I feel like this third season of "The West Wing" has been a bit of a rollercoaster. As far as I know, a lot of the season's planned storylines were changed after the attack on 9/11, which made the season lean more heavily into the Islamic extremism factor and come up with entirely new countries to further the political accessibility of the show. It's almost weird to judge this season as a whole as it feels like it was put together after the fact. With that said, I still find that most of this season has been in the vein of the classic "West Wing" writing and I'm glad to see that Sorkin still has a lot of fresh ideas even after having done this for three seasons. This season could have gone in many different directions had everything been a little different, but instead, we ended up with something that feels like both one of the weirdest seasons of television, but also one of the most fulfilling. And it all comes together in a season finale that feels like it has to put the lit on a lot of different things that needs to be put out of the way so we can focus on the election storyline coming up in the next season. With all that on the table, I can't imagine a better outcome than this as this episode managed to bind a bow on the season with passion and knowledge, ending a season marked by tragedy in even more tragedy.
I was told to look out for this episode and its shock value, and I understand why. There's a lot going on here and it's difficult not to want to do something else as a lot of it is very tough. Bartlet has been faced with this choice of using the military to get rid of a known terrorist, who also happens to be the minister of defense of a foreign country. This puts a lot of pressure on Bartlet, but also the administration to tell him what the rights and wrongs of this is. It ended unexpectedly and emotionally satisfying.
This is one of those episodes where the stakes felt extraordinarily high. Not only is there a lot of life-and-death situations going on here, but the entire idea of this season was leveled after everything that went down on 9/11, giving the show a completely new sense of political pressure and responsibility that it has to stick with. They managed to pull all that together in a hard-hitting finale that doesn't spare any expense and pulls the trigger on more than a few occasions, even providing the death of another character that feels like it was bound to happen.
There are a lot of ideas floating around here, and the big contrast to the last season is almost unfathomable. With the last season, we saw someone go into a press room and having a moment of triumph, both over himself and the people in the room. Here, he's the smallest person ever and have just done something that he takes as a defeat. The idea of building these two finales up like that and then put everything on its head is an incredible way of raising the tension and I think Sorkin has expertly set the stage for Season 4.
This episode featured a lot of career-high performances for these exceptional actors. First of all, it was nice to see Lily Tomlin pop in for a short time. She's always a joy to see on the big screen. Martin Sheen doesn't have to prove that he's the best actor in this show, but he always finds ways to impress, and it seems like these finales are where he really shines. This episode featured some of his most subdued work, yet also some of his most explosive, and both at the same time. Only a master can achieve that, and he did.
"Posse Comitatus" is an episode that start off with everyone at their happiest but ends with everyone at their lowest through a series of tragedies. It features some of the highest stakes the show has ever had, and the tension is incredibly thick, setting up a lot of conflicts to be explored in Season 4.
I was told to look out for this episode and its shock value, and I understand why. There's a lot going on here and it's difficult not to want to do something else as a lot of it is very tough. Bartlet has been faced with this choice of using the military to get rid of a known terrorist, who also happens to be the minister of defense of a foreign country. This puts a lot of pressure on Bartlet, but also the administration to tell him what the rights and wrongs of this is. It ended unexpectedly and emotionally satisfying.
This is one of those episodes where the stakes felt extraordinarily high. Not only is there a lot of life-and-death situations going on here, but the entire idea of this season was leveled after everything that went down on 9/11, giving the show a completely new sense of political pressure and responsibility that it has to stick with. They managed to pull all that together in a hard-hitting finale that doesn't spare any expense and pulls the trigger on more than a few occasions, even providing the death of another character that feels like it was bound to happen.
There are a lot of ideas floating around here, and the big contrast to the last season is almost unfathomable. With the last season, we saw someone go into a press room and having a moment of triumph, both over himself and the people in the room. Here, he's the smallest person ever and have just done something that he takes as a defeat. The idea of building these two finales up like that and then put everything on its head is an incredible way of raising the tension and I think Sorkin has expertly set the stage for Season 4.
This episode featured a lot of career-high performances for these exceptional actors. First of all, it was nice to see Lily Tomlin pop in for a short time. She's always a joy to see on the big screen. Martin Sheen doesn't have to prove that he's the best actor in this show, but he always finds ways to impress, and it seems like these finales are where he really shines. This episode featured some of his most subdued work, yet also some of his most explosive, and both at the same time. Only a master can achieve that, and he did.
"Posse Comitatus" is an episode that start off with everyone at their happiest but ends with everyone at their lowest through a series of tragedies. It features some of the highest stakes the show has ever had, and the tension is incredibly thick, setting up a lot of conflicts to be explored in Season 4.