Customer Reviews

The West Wing: The Complete Fifth Season

5 star:		(37)
4 star:		(26)
3 star:		(11)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

After the great first four seasons, season five of the West Wing is, quite frankly, terrible. Aaron Sorkin, the architect of the four first seasons and creator of the show, was fired mid-story arc by NBC and probably had a hard time watching this season, as many familiar characteristics were stripped away. Donna has suddenly gone from being a bright-eyed optimist to a jaded Washington insider, constantly speaking in a bizarre low voice. Toby is no longer quirky, but simply mean and uninteresting. The assasination of Abdul Sharif, a story arc that had existed for over a season, is ended unceremoniously in a matter of a few minutes, shoved into the end of an episode and never spoken of again. Josh's character, once funny and energetic, is reduced to screaming at the capital building, a scene, intending to be a dramatic, more likely to produce laughter than further unerstanding of his character. Will Bailey, a great replacement for Sam in season four, takes a job with the new vice president, and loses his sharp wit along the way. Despite no longer working for the president, Will is still often at meetings determining presidential policy(?).

And all of a sudden, everyone's having sex. It turns out C.J. and the Vice President were once together, an absolutely absurd story line that is difficult to believe to say the least.Then, C.J. encourages Donna to "broaden her horizons" beyond Josh, and as a result, she sleeps with a guy before getting blown up while on a fact-finding mission to the Gaza strip.(Don't ask... just don't ask.)

The fast-paced dialogue that was a trademark of the show through its first four seasons disappears. Meetings in Leo's office or the Roosevelt Room that were once fast-paced now consist of short, bland dialogue, lacking real meaning. There were a couple of episodes that I simply couldn't get through.

And then there's the president. A man who was once, as he described himself, "full of mirth", has changed. His character is as dull as a pencil after the SATs. His part becomes bland and predictable, except for the truly bizarre storyline in which he shuts down the federal governement for five days, a decision that left even hardcore fans scratching their heads.

To sum this seaons up, I would say that this is definitely not a season where every episode deserves watching. Of the seven seasons, season 5 is by far the worst- I would reccomend it to those who are looking to have a compelte collection of West Wing episodes, not someone looking to be entertained.

There are enough reviews involving the quality of content for this excellent show, you don't need mine. My gripe is with the packaging. I prefer the fold-out style of the first three seasons. The fourth and fifth season cases are less appealing. The fifth actually fell apart in my hands upon opening. Binding plastic sleaves with tape; "hey thats quality!". Enough said, I yield the floor.

West Wing Season 5 shows clearly the departure of the talented Sorkin and Schlamme team. Nonetheless, the ensemble cast is so strong and compelling that the show lives on. Janney deserves more credit for her brilliant, complex portrayal of C.J. - an addictively watchable unfolding story of a brilliant woman with a lot of power which she wields responsibly. Whitford does yeoman's work as the probably very life-like Josh Lyman but is somewhat laughable as a nearly 50-year old man playing a thirty-something wearing a suit and carrying a ridiculously incongruous backpack. John Spencer made acting the part of Leo look easy, but his seamless elegance must have been the product of a lifetime of work. His face and voice logged a thousand miles and every scene he played was a brilliant character piece. I don't know what they will do without him! The editorial reviewers for this site should be ashamed of their illiterate staff. I count several glaring typos in the very brief blurb describing Season Five of The West Wing. That's "Bingo Bob," not "Bongo Bob and it's Leo McGarry, not McGRarry. Nice tribute to departing Jonathan Schlamme - you couldn't even bother to spell his name right. Doesn't anyone care about publishing standards on the Internet? I don't think mis-spellers ought to be granted space on billboards or web pages.

There is definitely a change in the West Wing for Season 5, while Aaron Sorkin and Rob Lowe are very sorely missed, it is still the same incredible cast of characters, for the most part, that continue to make this the best show on television.

Season is 5 is far from the best and nowhere near as good as seaons 2 and 3, but there are still some very worthwhile episodes and even those episodes that fall short of the quality of this show, it is still a pleasure to watch Leo, Josh, CJ, Toby and Jed in the West Wing.

I admit, I briefly debated purchasing season 5, but in the end I
found myself at Target today, it's first day of release, buying the second to last set they had on the shelf. My love of these wonderful characters and the show itself, beat out the disappointment I felt in some of the casting, writing and storyline decisions.

