All rise, if you’re done viewing Suits on Netflix.
That’s after the USA Network series — starring Patrick Adams as Mike Ross, a whip-smart college dropout who, mid-drug deal, lands a coveted legal gig working for Gabriel Macht’s Harvey Specter despite not having an actual law degree — has enjoyed a huge resurgence in viewership while streaming on Netflix and Peacock.
Suits reigns over the Nielsen streaming charts, where it’s been smashing records since launching on Netflix in mid-June. The series originally aired on USA Network from 2011 to 2019.
Here’s another 10 TV dramas mostly about the inner workings of law firms where attorneys — hard-working, obnoxious or otherwise — defend and do anything to win cases in courtrooms and boardrooms, ethically or not.
Look no further for your next binge-worthy workplace dramas than this list, which is filled with lawyers entwined in their own legal cases and romantic entanglements, whether dark and nuanced or just simply fun and entertaining like Suits.
The Hollywood Reporter has you covered with more legal series, more courtroom wins (and losses) to keep you on the edge of your seat through to the end of the year.
The Lincoln Lawyer
The Lincoln Lawyer, a legal drama from the prolific David E. Kelley, based on the book series by author Michael Connelly, opens up a window on the legal system in Los Angeles. But what’s new is defense attorney Mickey Haller, played by Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, runs his law practice out of the back seat of his Lincoln town car. This legal procedural will have you show up for court as Haller takes cases big and small, each from a different corner of the law, and glam views of Los Angeles are tossed into the bargain. And if you think this series concept sounds familiar, you’d be right. It’s a TV adaptation of the 2011 feature film starring Matthew McConaughey, playing Mickey Haller as an iconoclastic idealist running his law practice out of the back of his Lincoln car.
The Good Wife
This frothy CBS legal drama has a catchy premise — the wife of a disgraced politician returns to work following her husband’s scandal. But a cast led by Julianna Margulies — bringing the aura of her Emmy-winning work on ER — and Christine Baranski produced more than a legal case-of-the-week drama as the series combined workplace tension with courtroom drama to secure an eventual seven-season stretch. Will Alicia Florrick (Margulies) stand by her disgraced husband, played by Chris Noth? Will Alicia and her law school love-turned-boss Will Gardner (Josh Charles) kiss? The Good Wife always had viewers guessing which real-life political sex scandals it was dramatizing, even as the Chicago law firm’s attorneys defended drug kingpins, serial murderers and the wrongly accused.
Boston Legal
James Spader won three Emmys for his role as Alan Shore on David E. Kelley’s law drama Boston Legal, itself a spinoff of The Practice. The legal series, which ran for five seasons, had Spader headlining with William Shatner as the bombastic barrister Denny Crane as the drama portrayed their legal cases, loves and wacky lives while working at the high-priced legal firm of Crane Poole & Schmidt. That their workplace had plenty of cigars, whisky and women provided weekly fodder for what by some see now as a tone-deaf procedural drama from back in the day.
James Spader in Boston Legal
Ally McBeal
If you like Suits because that slick lawyer show was filled with pretty people and their problems, then the bumpy path of another law firm and its titular character, Ally McBeal, played as a pleasingly flawed and quirky Boston lawyer by Calista Flockhart, deserves your viewing. Created by David E. Kelley, the 1990s Fox legal dramedy features McBeal as a hopeless romantic and ditz in her personal life, yet becoming an outstanding lawyer when representing Cage and Fish legal firm clients in the clutch. That’s key because Ally McBeal was framed by the cases handled by McBeal and her fellow lawyers, but it was their personal lives, often messy, that kept viewers hooked. That’s especially so with an ensemble cast that included Robert Downey Jr., Courtney Thorne-Smith, Jane Krakowski, Lucy Liu and Hayden Panettiere.
