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The West Wing Seasons 6-7
Or, the ones where a lot of people get new jobs and the credits keep changing. I've only just seen Tomorrow, so forgive me for being a bit misty-eyed right now. No more West Wing for me to watch!
I think the crucial change between the last two seasons and the fifth one isn't just the two campaign storylines - the primaries in s6, the national election in s7 - but the decision to make them the main plot, with the White House plots gradually fading in the background. In s6, every second episode takes place in the White House, but even those have a campaign subplot; in s7, it's only every third or fourth. By and large, I think this was the right decision, not just because the number of stories you can write about an administration is ultimately limited before the problems it faces get repetitive but also because it offered the writing staff the chance to get out of Aaron Sorkin's shadow by bringing in their own characters without this feeling articial.
This being said, I was always torn. On the one hand, I really liked most of the newbies - Kate, Annabeth, Arnold Vinick especially - but on the other, I felt regretful and melancholy about some dynamics and characters that disappeared or at least didn't get any scenes together anymore because of the changed screentime. One good example of this give and take is that where season 4 had left us with Abbey Bartlett being friends with CJ, having just hired Amy as her chief of staff, the rest of the series saw Amy leaving (hooray for her return at the end, more about that later) quickly and CJ, when she did get scenes with Abbey at all, being back to calling her Ma'am. But even while I bemoan this loss of female relationships I declare myself delighted about all the CJ and Kate scenes (and a great many of them dealing with the two of them solving political problems, just as their positions deserved, which I loved) in the last two seasons, and also about CJ establishing her own rapport with Margaret.
(One loss we didn't get something in exchange for in season 6 was the complete lack of Jed Bartlet and Toby interaction; in season 7, of course, what we did get was spare but crucial. More about this later, as it deserves some character analysis. But in s6, I really missed these scenes, because theirs is a pretty unique relationship neither of them has with anyone else, and I think that particular season 7 subplot would have had even greater impact if we had gotten some of their discussion scenes of yore in s6.)
(And while we're speaking of Toby, there also was no Andi in season 6, aside from a brief glimpse in the opener. I felt bereft.)
I remember reading![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
inlovewithnight's posts about starting to watch The West Wing and her devout wish Josh would be devoured by bears, and am not surprised the reviews stop after s5, because if you don't like Josh, you're pretty much screwed in the last two seasons, given that he becomes the closest thing the show has to a leading man there. I like Josh, but I confess I occasionally wished there would have been a bit less of him and a bit more of, see above. I also can't help suspecting that CJ's promotion after Leo's heart attack was solely in service of Josh's storyline - if Josh had been promoted to Leo's position, he couldn't have credibly quit to become Santos' campaign manager - instead of being a follow-up to her own. This being said, it did get me those CJ and Kate saving the world scenes on a regular basis, so I'm not really complaining.
Speaking of Kate saving the world: I was very amused that in the Cuba episode in s6 after her CIA past came up, no sooner had I thought "so, basically, Kate was Sydney Bristow" that we actually saw her in a flashback as a brunette looking exactly like Jennifer Garner in s4 of Alias. Is there a crossover where she's revealed as Sydney's SpyCousin? We still have an unaccounted for niece of Irina...
(And since I'm talking hair colours: what is it with the invasion of the blondes? In late s5, we get Kate who's blonde. (In the present at least.) In s6, we get Annabeth and Helen Santos who are also blonde. And there is no red-haired Andi, black-haired Amy doesn't show up again until late in s7, and Abbey Bartlett shows up less and less, too, leaving CJ as the only brunette holding the fort in a sea of blondes. What is it with the blonde agenda, show?)
If you compare the two compaigns, I think the national one in s7 is better written. The one in s6 slightly suffers from the fact that of Santos' two rivals, Hoynes got the Dukat treatment (though at least here he's early s6 Dukat instead of post-Waltz Dukat), and there never is any question of Russell being someone the audience could take as a serious contender to succeed Bartlet. Yes, Will and Donna work for him, but this is presented as a bit of a sell-out on Will's part and on a necessary stop to independence on Donna's. Whereas the show goes out of its way in s7 to show the Republican Vinick campaign as every bit as motivated by idealism and people devoted to their candidate as Democratic Santos campaign, with the sole dislikable Republican only becoming a part of the campaign very late in the game, and not in a way that makes the rest look bad. If you compare the way Bruno (about whose return I squeed a bit - hello, Bruno, good to see you again!) and his decision to work for Vinick are presented to how Will and in a different way Donna's decision to work for Russell are presented, it's as noticable as in the presentation of Vinick as a worthy rival and smart, honorable man versus the presentation of Hoynes and Russell both.
