Will & Grace Review: The Scales of Justice (Season 10 Episode 11)

Will and Grace rebounds after a dud of an episode with Will and Grace Season 10 Episode 11, “The Scales of Justice.” It’s not the best episode by any means, but it is an improvement over the shenanigans of Will and Grace Season 10 Episode 10, “Dead Man Texting.”

This episode’s storylines pair up characters we don’t get to see play off one another as often — Grace and Jack are attempting to conquer dieting together and Karen joins Will’s law class for a mock trial with her stepdaughter.

My biggest takeaway is that I want to see these pairs together more often; while Karen and Will have shared a fair number of their own scenes throughout the series since he was her lawyer, Grace and Jack are not often in scenes with just the two of them and this episode reminded me just how much I love them as a duo.

While Will acts as the balancing force in his individual relationships with each of them, Grace and Jack encourage and amplify each other’s harebrained tendencies. It truly is a delight to watch.

After splitting their pants (yes, literally), Jack and Grace agree to be each other’s accountability partner and embark on a diet. Jack has to get ready for his upcoming nuptials. Meanwhile, Grace feels like she needs to lose some weight “because she’s a woman that is alive.”

Damn. Right to my heart. That’s also one of the funniest lines of the season.

I am in the midst of a diet myself, so some of the madness around weight loss felt all too close to home. I appreciate that the show acknowledges how bodies change as we age.

Debra Messing is still a beautiful woman though her body has filled out since her original stint on the show. The fact that the show is up front about the realities of how our bodies evolve as we get older — and tries to portray the tension around wanting to fight that while also wanting to accept and love your body — is very relatable.

What the show really gets right is the bargaining that comes with dieting. It’s as much of a psychological process as it is a physical one, and it’s a fight that Jack and Grace are losing.

The funniest scene comes when Grace begins to put some croutons in her salad. While Jack initially tries to get her to avoid the croutons entirely, things quickly escalate.

First, they agree to lick a single crouton just so they could get a taste but not have to deal with the full calories and carb count.

Then, realizing they didn’t get quite the right ratio of herbs and cheese, they agree to lick a few more croutons.

And then a few more.

This scene plays to both Sean Hayes and Debra Messing’s strengths in physical comedy as they wring every bit of humor out of dramatically licking croutons, pitching them into a bowl, and lunging with a trashcan. The result is far funnier than it has any right to be, especially when you consider how it reads on paper.

A crouton scene is that funny? Seriously?

No, really, seriously. It is.

I also loved the concluding scene where Grace and Jack get ready to weigh in and start trying to do some creative math around how to influence what the scale says. So many of their strategies sounded familiar.

Should they pee more? (Check. Tried that one.)

Should they subtract some pounds for their clothes? (Check. Obviously.)

What about subtracting some more pounds for “[bras] and feelings”? (Check. Everyone knows bras totally add a ton of weight to the scale that definitely doesn’t count.)

The whole time I watched this scene, I was filled with both recognition and horror. When you really consider it, the impact a simple number can have on our feelings about ourselves is ludicrous and sometimes even borders on dangerous, but it’s a common struggle.

The bargaining is real. The shame is real. And weight loss is made even worse by how so many of us approach it.

While I really enjoyed the Jack/Grace storyline, I did have one qualm. After agreeing to give themselves permission to enjoy eating and not try so hard to be skinny, Jack declares, “We’re not Fashion Week skinny but we’re definitely Disney Land skinny!”

Feeling frustrated with your own appearance is one thing, but judging others’ is another. That comment bordered enough on fat-shaming in general that it left a sour taste in my mouth after a moment of body positivity. The scene would have been just fine without it.

The other storyline focuses on Will’s torts class. I have wondered when we were going to get an opportunity to sit in on Will’s class, and after the last episode focused so heavily on his passion for his job, it makes sense that the show would direct more attention toward his class.

Overall, our foray into Will’s life as a Columbia professor is disappointing.

I love that he is so obsessed with trying to get his students to like him after some disappointing reviews on a student website. Given how neurotic Will is on a good day, this feels very on brand.

However, I simply was not emotionally moved by the storyline between Karen and her stepdaughter and certainly did not feel like it was the most compelling first look into Will’s classroom.

I personally think there’s potential for the show to mine his classroom for more interesting storylines with his students (imagine the guest star opportunities!) though I’m already bracing myself for what feels like an inevitable student-professor romantic subplot.

Stray observations:

• Was Stan’s ex alive in the original run of this show and her being dead suddenly a retcon for the sake of this storyline? Any other avid fans, please enlighten me!
• I still get sad anytime someone mentions Rosario. I suspect that feeling is never going to fade.
• I wonder if Grace and Jack will ever make an appearance in Will’s classroom. Imagine what a Divorce Court-like scene would look like for Estefan and Jack!

What did you think of this episode of Will and Grace? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

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Will and Grace airs Thursdays at 9:30/8:30c on NBC.

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