This one is for my Wingnuts. If you are not a fan of West Wing or Aaron Sorkin, you may not understand or agree with this post. Apologies in advance.
One of my favorite humans / writers is Aaron Sorkin. Yes, some of the "Sorkinesque" tropes can be tiresome, but he's a goddamn national treasure. I have seen every TV show and every movie (though admittedly not recently, and I haven't yet watched Trial of the Chicago 7, but it's on my to do list (which is really long and for someone that has no job I sure seem to have a never-ending, uncheckmarked to-do list.
Sidebar: I can't believe ProWritingAid let me type the word "uncheckmarked" without yelling at me.
I have literally memorized seasons of episodes of The West Wing, all the Aaron Sorkin years, and I would be happy to perform them for you. I will stress only the Aaron Sorkin years of The West Wing have been repeatedly comfort-watched by me as I find the post-Sorkin years, though intersting and well-written in certain storylines, are too sad.
The thing that I love about being a Wingnut is that I know I am not alone in my devotion to the Sorkin years., I know there are countless others that have memorized dialogue and rejoinders, even Mr. Lin-Manuel Miranda himself. "The Room Where it Happens?" West Wing reference. The song that LMM took his last Hamilton curtain call to? The West Wing theme. Case: rested.
By the way if you, like me, are addicted to podcasts as well as West Wing, well have I got a podcast for you: Meet my friend The West Wing Weekly. Josh Malina (Will Bailey on TWW) and Hrishikesh Hirway watch, discuss, and analyze an episode every week. They have actually finished now, but they did a special episode when the reunion that wasn't a reunion happened in November. Give it a binge-listen.
So if you are a Wingnut and still reading this, here is a specific complaint about Season 1 of the West Wing that you are welcome to share thoughts on, either in comments or in message form.
Mandy Hampton. Why?
Not Moira Kelly's fault, but boy was this a mundane, unnecessary, annoying character. Which they clearly figured out, how else to explain Mandy disappearing when her ex-boyfriend gets shot even though she was in the previous episode? And she is never mentioned again. Was she a dream? Like Chuck in Season 1 of Happy Days? He was Richie and Joanie Cunningham (RIP Erin Moran)'s elder brother. He disaappeared and was never mentioned again, and suddenly the Cunninghams only had two children.
My God, what did they do to Chuck?
You know who else is missing? Coco from The Golden Girls. At least Mandy and Chuck got a season. Coco only got one episode. Speaking of Golden Girls as I often do, did you know that the episode that also served as the pilot for Empty Nest originally starred Rita Moreno and famous "that guy" Paul Dooley as the empty nesters?
I would have been so completely in for a Rita Moreno / Richard Mulligan on-screen pairing.
I have digressed so far I do not remember what my original ramble was.
What's next?
Proof of the Original Empty Nest Pilot
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