‘The Lincoln Lawyer’ Season 2, Part 1 Ending Explained: Is Mickey Haller Dead? Is Henry Dahl A Villain?

With the Trevor Elliott murder trial behind him, Mickey Haller (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) returned in The Lincoln Lawyer Season 2 as LA’s hottest defense attorney. But after finally wrapping Jésus Menendez’s (Saul Huezo) case, another suspect in a high-profile murder came calling.

Season 2 of Netflix‘s legal drama, based on the fourth book in Michael Connelly’s best-selling series, primarily follows Haller’s fight to clear his chef crush Lisa Trammell’s (Lana Parrilla) name after she’s accused of killing wealthy real estate developer Mitchell Bondurant (Clint Carmichael).

With a witness able to place Lisa outside Bondurant’s office on the day of the murder, a mysteriously missing hammer in her toolkit (which is looking more like a murder weapon each episode), and Andrea’s (Yaya DaCosta) decision to pull the plea deal ahead of deadline, things aren’t looking great for Mickey and Lisa at the start of Season 2, Episode 5. And somehow, when the end credits roll on Season 2, Part 1, they look exponentially worse.

So what does The Lincoln Lawyer Season 2, Episode 5 have in store? Have Mickey or Andrea found the smoking guns they need to take each other down? Are Cisco (Angus Sampson) and Lorna (Becki Newton) back on track? And is Henry Dahl (Matt Angel) the bad guy? Decider’s Lincoln Lawyer Season 2, Part 1 ending explained article has all the answers.

The Lincoln Lawyer Season 2, Part 1 Ending Explained: Season 2, Episode 5 Recap

The Lincoln Lawyer Season 2, Episode 5, “Suspicious Minds,” takes a page from The Bear‘s book and kicks things off with some mouthwatering food porn. Mickey is having an out-of-body experience taste-testing flan in Lisa’s restaurant, when suddenly she appears to — wait for it — lick caramel off his lips. Just when things are heating up, Mickey snaps out of his flan-induced fantasy and returns to reality, where he is at Lisa’s restaurant, but the circumstances are far more dire.

Mickey voices his concern over Andrea pulling the plea deal and tells Lisa her ex-husband Jeff is still a major loose end. Lisa is confident Jeff won’t testify and is clearly on-edge when Mickey presses her for info about their relationship. But she agrees to track him down and connect him with Mickey.

With Alex Grant MIA and Mickey unsure what Andrea has against Lisa, he plans to get the judge to question the merits of the case so Andrea will reveal all her evidence. He also hopes to get Andrea’s witness, Margot Schafer, on the stand for questioning. But as Mickey is shopping for a new “suit of armor,” Izzy (Jazz Raycole) reveals a snag in the plan; a new Henry Dahl podcast, Gentrify And Die, which explores Lisa’s case and features damning audio clips from her old interviews. Mickey lets Lisa know she messed up by green-lighting the project and questions Henry’s character, but she still chooses to believe Henry’s only trying to help her. On the bright side, she tracked down contact info for her ex Jeff, so at least Mickey has that going for him!

It’s worth noting that he and Lisa aren’t the only ones struggling. Izzy needs Ray’s half of the deposit for their studio by next week or they lose the space. And Cisco is still navigating the Kaz situation and promises Lorna all his shenanigans will be over soon. When he straps on a hard hat in search of the elusive Alex Grant, Cisco gets a call from Kaz who he orders to lay low until the big plan goes down later that night. Uh oh.

Back in the courtroom, Mickey successfully gets Andrea’s detective dismissed and Margot Schafer on the stand. As he and Lisa are leaving the courtroom, a disgruntled Henry Dahl intercepts them and confronts Mickey for halting the podcast, which makes Lisa angry, because she told Mickey she was going to handle it herself. At home, Mickey gets a call from Lisa’s ex Jeff Trammel, who refuses to testify on her behalf, says he doesn’t want to “get dragged back into her drama,” and shuts down questions about the missing hammer. Hmm…

Later that night, Cisco’s big plan is revealed when authorities raid Road Saints’ hangout. For a moment, it looks like Cisco set them up, but we soon learn he helped them hide their guns in exchange for his and Kaz’s freedom. Later in the episode, Lorna pays a visit to Kaz, gives him a passport, and tells him to stay away from Cisco.

The following morning, Lorna stops traffic to recreate the scene where Andrea’s witness saw Lisa walking away from Bondurant’s office. Photos she sends Mickey cast sufficient doubt on Schafer’s testimony, but Andrea calls Hannah Gates, a forensics analyst with the county crime lab, to the stand and they present a pair of Lisa’s gardening gloves that have a small blood stain that matches the blood of the murder victim. Though Lisa admits she parked outside the office the day Bondurant was killed she swears she didn’t murder him and tells Mickey she’s being set up.

In the wake of the damning new development, Mickey plans to pull another all-nighter to build his defense, but when he receives an article from Izzy that says Henry Dahl is turning Lisa’s case into a limited series he scrambles to find the document she signed for him. The final scene of Season 2, Part 1 takes us back to the parking lot, where Mickey frantically searches for Lisa’s folder in the trunk of his car, finds her folder empty, and gets attacked and brutally beaten by two men who were waiting for him.

Does Mickey pull through? (It’s called The Lincoln Lawyer so we have to assume yes!) Is Lisa’s case doomed? (There are still five episodes left so we have to assume no!) And is Henry Dahl behind those chaotic final minutes? (We’re not sure about the attack, but who else would steal that document?!) We’ll have to wait for Part 2 to find out.

When Does The Lincoln Lawyer Season 2, Part 2 Premiere on Netflix?

The Lincoln Lawyer Season 2, Part 2 is scheduled to premiere a month after Season 2, Part 1 on Thursday, August 3, 2023. The final batch of Season 2 episodes will be available to stream then at 3:00 a.m. ET. In the meantime, The Lincoln Lawyer Season 2, Part 1 is streaming on Netflix for any rewatch needs.