Michael J. Fox confounds Diane and Julius in absurd The Good Fight sneak peek

After spending the bulk of The Good Fight's season 4 premiere in an alternate reality where Hillary Clinton was president, Diane Lockhart (Christine Baranski) is firmly back in the real world in Thursday's episode. But as the above exclusive sneak peek reveals, things aren't any less absurd than in her dream.

In this week's episode, titled "The Gang Tries to Serve a Subpoena," Diane goes before her former colleague-turned-judge Julius Cain (Michael Boatman)while representing a restaurant owner (Jane the Virgin's Andrea Navedo) in an eminent domain case against large real estate developer Rare Orchard, represented by the cunning Louis Canning (Michael J. Fox). The first hearing, though, proves to be particularly confounding for both Diane and Julius because Rare Orchard's CEO has chosen to ignore the subpoena summoning him to court. Apparently, he "doesn't recognize its legitimacy," a stance which leads to the hilarious and absurd back-and-forth between Julius and Canning showcased in the above clip.

"Mr. Canning, did you explain to your client that this is a federal court, I am a federal judge, and that the issuance of a subpoena by me is in fact legitimate?" Julius asks.

"I told him that would most likely be your position," says Canning. "My client believes there's ample authority for maintaining a contrary position."

The above scene is actually indicative of season 4's theme, which sees Diane and her colleagues constantly undermined by something called "Memo 618," which seems to allows some people to simply ignore judicial rulings. This season-long story was inspired by the recent impeachment hearings during which it seemed like "suddenly subpoenas were optional," creator Michelle King recently told EW, with her husband and co-showrunner Robert adding, "What we wanted to do this year was play a season off of this idea that court systems start falling apart because of people's willingness to say, 'No, no, subpoenas apply to every other human being except for my circle of powerful friends."

Watch the clip above.

After this week, The Good Fight is going on a one-week hiatus and will return with a new episode Thursday, April 30.

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