Santos himself caused me some weird disconnect because watching Jimmy Smitts in the role is a bit odd if you watch him simultanously as Miguel Prado on Dexter; I also think he probably was the trickiest character for the writers to get a hold on. They clearly didnt want to make him Jed Bartlet, Mark II, only younger, and they successfully avoided Latino clichés. But they didn't move beyond "charismatic leader", either. If you look at s1, the way Sorkin managed to make Bartlet a real character instead of of some noble but not that interesting figure was both through the quirks - the geeking out, the endless fondness for trivia, what Toby once called his absent minded professor routine, the inability to quit smoking despite knowing better - and through some genuine flaws along with the virtues. And with flaws I don't just mean "good" flaws like, say, intellectual arrogance (which he has), but something like the ability to be genuinenly petty and hold a grudge (which I think we see for the first time mid-s1 when Hoynes finally asks him about the reason for the constant put-downs and Bartlet frankly replies they're because Hoynes made him beg (to accept the VP nomination)). After two seasons, I couldn't tell you what Matt Santos' flaws are, and I don't recall any quirks, either.
After having something of a problematic time in terms of writing in s5, Leo got a great last and a half season. I knew John Spencer died before the show was over, but I didn't know when, though I figured out it couldn't be directly after the heart attack (they wouldn't have made him play that if he had been that sick at this point). Still, the end of s6 with him getting the VP nomination did come as a surprise (not in a bad way). It's interesting to compare his story in s6 to Toby's in s7 in one particular regard. The argument between Leo and the President at the start of s6 has been prepared by their disagreement re: Palestinians at the end of s5, which only got intensified through the season opener. I briefly wondered whether or not the show was being fair or taking the easy way out by the way Jed Bartlet's guilt trip after Leo's heart attack immediately patched over the initial argument but then decided that due to the BFF type of relationship they have after such a reconciliation the instant reconciliation is true to character. On the other hand, the argument itself was also in character for both, not just the different positions on the "to bomb or not to bomb" question but a bad reaction to what was perceived as an ultimatum. (Plus, let's face it, next to politics Jed Bartlet is the love of Leo's life, and there isn't much he wouldn't forgive instantly.) All of which leads to hugs and domesticity in the second half of the season, including tv watching on the sofa together, and then a mirror/contrast imagine in the s6 finale to the flashback in the s5 finale where a newly elected Jed Bartlet, just before facing reporters as President-elect for the first time, turns and says to Leo "it should have been you"; in the s6 finale, we see them both in profile and this time Leo goes out to be presented as candidate for VP on the Democratic ticket.
Now, the difference between this and any given Jed Bartlet/Toby argument even before s7 isn't just nearly 40 years of friendship but the fact the disagreements between Leo and the President are about things he should or shouldn't do, including the big "how to deal with the Palestinians" argument that leads to the break-up/heart attack/reconciliation events. They're about individual actions, but no more. Whereas arguments between Toby and the President might be triggered by individual actions but to my mind aren't really about them; they're about who Jed Bartlet is, who Toby thinks he should be, who Jed thinks Toby thinks he should be (not always the same thing), and about who Toby is. Hence the recurring of them. (In seasons 1-4, and somewhat in 5, where they have at least the social security episode, but not much more, and one assumes they did go in s6 OFFSCREEN, which I am still sulking about, see above.) In a way, it strikes me as a not even that metaphorical writer-and-muse relationship, with neither of them being completely clear as to who the writer and who the muse is, which also contributes to the struggle.
