F#$% the Newsroom

I am an Aaron Sorkin fan, just to make that clear.  I loved the West Wing; it might be my favorite show of all time.  Studio 60 was ok, and probably deserved a 2^nd season. But with the bidding war and excessive rights fees I can totally see why it didn’t make it past season 1.

The Newsroom is probably a bit better than Studio 60 and not as good as The West Wing.  Which isn’t quite fair, WW took a season to really hit its stride, and Studio 60 started slow too.  The Newsroom so far has lurched along.  Some episodes inducing cringes and some episodes showing flashes of Sorkin’s previous brilliance.  Quick take on the first 5.

• “We Just Decided Too” - very good pilot, and average episode.  Pilots are tough because you got to get people caring about characters you just introduced.  The beginning rant was awesome and right in the snappy banter sweet spot.

• “News Night 2.0”  -  lame.  It’s hard to buy that the ‘best EP there is’ is such a moron with email.

• “The 112^th Congress” – lame.  Although watching Jeff Daniels smack down the Tea Party was fun.  This episode covered 6 months in an hour.  It finally does introduce the bad guys though, stupid upper management.

• “I’ll try to fix you” -  good.  I really liked the depiction of everyday life and petty squabbles getting put on hold when something really important happens.

• “Amen” – good.  Explored the difficulty and consequences of trying to cover Arab Spring.   

Which brings us to “Bullies”

Bullies was good, but frustrating.  By my count there were 3 recycled West Wing plot elements.

#1 – Gay Republican refuses to be defined solely by his sexual orientation.  This right out of “The Portland Trip”   Quoting from that Wiki article

“Josh spends the evening discussing an anti-gay marriage bill (similar to the actual 1996 Defense of Marriage Act) with a gay Republican congressman, and can't really understand how a gay man could throw his support behind a measure that says he's a lesser citizen of the U.S. The Congressman says that he agrees with most of the Republican agenda and doesn't have to base his entire life around his sexuality, but does show visible contempt when some GOP colleagues fawn over his efforts in support of the bill.”

#2 – Primary protagonist reluctantly seeks therapy because he can’t sleep, and it is revealed that both male leads were abused by their fathers.  “Five Nights”

#3 – Snarky bodyguard watches over reluctant principle; CJ Craig in West Wing and Will McAvoy in Newsroom.  This is pretty much Mark Harmon’s character Simon Donovan.  This one bugged me the least because the story arc will not be the same, at least I doubt there will be sexual tension.  Plus the snark was really entertaining and the bodyguard might be my favorite character on the show.

So why does this matter?

It’s actually praise worthy to draw inspiration from previous works.  The classics are classic for a reason and very little is truly original.  When you crib near verbatim you are turning your show into West Wing’s greatest hits.    And if the show keeps going in this direction I will just sign up for Amazon Prime and stream WW’s reruns.