Diksha Sundriyal
Netflix’s ‘The Law According to Lidia Poet‘ returns for a third and final season, where the protagonist’s fight to become a lawyer continues while she works on one mind-boggling case after another. Picking up about six months after the events of the second season, we find Lidia Poet still in Turin. Forneau has survived his brain surgery, and he and Lidia have been happily together since. She has received her doctorate, though the dream of wearing a black cloak still remains out of reach. Things shake up when her brother, Enrico, returns from Rome, shortly followed by Jacopo, who has a new love interest, Consuelo. With a new case on their hands, things have never been more personal and challenging for Lidia. SPOILERS AHEAD.
The Law According to Lidia Poet Season 3 Plot Synopsis
When Lidia was young and still in the university, she ran away from home following a fallout with her father. Cut off from her family, she was forced out on the streets, which is where she found Grazia. They became great friends, and Grazia even helped her finish her last year in university. Lidia considers her one of the major reasons behind her current success, which is why when she comes asking for help, Lidia cannot refuse her. At first, Grazia asks for some money because she is in trouble with some lenders. Later, however, she confesses that she made up the story about the lenders.
In truth, she wants the money so she can pay off a man who can get her and her daughter, Mila, safe passage out of the country with new identities. She is doing it because she wants to run away from her abusive husband, Fontana. She is scared that he will kill her if he finds out she wants to leave him. Lidia decides to help her with the separation, but in the midst of this, Fontana unexpectedly shows up at the Poet residence. He asks for a private audience with his wife, and despite her best instincts, Lidia allows it. A few minutes later, they hear Grazia’s screams, and it turns out that she has killed her husband.
Grazia is arrested, claiming that she killed her husband in self-defense. Of course, the prosecution thinks otherwise, while Lidia nudges Enrico to take her case, knowing that no one else will. With Forneau becoming the lead prosecutor on the case, things get tense between them, and it becomes even more complicated when Jacopo comes back from Rome with an opera singer named Consuelo. Lidia is stretched thin on all ends. Her romantic life is in shambles, her relationship with her brother becomes more strained, and the pressure of freeing her friend also causes a rift between them. With so much hanging in the balance, Lidia worries that she might not be able to make it out in one piece this time.
What Happens to Grazia? Is She Found Guilty or Innocent?
When Grazia is found next to her husband’s dead body, it is clear that she killed him. The main challenge in the case is to prove that she killed him in self-defense. The prosecution tries to paint it as a premeditated murder, and if proven, this would lead Grazia to the gallows. With each hearing, Lidia and Enrico try to find the pieces that would support Grazia’s claim of being in an abusive marriage with a husband who wouldn’t have hesitated from killing him. At first, the prosecution points out that she had sent a telegram calling her husband to the Poet residence, which means she knew he was coming and could have planned her murder. But then, it turns out that it was her daughter, Mila, who called her father, hoping that his parents would reconcile.
Then, Lidia and Enrico bring forth the doctor who had treated Grazia and knew from her injuries that she was being abused at home. However, the prosecution discovers that the two of them had sent letters to each other, from which it is proven that they were having an affair. Grazia’s infidelity turns the tide against her even more, and for a moment, it seems that there is no way to save her now. This is where Lidia decides to change strategies and focus on Grazia as the victim and Fontana as the main culprit, even though he is the one who died. With Jacopo’s help, she unearths Fontana’s sordid past, and this is what eventually helps in rewriting the narrative. It turns out that he was not the decorated and respected war veteran he had painted himself to be.
Not only had Fontana not fought valiantly in the war, but he was also a pedophile. When he returned home from his service in Eritrea, he brought a girl named Amira with him. He treated her as a slave and abused her, physically and sexually. When she fell in love with someone else and planned to run away with him, Fontana found out about it and lost his mind. He couldn’t bear the thought of being left behind, and in his anger and jealousy, he killed her. He buried her in the basement of the house he lived in with the help of his best friend. When this truth comes to light, Jacopo writes about it in his newspaper, and it is later used to paint Fontana as the villain he was in court. At the end of the day, the prosecution and the defense make their closing statement.