Honestly, I wasn't spoiled, and yet I knew even in the s6 finale, let alone subsequent s7 episodes, that the White House leak had to be Toby. For one thing, CJ was an obvious red herring, given that suspicion of her was almost instant, and also that she already had an episode where she was tempted to leak information but ultimately didn't back in the Sorkin era. And for another, the big hint was the President's angry "I want to know who thought he could make the moral decisions for me". Which isn't a CJ thing - not that she doesn't argue with him on ethical grounds at some points in the show, but she ultimately defers to him, plus she's both too professional and not nearly self destructive enough to leak classified information, again, see earlier - but it is a Toby thing. Or not. Because in this particular case, there were a lot of factors, Toby's dead brother the astronaut, the three astronauts in danger, the question of arming space, etc. On the other hand, it's likely Bartlet would have given the order to save the astronauts despite the secret military shuttle being not secret anymore as a result; probably not for another half an hour or so, but before the time frame was over. So it wasn't a clear-cut case of it only being about saving the astronauts, either. But however mixed Toby's motives were, Jed Bartlet takes it entirely personally, and as a result we get one of those rare cold and hence incredibly wounding displays of anger. There is a difference here to, say, angry and immediate temper outbursts when the media or someone else goes after his daughters. Or even the kind of anger he showed very early in the show when his doctor was killed. The episode deliberately lets time pass between the President being told it was Toby (though I had the impression he at the least suspected this already in their brief scene earlier together, with the pointed remark about CJ) and their confrontation at the end. And the crucial act here isn't the firing itself (which under the circumstances is the law) but that Jed Bartlet very deliberately first does a Toby; i.e. he makes an eviscerating analytical statement not about this particular action but about Toby's psychological and emotional nature in general. Is the kind of remarks Toby makes towards Bartlet himself in earlier seasons and in this one towards Josh and CJ. And then he follows it up with "there are a lot of people who will think of you as a hero; but I don't want you to imagine, not even for a moment, that I am one of them". And there you have it. The argument about nature, not individual actions; about the ideas of each other.
Toby takes everything personally. Will leaving to work with the VP, Josh leaving to work with Santos, those are all not career moves in his eyes but desertions aimed at himself and reasons for pointed Et tu, Brute type of remarks. (Conversly, Ann Stark is able to dupe him because he doesn't think someone who has a personal good relationship with him would stab him in the back politically.) And of course words are his medium, his weapon and his defense, and the element that connects him with the man he writes for. Which makes this scene so painful and effective.
We see Toby only intermittendly during the rest of the season, but enough to get how he feels, and also in scenes that cover his relationships with Josh, CJ, Andi and his children. But we have to wait until the finale for a follow-up on Toby and the President. (Other than the brief and cryptic acknowledgement during Leo's funeral.) Given that the season opened with a scene set three years later, an epilogue set at the start of the last chapter, so to speak, a scene that tells us three years from now the gang, including Toby Ziegler and Jed Bartlet, will be on friendly terms with each other again, I did guess that it somehow wouldn't end with Toby in prison. The presidential pardon possibility hadn't occured to me, but when Andi asked CJ it seemed inevitable and yet the idea felt as not satisfying enough a follow up to what had happened before. Then the show did something very clever. Because what made the gesture work in the end was that CJ didn't ask the President for it, or Josh, or anyone else. (And of course Toby wouldn't.) But that he put Toby's name on the list himself. (Judging by reactions to real life presidential pardons, including my own, I guess in the West Wingverse the general assumption now will be Toby had leaked the information with the silent or verbal approval of the rest of the administration and/or the President.) And leaves it till the end so Jed Bartlet's last act as President of the United States is writing his name under a document about Toby Ziegler. The symbolism seems eminently fitting.
HOWEVER: a look at the National Library archive of WW fanfiction leads me to the conclusion that fandom fails me. Because if something demands a follow up and exploration by fanfic, it's this, the gap between the pardon and the three years later scene. For starters, I can't imagine this being bridged by a hug a la Leo and Jed, because the relationship is so very different. What I can imagine is Toby being incredibly mad and driving up to New Hampshire to launch into a rant about make-yourself-feel-good sentimental gestures, leading to a counter explosion about self righteous martyrdom. Which is when Toby intends to make a grand exit, but that canonical snow storm in New England lets him be stuck in Manchester for the next week. Leading to more arguments and eventual chess games. Also, you know that when the MS eventually claims limbs permanently, Toby is the guy you can rely on to show up and still argue instead of speaking in hushed tones, which I imagine will be incredibly important for the former President, and they both know it but it won't ever be an easy relationship.
