Heck, if Karen can mention West Wing on her blog, so can I!
It does seem kind of numbing, realizing that was the last episode ever. I’ve followed lots of television shows from start to finish, some running longer, some running less time. Some were probably important in my life at the time, some less so.
I don’t know if the end of any ever seemed quite so gut-wrenching.
West Wing was a special entity. It was real life. But it was a fantasy. (Even more so after the election of George W.) It was intelligent and literate and informative. (I never knew as much about current political situations, and American politics – and actually, never knew less about American politics than I know now!) It has to have had some of the finest writing and acting that I can recall in any television series I’ve ever watched. (And I’ve always had a bit of a love affair with the television. It fascinates me and repels me. Intrigues me, inspires me, bores me.) I love books passionately, but I love theatre even more, and television is sometimes like a tiny captive theatre. Not always! But sometimes.
West Wing had passion and great beauty. Oh, it had silliness and humour and stupidity and anger. It made me go away and look things up. It rootled about in my memory and pulled up quotes and references I didn’t even know I had stored away. It made me far more aware of current events.
They lost their way a bit when Aaron Sorkin left the show, though he’d left them with a crisis to carry them along a bit, the abduction of Zoe Bartlett. However they seemed to find their stride again in season 6, and by season 7, although it was a very different show, it was a comparable one.
I think I’d have been perfectly happy if it had carried on to become whatever new show it was destined to be, during the tenure of President Santos. I think it would still have been very good TV.
But I don’t think I can ever be as innocent in politics again, having seen West Wing. Oh for the likes of President Bartlett! Yes, it was a fantasy, but what a fantasy!
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