Stephen Amell Shuts Down a ‘Your Mom’ Joke in ‘Suits LA’ Sneak Peek: She ‘Passed Away Years Ago’ (Exclusive)

Stephen Amell‘s Suits LA character, Ted, has a lot of strengths — but picking up on humor is not one of them.

In Us Weekly‘s exclusive sneak peek from the Sunday, March 2, episode of NBC’s legal drama, Lex Scott Davis‘ character, Erica, attempts to start the day off with a joke.

“Just the woman I wanted to see,” Ted says, to which she replies, “I was going to say the same thing.”

Ted asks “who” Erica was referring to — a perfect setup for a “your mom” quip. “My mom passed away years ago,” Ted deadpans. Erica isn’t thrilled by the response, adding, “Way to suck the fun out of the morning. Are you here to tell me I have a tumor?”

After the joke fail, Ted switches the topic to their A-list client Dylan Pryor (Victoria Justice).

“She has got two movies. One is an indie and the other is a potential action franchise, I am sure you can guess what the priority is,” Ted says before realizing they aren’t on the same page. “Erica, you have no idea who Dylan Pryor is, do you?”

Erica, however, fires back that Ted has “no proof” of that.

“She is your client who we signed last week who you need me to take care of, which I will,” she points out. “That will be all.”

Following some playful back and forth, Ted returns to the task at hand, saying, “Funny games aside, Stuart [Josh McDermitt] taking half the firm is still the talk of the town. Dylan is a new client and you are the new head of entertainment.”

Erica assures Ted that he had nothing to worry about with her. “I know what the stakes are and I know you are focusing on Lester’s murder trial,” she concludes in the clip. “Whatever she needs, I will get it done.”

Suits LA, which premiered earlier this month, is a spinoff starring Amell, 43, McDermitt, 46, Davis, 33, and Bryan Greenberg. The series is a response to a resurgence in interest after the original Suits was added to Netflix and Peacock.

“We want to play the hits. We want to have a lot of fun,” Amell told Entertainment Weekly in December 2024. “We are only sitting in Black Lane Law group conference room at the moment right now because of Gabriel and Patrick and Sarah and Meghan and Rick [Hoffman] and all of the people that comprised the original Suits cast. So all of them are welcome.”

Set in a fictional New York City corporate law firm, the original Suits followed associate lawyer Mike Ross (Patrick J. Adams), who started working with Harvey Specter (Gabriel Macht). The legal drama, which ran from 2011 to 2019, focused on Harvey and Mike winning lawsuits and closing cases while simultaneously hiding Mike’s secret that he didn’t go to law school.

“You’ll notice behind my desk that there’s a picture of a young Ted Black with what can only be a young Harvey Specter so there’s clearly a history between the characters,” Amell teased to EW. “We came up together in the D.A.’s office. So if I was going to have anyone [from the original cast] come back, I would want it to be Gabriel.”

He continued: “I would really hope that that happens, because I am very much a fan of his character and I think that that dynamic would be something that the viewers would really enjoy. … I’m not the one that invites [past actors for cameos], but as far as I’m concerned, all of them are welcome. We’re going to do our own thing, and that’s OK. We do things on this show that they couldn’t do on the original.”

Suits: LA airs on NBC Sundays at 9 p.m. ET