So why has no one written that yet? Or did they and I haven't found it? I did find an ensemble story post-Tomorrow and pre-season opener flashforward, Fruits of Communion, which is good but not quite what I have in mind.
Lastly: as was remarked in several media, there are some parallels between those last two seasons and real life, made a bit eerier by several characters being loosely based on their real life counterparts. Still, I don't know whether they would have struck me if I hadn't been told about them in advance. (And they don't seem to stop, with the most recent one being the making-one's-former-rival-secretary-of-state thing.) Other than that, I was spoiled for Josh/Donna eventually happening, Kate/Will I had heard nothing about but found them fun together, Unexpected!Kristin Chenowitch as Annabeth was unexpected but aww on her teasing Leo and slightly crushing on him, hooray for Santos' main secretary being lesbian, but I have to say that the people finally coming together which really touched me were CJ and Danny (whom I believe when he says he has no problem being Mr. CJ Cregg, and how many guys exist like that on tv or in real life?). I do hope CJ took that gold fish with her to California. And hey, good to see Ainsley again, albeit briefly, and to know she's back being lawyer for the administration. God knows these people need one!
I think the crucial change between the last two seasons and the fifth one isn't just the two campaign storylines - the primaries in s6, the national election in s7 - but the decision to make them the main plot, with the White House plots gradually fading in the background. In s6, every second episode takes place in the White House, but even those have a campaign subplot; in s7, it's only every third or fourth. By and large, I think this was the right decision, not just because the number of stories you can write about an administration is ultimately limited before the problems it faces get repetitive but also because it offered the writing staff the chance to get out of Aaron Sorkin's shadow by bringing in their own characters without this feeling articial.
This being said, I was always torn. On the one hand, I really liked most of the newbies - Kate, Annabeth, Arnold Vinick especially - but on the other, I felt regretful and melancholy about some dynamics and characters that disappeared or at least didn't get any scenes together anymore because of the changed screentime. One good example of this give and take is that where season 4 had left us with Abbey Bartlett being friends with CJ, having just hired Amy as her chief of staff, the rest of the series saw Amy leaving (hooray for her return at the end, more about that later) quickly and CJ, when she did get scenes with Abbey at all, being back to calling her Ma'am. But even while I bemoan this loss of female relationships I declare myself delighted about all the CJ and Kate scenes (and a great many of them dealing with the two of them solving political problems, just as their positions deserved, which I loved) in the last two seasons, and also about CJ establishing her own rapport with Margaret.
(One loss we didn't get something in exchange for in season 6 was the complete lack of Jed Bartlet and Toby interaction; in season 7, of course, what we did get was spare but crucial. More about this later, as it deserves some character analysis. But in s6, I really missed these scenes, because theirs is a pretty unique relationship neither of them has with anyone else, and I think that particular season 7 subplot would have had even greater impact if we had gotten some of their discussion scenes of yore in s6.)
(And while we're speaking of Toby, there also was no Andi in season 6, aside from a brief glimpse in the opener. I felt bereft.)
I remember reading
inlovewithnight's posts about starting to watch The West Wing and her devout wish Josh would be devoured by bears, and am not surprised the reviews stop after s5, because if you don't like Josh, you're pretty much screwed in the last two seasons, given that he becomes the closest thing the show has to a leading man there. I like Josh, but I confess I occasionally wished there would have been a bit less of him and a bit more of, see above. I also can't help suspecting that CJ's promotion after Leo's heart attack was solely in service of Josh's storyline - if Josh had been promoted to Leo's position, he couldn't have credibly quit to become Santos' campaign manager - instead of being a follow-up to her own. This being said, it did get me those CJ and Kate saving the world scenes on a regular basis, so I'm not really complaining. Speaking of Kate saving the world: I was very amused that in the Cuba episode in s6 after her CIA past came up, no sooner had I thought "so, basically, Kate was Sydney Bristow" that we actually saw her in a flashback as a brunette looking exactly like Jennifer Garner in s4 of Alias. Is there a crossover where she's revealed as Sydney's SpyCousin? We still have an unaccounted for niece of Irina...
