If there’s one thing the characters of Suits know how to do, it’s fight. For eight seasons, Harvey Specter, Donna Paulsen, Louis Litt, Mike Ross, Rachel Zane, and Jessica Pearson could spar better than any heavyweight boxer. Episode after episode, they go to war with their words. Their sneaky tactics help them win cases in the courtroom, but they also cause rifts in the office.
While verbal altercations are common between co-workers, they wouldn’t hesitate to go to battle with anyone who’d challenge one of their own or the firm as a whole. And they don’t have qualms about crossing some light ethical or legal boundaries when needed. Season 9 is no different: Harvey, Donna, Louis, Alex Williams, and Samantha Wheeler spend a lot of time in the final 10 episodes determining how to fight back to keep their firm intact with all their names on the door.
Of course, the last season isn’t just about fighting. A romantic coupling eight seasons in the making finally happens …
The first episode of Season 9 is titled “Everything’s Changed,” and it couldn’t be more true. The first scene shows Harvey (Gabriel Macht) and Donna (Sarah Rafferty) in bed together following their first real kiss after he’d rushed to her apartment in the Season 8 finale. The moment together doesn’t last long, though, as Louis (Rick Hoffman) shows up to tell Donna how Robert Zane (Wendell Pierce) took the fall for Harvey and was disbarred. Louis assumes they were working on the case all night, so they’re able to keep their tryst a secret. Donna wants to keep their status to themselves for a bit, especially because she has to break up with Thomas Kessler (Sasha Roiz) first.
Speaking of everything changing, a member of the New York State Bar Association tells Alex Williams (Dulé Hill) that the firm must remove “Zane” from its name or else they’ll lose clients — and their good standing with the bar. (Obviously, they couldn’t stay Zane Specter Litt Wheeler Williams for long because this firm changes the name on their door more than other firms change their coffee filters.)
Clients are already leaving because Robert’s former partner Eric Kaldor (Jeffrey Nordling) is poaching them, and he’ll only stop if Harvey gives up 10 of his own top clients. Harvey comes around to the idea, but it doesn’t matter. The New York Bar orders Faye Richardson (Denise Crosby) to be instated as the firm’s acting managing partner; if they don’t accept, every partner will be suspended for six months.
The first meeting with Faye doesn’t go well. She tells the partners that their days of being cowboys (and girls) are over. She will approve all cases and allocate resources as she sees fit, and her first act as managing partner will be to remove Robert’s name. Samantha Wheeler (Katherine Heigl) says she’ll find dirt on Faye if she does so, and Faye points out that she also has the power to fire any of them if they don’t walk the straight and narrow.
Zane comes down from the wall, and the firm is now known as Specter Litt Wheeler WIlliams. Nearly everyone butts heads with Faye immediately, but none more so than Louis, who doesn’t take kindly to his managing partner title being hijacked. He enlists IT to find a loophole in the bar bylaws, but it backfires when Faye finds out and permanently demotes him.
Donna and Harvey’s working relationship has to evolve now that they’re in a romantic one, and Faye isn’t helping matters there either. She finds out they’re a couple and tells Donna she has to give up her board vote. Ultimately, Harvey, Alex, Louis, and Samantha present a united front to Faye about a new code of conduct allowing personal relationships at work. They threaten to collectively quit if she doesn’t agree, which wouldn’t look good to the bar, so they get a small win.
Mike (Patrick J. Adams) and Rachel (Meghan Markle) said goodbye to their friends and the New York firm at the end of Season 7 when they moved to Seattle. Although Rachel isn’t seen on-screen again, Mike does return to take on his old mentor in a Season 9 case.
Mike’s client, a famous basketball player, wants out of a shoe contract with the company Brick Street, which is Harvey’s client, because of their unethical work conditions. Because Mike knows Harvey so well, he knows just how to beat him and proposes a settlement. Samantha, who joined the case with Harvey, doesn’t take loss well and fabricates evidence to win. But Faye and her ever-watchful eye knows what Samantha did and fires her.
Samantha’s firing is the final straw. Harvey is livid, and he goes to Faye’s ex-husband, George, for dirt to get her removed as acting managing partner. It turns out George should have been disbarred, but Faye helped him prevent it so their daughter wouldn’t find out. Harvey is touched that Faye would do this to protect her family, so he lets it go — for the time being.
But Harvey has bigger worries now: Sean Cahill (Neal McDonough) has been charged by Andrew Malik (Usman Ally) for conspiring to get Mike out of jail early. Yep, Mike’s fake law degree is still causing problems nine seasons in! Harvey convinces Sean to hire him as his attorney so their conversations — and what they did to help Mike — are privileged. Malik has what he needs anyway and arrests both of them. Cahill confesses, and Harvey risks disbarment (again!), but Alex finds a discrepancy that unearths the fact that Malik fabricated evidence. In the end, Malik ends up in jail and Harvey and Cahill are free.
Just when Harvey thinks things are OK, Donna informs him that his mother had a heart attack and has died. Mike returns for the funeral — and to help his friend. Mike partners with Sam to file a wrongful termination suit against Faye. Not ready to go down without a fight, Faye asks Harvey and Louis to represent her. If they win, she’ll consider her work at the firm done. If they lose or tell the other side about the deal, she’ll recommend the firm be permanently disbanded.
In court, Mike uses information against Faye that leads her to believe Harvey and Louis broke the deal. But it was actually Katrina Bennett (Amanda Schull) who did. She was so upset at how Louis went after Sam on the stand that she leaked info to Mike. When Louis explains the situation, Katrina comes clean to Faye in the hopes that it’ll save the firm, but instead Faye fires her.
Still furious, Faye threatens to make Harvey testify since he’s the only other person who knows Sam fabricated evidence. Harvey comes clean with Mike and tells him he’s going to lie on the stand, but Mike won’t let him perjure himself; instead, they have to do “One Last Con,” the name of the series finale. The entire firm bands together to con Faye into signing a document that says she ordered Harvey to tamper with a witness. In the end, only she and Harvey are in the room, but they strike a deal and she agrees to leave the firm alone.
In other happy news, Louis asks Sheila Sazs (Rachael Harris) to marry him once their baby arrives, and she says yes. At their wedding, Sheila’s water breaks mid-ceremony, and the couple leave to welcome their baby daughter, Lucy. At the bride-less wedding reception, Harvey proposes to Donna, she says yes, and they tie the knot right there in front of their friends.
In the final moments, we learn that Faye only agreed to leave the firm because Harvey agreed to do the same. It’s a shock to everyone, but he feels at peace. Donna also exits the firm — she and Harvey have plans to join Mike and Rachel at their firm in Seattle. With Sam reinstated, the partners ask Katrina to be a named partner, which she accepts. And with that, the firm’s final name is Litt Wheeler Williams Bennett.
No matter what the firm’s name was or is, it’ll always be a place where people fight for one another — they may just need to cross into some gray areas to do so.
