^Not really. But I don't see why you singled out Mr Frost. It was a good episode apart from that - especially with Toby confessing at the end!

And the debate was well done. I actually thought Vinick came out on top! But leave it to The West Wing to make the most out of an idea that's basically a stunt, and that I'd always thought was slightly beneath it.

I thought it was a dreadful episode, gimmicky especially getting rid of the rules at the beginning, there is no way that any candidate would do that.

When you consider Bartlet's debate in the previous election it showed the power of the man, here Vinick just seemed to shallow.

If they were going to do a live episode surely it would have been more impressive or a challenge if they had something going on the White House itself. When ER did something similar a few years ago they had the bodies streaming in all the time. I think that a dramatic series of events in the Sit Room would have been more impressive.

I think it was the most disappointing episode of TWW I have ever seen, even worse than Access.

I don't understand the problem with Mr. Frost, I thought that was a good episode.

Can't wait till next week.

Hi there - i am new to the forum but not the drama! I completely agree with Jimmy James. The Debate looked so contrived and if it were real I wouldn't vote for either candidate. As soon as it was over I played some favourites from Season 4 - just to reassure myself that Bartlett is truly the one and only President.

Re: Previous post
Am just getting the hang of this posting melarkey so excuse the random emoticons and the wrong spelling of bartlet - inexcusable!!!

I kind of enjoyed the debate but it was a bit odd and like West Winger said it almost looked fake.

There was one bit where Alda fluffed a line and Smits follow up didn't make sense and they both started grinning, that seemed a bit wierd for a show that's normally so slick and polished.

As for the characters, they seemed pretty evenly matched I don't think there was an outright winner from the debate. When Bartlett was running for his second term the republican candidate was pretty lame as I remmeber (Crime... boy, I don't know) but you can't call it between these two.

If the series was carrying on then Santos would be a shoe in but with it ending them you really can't tell and I've managed to avoid all spoilers from the USA so I've no idea how it's going to go! Good stuff!

I think the reason it "looked" fake is because that's what live TV is like in the US! They wouldn't have the polished look of The West Wing on a live broadcast. The "videotape" look, actually gave it some authenticity.

thats a fair point, different might have been a better word than fake.

Hi,
Don't know if anyone has seen but the season 7 dvd of the West Wing has been announced for release on the 11th of September, see here for the box cover.
Really can't wait to watch them all again, but I am a bit sad that it will be the last time I'll have the waiting period then the entire weekend I devote to watching the episodes back to back!

What did anyone think of last week's episode.

Toby and Josh have had that argument before and that time it resulted in a fight. Fair play to Josh making the effort to go back and see Toby, especially as he was less than keen to forgive Donna.

As Josh said Toby can be a complete *******, his whole point seemed to me that because Santos wasn't jumping up and down to do the job (as Bingo Bob Russell was and Toby wasn't jumping to support him either) he should be binned. On this basis Bartlet shouldn't have his support either, don't forget it was Leo who persuaded Jed to join the race. Even then Bartlet thought he was only there to push the debate along and told Abby it would be over by Ohio.

Although Toby was an awkward pain in the ass, he was a good character and on the whole I shall miss him, but after a while his hypocrisy has become too much.

Also why didn't Josh ask Leo to ask the President to come to LA. Surely Leo would have more sway than CJ, who didn't even make the call. I guess the writers wouldn't have been able to demonstrate the White House lack of commitment to the cause.

I seem to recall that in the other parallel universe Clinton also was slow to come off the fence and support Al Gore in the 02 election campaign.

Still looking forward to Friday.

Hey Jimmy J

Liked the scenes between Josh and Toby. To be honest was quite upset in series 6 when they had the fight. It seemed like the script writers were scraping the barrel a bit for something to do with the characters. I guess there was always going to be natural progression but surely even Toby would be able to let Josh move on.

Can't believe it will soon be all over... as Donna and Josh fly off into the sunset and Toby hopefully gets Andy to marry him... (we can dream!!)

I've lost count how many episodes we've seen now. It feels like 8, I hope it isn't more.

I thought that the wedding episode was great, it was good to see all of the old staff together doing what they have to do. The subplot of Josh's poor performance against the wedding was well carried out.

I do feel that Josh is a bit lost in the role. Leo is better suited but tragically did not have the strenght to see it through.

There were some good one liners - is that the Duke of Edinburgh? (surely even the Americans know who he is), the look on Leo's face when they realised they wanted him to do the job.

By the way on my way into work this morning I noticed that a fellow Wingnut had a Santos McGarry05 Bumper Sticker on thier car. If you drive around North London with this sticker on my hats off to you whoever you are.

Hey jeezypeeps,

was thinking about your comments about the fight between toby and josh scraping the barrel but i think that despite his cynical exterior Toby truly believes that once you commit to something there is no going back - remember how angry he was with Will when he went to work with Bingo Bob - you don't go from playing the NBA to shirts and skins - and he doesn't even like Will that much. Maybe Josh leaving the Whitehouse hit him harder than everyone thinks. whatever else you can say about Toby, his loyalty is almost unquestionable.

Yep his loyalty is unquestionable and as a character he is great. I loved his wit early on I guess you couldn't question his morality even the whole leak thing - you almost feel he is doing the right thing. However Josh's loyalty is paired with reality - remember when he told Leo that all he wanted was to get Jed Bartlet a third term. He knows this can't happen and he knows they deserve better than Bingo Bob.

Also agree that Leo would have been better as Santos' campaign manager - can't imagine Josh as COS but who knows....

Loved the wedding ep also. Enjoy the rest of series 7 - looks like the ep "The Cold" is gonna be a good one for all J&D fans without giving too much away.

