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This Will Be Subtle: 'The Newsroom' Tackles Occupy Wall Street In New Trailer For Season 2

By Kevin Jagernauth
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June 10, 2013 9:22 AM
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5 Comments

Television

There is probably no show that engendered as much hate-watching last year as Aaron Sorkin's "The Newsroom." The highly anticipated show had so much to like about it including a great lead turn from Jeff Daniels, and basically an all around excellent cast (Emily Mortimer, Alison Pill, Dev Patel, John Gallagher Jr., Jane Fonda, Chris Messina, Terry Crews, Olivia Munn etc). But damn if Sorkin couldn't out of the way of himself, with the show seemingly unable to go two minutes without speech-ifying, not to mention two separate, and equally tedious romantic subplots that made adults act like junior high teenagers. Can Sorkin right the ship in season two?

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Patton Oswalt & Rosemarie DeWitt Added To Cast for Season 2 of 'The Newsroom'

By Kevin Jagernauth
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November 9, 2012 5:29 PM
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1 Comment

Television

This summer, Aaron Sorkin dropped his highly anticiapted HBO series "The Newsroom," and to quote Brian Williams: "That happened." Unabashedly and at times embarassingly preachy, it was also tremendously compelling as uneven as it was, becoming the show many loved to hate to watch. But HBO has faith Sorkin and co. can turn it around, renewing it for a second season, and some new faces are coming along to possibly irritate the hell out of you.

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Recap: 'The Newsroom' Closes Up Its First Season With An Underwhelming Season Finale

By Oliver Lyttelton
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August 27, 2012 10:01 AM
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30 Comments

Television

And so here we come to the end. "The Newsroom" arrived nine weeks ago with high expectations -- the return to TV of Aaron Sorkin, the man behind one of the best network TV series ever, "The West Wing," and a fairly fresh-minted Oscar winner for his screenplay for "The Social Network." The pilot was problematic, but not without promise, but over the run of the series, Sorkin's indulged many of his worst instincts for a show that's been frustrating, and borderline terrible. Every so often, it feels like it might recover with a better episode, before plummeting back down again (with last week's episode something of a nadir for the series).

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Recap: 'The Newsroom' Holds A Mock Debate, Hits New Lows

By Oliver Lyttelton
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August 20, 2012 11:01 AM
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17 Comments

Television

On TV at least, it feels like one of the major problems with Aaron Sorkin's writing, both on "Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip" and "The Newsroom," is that it seems like he'd still rather be writing "The West Wing." It's understandable. For one, he was unceremoniously fired from that show at the end of the fourth season, and presumably feels there's an itch still to be scratched. For another, it was pretty much the best network TV drama of the last 15 years. We'd certainly rather be watching "The West Wing." But while it's not as inorganic as it was on 'Studio 60,' there's a sense that Sorkin is returning to the same kind of issue-based plotlines he tackled before, but in a setting that makes it feels somewhat forced.

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Recap: 'The Newsroom' Blends The Sublime & The Ridiculous As It Tackles Casey Anthony & Anthony Weiner

By Oliver Lyttelton
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August 13, 2012 10:03 AM
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9 Comments

Television

Not to get too Will McAvoy about it, but one of the things we lament about the level of discourse on the internet is the way in which people seem to be more and more allergic to the very idea of nuance. We seem to live in a world where things can only ever be awesome or sucky, rotten or fresh. Certainly the reactions to "The Newsroom" have fallen along these lines. The comments on these recaps to date have, for the most part, either told us that the show is the worst thing ever, and that we're crazy for praising it, or that it's the best thing on TV, and that we're biased and stupid for criticizing it.

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Recap: 'The Newsroom' Break Bin Laden's Death In Irritating, Manipulative Low For The Series

By Oliver Lyttelton
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August 6, 2012 11:00 AM
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25 Comments

Television

Later on today, the first trailer for "Zero Dark Thirty," the film by "The Hurt Locker" helmer Kathryn Bigelow that focuses on the hunt for, and successful assassination of, Osama Bin Laden, and which stars Joel Edgerton, Jessica Chastain, Mark Strong, Chris Pratt, Kyle Chandler, Jason Clarke, Edgar Ramirez and Mark Duplass, among many others. It's presumably nothing but a coincidence that last night saw Aaron Sorkin tackle the same subject on "The Newsroom," with Will McAvoy and the rest of the "News Night" team receiving early reports that Navy Seals had gone into Pakistan and taken out the Al Qaeda leader, and battling to find confirmation. But one can only hope that Bigelow and writer Mark Boal have a somewhat stronger handle on their own material than this uneven, misjudged and generally botched "Newsroom" episode.

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Recap: 'The Newsroom' Continues Its Uptick By Letting Its Characters Fail

By Oliver Lyttelton
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July 30, 2012 10:58 AM
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6 Comments

Television

At the close of our recap of last week's "The Newsroom" episode, we wrote of protagonist Will McAvoy (Jeff Daniels), that we thought "he'd actually be more sympathetic if he actually made a mistake and had to deal with the consequences. In fact, the show would be helped enormously if they made some serious fuck up too, rather than being right every single week." Of course, episode six, "Bullies," had been written and made long ago, but clearly someone on the creative team had the same thought, because it was this exact conceit -- our heroes being wrong, and being less than saintly -- that formed the theme of this week's episode, and the result was a continued upswing for the show, and further proof that "The Newsroom" can be saved after a very rough start.

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Recap: 'The Newsroom' Halts Its Death Plunge With Its Least Terrible Episode Since The Pilot

By Oliver Lyttelton
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July 23, 2012 10:03 AM
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21 Comments

Television

So far "The Newsroom" has had two major problems, sitting on top of a whole bunch of minor ones. Firstly, Aaron Sorkin's often-questionable approach to female characters has reached something of a zenith here. His shows have often featured strong powerful women undone by their love lives, but the leads of "The Newsroom" feel particularly and offensively bird-brained, and unlike CJ in "The West Wing," Sorkin's finest creation to date, haven't been shown to be particularly competent at their jobs either, mainly out of Sorkin's desire to show Will McAvoy to be right about everything. And some of them have been shown to be actively devilish, like Hope Davis' gossip columnist last week.

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Aaron Sorkin's 'The Newsroom' Gets A Writing Staff Shakeup

By Joe Cunningham
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July 20, 2012 2:52 PM
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2 Comments

Television

It was little over a year ago that Aaron Sorkin was celebrating an honor that (arguably) represents the pinnacle of his craft – an Academy Award – but after airing just four episodes of his new show “The Newsroom” things are looking considerably less rosy. Sorkin hasn’t had the easiest time on television before, but the likes of “Sports Night” and “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip” at least had the backing of the critics even when they struggled to find an audience to sate their networks. But while anticipation was high for Sorkin’s return to the small screen, by an large critics don’t seem to have warmed to his recent work as they have in the past and some have really given "The Newsroom" a kicking.

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Review: Tabloid Journalism, Media Tricks & A Coldplay Montage...Yes, It's 'The Newsroom'

By Kevin Jagernauth
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July 15, 2012 11:00 PM
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3 Comments

News

There is perhaps no better encapsulation of the many flaws and tremendous promise that Aaron Sorkin's "The Newsroom" contains than "I'll Try To Fix You." The last of the first batch of episodes sent to press, as the credits roll, it's easy to see why advance reviews were all over the map, because the show itself is an unwieldy mess of liberal politics, sitcom comedy, media commentary and genuinely affecting drama. And all of those thing swirl together in what is perhaps the most representative episode of the show so far.

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