(And since I'm talking hair colours: what is it with the invasion of the blondes? In late s5, we get Kate who's blonde. (In the present at least.) In s6, we get Annabeth and Helen Santos who are also blonde. And there is no red-haired Andi, black-haired Amy doesn't show up again until late in s7, and Abbey Bartlett shows up less and less, too, leaving CJ as the only brunette holding the fort in a sea of blondes. What is it with the blonde agenda, show?)
If you compare the two compaigns, I think the national one in s7 is better written. The one in s6 slightly suffers from the fact that of Santos' two rivals, Hoynes got the Dukat treatment (though at least here he's early s6 Dukat instead of post-Waltz Dukat), and there never is any question of Russell being someone the audience could take as a serious contender to succeed Bartlet. Yes, Will and Donna work for him, but this is presented as a bit of a sell-out on Will's part and on a necessary stop to independence on Donna's. Whereas the show goes out of its way in s7 to show the Republican Vinick campaign as every bit as motivated by idealism and people devoted to their candidate as Democratic Santos campaign, with the sole dislikable Republican only becoming a part of the campaign very late in the game, and not in a way that makes the rest look bad. If you compare the way Bruno (about whose return I squeed a bit - hello, Bruno, good to see you again!) and his decision to work for Vinick are presented to how Will and in a different way Donna's decision to work for Russell are presented, it's as noticable as in the presentation of Vinick as a worthy rival and smart, honorable man versus the presentation of Hoynes and Russell both.
Santos himself caused me some weird disconnect because watching Jimmy Smitts in the role is a bit odd if you watch him simultanously as Miguel Prado on Dexter; I also think he probably was the trickiest character for the writers to get a hold on. They clearly didnt want to make him Jed Bartlet, Mark II, only younger, and they successfully avoided Latino clichés. But they didn't move beyond "charismatic leader", either. If you look at s1, the way Sorkin managed to make Bartlet a real character instead of of some noble but not that interesting figure was both through the quirks - the geeking out, the endless fondness for trivia, what Toby once called his absent minded professor routine, the inability to quit smoking despite knowing better - and through some genuine flaws along with the virtues. And with flaws I don't just mean "good" flaws like, say, intellectual arrogance (which he has), but something like the ability to be genuinenly petty and hold a grudge (which I think we see for the first time mid-s1 when Hoynes finally asks him about the reason for the constant put-downs and Bartlet frankly replies they're because Hoynes made him beg (to accept the VP nomination)). After two seasons, I couldn't tell you what Matt Santos' flaws are, and I don't recall any quirks, either.
After having something of a problematic time in terms of writing in s5, Leo got a great last and a half season. I knew John Spencer died before the show was over, but I didn't know when, though I figured out it couldn't be directly after the heart attack (they wouldn't have made him play that if he had been that sick at this point). Still, the end of s6 with him getting the VP nomination did come as a surprise (not in a bad way). It's interesting to compare his story in s6 to Toby's in s7 in one particular regard. The argument between Leo and the President at the start of s6 has been prepared by their disagreement re: Palestinians at the end of s5, which only got intensified through the season opener. I briefly wondered whether or not the show was being fair or taking the easy way out by the way Jed Bartlet's guilt trip after Leo's heart attack immediately patched over the initial argument but then decided that due to the BFF type of relationship they have after such a reconciliation the instant reconciliation is true to character. On the other hand, the argument itself was also in character for both, not just the different positions on the "to bomb or not to bomb" question but a bad reaction to what was perceived as an ultimatum. (Plus, let's face it, next to politics Jed Bartlet is the love of Leo's life, and there isn't much he wouldn't forgive instantly.) All of which leads to hugs and domesticity in the second half of the season, including tv watching on the sofa together, and then a mirror/contrast imagine in the s6 finale to the flashback in the s5 finale where a newly elected Jed Bartlet, just before facing reporters as President-elect for the first time, turns and says to Leo "it should have been you"; in the s6 finale, we see them both in profile and this time Leo goes out to be presented as candidate for VP on the Democratic ticket.
