![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shallownessThe West Wing - 6.5 The Huppert Peak
I was pleased enough that the issue of the day was the environment and fossil fuel dependency, because I’ve been finding the Bartlet administration pretty dire on green issues. I wondered if Josh’s SUV disaster was partially motivated by his desire to feel manly because he’d been passed over for promotion. The overconfidence and pile-on of bad choices felt so Josh, though. (But the podcast was less forgiving.)
I kept being reminded of Sam all episode, what with Annabeth moving into his old office and the talk of chess. That brought a talking Leo back on screen (not eating, in pain, on prescription drugs, which did make me go !?!?, but think ‘at least a nurse is monitoring him’, while the podcasters were more critical.) I took him reminding CJ of the core principles of being this president’s chief of staff as feeding into her response to Charlie when he asked her to ignore his resume. I suppose Malina’s criticism that it might have been better if CJ had found her own informal ritual of checking in on the President rather than bringing in a stranger to play chess fair. Anyway, CJ was settling in a bit.
I was amused by Toby’s transformation, as he grudgingly listened to the advice that was being dished out to him, the little physical gags. I thought they made a good point about the contrasting energies between Schiff’s Toby and Chenoweth’s Annabeth. I did feel a pang for Carol, though.
So there was development and all these plotlines, like what Charlie’s graduation meant. I still think he could have argued that he’d like to stay on for the rest of Bartlet’s term with a promise to seek a ‘proper’ job after, although I can see Bartlet might counter that agument with Charlie finding it difficult to make the break then. Anyway, Zoey, who’d masterminded the celebration of Charlie’s agreement, returned and seemed well. Charlie/Zoey had a very cute little moment.
I was especially pleased that they touched on Donna’s mental health after her near-death experience. I liked that Kate reached out as the woman who was most likely to have had a similar experience, and the potential of a friendship there. Donna being able to admit that she wasn’t ready to talk but acknowledging her problems and that she’d talked to experts (probably because she’d seen what Josh had gone through and learned from it) was just enough.
And the race to be the next President began heating up, with the appearance of the VP and his and Will’s confidence their most likely Democrat opponent wasn’t running leaving Josh and Toby to grapple with what that meant for the political project they’d been at the heart of for years and, y’know, their country (and their world, typing from outside the US.) I think I was less negative about the episode than they were on the podcast.
FWIW, I watched the episode in 2023, listened to the podcast in 2024.
I was pleased enough that the issue of the day was the environment and fossil fuel dependency, because I’ve been finding the Bartlet administration pretty dire on green issues. I wondered if Josh’s SUV disaster was partially motivated by his desire to feel manly because he’d been passed over for promotion. The overconfidence and pile-on of bad choices felt so Josh, though. (But the podcast was less forgiving.)
I kept being reminded of Sam all episode, what with Annabeth moving into his old office and the talk of chess. That brought a talking Leo back on screen (not eating, in pain, on prescription drugs, which did make me go !?!?, but think ‘at least a nurse is monitoring him’, while the podcasters were more critical.) I took him reminding CJ of the core principles of being this president’s chief of staff as feeding into her response to Charlie when he asked her to ignore his resume. I suppose Malina’s criticism that it might have been better if CJ had found her own informal ritual of checking in on the President rather than bringing in a stranger to play chess fair. Anyway, CJ was settling in a bit.
I was amused by Toby’s transformation, as he grudgingly listened to the advice that was being dished out to him, the little physical gags. I thought they made a good point about the contrasting energies between Schiff’s Toby and Chenoweth’s Annabeth. I did feel a pang for Carol, though.
So there was development and all these plotlines, like what Charlie’s graduation meant. I still think he could have argued that he’d like to stay on for the rest of Bartlet’s term with a promise to seek a ‘proper’ job after, although I can see Bartlet might counter that agument with Charlie finding it difficult to make the break then. Anyway, Zoey, who’d masterminded the celebration of Charlie’s agreement, returned and seemed well. Charlie/Zoey had a very cute little moment.
I was especially pleased that they touched on Donna’s mental health after her near-death experience. I liked that Kate reached out as the woman who was most likely to have had a similar experience, and the potential of a friendship there. Donna being able to admit that she wasn’t ready to talk but acknowledging her problems and that she’d talked to experts (probably because she’d seen what Josh had gone through and learned from it) was just enough.
And the race to be the next President began heating up, with the appearance of the VP and his and Will’s confidence their most likely Democrat opponent wasn’t running leaving Josh and Toby to grapple with what that meant for the political project they’d been at the heart of for years and, y’know, their country (and their world, typing from outside the US.) I think I was less negative about the episode than they were on the podcast.
FWIW, I watched the episode in 2023, listened to the podcast in 2024.
