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shallowness) wrote2023-02-11 02:01 pm
shallowness) wrote2023-02-11 02:01 pm
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TWW: Entering a new era
5.1 7A WF 83429
Frenetic opening, and perhaps because I was looking for it, a slightly different feel throughout the episode, (while the podcasters noted the weirdness, they grouped it with the last two episodes of s4, and, as they pointed out, the plot of having someone new in charge and the discombobulated staff were fiction emulating reality, usefully). What struck me, although it was partly explicable by when scenes were set and the sombre mood, was that the episode was literally a lot darker than usual.
All the political, international and personal ramifications of the set-up played out. It now seemed to have been the sleeper cell behind Zoey’s abduction, and it was kind of linked to Qumar. As the news broke of Sharif’s assassination, it all escalated with a terrorist attack and there was a strong political thriller vibe, with the added complexity of two Presidents in the (White) House. And one of them was the opposition, bringing his own people in, but they were having to clean up the Bartlet administration’s messes.
We followed Leo, heartsick because of Zoey – as the podcast emphasised, who he’d known all her life - watching the man they’d brought in to be more dispassionate being more willing to pull the trigger than we were used to, it looked like, despite respecting Nancy’s advice. (Good catch on the switcheroo in her position on Qumar by Hrishi.) Walken saying he thought Zoey was already dead was chilling.
Where he absolutely lost me was in bringing in his dog. Politics aside, that’s disrespectful. It’s not an assistance dog, why do you need it in the Oval Office shedding its fur so that CJ had to pick it up on her skirt? In fact, if you’d already been a senior politician, wasn’t it cruel to the dog to have it?
(Can you tell I’m not a dog person?)
And we got to see the Bartlets’ anguish and tensions - finally meeting the big sister - although I actually cared more about Bartlet and Charlie’s conversation. Fair enough that Abbey lashed out about the Sharif assassination and that it might have led to their daughter’s abduction, and that her daughters sided with her.
And everyone was fighting tiredness and trying to do their best – and Toby not getting to see his kids, Leo being short with Margaret, and Josh worrying about the politics for valid reasons, and economics coming on top of it! It was a meaty episode.
I was amused when it was pointed out on the podcast that if Walken had got a Vice President nominated, he’d effectively be ejecting himself.
5.2 The Dogs of War
The main thing I thought about the scene with the pollster was that the sound was bad – she had a low voice and the background noise was loud.
The Qumari ambassador seemed to speak with no punctuation, outrage at Shariff’s death running into sympathy with Zoey’s plight running into outrage that the US were bombing his country running into an admission that he too had a daughter. (The podcasters were right that you’d have thought he’d want to get in touch with his country that was getting bombed, although how he could have done that right then in the White House, I don’t know.)
Sleep-deprived Josh was prompted to take yesterday’s anxieties about Walken looking presidential back up by Amy (it wasn’t really examined what was driving her, but she sounded more like Amy before working for the First Lady, and was possibly channelling her own anxieties because presumably she had nothing to do once they’d cancelled all of Zoey’s mother’s engagements). The more well-rested Toby and Will didn’t buy it, but Leo maybe did. (Angela Black having got through to him that, as Chief of Staff, he wasn’t just responsible for Bartlet.) Leo got shot down for it, and when Josh accosted Republican Steve (in the men’s toilets!?), he got told that the Republicans were in awe of Bartlet for what he’d done. (He could have been lying.) They went after Bartlet recusing himself having been a mistake because he looked weaker a lot on the podcast.
I really liked the humanising conversation between President Walken and Debbie.
in fairness, Walken hadn’t made the call on Sharif (although it seemed like he was perfectly willing to go to war on hostile actors, without much weighing up. And so Abbey and the girls gave Jed a quiet hard time because this could make this worse for Zoey, and he was absenting himself from his responsibility to keep the whole country safe.)
But then – after noticing that we’d passed hour 50, i.e. over two days, and there had been so many exchanges where there was no news on Zoey - we saw Bartlet reach out to his work family, and demand to see the other speech. I loved that he adapted the worst scenario one.
I agreed with the podcasters, finding Zoey felt a little easy. They broke down how it was both confusing and underwhelming, apart from the moment of reunion and seeing Zoey’s state.
The speech was reassuring, President Bartlet had returned. I think they were right on the podcast that our guys being out of the loop and unsettled was catching, as it should be, and the episode conveyed that.
What was the point of the intern kid other than for Josh to revert to Harvard insecurities? (The podcast informed me he was played by Jesse Bradford, which would have registered way more when I first watched it. Right now, I don’t even want to count the years since Bring It On came out.) They also went after how entitled the intern was, but I was more annoyed by Josh, because however privileged or helped by nepotism the kid was, Josh had all the power – to make the young man just sit there and do nothing. And it wasn’t Josh or Donna who had the pratfall during the walk and talk.