Now, the difference between this and any given Jed Bartlet/Toby argument even before s7 isn't just nearly 40 years of friendship but the fact the disagreements between Leo and the President are about things he should or shouldn't do, including the big "how to deal with the Palestinians" argument that leads to the break-up/heart attack/reconciliation events. They're about individual actions, but no more. Whereas arguments between Toby and the President might be triggered by individual actions but to my mind aren't really about them; they're about who Jed Bartlet is, who Toby thinks he should be, who Jed thinks Toby thinks he should be (not always the same thing), and about who Toby is. Hence the recurring of them. (In seasons 1-4, and somewhat in 5, where they have at least the social security episode, but not much more, and one assumes they did go in s6 OFFSCREEN, which I am still sulking about, see above.) In a way, it strikes me as a not even that metaphorical writer-and-muse relationship, with neither of them being completely clear as to who the writer and who the muse is, which also contributes to the struggle.
Honestly, I wasn't spoiled, and yet I knew even in the s6 finale, let alone subsequent s7 episodes, that the White House leak had to be Toby. For one thing, CJ was an obvious red herring, given that suspicion of her was almost instant, and also that she already had an episode where she was tempted to leak information but ultimately didn't back in the Sorkin era. And for another, the big hint was the President's angry "I want to know who thought he could make the moral decisions for me". Which isn't a CJ thing - not that she doesn't argue with him on ethical grounds at some points in the show, but she ultimately defers to him, plus she's both too professional and not nearly self destructive enough to leak classified information, again, see earlier - but it is a Toby thing. Or not. Because in this particular case, there were a lot of factors, Toby's dead brother the astronaut, the three astronauts in danger, the question of arming space, etc. On the other hand, it's likely Bartlet would have given the order to save the astronauts despite the secret military shuttle being not secret anymore as a result; probably not for another half an hour or so, but before the time frame was over. So it wasn't a clear-cut case of it only being about saving the astronauts, either. But however mixed Toby's motives were, Jed Bartlet takes it entirely personally, and as a result we get one of those rare cold and hence incredibly wounding displays of anger. There is a difference here to, say, angry and immediate temper outbursts when the media or someone else goes after his daughters. Or even the kind of anger he showed very early in the show when his doctor was killed. The episode deliberately lets time pass between the President being told it was Toby (though I had the impression he at the least suspected this already in their brief scene earlier together, with the pointed remark about CJ) and their confrontation at the end. And the crucial act here isn't the firing itself (which under the circumstances is the law) but that Jed Bartlet very deliberately first does a Toby; i.e. he makes an eviscerating analytical statement not about this particular action but about Toby's psychological and emotional nature in general. Is the kind of remarks Toby makes towards Bartlet himself in earlier seasons and in this one towards Josh and CJ. And then he follows it up with "there are a lot of people who will think of you as a hero; but I don't want you to imagine, not even for a moment, that I am one of them". And there you have it. The argument about nature, not individual actions; about the ideas of each other.
Toby takes everything personally. Will leaving to work with the VP, Josh leaving to work with Santos, those are all not career moves in his eyes but desertions aimed at himself and reasons for pointed Et tu, Brute type of remarks. (Conversly, Ann Stark is able to dupe him because he doesn't think someone who has a personal good relationship with him would stab him in the back politically.) And of course words are his medium, his weapon and his defense, and the element that connects him with the man he writes for. Which makes this scene so painful and effective.
We see Toby only intermittendly during the rest of the season, but enough to get how he feels, and also in scenes that cover his relationships with Josh, CJ, Andi and his children. But we have to wait until the finale for a follow-up on Toby and the President. (Other than the brief and cryptic acknowledgement during Leo's funeral.) Given that the season opened with a scene set three years later, an epilogue set at the start of the last chapter, so to speak, a scene that tells us three years from now the gang, including Toby Ziegler and Jed Bartlet, will be on friendly terms with each other again, I did guess that it somehow wouldn't end with Toby in prison. The presidential pardon possibility hadn't occured to me, but when Andi asked CJ it seemed inevitable and yet the idea felt as not satisfying enough a follow up to what had happened before. Then the show did something very clever. Because what made the gesture work in the end was that CJ didn't ask the President for it, or Josh, or anyone else. (And of course Toby wouldn't.) But that he put Toby's name on the list himself. (Judging by reactions to real life presidential pardons, including my own, I guess in the West Wingverse the general assumption now will be Toby had leaked the information with the silent or verbal approval of the rest of the administration and/or the President.) And leaves it till the end so Jed Bartlet's last act as President of the United States is writing his name under a document about Toby Ziegler. The symbolism seems eminently fitting.
