The Bartlet Administration has come to an end.
The final episode of the West Wing aired in the US on Sunday night, and I *cough* downloaded it and watched it.
I remember well the first time I watched it, six years ago, on a Sunday evening on Channel 4. The first episode I saw was the opening of the second season, “In the Shadow of Two Gunmen, Part 1″ which, as the name implies, deals with the aftermath of an assasination attempt on the President and his staff.
I had read the hype for the first season in the Radio Times, and had in fact recorded the first couple of episodes, but never got round to watching them. But from that first episode I saw half a dozen years ago, I was hooked.
It was like nothing I had seen before. The pace of the writing knocked me backwards. The characters – especially thrown into the middle of this assasination attempt – were incredibly real and believable. And the ideas – the scope of the whole thing – was bigger and more impressive than anything on TV.
I was hooked.
Suffice to say that the West Wing became nothing less than appointment viewing every week for me – even when Channel 4 lost faith in the series and bumped it all over the place (in fact, C4 still hasn’t show Season 5…).
I think this is the first time I’ve ever really been so drawn into a television drama. It sounds weird, but I really cared what happened to Jed and Abbey, to Josh and Donna, Leo, Sam, Toby, CJ… OK, the series lost something when Rob Lowe (Sam) and then Aaron Sorkin left the show 3 years ago. But even when the series wasn’t on form, it was a damn sight better than anything else on television.
It was a weird premise for a television series, given that it could only possibly last eight years with the original characters. When John Spencer (Chief of Staff Leo McGarry) passed away suddenly over Christmas, I think everyone knew that show was going to be ending. The last few episodes, featuring Leo’s funeral and then the last few weeks of the Bartlet White House, were, in the most part, a wonderful ending to a wonderful series.
So thank you, to the whole cast and crew of the West Wing, for seven years of stunning, record-breaking, must see televison. Thank you for not tempting the wrath of the whatever from high atop the thing; for being “da man”; for woot canaw and a Secret Plan to Fight Inflation… thank you for the Jackal; for Mrs Landingham, who missed “her boys”; for being nothin’ but a family thing and for being able to sign the President’s name pretty good. Thank you for (not) being wrong on so many levels; for having health and strength and stealing the rest; for Admiral Sissymary and for Big Block of Cheese day (not to mention the wheat thin the size of Lake Tahoe)… thank you for band gazebos; for the seventeen spices used to baste a turkey and for shoving motherboards and legislative agendas… well, you can guess where! Thank you for not stopping for a beer or red lights; for “You look amazing”, for “I’m still here…”, for taking a walk… or something and for not saying anything about talking… thank you for doing what’s hard, for saying it right, for running into walls at full speed and for “what’s next?” Thank you for friends who have been down here before, and know the way out. Thank you for babies coming with hats; for dancing with the one that brung ya, for WWLD and for Bartlet for America. Just… thank you all – for all of it. [ta, TWoP forums]
The Da Vinci Code