The pilot begins with Nick Fallin being sentenced to 1500 hours of community service as a child advocate - a Guardian. He was arrested and judged for drug use. We learn that Nick works with his father, Burton Fallin, at Fallin & Associates, a corporate law firm. We can see from the start that Nick and his dad have a strained relationship.
Nick's 1st case is a boy, Hunter Reed, whose father stabbed to death his mother in front of him. Nick’s job as a Guardian is to do what the kid wants. At first Nick is not pleased to work for the  Community Legal services and clearly shows us that he doesn’t want to be there and take care of Hunter when he has work to do for his father back at the firm.
Anyway, Hunter wants to be with his dad...and in order for that to happen Nick has to help the father. Hunter’s father was under the influence of an experimental drug (he is schizophrenic) when he killed his wife and Nick wants/has to prove that the father was not responsible. He wants to file a civil suit against the pharmaceutical company who created the drug. I don’t want to recap the whole episode so I’m just going to end this paragraph by saying that the Hunter Reed story doesn’t end here and continues in other episodes of season 1.

 Ok so now, my thoughts on Nicholas Fallin!

Nick’s character is very interesting I believe, because at first he appears as being this cold and arrogant man (i.e. The scene with Laurie Salt in which he is extremely rude and basically tells her that she looks like crap...), BUT in fact by the end of the episode we realize that there's more to Nick than that. (i.e. The final scene where he hugs Hunter Reed) I think that David Hollander was very clever in his pilot because he put us on the right path, when it comes to Nick and Nick & his father, from the beginning. We get from episode 1, a pretty good idea of who Nick is and what his problems might be and where they originated from. We immediately love him, despite his being rude, arrogant etc. BECAUSE we see that he is a man in pain…deeply scarred by his mother’s death, his relationship with his father. You just want to hug this man and protect him. This episode makes you want to watch the show to try and see why Nick is the way he is, you want to see him and Burton sort things out for example, you want Nick to smile, you want to see if he can be happy, you want to crack his shell dammit!!! You simply want to see him open up…I think this is why some of my favorite episodes/moments are the ones where he cries, or does something that would seem unusual if you have in mind the Nick from the fifteen first minutes of the pilot!

 Simon Baker really proves with that role that he is an amazing actor. He didn’t get the deserved recognition for this role in my humble opinion and it’s a shame because he deserved it. Simon is now this TV superstar, sexiest man on TV guy…thanks to The Mentalist and I am truly glad for I love The Mentalist and I loooooove Patrick Jane, but for me he became my star and tv’s sexiest man back in the days when The Guardian aired! People shouldn’t disregard The Guardian…this series is often forgotten and underrated. I mean, Nick is such a complex character and Simon was just spot on in his portrayal. You really feel Nick’s pain…just watch Simon’s eyes…they tell you everything! Nick doesn’t talk a whole lot, he’s a closed shell, many times you would just want him to say what he feels and unload his chest (other times you wish he wouldn’t say what was on his mind…lol), but the force of this character and of Simon’s portrayal is that in his eyes, through his facial expressions, you know! You just know what he feels and you don’t need words to understand. When you see Nick…you don’t see Patrick Jane! And that’s super important! Nick is Nick and Patrick is Patrick thanks to Simon’s tremendous talent. (Yeah I know…what can I do? I love the man)

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Hmm my theory concerning the episode swap : in this week's episode L/P were still all couply and googly-eyed (eww)...in the upcoming ep however we know from the spoilers we read, that Leonard isn't going to fit in with Penny's friends at all and basically end up drunk and all...My guess is that the writers are preparing us for the long awaited breakup!!! (I hope). I like to believe that things will go from bad to worse for L/P from this episode on! We know about the episode where they will fight A LOT (then make up again but not a problem...its the beginning of the end)...I'm hopeful!!!

Maybe after the L/P breakup...things will be awkward for them for a little while so Leonard will hang out with Raj/Howard more and Penny will hang out with Sheldob (who's still 'mad' at Leonard for the Arctic data tempering) From there the S/P friendship will grow more and more until the end of the season, where Sheldon will do something amazingly nice for Penny and they'll acknowledge that they are best friends! Then S4, these guys will be bffs! With Sheldon getting to acknowledge just how important Penny is to him! And maybe, maybe S5 we can have Penny realize that she more than likes Sheldon!
You know...realize that he's hot etc. Maybe we can have Sheldon finally date a girl from the university who isn't going to go all Ramona on him and have Penny be jealous and all...<3

OMG how I would love it if everything I wrote was to happen!!! Imagine how great it would be!!! *sigh*