HOWEVER: a look at the National Library archive of WW fanfiction leads me to the conclusion that fandom fails me. Because if something demands a follow up and exploration by fanfic, it's this, the gap between the pardon and the three years later scene. For starters, I can't imagine this being bridged by a hug a la Leo and Jed, because the relationship is so very different. What I can imagine is Toby being incredibly mad and driving up to New Hampshire to launch into a rant about make-yourself-feel-good sentimental gestures, leading to a counter explosion about self righteous martyrdom. Which is when Toby intends to make a grand exit, but that canonical snow storm in New England lets him be stuck in Manchester for the next week. Leading to more arguments and eventual chess games. Also, you know that when the MS eventually claims limbs permanently, Toby is the guy you can rely on to show up and still argue instead of speaking in hushed tones, which I imagine will be incredibly important for the former President, and they both know it but it won't ever be an easy relationship.
So why has no one written that yet? Or did they and I haven't found it? I did find an ensemble story post-Tomorrow and pre-season opener flashforward, Fruits of Communion, which is good but not quite what I have in mind.
Lastly: as was remarked in several media, there are some parallels between those last two seasons and real life, made a bit eerier by several characters being loosely based on their real life counterparts. Still, I don't know whether they would have struck me if I hadn't been told about them in advance. (And they don't seem to stop, with the most recent one being the making-one's-former-rival-secretary-of-state thing.) Other than that, I was spoiled for Josh/Donna eventually happening, Kate/Will I had heard nothing about but found them fun together, Unexpected!Kristin Chenowitch as Annabeth was unexpected but aww on her teasing Leo and slightly crushing on him, hooray for Santos' main secretary being lesbian, but I have to say that the people finally coming together which really touched me were CJ and Danny (whom I believe when he says he has no problem being Mr. CJ Cregg, and how many guys exist like that on tv or in real life?). I do hope CJ took that gold fish with her to California. And hey, good to see Ainsley again, albeit briefly, and to know she's back being lawyer for the administration. God knows these people need one!
no subject
It's far worse than an angry yelling would have been. Now we've seen this words-as-weapons thing before - usually in scenes when it's Bartlet versus Religius Fundies, like in the pilot or the scene with the radio talk show host later, and it always has that kind of devastating precision - so it's not that we didn't know he could do that. But I don't think there's a precedent of him doing it to a friend. Aside from being a demonstration of just how furious and betrayed he feels, I think it's also telling about something else, because up to that point in way Toby is one of his heroes, and he does think of him that way. Toby wouldn't be as effective in getting under his skin if he didn't feel he had to match Toby's expectations and fails if he doesn't. It's evident in humorous scenes like at the start of s4 when Josh says that on days where the President has bad blood pressure, Toby isn't allowed in his line of sight when he's giving speeches because he can tell when Toby disapproves, and it's evident in far more serious scenes like the "angels and demons" conversation.
you have to be a nutty author to be the one who wants to take on the relationship between Toby and Jed, ;)
Right. And you and
Am I imagining it, or doesn't Leo flat out say that was his reasoning behind the decision at a certain point in the series.
Not that I recall, and I just watched it. Also, I don't think that could work on a Watsonian level as opposed to a Doylist one, because while the WW writers knew they had to keep Josh free to work for Santos later, at the point of the s6 third episode when Leo tells Jed his choice Josh hadn't met Santos yet (I think he does in the next episode, or the one after that), and nobody knows Santos could be a contender in the primaries. At most, you could fanwank Leo thinks Josh might want to campaign for Hoynes, but then Hoynes got retconned in s5, so that doesn't work as well as it would have without the retcon.
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I think this is behind why I both abhor it (how could you not, it's an awful thing to say) and adore it. There are a lot of people in and outside the fandom who liked to believe that Bartlet was their dream President, without flaw. Whereas I always thought he was far more interesting when he was both that dream President, and a President a little more like the ones we have: occasionally prone to extreme fits of petty behavior.
