Warning: Deep spoilers for The Lincoln Lawyer’s season-two finale lie ahead.
After a month-long recess, The Lincoln Lawyer has returned to Netflix to wrap up season two’s big case. In brief: This season, idealistic criminal-defense lawyer, car-brand loyalist, and part-time foodie Mickey Haller has been in the spotlight as he takes on a high-profile murder case in which L.A. chef Lisa Trammell is accused of murdering Mitchell Bondurant, a big-time real-estate developer. Lisa’s been leading the protests against Bondurant’s attempts to gentrify the neighborhood where her restaurant and home are located, which lands her with a restraining order from Bondurant that becomes null and void pretty quickly because, not long after, whoopsie, Bondurant ends up dead. Mickey — who met Lisa while dining at her restaurant before she used food as foreplay (his weakness!) and the two hooked up — put a pause on the frisky business in order to take on her legal business.
The evidence is stacked up against Lisa: Her gardening gloves have Bondurant’s blood on them, and in the second half of the season, Lisa’s own missing hammer turns up as the murder weapon. Plus, she’s not doing herself any favors by looking incredibly guilty any time Mickey brings up people who keep secrets and buried bodies. Regardless, Mickey’s tactic is to toss blame on another possible suspect, Alex Grant, the son of an Armenian mob boss who had an axe to grind with Bondurant, as well. So, how do things shake out in the end? Is Lisa guilty? Does she get away with it? And how do we leave things with Mickey once the dust settles? Hey, Mickey’s not the only person looking for answers here — find yours below.
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Who killed Mitchell Bondurant?
Surprisingly, not Lisa Trammell! Hey, good for Mickey, having an innocent client! In the penultimate episode, Lisa’s employee René recognizes city building inspector Walter Kim as the health department inspector who came to the restaurant the day before Lisa’s arrest — where he had access to her gardening gloves and hammer — and the Haller team realizes all the evidence points to Kim as Bondurant’s killer. They already knew Kim was taking bribes from everyone’s favorite Armenian mobster Alex Grant to get permits approved on his construction jobs, but didn’t put it together that those bribes meant that when Bondurant was threatening Grant with federal legal action, he was also threatening Kim. We don’t get a straight answer on whether Kim acted on his own or was paid by Grant to kill Bondurant, but Grant’s courier-company van being at the scene points to the latter. In the final episode, we learn there was a shard of broken glass matching the one at Bondurant’s murder scene missing from one of Kim’s telescoping inspector tools — the same type of tool that would’ve given Kim a way to force Bondurant to look up at the ceiling, allowing him to smash his head in with that hammer.
So, Walter Kim killed Bondurant. Unfortunately for Mickey and Lisa, Walter Kim is dead. I guess that’s unfortunate for him, too. It’s clear that Grant had Kim killed to keep him quiet, which means that Mickey, who had already rested the defense’s case, can’t recall Kim to the stand and reopen the case. Even with this new overwhelming evidence, all Mickey has left to protect his client is his closing arguments.
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Does Mickey win his case?
This is Mickey Haller, baby, of course he does. Mickey is a man fueled by drama (and octopus dumplings). He uses his closing arguments to reiterate the fact that neither the police nor prosecution looked into any other suspect, that Alex Grant certainly had motive and seemed like he was hiding something (pleading the fifth will do that to a guy), and that all of the blood evidence pointing perfectly at Lisa seemed very much planted. Reasonable doubt is on Mickey’s side here, and the court finds Lisa Trammell not guilty. Mickey celebrates by accepting a No. 1 lawyer mug from opposing counsel and excellent sparring partner Andy Freeman, and by having his client fire him so he can have sex with her again. Is this why people want to become lawyers?
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I’m sorry, the cilantro was growing in what now?