Well, Leo has power over Josh, but Malina was suggesting this was going somewhere and I can’t remember where ATM. [Edited for typos and punctuation - 26/5/25.]
Frenetic opening, and perhaps because I was looking for it, a slightly different feel throughout the episode, (while the podcasters noted the weirdness, they grouped it with the last two episodes of s4, and, as they pointed out, the plot of having someone new in charge and the discombobulated staff were fiction emulating reality, usefully). What struck me, although it was partly explicable by when scenes were set and the sombre mood, was that the episode was literally a lot darker than usual.
All the political, international and personal ramifications of the set-up played out. It now seemed to have been the sleeper cell behind Zoey’s abduction, and it was kind of linked to Qumar. As the news broke of Sharif’s assassination, it all escalated with a terrorist attack and there was a strong political thriller vibe, with the added complexity of two Presidents in the (White) House. And one of them was the opposition, bringing his own people in, but they were having to clean up the Bartlet administration’s messes.
We followed Leo, heartsick because of Zoey – as the podcast emphasised, who he’d known all her life - watching the man they’d brought in to be more dispassionate being more willing to pull the trigger than we were used to, it looked like, despite respecting Nancy’s advice. (Good catch on the switcheroo in her position on Qumar by Hrishi.) Walken saying he thought Zoey was already dead was chilling.
Where he absolutely lost me was in bringing in his dog. Politics aside, that’s disrespectful. It’s not an assistance dog, why do you need it in the Oval Office shedding its fur so that CJ had to pick it up on her skirt? In fact, if you’d already been a senior politician, wasn’t it cruel to the dog to have it?
(Can you tell I’m not a dog person?)
And we got to see the Bartlets’ anguish and tensions - finally meeting the big sister - although I actually cared more about Bartlet and Charlie’s conversation. Fair enough that Abbey lashed out about the Sharif assassination and that it might have led to their daughter’s abduction, and that her daughters sided with her.
And everyone was fighting tiredness and trying to do their best – and Toby not getting to see his kids, Leo being short with Margaret, and Josh worrying about the politics for valid reasons, and economics coming on top of it! It was a meaty episode.
I was amused when it was pointed out on the podcast that if Walken had got a Vice President nominated, he’d effectively be ejecting himself.
5.2 The Dogs of War
The main thing I thought about the scene with the pollster was that the sound was bad – she had a low voice and the background noise was loud.
The Qumari ambassador seemed to speak with no punctuation, outrage at Shariff’s death running into sympathy with Zoey’s plight running into outrage that the US were bombing his country running into an admission that he too had a daughter. (The podcasters were right that you’d have thought he’d want to get in touch with his country that was getting bombed, although how he could have done that right then in the White House, I don’t know.)
Sleep-deprived Josh was prompted to take yesterday’s anxieties about Walken looking presidential back up by Amy (it wasn’t really examined what was driving her, but she sounded more like Amy before working for the First Lady, and was possibly channelling her own anxieties because presumably she had nothing to do once they’d cancelled all of Zoey’s mother’s engagements). The more well-rested Toby and Will didn’t buy it, but Leo maybe did. (Angela Black having got through to him that, as Chief of Staff, he wasn’t just responsible for Bartlet.) Leo got shot down for it, and when Josh accosted Republican Steve (in the men’s toilets!?), he got told that the Republicans were in awe of Bartlet for what he’d done. (He could have been lying.) They went after Bartlet recusing himself having been a mistake because he looked weaker a lot on the podcast.
I really liked the humanising conversation between President Walken and Debbie.
in fairness, Walken hadn’t made the call on Sharif (although it seemed like he was perfectly willing to go to war on hostile actors, without much weighing up. And so Abbey and the girls gave Jed a quiet hard time because this could make this worse for Zoey, and he was absenting himself from his responsibility to keep the whole country safe.)
But then – after noticing that we’d passed hour 50, i.e. over two days, and there had been so many exchanges where there was no news on Zoey - we saw Bartlet reach out to his work family, and demand to see the other speech. I loved that he adapted the worst scenario one.
I agreed with the podcasters, finding Zoey felt a little easy. They broke down how it was both confusing and underwhelming, apart from the moment of reunion and seeing Zoey’s state.
The speech was reassuring, President Bartlet had returned. I think they were right on the podcast that our guys being out of the loop and unsettled was catching, as it should be, and the episode conveyed that.
What was the point of the intern kid other than for Josh to revert to Harvard insecurities? (The podcast informed me he was played by Jesse Bradford, which would have registered way more when I first watched it. Right now, I don’t even want to count the years since Bring It On came out.) They also went after how entitled the intern was, but I was more annoyed by Josh, because however privileged or helped by nepotism the kid was, Josh had all the power – to make the young man just sit there and do nothing. And it wasn’t Josh or Donna who had the pratfall during the walk and talk.
Well, Leo has power over Josh, but Malina was suggesting this was going somewhere and I can’t remember where ATM. [Edited for typos and punctuation - 26/5/25.]