Are you asking me to jump from a cliff?
Yes, I believe I am.
Also, I don't think that could work on a Watsonian level as opposed to a Doylist one, because while the WW writers knew they had to keep Josh free to work for Santos later, at the point of the s6 third episode when Leo tells Jed his choice Josh hadn't met Santos yet (I think he does in the next episode, or the one after that), and nobody knows Santos could be a contender in the primaries.
Well, Leo is the one who sends him out on the quest to find his own thing. And it would not be stretching canon in any sort of Watsonian way to say he considered Josh his heir apparent. It would be giving Leo Machiavellian powers to plot that he hadn't exactly shown in the show... on the other hand, maybe not surprising to suggest that even drugged he knew an election cycle was coming up and that it would be shocking if the administration could keep him. I always saw CJ as the choice because she would be stable. (One thing I like in that episode is the Toby-Josh frission, with Josh not exactly wanting the job but thinking Toby is plotting against him, only for Toby to reveal he was trying to maneuver for Josh. Hah.)
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Agreed. And as I said in my post, that's my problem with Santos - he doesn't quite come real for me because he doesn't seem to have any flaws, whereas I can believe in Jed Bartlet as a real character because he does.
Re: Leo: okay, yes, I can believe he knew Josh would want to find his own candidate (who couldn't be Russell) and this couldn't happen had Josh been promoted to Chief of Staff. Also:
I always saw CJ as the choice because she would be stable.
That, and the Chief of Staff has to be able to argue with the President and stand up to him. The show had given CJ earlier scenes where she does that (notably in the s5 episode about the disaster visit), but I can't somehow believe Josh would have been able to do it. Not with Jed Bartlet. (I have no problem believing he could do it with Santos, and in fact we see them argue often in enough in canon.) There is too much father figure awe there.
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More on the stability: I think you're right about Josh's relationship with Bartlet. Also seems likely that Leo knew that Josh is a clingy person, by nature, and loyal to an actual fault. Putting him in the CoS job would have meant Josh would have rode it to the very end whereas Leo always meant for him to go on to other things.
I should dig up some old posts from when this was current, but I was briefly excited by the thought they'd pick Toby. Now, Toby would have been a miserable CoS, but he always seemed to be the foreign policy heavyweight to Josh's domestics.
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There is something of the difference between father/son and father/daughter here, too. If you look at Josh, Sam and Charlie, all of whom Bartlet sort of adopted (as did Leo with the first two, of course, and in the season one extra it totally cracks me up that Martin Sheen and John Spencer can't agree who plays the mother and who the father), they all occasionally voice disagreements, absolutely, but only up to a point. I can't imagine any of them doing something like giving Jed the "these people need their hotel rooms and the roads cleared of your motorcade and I need you as a president, not as a charity worker" speech CJ does, or make a statement like "I'm dissappointed". (Charlie perhaps, but that's stretching it. Definitely not Josh.)
Now, Toby would have been a miserable CoS, but he always seemed to be the foreign policy heavyweight to Josh's domestics.
True, but do you think he'd be able to get through one meeting with the chiefs of staff without pissing them off? Not to mention he wouldn't have been able to write anymore, which would have increased the general Toby misery considerably.
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True, but do you think he'd be able to get through one meeting with the chiefs of staff without pissing them off? Not to mention he wouldn't have been able to write anymore, which would have increased the general Toby misery considerably.
True. I just have a problem with the show twisting reality to make CJ CoS. It really is a decision borne more of 'they have Allison Janney in the role' and less to do with reality than anything else that ever happens on that show. Especially given that the Bush White House was shedding Press Secretaries left right and center in those years, who would come out and write tell-alls about how they knew NOTHING of inner policy discussion.
I also think there's some deliberate effort going on in the writing immediately before those episodes to make Josh a bit dumber about foreign policy than he appears in the Sorkin years. 'The one shaped like a boot' sounds like a quip he made in jest, and we'd seen him do a lot of Latin American policy in other episodes. It's not dramatic enough, I agree... but then, maybe they should have brought in a new character entirely to serve.