prior to rewatching "Good Faith". Season 17 generally was a solid season up to this point of the season, and was a solid one overall, there were some good ideas here Melnick has always been a great character. Despite the subject being the bold one, have said more than once about not always being crazy about episodes of the franchise where religion plays a big part in the case, which "Good Faith" does.

"Good Faith" didn't work for me on the whole and is one of my least favourite Season 17 episodes. It is not a bad episode, not at all, and has its good things and moments, but this was a case of the ideas being good but the execution being heavily flawed. It is also one of the very few times where Melnick (usually a welcome presence whenever she appears) frustrated more than she delighted, or at least her arguments are.

There are good things about "Good Faith". Production values are slick and professional, not ever resorting to cheap or untested gimmicks or anything. The music is haunting in the right places and isn't constant or too loud, and there are times where the direction does give the drama urgency and breathing space in the latter stages.

Most of the acting is fine, particularly in the legal portions. McCoy and Melnick have great chemistry together and the episode shines most when they're together.

However, the story executes its good ideas pretty weakly. There is a lack of tension, the case is too thin and found the second half at times far fetched and patronising. The defense argument was insultingly lame and borderline illogical, Melnick was usually much more intelligent and professional than here, and should have been dismissed.

Also felt that the script lacked tautness and could have done with more grit. The pace is pretty dull at times, especially in the first half, which doesn't have too much to it, and then becomes rushed in the final quarter, where it also becomes on the over-complicated side. Still not a fan of Cassady and Milena Govich playing her and there is nothing memorable about them here.

Overall, could have been a lot better. 5/10.

Tovah Feldshuh makes one of her welcome appearances as defense attorney Danielle Melnyk in this Law And Order episode where she defends father Jeffrey Donovan who says he not only bashed in his daughter's biology teacher in, but burned a church down to cover up his crime because the teacher was teaching Darwin in what was purported to be a Christian Academy.

Sam Waterston is rather put out that Feldshuh would argue such a cockamamie defense. Quite rightly he says that would sure open a justification defense for say the Marathon bombers in Boston. Or even if Franklin Graham got a hold of a nuclear bomb and decided that he would demolish San Francisco with ground zero the Castro for violating that oft quoted part of Leviticus. That Judge Denise Dowse would allow such a thing makes this episode one of the lesser ones. Just simply wouldn't happen.

That being said in the end some lies by the daughter Sarah Ramos fueled her fundamentalist father to kill the teacher for some more traditional reasons.

Interesting issues, but not presented well in this story.