So What did everyone think of last Fridays episode? I thought it was one of the best of the season so far. I felt like it was like a return to the writing of the early seasons, especially with the return of a few lighter moments.
It's such a shame we'll never see John Spencer in anything again, he was particualarly good in this episode.
Did anyone else notice the references to Matin Sheens and Jimmy Smits other film roles in Apocalypes Now and Star Wars, or was I reading to much into it?

I thought it was okay, it was fairly obvious that Leo was the source of the leak, anyone with his experience was bound to suss out what was going on.

I can't help but feel that Josh is living on borrowed time, he just doesn't seem to command his troops.

I loved the scene when they were talking about thier friends and who won the sadness awards.

Missed any reference to Apocolypse Now and Star Wars, well spotted!

Only two days to go to the next episode...

Hi all!

I've been a long time reader of this thread and am glad (and slightly relieved) to know that there are many out there addicted to TWW as myself. This is my first post so excuse any faux pas.

As the name suggests I'm a bit of a fan of the show (all series on box set, can't watch just one episode at a time etc etc). I managed to race through the sixth series on DVD as soon as it was out and then set myself for the long wait until the seventh series was shown on Channel 4 somewhere. So you can imagine my horror when late one Sunday evening I idly flicked on the More4 to see what stage of the sixth series they were up to and suddenly realised that I had never seen that episode before. I had managed to completely miss any adverts to announce the start of the seventh series (although previous experience with C4 and TWW would suggest that I may not have had much to miss).

So I'm in a bit of a dilemma and appeal to all my fellow WW addicts for help! I clearly can't just pick up the final series half way through and I'm very reluctant to wait until September for the DVDs to be released as I need to join in the moment of watching the final ever WW episode along with everyone else - so does anyone know of anywhere I can download/buy etc the episodes of the seventh series I've missed so far? I know that serendipty.net has some clips available, but I'd rather not spoil the episodes (I'm a strict WW purist).

Any help would be greatly appreciated - even if someone out there has the episodes so far recorded I would be willing to reimburse reasonably costs for copies.......

Thanks!

I liked the Debate episode, even if it was lowering itself to gimmick television (something John Wells is familiar with!)

"Internal Displacement" was the best written episode so far this season, and the best since "The Supremes".

My main moan about the show is that it's called THE WEST WING, and we hardly ever see it!

"Internal Displacement" was the best written episode so far this season, and the best since "The Supremes".
/QUOTE]

it was written by bradley whitford aka josh! and what has happened to charlie??

I hadn't realised that it was written by Bradley Whitford, but it seemed to make sense as soon as I found out.

It did seem like an early season episode, although slightly unusually it did focus on one character. It seemed the first time that CJ was entirely in control of the situation and interestingly the first time that Josh acted like a campaign manager.

I thought that Liz Bartlet was a little too happy to be trampled over, especially when she had seemed so strong when previously appearing in the series.

The situation in Darfur was one of the first times that a real life situation was discussed in the series as far as I can tell. 9/11 has obviously been alluded to but other than that can anyone else remember a real life situation being discussed.

Not long to go now unfortunately.

Jimmy James

The other obvious real situation that springs to mind immediately is the Israel-Palestine conflict, though with fictional leaders.

I really enjoyed this week's episode too, and agree that it felt like an early season episode. The interaction between the characters was back, and there was the great mixture of humour and serious issues which always made WW such a great show. It seems a shame to me that Bradley didn't write some more.

Is that us about half way through now? I have lost count, but guess we are at episode 11 or 12?

Also, while we're on the subject of WW, Bradley Whitford etc, it seems that C4 have so far failed to buy the rights to the new Sorkin show Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip (starring Whitford and Matthew Perry). I asked the question in the Discuss4 forum. This looks to me like it could be a great show, and I really hope that they do get it. It would fit perfectly on More4. Has anyone heard anything about anyone else picking this show up for the UK market?

Chadders,

I hadn't realised that they had even made any of the new show, wouldn't it be optimistic even by a Wingnut standard to book a show you hadn't seen?

Personally I would love to see it and would hope that the BBC bought it. Given their treatment of WW I would hate to get into another excellent drama only for CH4 to mess it around. If it was committed to More 4 then I could accept that.

Failing all of that Living TV seems to pick up most of the other significant US Dramas (apart from 24 before other people write in.)

Only two days to go.

As soon as I posted my last mail I remembered Donna getting blown up in Palestine, I just wanted to see if anyone else picked up. Well done Chadders!

Since people are starting to talk about Studio 60, I did a bit of searching around and found this 6 minute preview clip, Here.The sound quality isn't great but you can understand it. I really hope one of the freeview channels buys this as I don't have sky!

Sorry for the double post but this link I posted doesn't work and I'm not allowed to edit my posts for some reason? Here it is again- http://www.***********/watch?v=K7tLTLogH0I:

Jimmy,

As a Freeviewer, I would be gutted if it went to Living TV - purely selfish i know. I suspect that the dawn of the digital age will mean that C4 will now be using More4 and E4 solely, to show certain shows from now on (eg. as with the West Wing). I am kind of OK with this as the show does get treated far better - see, for example, the stability of WW since it moved to More4 compared with C4's shoddy treatment (admittedly down to it not performing well enough in the ratings).

I do take your point about the BBC, but have to disagree about it going there. I can't see where it would fit in for them (apart from BBC4 maybe), and I still haven't forgiven them for how badly they treated Seinfeld - nothing for ages, then showed every night at about midnight for 3 weeks or so. Compare and contrast with More4's excellent treatement of Curb Your enthusiasm....