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DrVenkman posted:I don't envy John Wells one bit. He hard a hard job to follow up Sorkin and actually pulled out some great episodes from season 6 onwards. I just think he sometimes focused on the big stories instead of the characters. There's some really sloppy work in Season 5, though, the most egregious example being having Elisabeth Moss' name in the opening credits for the denouement of the kidnapping plotline. That said, there are good episodes in Series 5 as well : the CJ/Hoynes one and The Supremes mainly. And generally the characters don't get too stupid, even if Jesse Bradford's entire reason for being on the show appears to have his character gently caress over Josh.
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Jul 7, 2011 22:11
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I happened to have some of 'Stirred' (3-17) flash through my mind yesterday and spent a few minutes wondering how awesome it would have been to get Admiral Sissymary as V-POTUS. And then I realised that the most awesome of all would have been to get Nancy McNally on the ticket. I mean, Hoynes showed his worth, drumming up support for Bartlett on a few occasions, but imagine the poor first term senator daring to deviate from the party line who gets a personal visit from McNally.
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Nov 7, 2011 08:16
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DominoDancing posted:Then I guess I'm in the minority thinking that fight scene was not stupid at all. The whole situation was built up to pretty well, since Toby had been pissed off at Josh for quite a while. It's not really a "fist-fight" either. I don't know, I've never been in a fight except once with one of my friends, and the situation looked and developed pretty much like this one. I agree. It's set up quite nicely over the seasons that Toby & Josh get along (just about) in a professional relationship, but that that's the extent of it (see '20 Hours In America' for the most concrete proof). They also have very different motivations for what they do. Josh feels more responsibility towards Leo, while Toby's intentions are always more influenced by ideology than politics (consider his political career prior to Bartlet). Leo explicitly tells Josh to go and find a candidate who's worthy of being President, but he doesn't mention Toby. Toby's pride (["Are you good at it?"] "Yeah, I'm very good at it.") means he'd never quit Bartlet's administration or ask Josh if he could join in, but that doesn't mean he isn't seething about being overlooked. He was part of the reason Josh decided to sign on with Bartlet (["You said he should piss off the dairy farmers."] "I said he should, if only because it's the easiest thing to remember, tell the truth.") and my guess is that he remembers that quite well. He's pissed off because Josh doesn't recognise that fact. I think it actually works better for Santos that Toby isn't officially part of his staff. Toby worked well for Bartlet because he's the morally pure angel/demon on his shoulder, but Santos is - from what we're shown - someone who's pragmatically, rather than dogmatically, Christian. poo poo, Santos is based on Obama. Can you imagine someone like Toby working for Obama?
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Nov 19, 2011 03:38
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Mackieman posted:That said, I wish the series had more Oliver Babish. It's odd. There's a lot of dialogue dedicated to how Bartlet gets through White House Counsels like cheap toilet paper and then Babish re-appears 6 years later, in the same job, without anyone commenting on it.
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Dec 17, 2011 02:07
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JerkyBunion posted:One of my all time favorite The way the two Secret Service guys walk over and stand ominously over his desk is hilarious.
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Apr 23, 2012 12:47
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scenes is when Charlie gets the knife from Bartlett. That and Charlie's taxes. "Milo, Coop, help Charlie find his pockets." or something to that effect.
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Hobo Erotica posted:To be honest I'd forgotten they hooked up, and I'm not sure I'm on board.. She's too good for him. But whatever, as long as they're happy. I always considered it along the same lines as the campaign teams' hook-ups. It's convenient, the other person is acceptable and you don't really have to worry about saying something you shouldn't have. Particularly for Kate, who doesn't seem to keep very sociable hours.
