Friday, August 24, 2012


The Newsroom
Aaron Sorkin returns to television after his wildly successful crack at film, with the well received and much rewarded Social Network. After tackling a subject matter as big as the inner-workings of the White House to massive critical acclaim Sorkin turns his attention to the people who report on the decisions made in the White House. The Newsroom centres around Will McAvoy (played by Jeff Daniels), who starts out as a likeable news anchor who, in the first scene of the first episode has a moment during a panel discussion where he suddenly realises that his life is worthless and from here on out he’s going  to whip his news team into shape and start delivering “real news”. So is it any good?

The Newsroom isn’t far off being a great show, but there’s just a couple of gaping flaws. Most notably and what a lot of people were quick to point out was that somewhere between the West Wing and The Social Network Aaron Sorkin forgot how to write women. The standard episode begins it coming to light that one of the women in the office has messed up by not covering an important news story or accidentally sending out a private email to everyone in the building. At this point Will and the boys will roll their eyes and set about fixing the screw-up in time for Will to go on the nine o’clock news so he can deliver eye-opening truth-bombs to American population. The bumbling incompetents in The Newsroom are a far-cry from the likes of CJ Cregg and The First Lady in the West Wing. But it’s all ok because every so often we’ll be reminded that they all have numerous PHDs. The whole thing just smacks of Sorkin saying “Women.  Am I right fellas?

One thing that becomes all too clear after a few episodes of The Newsroom is that Sorkin is treating it as his own personal soapbox to voice his thoughts and opinions on the state of things. This would be fine if the show itself wasn’t so self-assured. The characters are constantly telling each other how good their version of “the news” is and we’re constantly reminded how clever they all are. They walk around talking about how their news show is a cut above the rest and breaking down the likes of FOX and CNN and other lesser news stations so they can talk about what the lowly sheeple are responding to. Will of course gets most of this praise and it’s all too obvious that Will is Sorkins own thinly veiled avatar of himself. He walks around saying his quasi-catchphrase “I’m on a mission to civilize” (the show takes a few cues from the 1600s novel Don Quixote, a fact that they’re all too proud of and remind us every other episode)  Again there’s nothing inherently wrong with this until all the characters go around singing his praises. They talk about how he’s really a nice guy once you get to know him, and how he’s so clever and on far more occasions than is necessary, so handsome (thanks, but I think the viewers can make up their own mind on that one). The Newsroom feels all too often like Aaron Sorkin’s love letter to himself.

The Nesroom certainly has moments of brilliance there was a great episode where the staff hire a rogue reporter to get them the inside story on the violence in Egypt  and there’s a great commentary kicking off now on the phone hacking scandals There’s definitely flashes of that sharp fast Sorkin dialogue but this is not what we should expect from the writer of The West Wing. While there are plenty of programmes a lot worse than the Newsroom, The Newsroom’s shortcomings are magnified because it’s a show that really needs to be good. Because it’s the type of programme we need in the world where in The West Wing Sorkin gave America the perfect fictional president now he’s trying to give the world the perfect fictional news channel, one that cuts the bullshit and the spin. But it also needs to be good because it keeps insisting that it is. And most importantly it’s obvious that it could be really good. However it’s various problems means it keeps falling short of the mark.

There are moments when you see flashes of brilliance comparable to that of The West Wing but it’s usually quickly followed by Jeff Daniels looking smug or Alison Pill being irritable and scattered because that’s how women in top news stations act, right? To put it in perspective, if The West Wing and The Newsroom where to take the same exam, The West Wing would pass with first class honours while the Newsroom would be the guy who borrows his notes the night before and scrapes a pass. I hope lessons have been learned come season two.