Forneau is forced to read the statement written for him, in which he asks for the death penalty for Grazia for killing the husband who loved her and provided for her while she cheated on him. Enrico, on the other hand, reads the statement written by Lidia, talking about how it was clearly self-defense, and if her death is what would make society see her as a victim. He also beseeches the jury to think about the precedent they would be setting for the treatment of other women, including their daughters in the future. The statement receives a resounding applause, and after hours of deliberation, the jury comes forth with a verdict. They unanimously find Grazia innocent, and she is let go and allowed to live her life as an innocent woman.
Do Lidia and Jacopo End Up Together? Why Do Jacopo and Consuelo Break Up?
Apart from handling Grazia’s case, another challenge in Lidia’s life is Jacopo. They had formed a strong romantic connection in Season 1, but when he asked her to marry him, she refused because she had no intention of getting married at all. Then in Season 2, he moved away to Rome while she moved on with Forneau. But then, when Forneau asks her to marry him, she stands by her decision not to marry, which leads to their breakup, much as it did with Jacopo. Meanwhile, Jacopo is with Consuelo, and while he claims he has closed Lidia’s chapter, even Consuelo can see there is still something between them. This is what keeps her from telling Jacopo about her pregnancy. When Jacopo learns of Lidia and Forneau’s breakup, his feelings for her resurface.
They end up sleeping together, but then, she receives a letter from Teresa, who asks her to stay away from Jacopo because he is going to be a father. This information eventually reaches Jacopo, and he decides to do the right thing and marry Consuelo. He proposes to her, and she tells him about her pregnancy, only to realize that he already knew about it. Despite being in love with him and having his child, Consuelo doesn’t want to marry Jacopo while he is still in love with Lidia. She didn’t want to be his second choice and wished that he would ask for her hand in marriage only if he were sure that he loved her. She knew that if she told him about her pregnancy, he would see it as an obligation to marry her, which is exactly what happened.
This confirms for her that he isn’t truly in love with him, so she breaks up with him. They reach an arrangement in which he will be part of their child’s life, but she personally does not want anything to do with him. This leaves Jacopo free to follow his heart, and he goes back to Lidia, making a proposition of his own. He knows that she will not marry him, but that doesn’t mean they cannot be together. He knows that he is never going to fall out of love with her, due to which he will never fall for anyone else. He also knows that she loves him. So, instead of being miserable apart, they decide to be miserable together. They get back together, deciding to be in a relationship without getting married.
Does Lidia Become a Lawyer?
‘The Law According to Lidia Poet’ started with the protagonist’s fight to get women into the field of law. Despite being a brilliant lawyer and often better than, if not equal to, her male counterparts, she is not allowed to become a lawyer because she is a woman. In 1883, she became the first female lawyer in the country, but then her bar membership was revoked, forcing her back into the very situation she fought hard to get out of. Still unable to practice law, she found ways around the hurdles in her path. She collaborated with her brother, Enrico, to keep working towards helping innocent people, while also making sure that relevant laws are considered and passed in the parliament to allow women equal rights and opportunities.
At the end of the series, Lidia’s work in proving Grazia’s innocence becomes yet another milestone case that helps shift the tide. However, she knows that her personal battle is still a long way from being over. That still does not dampen her hopes. She knows what she wants, and she is going to fight for it tooth and nail till the very end, and that’s exactly what the real Lidia Poet did. In one scene, while trying to escape the captivity of Fonatana’s friend through a tunnel, she finds herself face-to-face with a vision. It takes her into the future, where she sees her much older version finally receiving the black cloak with the respect and dignity she always dreamed of. The court acknowledges that she has been kept from this achievement for far too long, but no more.
This moment is what Lidia wanted all her life, and in real life, too, she had to wait very long for it. It wasn’t until the age of 65 that she finally succeeded in fulfilling her lifelong dream of becoming a lawyer. The final scene of the series shows Lidia in the empty courtroom, wearing the black robe. This signifies her persistent dream, which she will continue to fight for. Her vision has shown her that it will happen, even if that reality is decades away. So, she will keep working towards that end. In the meantime, she will fight for others, saving innocent people from becoming victims of an unjust system, and pushing for feminist laws in the country so that the women who come after her don’t have to fight the same battles she did.
Read More: Was Lidia Poët Married? Who Was Her Husband?
You must be logged in to post a comment.