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May 26, 2012 18:41
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HorseHeadBed posted:I really dislike Will. It's weird because he's sort of the guy you can imagine Sam being 4-5 years before Bartlett's campaign gets underway. He's got the energy, the enthusiasm, the righteous indignation (that Chuck Webb speech) and a knack for predicting the weather. His main problem is that he doesn't have a few years to become disillusioned with what he's doing. Josh is working for Hoynes until Leo shows him something better and it takes Josh to drag Sam into the fight. And Bartlett's fight to become president isn't a sure thing at all (it's noticeable that we see nothing of the Presidential election) so there's undoubtedly some pretty hairy stuff they go through to get to the White House. But Will gets none of that. He takes on a losing cause and, in winning a pyrrhic victory, gets fast-tracked to a White House run by people he almost idolises (note his chat with Sam about who each of them has written for). poo poo, his first job is to write an acceptance speech. He's not part of the inner circle when Bingo Bob is chosen as VP, so when he sees that this is the "Because I might die" guy, why wouldn't he assume that Bob's got hidden depths? His mistakes are almost all due to factors outside his control, but he gets grief from Toby and Leo about his decisions and - even when it's clear Bingo Bob shouldn't be running anything more serious than a coconut shy - resists the temptation to point out what gigantic shitheels the rest of the West Wing have been. Frankly, Will is a loving American hero. I say that as a full-blooded British citizen.
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Aug 5, 2012 00:58
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School Bully posted:In one of his earlier episodes, Josh can't Get Something Done, and there's a quick scene of Pierce calling one of his family connections, and then later on It is Miraculously Done. Does this ever get mentioned at any stage afterwards? I can't bring myself to rewatch Season 5, but on first viewing, it seemed like Pierce was doing all of this stuff behind Josh's back as a way to try to make himself useful. The problem being that because Josh had no clue what was going on, he thought it was his actions that were making things happen; at which point, why wouldn't you keep on doing the same stuff. Then when Josh did something without Pierce making a call, it went horribly wrong. Josh got blamed, but I couldn't really find fault with what he was doing - as far as he was concerned, he was on a pretty good streak. The plotline annoyed me and the character annoyed me.
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Aug 14, 2012 13:51
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Billy the Mountain posted:So I just came across an uncharacteristic example of sexist racism from Josh in season 5 [...] That's just Season 5. Or, in fairness, a combination of the always vaguely-racist & sexist ways of Joshua Lyman combined with the generally pretty bad writing of Season 5. I mean, you could kind of argue that Josh's character in general displays characteristics of being aware of both sexist and racist points of view, but his character being so ingrained (and indebted to) those same cultural biases means that sometimes the words just slip out. Josh is kind of a dick, after all.
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Jun 1, 2013 03:50
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Honestly, most of the stuff Josh tries over the entire 7 seasons fails or gets rescued miraculously. Season 5 is the best for this when he gets a senator to leave the Democratic party (although I have some sympathy for him here, given he didn't know what that moron intern was doing) and then, when brought back from the cold by Bartlett to help with the Shutdown impasse, only has his 'WALK DOWN THE ROAD LIKE A MAN OF THE PEOPLE' deal work when Haffley and the other Republicans act like idiots by keep them waiting outside the door. I don't know if it was planned that the show promotes victory through utter incompetence, but it certainly turns out that way where Josh is involved.
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Aug 25, 2013 11:43
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DominoDancing posted:Also, I just actually watched one of those Mark Watches vlogs. While I can't imagine doing that for whole seasons, it's pretty funny. And it helps that he's cute. This is from a particular episode of Friday Night Lights:  I don't watch many of them. Just if I think his reactions will be good.
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Nov 3, 2013 11:59
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Khablam posted:Heh, I know. But it's like a whole minute of clunky setup in an episode which is otherwise pretty fantastic. But it is thematically relevant to the rest of the 2-parter - Josh & Toby are so focused on the election and politics that they don't give a poo poo about the sorts of things other people care about. Not that anyone should give a poo poo about mop-head's E/N issues.
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Dec 8, 2013 11:31
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Luigi Thirty posted:My favorite thing will forever be Clearchannel's list of 100 songs you couldn't play on the radio because of 9/11. Which just makes 9/11 the best day to listen to GBS.FM
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Aug 20, 2014 23:40
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