Post by Flamingo on Feb 17, 2004 17:01:10 GMT
The following is an extract from the St.Louis Post Despatch which contains no spoilers. The link however, to the rest of the story does contain season 5 spoilers
These are dark days for "The West Wing," in just about every sense of the word.
Our heroes are chronically cranky; rarely does anyone crack a smile, let alone a joke; and somebody seems to have turned out the lights.
It's possible to argue both pro and con for the Emmy-winning NBC drama in its first season since creator Aaron Sorkin was forced out. TV critics did a lot of that while mingling last month in Los Angeles, with some asserting that the show's transition into the hands of executive producer John Wells had been seamless. Others contended that the product had actually improved post-Sorkin. Not so preachy, they said. Easier to follow.
On the other side are those who loved "The West Wing" best in earlier seasons and find it almost a parody of its old self this year. Count me in the group feeling a real sense of loss that something once sublime is now simply a TV show.
Yes, it always was, but what poured from Sorkin's pen was often closer to poetry. An unabashed idealist who could make us laugh and cry, sometimes simultaneously, in every episode, Sorkin also was a sorcerer, capable of turning government minutiae into improbably involving stories.
Read the whole story here - CONTAINS small SPOILERS
www.stltoday.com/stltoday/entertainment/Columnists.nsf/Gail+Pennington/A9DAB2C259D2553886256E3A00383EA2?OpenDocument&Headline=The+harshest+critique%3A+%22West+Wing%22+is+just+a+TV+show>
These are dark days for "The West Wing," in just about every sense of the word.
Our heroes are chronically cranky; rarely does anyone crack a smile, let alone a joke; and somebody seems to have turned out the lights.
It's possible to argue both pro and con for the Emmy-winning NBC drama in its first season since creator Aaron Sorkin was forced out. TV critics did a lot of that while mingling last month in Los Angeles, with some asserting that the show's transition into the hands of executive producer John Wells had been seamless. Others contended that the product had actually improved post-Sorkin. Not so preachy, they said. Easier to follow.
On the other side are those who loved "The West Wing" best in earlier seasons and find it almost a parody of its old self this year. Count me in the group feeling a real sense of loss that something once sublime is now simply a TV show.
Yes, it always was, but what poured from Sorkin's pen was often closer to poetry. An unabashed idealist who could make us laugh and cry, sometimes simultaneously, in every episode, Sorkin also was a sorcerer, capable of turning government minutiae into improbably involving stories.
Read the whole story here - CONTAINS small SPOILERS
www.stltoday.com/stltoday/entertainment/Columnists.nsf/Gail+Pennington/A9DAB2C259D2553886256E3A00383EA2?OpenDocument&Headline=The+harshest+critique%3A+%22West+Wing%22+is+just+a+TV+show>