Oh, wow, a real rough turn of events here, folks. Remember when I was congratulating Mickey on having an innocent client? Well, it’s not so simple. Lisa Trammell is very much innocent of Mitchell Bondurant’s murder, but — post-coitally of course — something about Lisa just isn’t sitting right with Mickey, and it isn’t her Korean spare ribs because, honestly, those look delicious. While hanging out at Venice Beach with his daughter, Mickey recognizes the ambient noises around him as exactly the same noises he heard in the background during his first phone call with Lisa’s ex-husband Jeff. He does some digging and confronts Lisa at her restaurant. It makes no sense that Jeff wouldn’t go through with their divorce and instead just disappear — California is a community-property state, so he stood to get half of everything Lisa owned. It also makes no sense that Lisa wouldn’t just take the large sum of money Bondurant offered her to move out of her place — she could’ve taken the money and started at a new location. And it absolutely makes no sense that Lisa vehemently refused to put up her restaurant for bail, deciding she’d rather stay in jail than risk losing the place.
The real nail in the coffin, so to speak, is Mickey doing a little social-media digging and learning that the “Jeff†he met earlier in the season was actually a former employee of Lisa’s. You see where this is all going, don’t you? Lisa killed her husband. “Just because you’re not guilty of something doesn’t mean you’re innocent of everything,†he tells her. When Mickey questions Lisa as to where Jeff’s body is, he realizes he already knows: SHE BURIED HIM IN THE HERB GARDEN. I’m surprised Mickey doesn’t immediately start vomiting — that man has eaten so much food from this restaurant! But it all makes sense now: It’s why Lisa didn’t want to sell the place; she couldn’t risk the body being discovered. Mickey can’t call the cops on her, but Lorna sure can — it looks like Lisa will be headed to prison after all.
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Do Cisco and Lorna FINALLY get hitched?
While Mickey’s love life may be headed for a slump — probably a little hard to bounce back from sex with a husband-killer — there is some great news in the romance department. After a lot of back and forth and double bookings, Cisco and Lorna finally get married. It’s very sweet. When they can’t have the big wedding they’ve been hoping for, they get married at City Hall, and then Cisco surprises Lorna with a big party at Izzy’s new dance studio. Winston the dog wears a blue tie that supposedly Mickey picked out for him, and I’ll never forgive this show for depriving us of seeing that moment.
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Will Izzy remain part of the Haller & Associates team? Please say yes.
The Mickey-Izzy relationship is one of the best parts of The Lincoln Lawyer, so when Izzy’s big storyline this season was about her buying a place to start a dance studio, I feared we might be forced to say good-bye. Thankfully, even though she turns Mickey’s keys back over to him, Izzy won’t be gone for good. She’s helping out at the office while Lorna and Cisco go on their honeymoon, and she asks Mickey if she can still work part time for him to help fund her dance studio. She’s not going anywhere!
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Okay lay it on me: How is Mickey’s life in danger now?
You’re right, Mickey’s life is always somehow in danger, isn’t it? It’s only been two seasons and already Mickey’s ex-wife Maggie has had multiple conversations with him about not dying on her. How exhausting! No wonder she hightailed it to San Diego this season! Mickey has pissed off the wrong people once again. He messed with the Armenian mob, guys! And although we learn that it was not Alex Grant who had Mickey beat up in the parking garage but Lisa (she wanted to prove she was innocent to Mickey by making Grant look guilty, yes, as Lorna notes, it is psychotic), Grant did have both Bondurant and Kim killed. And if that mysterious car that almost runs Mickey down in the middle of the road is any indication, Mickey Haller is next on his list.
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Most importantly: Do we have a case for season three?
Keeping himself out of Alex Grant’s crosshairs won’t be the only thing taking up Mickey’s time in a potential Lincoln Lawyer season three. At the end of the finale, Mickey goes to meet with a new client named Julian La Cosse who is being held in jail on a murder charge. Julian’s being accused of murdering his friend Giselle Dallinger — the same woman who told him that Mickey was the guy to call if he’s ever in trouble. Mickey doesn’t know anyone named Giselle but agrees to help Julian, who really does seem to be in a bind. The next day, he heads to the morgue to look into this Giselle person. When the coroner removes the sheet, Mickey realizes, tragically, that he does know Giselle — it’s Gloria Dayton, or Glory Days, the sex worker whose testimony helped him get Jesus Menendez released last season. Mickey had taken a liking to her and was happy when she told him she was headed to Hawaii to spend time with her mom and maybe figure out a new gig. She even sent him a postcard! Clearly, something went very wrong, and it’ll be up to Mickey to get his friend justice. Fire up the Lincoln, baby, we’re headed back to court! Probably! At some point! There is a lot of paperwork to get through first, you know?