:::comes in:::
:::taps mike:::
Good. Now, Dark Angel’s second season was where it really got into stri…WHAT?
The Mr. Willis episode had two big problems however.
- Representatives are not replaced by appointments, but rather by special elections.
- They don’t have oral roll call votes in the House very often. They have them on the first day to elect the Speaker or if the electronic voting system is on the fritz.
I’ve watched up to Episode 15, and Munch has so far nailed it. In Excelsis Deo actually brought tears to my eyes, but the series as a whole has been very variable.
I find it a very enjoyable, well-crafted show with likeable characters and some very good writing. My only gripe, and it’s a minor one, is that it occasionally veers into worthiness - everyone has a magnificent speech in them, the good guys mostly win, or at least acknowledge and address their mistakes immediately. It’s an idealised government, at least in comparison to the far more flawed types we seem to get in the real world.
I’m glad you stuck with it, Quartz. If you do catch later seasons, I think you’ll find it gets quite a bit more consistent (at least through Sorkin’s run).
I’ve been watching a lot of repeats on Bravo and ABC (they run them late on the weekends here), and while I believe Sorkin’s writing is incredibly sharp and witty, one other thing I miss is that those early seasons tried to *teach * you something about Washington and the White House - how bills are passed, how the Cabinet is set up, how policy is made, etc. Even the “big block of cheese” episodes were educational in a sense. I miss that.
I’ll have to go back and look at that again, but IIRC she was absolved from what she did by Barlet. She was doing her job when working for another Democrat, and wasn’t working for the Barket administration then. He was more annoyed that the staff didn’t see the paper first, and use it to their advantage (correct the identified weaknesses.)
And, didn’t she show up for one episode in S2 (or maybe S3), trying to get the administration to bully China into giving them a couple of pandas?
I played catch-up with West Wing. I boycotted the first couple of seasons, because I was so pissed off that Sorkin’s previous show, Sport’s Night, was cancelled after only two seasons. I (wrongly) blamed Sorkin for it, assuming that he wanted to spend all his time on this psuedo-spin-off (is that a word?) from his movie The American President. But I’ve got the first three seasons on DVD now, and just started going through the S3 discs.
Just finished Series 1 and I’m most disappointed that they used the “Let’s finish on a massacre so we can screw all the actors” trick
Get used to it. Sorkin ended each season that way. If you’re getting to love the characters, the S2 ender will have you cursing and screaming.
But it did have the hand signal. Which gives it a plus.
And it leads to the season two opening episodes and some really good insight into some of the characters (and the season two Christmas episode, which I like much better than the season one Christmas episode)
I think you’re oversimplifying.
In series two there is a briefing by the Press Secretary about a shooting in a church, which then references this previous shooting.
The intended victim of the attack may not be who you expect either.
Plus there is a later psychological episode which hinges on the shooting.
You previously said “Even in retrospect, the first episode sucked: you had a lot of people squabbling and then at the end Bartlett came and laid down the law…”
The ‘squabbling’ you refer to started with an apology for a public remark by Josh which offended right-wing fundamentalists. The ensuing acrimonious discussion contains veiled references to anti-Semitism, political bargaining for an acceptance of the apology, Biblical references and corrections and finally an entrance by the President who changed his position on the issue based on events concerning his family.
This is a deep series and you need to concentrate to catch the nuances!
The position change came in a later episode - the one on birth control. IIRC the first episode was introducing the characters and introduced Bartlett at the end much as Moliere did with the King in Tartuffe.
Well, I’ve ordered Seasons 2 and 3.
O.K., a little tangental here, but I can’t watch West Wing or other “stressful work dramas”. It actually depresses me to see people so intense and wrapped up in work and dealing with life-or-death situations constantly. And that whole “really fast-dialogue-to-make-them-seem-smart” trick just pisses me right off. Actually, people talking too fast in general makes me uneasy, but maybe because I’m a Southerner.
Having said that, what I’ve seen of West Wing is pretty good. I think that they do lay out ethical situations well. But I just can’t watch it, or E.R. or anything like that before bedtime. It’s not relaxing for me at all.
