I had high hopes and expectations for this series. A respected producer, a very good cast, and an interesting premise.
But I just watched a promo excerpt at tv.yahoo.com and now I’m a little worried. The potential problem is that it seems to be taking an even more serious tone that The West Wing did. And while I can accept a certain amount of self-involved over-earnestness from characters who are supposedly running the United States government, it’s not going to go over as well with characters who are supposedly producing a late night comedy TV show. The last thing I want to do is see is a television show that takes television itself way too seriously.
Admittedly it was only one clip, so I may be over-reacting. And there’s always 30 Rock on the other channel.
I’d withhold judgement until you see the pilot. I know two people in the biz who have seen the pilot and they say it’s very good with room to grow, and that the promo is not very representative.
Have you seen Sports Night? It was serious at times, but also more than capable of the lighter tone. Then again, so was The West Wing… but with Sorkin, it’s usually more on the basis of individual episodes (while the “serious” ones are often still funny, it’s generally pretty obvious which are serious and which are light-hearted). Actually, now that I think of it, the SN pilot had a far more serious tone to it than the WW pilot. Anyways, just some food for thought.
I wouldn’t worry yet - I saw a couple of different previews, and they all looked different. I’m waiting until I see the full hour to make up my mind. (And not to alarm you, but 30 Rock is going to be on the same channel, just on a different night and time.)
