Byzantium's Shores: chronicling the misadventures of an overalls-clad hippie

(Warning: Spoilers herein for last night's episode of The West Wing.)

Well, no one can accuse Aaron Sorkin of not going out with a bang. Wow. I wonder if, when he decided that he would be leaving, if he said something like, "I gotta leave a good mess for the new writers to clean up...so I'll leave President Bartlet's daughter in the clutches of unknown kidnappers, and I'll leave the Presidency itself in the clutches of the Republican Speaker of the House! Mwooo-hooo-hoo-hahahahaha!!!" While I'm sorry to see Sorkin go, I'm actually thinking that things can be OK with new writers on board, as long as they're good ones. A lot of folks are saying that the show is doomed and won't be worth watching anymore, but I'm not willing to go that far. Executive Producer John Wells is still on board, and he's had pretty good results with keeping ER consistent over the years (despite a lull a few years back), and while I'm not a Third Watch viewer, that show's stuck around for long enough to indicate that it's doing something right.*

While I'm on the subject of The West Wing, I've seen the comment on a number of message boards and such this morning that of course the Republican Speaker is a big, uncaring, mean guy because that's the only kind of Republican Aaron Sorkin is capable of writing. And I'm thinking, what show are these people watching? Because they clearly missed the character of Ainsley Hayes over the previous two seasons, who was anything but an uncaring, meanie, evil Republican. Ditto Joe Quincy, the Republican lawyer played by Matthew Perry who appeared in two episodes just a couple of weeks ago. And ditto that Republican lawyer who Donna dated early in the third season. And ditto several Republican congressmen and other characters who have shown up on the show over its run. There have been some meanie Republicans, but there have also been some myopic and dorky Democrats on the show. Nobody ever mentions them, however.

A recurring motif of Sorkin's, in the course of The West Wing, is that the people who oppose us frequently don't equal the mental image we concoct of them for the sake of political convenience. The idea that The West Wing depicts a world where Democrats are always good and Republicans are always evil simply doesn't hold up to any actual scrutiny of the show. It's a complaint of convenience, not of reality.

(And speaking specifically of John Goodman's Speaker of the House last night, no, he doesn't come off as being particularly warm and friendly. But then, he's on screen for something like four minutes; and considering the viewpoint of his character, his lack of warmth is understandable. Here's a guy who is being forced to forsake his own political career by temporarily assuming the office of the Presidency, and he's assuming that office on the behalf of a President he's just spent five years of his life opposing at every turn, and he has to do it in front of the very White House staff he's spent that five years attacking and being attacked by. I would have found it utterly false if he'd been portrayed in any light other than the light in which he was shown last night.)

*Speaking of Third Watch, how many regular characters exist on this show? I'm asking because the show's been around for three or four years now, and yet it seems like every time I see a preview for it, the announcer is saying "This week, one of their own will die..." They should have run out of regulars to kill off by now, shouldn't they?