The Live West Wing Debate

I've been trying to get a grasp on what it is I so disliked about this episode.  I appreciate that they were trying to do something different... I was even excited about the possibilities... but this was a snoozer from beginning to end.  It was an hour long policy-wonkfest in a medium that made it virtually impossible to suspend disbelief.  And this is coming from a guy who likes watching actual debates.

If you absolutely had to do a live episode, we needed a few more nods towards character development.  We should have had an unscripted (and ludicrously free of rules) debate between Matthew Santos and Arnold Vinnick.  It was supposed to be a free-flowing exchange of ideas.  The medium got in the way, however, and I could never get past the idea that I was watching Jimmy Smits and Alan Alda in a highly scripted setting.  The method usurped the intent.

And as plotting goes, this could backfire.  Obviously Santos was supposed to win, but I think Alda seemed more composed - he is a better actor - than Smits.  To the casual observer, Alda "won" the debate.  I know that lines like "taxes are Africa's problem", and "nuclear power is perfectly safe" were supposed to come off as petulant, but they seemed to have more substance than any of Smits' arguments. 

Watch, in upcoming weeks, as some tragedy happens that directly relates to something Vinnick said.  A nuclear power plant explosion or something like that.  The Santos campaign's ability to paint the tragedy with Vinnick's own words are the only way that it will all make sense.

Comments

[Ty]

You know, I thought what you would say is how much you liked Santos' defense of the word Liberal...

I liked it. They didn't dumb it down, and I was actually impressed by a couple of the ideas. I heard it was scripted, yes, but they were prepared well enough to go off script and were expected to. I guess the question is how much off did they go.

But I tell you what, once you take the abortion issue out of the debate, it made it much harder for me (the liberal-leaning independent) to decide who I thought had won. They said at the end that you could go and vote for the winner, so I went this morning to check out the poll and see what people thought, and 70% thought Santos had won...I thought that was interesting. I wonder if it was for his debate or because I would guess the majority of The West Wing audience are Democrats.