My timeline may be confused:
What is the status of Charlie and Zoe now?
Was the woman SS agent in Two Gunmen the on who was killed when Zoe was kidnapped?
I guess I will put them in spolier boxes
Charlie and Zoe are on again, off again.
The female Secret Service agent, Molly, was killed, when Zoe was kidnapped.
No.
The SS agent in Two Gunmen was Gina Toscano played by Jorja Fox. The one killed when Zoe was kidnapped was Molly O’Connor, played by Kimberly Bigsby. She had just been assigned to Zoe’s detail right before the kidnapping.
As some of you may know I am a die hard conservative Republican, and I truly enjoy this show.
I first caught it by chance because I was reading some magazine article in a doctor’s office and read about this show premiering that very night. I had heard nothing about it personally because I almost never watch network television. Anyways I checked out the 1st episode and stayed on for the whole first season and really enjoyed it thoroughly.
I continued to watch the show religiously and caught the entire first 4 seasons without missing a single airing of a new episode (and I missed very few reruns.)
I never really felt that the show “jumped the shark” at any point during those 4 seasons.
Sometime before season 5 began I became extremely busy and had to miss the show for several months, and I didn’t watch the end of season 5 because I’m anal retentive about things like this and couldn’t stand to watch it without having first seen the rest of the season.
After this I got out of the habit somewhat, and I’m trying to slowly move through s5 reruns but the problem is I don’t believe Bravo airs s5 yet so it’s difficult to get caught back up.
Anyways the itself has good characters, generally “fun” storylines and is also somewhat educationally (as a huge political buff I haven’t really “learned” anything because I know a lot about government but the way they presented information without trying to dumb down the viewer is very good.)
The one gripe I do have against the show is every character is too “ideological.” At first Toby was the unruffled practitioner of realpolitik. He was definitely a liberal but he always played the political game like one would play chess, with cold and calculating strategy. Unlike Sam, who in the early days was by far the biggest bleeding heart reactionary (he would get in moral quandries all the time.)
Eventually though every cast member had their “ideologue” moment where the music would play and the camera would slowly move in on them and they’d then preach on about the inherent righteousness of something or other.
Now I actually think these “sermons” are often entertaining in the context of the show (as long as they aren’t repeated too often, if you have too many sermons they become cliched.) But the nitpick is I just really really doubt that actualy true life political operators who have progressed to the White House level are this ideological about ANYTHING. I mean, I know a lot of them have very strong opinions and feelings but I get the impression most real life staffers play “the Great Game” and aren’t the idealists that we see on the West Wing.
The position change was that Josh was not now going to apologise.
Originally Bartlett was only going to make sporadic appearances. The lead characters would be the senior staff.
Martin Sheene’s performance meant the scriptwriters changed the whole plan.
Enjoy seasons 2+3!
Well, I’m on Series 3 and I thought the intro episode - the post Sept 11 one was really excelent. At first I really didn’t like the MS plot but it’s growing on me.
I watched Series 2 to entertain me during a heavy cold so no one episode really stood out, but I will rewatch the series at some point.
I love The West Wing. It’s so magical and a refreshing change from, oh, real world politics. I also like all the heterosexual man-love. There is so much fond gazing going on between the men that you could make a drinking game out of it.
One thing I don’t like, though, is how the women always have to declare how pretty they are or how smart they are or what their educational background is. What’s that about?
So, every time a man gazes fondly at another man, and every time a woman declares how qualified, and/or pretty she is, drink!
ZJ
I feel silly putting spoiler boxes around information about an episode that was broadcast two years ago. But I’ll go along.
>>The one killed when Zoe was kidnapped was Molly O’Connor, played by Kimberly Bigsby. She had just been assigned to Zoe’s detail right before the kidnapping.<<
While Molly O’Connor’s character first appeared on camera right before Zoe’s kidnapping, the exposition said she had been guarding Zoe for quite some time at that point. (She and Zoe were on a first name basis as I recall.)