‘Matlock’: Did Matty Just Ruin Her Investigation? Showrunner Teases ‘Ticking Time Bomb’ Ahead

[Warning: The following contains MAJOR spoilers for Matlock Season 1 Episode 10, “Crash Helmets On.”]

Kathy Bates‘ Madeline “Matty” Matlock is losing the plot in her Wellbrexa investigation. The February 6 episode of Matlock showed the lawyer make a major mistake that has the potential to destroy all the headway she’s made so far. Her loyalty to Olympia (Skye P. Marshall), and being Olympia’s favorite, both broke up the “You Three” trio that is Matty, Sarah (Leah Lewis), and Billy (David Del Rio) and made an enemy out of Sarah. How does Matlock move on from this major complication? Showrunner Jennie Snyder Urman has teased where things go from here.

Matty and Sarah posed as grandmother and granddaughter in one of their two cases of the week in “Crash Helmets On.” Their investigation led them to an assisted living facility where they encountered a dementia patient whom Sarah was able to console in a moment of panic. This led to the reveal that Sarah was adopted by white parents as a child, and her adoptive grandmother had dementia. As her memory worsened, the grandmother forgot that Sarah was her granddaughter and referred to her as “that Chinese girl.” This eventually made Sarah stop introducing herself to as her granddaughter altogether.

Sarah confided this information to the sympathetic Matty, who later pulled the rug out from underneath the younger lawyer when choosing Billy to represent the firm in the courtroom. This led to Billy’s first major win, but it also was a deep betrayal to Sarah because of her personal connection to this case. The fact that Olympia let Matty choose who would try the case was enough of a blow for both Billy and Sarah. For Matty to then choose Billy after Sarah opened up to her broke their workplace friendship.

Erik Voake / CBS

Of course, Matty didn’t betray Sarah for no reason, but the reason wasn’t great either. The recording pen used to gather intel on Julian (Jason Ritter) became a major issue in this episode. Matty had to switch out the recording pen for a standard one in a panic to make sure that the former wasn’t discovered and traced back to her secret family. Matty had to betray Sarah to make sure her cover wasn’t blown, but this wasn’t just an uncontrollable wrench in the plan. Matty’s care for Olympia has clouded her judgment just like Edwin (Sam Anderson) feared, and it’s making Matty messy in their secret plot to avenge their daughter.

Simply put, sh*t has hit the fan, and she has yet to come to terms with the fact that she can’t continue this friendship with Olympia if she’s going to remain committed to their mission. The closer Matty gets with Olympia, the greater the risk of being crushed if/when Olympia’s true involvement in the Wellbrexa case gets revealed. Her relationship with Olympia proves that Matty isn’t that good at compartmentalizing her feelings for her colleagues the more she gets to know them.

So, how will Sarah’s negative opinion of Matty affect her work now? Urman gave glimpse into what’s to come in the second half of Season 1.

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“You’re in for, I would say, all cards that we’ve been laying down, some of which the audience is aware of, some of which they’re not aware of the importance, will ultimately start to flip over,” she told The Hollywood Reporter. “Our show has to have a bunch of things working at once. It has to have that big overarching crime story, spy thriller element and adding up to something real. But there’s also a love triangle that we’re working on between, Matty and Olympia and Edwin, her husband. She’s changing by being in this workplace and by becoming friends with Olympia, and it’s causing her to cast a light back on the life she thought she had, and caused her to look at things a little bit differently. Olympia is changing her. Edwin thought she was going to go into this mission, get the bad guy and then come out. I don’t think he was prepared for the changes that are happening to Matty.”

She also said that “how they’re going to end up mentoring Sarah becomes important as we go forward, bringing that next generation in. We start to really work through that.” This was said prior to the release of the February 6 episode, however. It’s difficult to imagine Sarah being willing to be mentored by Matty going forward.

And then, there’s Shae (Yael Grobglas), the show’s “human lie detector” who became a suspect in Matty and Edwin’s investigation in the January 30 midseason premiere because of her one-night affair with Julian during their work on the Wellbrexa case. Urman said that Shae is the “ticking time bomb” of the story moving forward.

Shae “is the person that Matty just can’t get around easily,” Urman explained. “And she doesn’t take her foot off the gas. She has Matty a little bit under the microscope, and she’s moving closer and closer to Matty and Matty has to figure out a way to deal with it, which continues for a few episodes. Shae has moves and Matty has moves, and so they sort of go toe to toe. In episode nine, you discovered a little bit of Shae’s involvement in the personal arena too. So, that just makes her even more of a ticking time bomb in Matty’s world.”

Matlock, Thursdays, 9/8c, CBS

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