Calista Flockhart in Ally McBeal
Goliath
Billy Bob Thornton shines as a washed-up attorney looking for redemption — familiar theme in underdog legal dramas, fair warning — in David E. Kelley’s Amazon Prime Video series Goliath. Thornton plays quirky Billy McBride, a formerly brilliant lawyer down on his luck and little more than an ambulance chaser living in a run-down motel. But a case that comes his way about a corporate giant with shady government ties has McBride looking to sober up and get his slingshot back out. But he only runs up against corruption in the courts that has him fighting for his life and career — and all to get revenge on the law firm he founded. Goliath ran for four seasons, and has McBride, despite being up against big odds, always getting his day in court.
Billy Bob Thornton in Goliath
White Collar
After Suits and the unlikely partnership and eventual friendship of Mike Ross and Harvey Specter, turn to another USA Network series, White Collar. It’s not strictly a legal drama, more a police procedural. But it has the same testy and odd partnership at work as Tim DeKay plays FBI Special Agent Peter Burke and Matt Bomer is the suave and semi-reformed con man Neal Caffrey. Given the onscreen chemistry between Neal and Peter and their subtle evolution as fraudster and FBI handler over six seasons under the baton of creator Jeff Eastin, you’ll be rewarded with another unlikely duo out to nab white-collar criminals and the crime caper’s shining glory. That’s when Peter, and viewers, aren’t left puzzling over whether Neal is just pulling another con!
White Collar
David Giesbrecht/USA NetworkThe Practice
Using a Boston law firm as a narrative tool, The Practice follows the escapades and cases of criminal defense attorneys led by senior partner Bobby Donnell, played by Dylan McDermott. The characters and legal tactics written into yet another David E. Kelley courtroom drama has episodes that play to a realism in the legal system, while still offering the glamour and heroics you expect of prestige dramas. Steve Harris as Eugene Young and Michael Badalucco playing Jimmy Berluti also headline an ensemble cast with Kelli Williams, Camryn Mannheim, Lara Flynn Boyle and James Spader.
The Practice
Private Practice
A spinoff of Shonda Rhimes‘s Grey’s Anatomy, this ABC workplace drama follows neonatal surgeon Addison Montgomery, played by Kate Walsh. After her infamous divorce with Derek Shepherd (Patrick Dempsey), she gets a fresh start in Los Angeles as part of a clinic run by her friends, Sam (Taye Diggs) and Naomi (Audra McDonald). Besides wanting to do the best by their patients, the doctors at the Seaside Wellness Group have among their colleagues lovers, best friends and friends with benefits. It gets as complicated as the illnesses needing treatment, and there’s wedding bells in the finale.
The Good Fight
The court is in session at Paramount+’s The Good Fight — itself a spinoff of CBS predecessor The Good Wife from creators Robert and Michelle King and Phil Alden Robinson. This lawyer drama is anchored by Christine Baranski as resilient Diane Lockhart and the many clients represented by Reddick, Boseman & Lockhart over six seasons. Where possible, they’re defended as deserving rather than rich. But the character-based drama also starring Cush Jumbo as Lucca Quinn and Sarah Steele as Marissa Gold gets its fuel from Lockhart balancing her own complicity in unjust systems as she pursues the right rulings in court, while all the while needing to attract wealthy clients like a still-thriving Harvey Weinstein (albeit in an episode titled “The Gang Deals With Alternate Reality”) to keep her firm profitable. That other challenge: having to out-crazy the Trump years with ripped-from-the-headlines plots.
Christina Baranski (center) in The Good Fight
Better Call Saul
A sequel-prequel of Breaking Bad that starred Bob Odenkirk and Rhea Seehorn, AMC’s Better Call Saul brings the criminal underbelly of Albuquerque into the courtroom as we learn more about the back story of Saul Goodman, AKA Jimmy McGill, and his wacky hijinks. First introduced to Odenkirk’s character when he was Walter White’s sleazy lawyer on Breaking Bad, we see the epic battle between Jimmy McGill’s good nature and his skills as a born swindler who will stop at nothing to get his way as Saul Goodman — until he sheds that persona with its extravagant suits with one final scam and his final courtroom testimony to protect Kim Wexler, played by Seehorn.
Source: Hollywood
