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Live from Aaron Sorkin, it's Monday Night!
I have a pretty standard practice of not using my livejournal to ramble about things. I usually only post specific filk-related updates to mirror my filk web site, and occasionally post about important topics or ask specific questions of those on my friendslist.
I'm going to break this practice to shamelessly plug a piece of media from a giant faceless corporate entity. Because every once in a while, even giant faceless corporate entities can make something that's truly art.
Several years ago, my friends the Bohnhoffs told me that I really needed to start watching a television show called The West Wing. I didn't, because I didn't feel I had the time to get addicted to a new television series. And anyway, a drama about the White House sounded boring to me.
After enough years of hearing how great this show was, I decided I wanted to see it, but then, I hate coming in in the middle of a series. Well, I was in luck, because that year the Bravo channel started running them all in sequence, starting with episode one. Thanks to the Tivo and a printout of an episode title list from an internet fan site, I was able to watch the first four seasons, sequentially, over the period of a couple of months. I was hooked and riveted from the very first scene. It was the most well-written piece of television I'd seen. Ever. The works of Joss Whedon come a distant second, and for those who know what a Firefly fan I am, this is really saying something.
There was something special about the dialogue. The rapid-fire delivery, the constant twists, the way that the simple turn of a phrase could make you truly think. The script rewarded you handsomely for listening closely and paying attention. This was not a show you let wash over you for bland entertainment. This was a sumptuous feast of words and cleverness and humor and drama, to be devoured whole without stopping to take a breath. There were moments in the show that you just wanted to memorize verbatim, if only because it would be a shame to lose those words to the ravages of time, much like the people memorizing books at the end of Fahrenheit 451.
I could go on about the show, about how its characters were so wonderfully realized, about how the actors gave them such weight, about how its not-quite-reality universe was used (much like the best of today's science fiction) as a tool to point out the best and the worst of the world we live in today. But I don't have that much time. Let's just put it this way: Aaron Sorkin is a GOD, and leave it at that.
Fast forward three years. Aaron Sorkin left the show during the final three seasons: 5, 6, and 7. And the show never felt the same. I still watched, like a caffeine addict forced to switch to decaf. And the writers who tried to fill his shoes actually started to get their footing towards the end. And the second-to-last episode contained a scene between CJ and Danny that was absolutely soul-breaking. But it wasn't the Sorkin I knew.
I'd actually forgotten what Sorkin's writing was like. Seriously. I'd had three years of Sorkin-free West Wing to wean me. Then![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
vixyish brings over a Netflix DVD. One of her friends recommended it.
It was like jumping into a pool after years in the desert. It was like having a great conversation after years of vowing silence in a monastery. It was like great sex after years of chastity. People, SORKIN IS BACK. The DVD was the pilot episode for his new show, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. Everything you loved about The West Wing is back, in spades. The not-quite-reality. The dialogue. The characters. The acting. The thinking. The devouring whole. It's all there.
And you now all have a chance to see the entire series, starting from episode one. If my information is correct, the series begins Monday, September 18th on NBC, when they will air the pilot episode that was on the DVD. A week later, on the 25th, the series continues with the second episode.
Don't miss this one.
PS: Speaking of addictions, Lost begins its new season on October 4th.
I'm going to break this practice to shamelessly plug a piece of media from a giant faceless corporate entity. Because every once in a while, even giant faceless corporate entities can make something that's truly art.
Several years ago, my friends the Bohnhoffs told me that I really needed to start watching a television show called The West Wing. I didn't, because I didn't feel I had the time to get addicted to a new television series. And anyway, a drama about the White House sounded boring to me.
After enough years of hearing how great this show was, I decided I wanted to see it, but then, I hate coming in in the middle of a series. Well, I was in luck, because that year the Bravo channel started running them all in sequence, starting with episode one. Thanks to the Tivo and a printout of an episode title list from an internet fan site, I was able to watch the first four seasons, sequentially, over the period of a couple of months. I was hooked and riveted from the very first scene. It was the most well-written piece of television I'd seen. Ever. The works of Joss Whedon come a distant second, and for those who know what a Firefly fan I am, this is really saying something.
There was something special about the dialogue. The rapid-fire delivery, the constant twists, the way that the simple turn of a phrase could make you truly think. The script rewarded you handsomely for listening closely and paying attention. This was not a show you let wash over you for bland entertainment. This was a sumptuous feast of words and cleverness and humor and drama, to be devoured whole without stopping to take a breath. There were moments in the show that you just wanted to memorize verbatim, if only because it would be a shame to lose those words to the ravages of time, much like the people memorizing books at the end of Fahrenheit 451.
I could go on about the show, about how its characters were so wonderfully realized, about how the actors gave them such weight, about how its not-quite-reality universe was used (much like the best of today's science fiction) as a tool to point out the best and the worst of the world we live in today. But I don't have that much time. Let's just put it this way: Aaron Sorkin is a GOD, and leave it at that.
Fast forward three years. Aaron Sorkin left the show during the final three seasons: 5, 6, and 7. And the show never felt the same. I still watched, like a caffeine addict forced to switch to decaf. And the writers who tried to fill his shoes actually started to get their footing towards the end. And the second-to-last episode contained a scene between CJ and Danny that was absolutely soul-breaking. But it wasn't the Sorkin I knew.
I'd actually forgotten what Sorkin's writing was like. Seriously. I'd had three years of Sorkin-free West Wing to wean me. Then
vixyish brings over a Netflix DVD. One of her friends recommended it.It was like jumping into a pool after years in the desert. It was like having a great conversation after years of vowing silence in a monastery. It was like great sex after years of chastity. People, SORKIN IS BACK. The DVD was the pilot episode for his new show, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. Everything you loved about The West Wing is back, in spades. The not-quite-reality. The dialogue. The characters. The acting. The thinking. The devouring whole. It's all there.
And you now all have a chance to see the entire series, starting from episode one. If my information is correct, the series begins Monday, September 18th on NBC, when they will air the pilot episode that was on the DVD. A week later, on the 25th, the series continues with the second episode.
Don't miss this one.
PS: Speaking of addictions, Lost begins its new season on October 4th.
no subject
Nicely articulated description. Which I happen to agree with. I don't think I was hooked from the first scene, but by the time the Bravo "TWW Season 1 all weekend" marathon was over, a couple of Thanksgivings back, I'd seen enough to be thoroughly hooked also.
Hmm, wonder how the TV reception is at the new place (in Ballard)...
Modified for genre, I think the above description also applies very well indeed, to most of Lois McMaster Bujold's novels in the Miles Vorkosigan series. Particularly Mirror Dance, Memory, and A Civil Campaign.
no subject
Ballard is geographically close to the television stations, and it wouldn't surprise me if those three big towers up on Queen Anne Hill just to the South of you were used as transmitters for those stations. So I'd guess you'd get great reception.
no subject
Thanks! Not *quite* yet. We get the keys Sept 1st. My house in Portland is on the market, but no offers yet. I confess I'm hoping there'll be some "movement" this coming week, on that front.
But sometime in September, most likely the first half of the month, I will indeed be officially relocated in Seattle. The thought is exciting... but the amount of stuff I have to slog through to get there is pretty daunting, and tiring.