Just watched the final episode of the West Wing. In contrast to the pilot episode, this was a let down and had no great lines. Remember the Lincolnisque lines with which Bartlett characterizes those Cuban refugees who braved a storm and came to America:
With the clothes on their back, they came through a storm. Those who didn’t die want a better life for their children. …. Talk about being impressive.
Given the ER-ification of the West Wing under John Wells, I am glad that the series ended. Still, we all enjoyed watching a President, even a fictional one, who read a book.
In that spirit, here is a tidbit that some of you might enjoy. In the final episode, among Bartlett’s personal belongings being packed up in the oval office was a book by Michel Foucault. In fact, it was the only book that was shown in today’s episode. Outside of the academy, all things French are resented in America. And the real West Wing seems to show no interest in the written word, as it continues to obsess over who Americans might be talking to. So seeing Foucault even in a fictional West Wing made me feel hopeful.
Soon, on the many moments and episodes that I really liked and watched many, many times.
Postscript: I didn’t get a good look at the book Bartlett was presumably reading but Nation reports that book was indeed ‘SOCIETY MUST BE DEFENDED‘. How apt!
For the West Wing nuts, Westwingnews offers a pretty good wrapup.
4 Comments
“Outside of the academy, all things French are resented in America.”
I am not sure that is true, though I am sure Bill O’Reilly would like you to believe so. As to the show’s waning quality, I was hoping Vinick would emerge a victor and turn things around, but that was not to be.
Well, I am exaggerting of course, both the obsession with French theory within the academy and hatred of all things French, outside.
On the plot and writing, I stopped expecting much once the impact of two factors - 9/11 and Sorkin’s departure - set the West Wing on a downward spiral.
I linked to your blog in my own review of the finale. Check it out!
Mrs. Babu and I about jumped off the sofa when we caught St. Michel coming off the shelf! Sure, the show waned in clever repartee after Sorkin left (though we will apparently get another AS creation next fall, the already-hyped Studio 60, starring no less than Matthew ‘Chandler’ Perry and Bradley ‘Josh’ Whitford), but g****mn the end of WW was depressing. Bad enough that my weekly escape into a politics of the possible has to die a cruel death at the hand of ratings fanatics, but all I could think of, THE WHOLE F***ING TIME, was how paltry and puny our real-world equivalents are. As I told the missus while holding back rare tears as they signed off, I’ve never been so invested with or attached to any single TV show in my life. Not for the fun, but for the fact that smart people, people who had read books (indeed, the likes of Foucault) actually got to be in charge, somewhere, at least for an hour a week. Jed Bartlett and Matt Santos are off to new Sheen and Smits projects, no doubt…but we in the reality-based community are stuck with The Chosen One and his NSA for another two and a half years (979 days, to be exact, according to my countdown keychain). No rest for the weary, I suppose…
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