The Newsroom (2012-) Season 1 Review

The Newsroom (2012) Season 1, Tv Show, Created and written by Aaron Sorkin
3/5

This above average drama focuses on the media particularly tv journalism and the recent changes from reporting the news to the bipartisan and entertainment focused broadcasting in the US. The performances are good with a strong ensemble cast including Jeff Daniels (Looper), Emily Mortimer (Hugo), Alison Pill (In Treatment), Dev Patel (Slumdog Millionaire, Skins), and Sam Waterston (Law and Order). Despite the good quality production value it is the writing and characters that fall short. Show runner and creator Aaron Sorkin (The West Wing), who also writes the show shows his shortcomings. Despite attempts to add personal backstory and human elements to the characters to compliment the news stories depicted in the series, the characters are mostly flat and almost soap opera fodder. The characters are simplified and unrealistic. Particularly Will McAvoy (Jeff Daniels) who is either demonised as this depressive, selfish asshole who then transforms into this overly idealistic anchor which is highly unrealistic. Also, Aaron Sorkin resorts to poor writing techniques that he used in his previous show The West Wing using "flashback" style episodes which switch back and forth between timelines using time stamp screens to distinguish between them and this device became tired through overuse during the run of The West Wing. These are cheap devices are used to bulk up not particularly well written narratives rather than complimenting it for effect. Also it is difficult when the news shown has occurred already in the past, so there aren't any surprises really and in a way the show attempts to re-write history at least it attempts to re-report the news in a more "factual" and idealistic manner. Overall it is a good show, but the show fails to dig deeper into the complexity of the issues around the media, journalism and politics that it portrays and neither does it examine the characters sufficiently or convincingly. However, the show has some interesting exploration of the media, politics and corruption as well as good cast and performances.