DVD : The West Wing - The Complete First Season

Rating: - Potus with the Mostus
Last night, I punished myself by watching the episode called "In Excelsis Deo" from the first season of "The West Wing." Now I am beside myself that I missed "American Idol." Oh, the humanity!

Watching the character, Toby Ziegler get caught up in a funeral for a homeless ex-marine veteran of the Korean Conflict was poignant and thrilling. Add the character of Mrs. Landingham and her story of what happened to her many Christmas Eves ago, and you have a classic. It reveals how you would like our government to treat and support, and I mean really support the veterans of our conflicts that is so sadly missing today.

As usual, "The West Wing" knows how to deliver a Christmas episode with a message of peace and caring for others who are simply our fellow Americans. No one sought to find out the dead marine's politics or beliefs. He was just accorded the honor that should be given to all our veterans. And this was just one episode. Wait until you get to Lord Marbury!

If I had to tell you which year of The West Wing to buy, I'd tell you only to buy one through five. I'm not sure that six has come out yet.

This season, as others, won every award in the book. Watch, and you will know why.

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Rating: - That boat left and I wasn't on it...
...despite being fairly liberal in my politics, I just don't get this show...it is TOO sappy, too PC, too, I guess, self-righteous and smug...it, to me, features all the over-the-top cliches about liberals that the Neocons trade in...that can't be a good thing, can it?

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Rating: - GREAT DVD!!
It is really great DVD to watch!! I bought this West Wing DVDs as a set and gave them to my husband for the Xmas present. He really loves them and watch them every night.

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Rating: - The West Wing the first Season
I just finished watching the first season of the West Wing. I have to say it is excellent!!! I did not watch this on TV when it originally aired, but I get to catch up with it on DVD. I can't wait to watch season two. I beleive this to be one of the most intelligently written and acted television shows. Im a huge Sopranos fan and I think it rivals even that. The dialogue is brisk and you do have to listen carefully to what they are saying, but, thats a benefit of owning it on DVD, you can reverse it and listen again. I think the cast, beginning with Martin Sheen and John Spencer are at the top of their game. This was a show that once I watched an episode I wanted more. The awards this show won for it's first season were definitely earned.

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Rating: - Brilliant - I only wish Season One were also widescreen
The range from light to dark provided by a good DVD player is analogous to the dynamic range (loud to soft) of a good stereo system. Being more of a music than a film person, I'm saddened by the increasing use of "compression" (in the audio engineer's sense--I don't mean JPEG or MP3 compression) in music. It makes CDs sound better in car stereos and on portable players. But for listening on a good hi-fi at home, much of the music's drama is lost if there isn't much difference between the quietest and the loudest passages.

One of my favorite things about West Wing has been that it's unusually cinematic for a television series. It isn't bright and day-glo. Unlike most TV shows, which more and more seem to be converging with the techniques of television advertisements.

So, yes: great cinematography. But it was Sorkin's scripting which was crucial. His ability to weave multiple subplots both within a show and from show-to-show remains unmatched by any other writer for television. Some may object that what I've described is merely the "soap opera" formula: but what soap opera ever had this kind of substance or emotional impact?

[SPOILER alert -- covering the next two paragraphs]

Think of the show where Josh is on stage narrating "a day in the life" at the White House: the time he filled in at a press conference after C.J. had an emergency root canal and could barely speak. Josh jokingly told the press corps that the President had a "secret" plan to fight inflation, and the reporters all take him seriously! His verbal performance is cut in not only with shots from that past fiasco -- but also merges with the developing story -- which Josh follows via his cell phone, occasionally interrupting his talk -- that story taking place in parallel, in the present, where a teetotaling Supreme Court nominee is arrested on a groundless DWI charge, which was in fact the crime of "driving-while-Hispanic" in what must have been a very-white Connecticut town.

If only the judge had followed through with his initial intention to stay in prison, not only so that he can see the justice system from the other side, but presumably also develop a better cause of action to sue the racist cops who arrested him. Yes, the plot might have slowed down too much...but what a spectacle it would have been.

[OK, this is where you can start reading again, if you didn't want to hear too much]

Most television producers imagine the audience can't possibly keep track of so many characters and plotlines. Especially not timelines! The success of West Wing has proven them s-o-o-o wrong.

I suppose it's too much to ask. To expect that kind of brilliant writing to appear on TV again.

But we can always watch the Sorkin seasons on DVD. Even on widescreen, although that wasn't done until Season Two.