Careful that you get the proper region though. US DVDs probably won’t play on players there.
I agree with the comments stating that the show never became crap. The first few seasons were some of the best TV ever made and it never got bad. Parts of season 4 and 5 became a little tedious and they overplayed some of the stereotypes, but the characters were still compelling and the stories relevant. Season 7 is simply great. I suggest you get your hands on the full series and just watch it all, including the 9/11 episode and make you own judgment. I assure you you won’t be wasting time that would have been spent on anything better.
Outside of Region 1, multi-region players are much more common. I have a Phillips player that I am able to change the region on at will using a special code in the remote.
Wow. I actually never noticed this before. I didn’t watch the show in real time, I watched the first two seasons then there was a change in when I could plant myself in front of the T.V. so I didn’t see it again for a couple of years then did all the catch-up (all the catch-up all the way through season 7) on DVD.
I had just accepted: the first season starts near the end of his first year in office, 8 years in office minus the one we didn’t see = 7 seasons. But my math was totally screwed. Start of Season 1 = end of 1st year in office should equal Start of Season 7 = end of 7th year in office.
But you’re off about when they “abruptly skipped a year in the timeline”. It wasn’t season 7, it was season 6.
As early as episode 4 of season 6 (2004) they begin setting up prep for another election year- 2005. Bartlett was elected in 1998 to his first term (prior to the start of the series) an in 2002 to his second term (season 4 episode 7), there shouldn’t have been another Presidential Election until 2006. So, the start of season 6 is when astute viewers should have first started scratching their heads feeling that something was off.
In the small defense of “Isaac & Ishmael,” it was one of the first dramas or sitcoms post 9/11 to try to reference it at all. Wasn’t a good job - but it was an attempt. L&O did much better, once they stepped up to the plate, later in the year.
But yes, season 5 was when I had to stop watching, it was such utter crap. And while I heard it got better, it was also obvious that they decided to skip around with the timeline - and I didn’t need to come back to that.
Seasons six and seven- and he is great!
He not only elevates the show, he also elevates the Republican Party- if only life could better imitate art.
In my opinion, many of the best moments in the show happened when the liberal Democrats were confronted with a smart Republican- and I say that as someone who considers himself to be to the left of Democratic Party.
Sam vs. Ainsley Hayes
Cliff Calley’s answer to Donna questioning him “Why are you a Republican?”
And Alan Alda’s Senator Vinick brought a lot of this kind of discourse to the show.
The episode where Bartlett had the opportunity to appoint two Supreme Court justices, and appointed a liberal and a conservative to maintain balance was another good example.
Yes; The West Wing takes place in a parallel universe where the election cycle is off by two years for some reason. (Probably because the show started in 1999 and they wanted that to be the administration’s first year, instead of the third.)
Huh, the Wiki page calls it the Election of 2006. I don’t recall any references to the actual year in the show. I think the show generally was set in the year it took place, although sometimes off by a few months to bridge the summer between seasons. Being off by a magnitude of months was stretched farther in the final season so as to spread the election story over the whole season.
Now the actual election episode did first air in 2006, but it aired in April taking place in November (of unspecified year).
The Democratic National Convention, season 6 finale, aired in April of 2005. If the show represented “real time give or take a few months to bridge summer”, then we’re dealing with a 2005 Presidential Election.
If West Wing continuity does indeed count it as a 2006 Presidential Election, then the Democratic National Convention Episode was set a whole year in the future, airing in 2005 taking place in 2006. Actually, that would make nearly all of season 6 taking place one year in the future.
After the fourth season finale, in which Peggy Olson got kidnapped. The first horrible episode was the fifth season premiere, which not even John Goodman could save.
There are fan theories that it has something to do with Nixon (the most recent real President mention onscreen) resigning in 1974. Supposedly there was no VP and rather than have the House Speaker serve the rest of his term Congress called an early presidential election which reset the cycle.
Don’t forget “babies have hats.” I melted during that scene. Say what you want about Aaron Sorkin…the man can write!
I also find it funny that a feud on TWoP between Sorkin and one of the writers (?) led to the secondary plot on The Poet Laureate episode, where Josh gets into it on a message board.