I don't watch much TV, there are very, very few shows that I HAVE to see and none that I enjoy as much as The West Wing. I'm glad I got Season 5 to add to my collection, so when the sad day comes when it is only shown in re-runs, I'll know I can just pop in a DVD to get my fix of the best shown on TV.

There's no doubt the quality of the show has dropped since Sorkin and Schlamme have left. Certain dialogue parts are uneven and in one episode the degree of tension and anger between everyone was very different from the four previous seasons.

Season 4, by the way, for those complaining about the kidnapping, was done that way to give the new writers something to work with since the heavy hitters were leaving.

Overall, I'd say this doesn't measure up to the first four seasons, especially the first three, so, it's a few notches down.

However, as the quality was so high, even though it's dropped a few notches, it's better than almost all of the current TV programs.

I discovered the West Wing late in 2003, just as the first season became available on DVD. As a person who looked upon TV with some disdain (having not really watched any significant amount of television since I was a kid), the show demonstrated to me that TV really could be something worth watching. I eagerly ate up every available episode on Bravo and bought the DVDs as they came out.

Imagine my pain when I learned of the departure of Sorkin and Schlamme. Season 4 ended on a cliffhanger like no other in all of television, on several levels. Here I was, a person who didn't really even like TV, actually mourning the fact that the situation would never see a "proper" resolution as Sorkin would have imagined it.

In fact, my worst fears were true. The first three or so episodes of season 5 are without a doubt the worst episodes of this series ever made. The climax at the end of season 4 is resolved clumsily, in true "deus ex machina" form. It was almost heartbreaking. However, the show did pick up again, though never achieving its former glory, and there are definitely some worthwhile moments in season 5. Season 6 started out terrific, and I really had hopes for the show's future. But I think interest petered out with the transformation of the show into "The Campaign Trail." Alan Alda notwithstanding, I suppose the show's recently announced finality was inevitable all along.

I'll be buying this DVD set, however, and not just for the sake of completeness. West Wing is much like pizza and sex: even when it's bad, it's still pretty good. In fact, it's better than pretty good. It's still just about the best thing on TV, and the smartest. With the possible exception of those first three Season 5 episodes (which are personally painful for me to watch), the show is still dazzles with its terrific cast.

Here's hoping the series finale this May is a worthy conclusion and makes for some memorable television (and Rob Lowe, please call John Wells ...)

I am a fan of West Wing, good, bad or ugly. I know this season was not up to par with the previous four, but so be it, it is what it is. I still enjoy watching the show, regardless. One off comment I have is regarding the packaging. Would these marketers please get off the cheap-run? The package holding these DVDs in the case fell apart within two days of purchase, its held together by a strip of tape! Give me a break Warner Brothers! You can do better than that!

Yeah, season six isn't up to the standards of the first four seasons, but then what shows are. The first four seasons simply represent some of the best programing commercial TV has ever had to offer.

But to say that there is nothing here worth watching is just hyperbole of the worst sort. This season offers the episode "The Supremes" in which Glenn Close guest stars as a potential Supreme Court nominee. The way this episode gets resolved is every bit as worthy of the Aaron Sorkin years (which, it might be reminded did have their down moments such as the "Ishmael and Issac" episode) as well as story lines that just weren't very good (Sam and the call girl).

As for the gripes about the lighting I am amazed that it is season five that gets all the complaints. The lighting on this show has always been frustratingly dark even during the St. Aaron years -- Leo working at his desk late at night with only one light on in his office? What was up with that and why are people just now complaining about it?

Season five lacks much of what made the first four season so remarkable -- no doubt about it, but the lack or explanation on some plot points is really no different that the characters that simply vanished with no explanation in the St. Aaron years.

Virtually any show that has been on the air as long as "West Wing" has been starts to shows signs of age even without personnel changes, and if you think that season five is so utterly unwatchable, well then, I guess "American Idol" will be right up your alley.

This is NOT the "West Wing." Period. This is an awful shadow (in every sense) of what used to be the finest show on network television. After NBC's horribly miscalculated decision to show writer/producer Aaron Sorkin the door (and executive producer Thomas Schlamme), John Wells took over as exclusive executive producer and delivered, well, junk. This season the show quickly turned into e.r. comes to the White House, with drama developed the only way John Wells knows how - by having characters fight with one another. Where once this show delivered a working family of committed, dedicated civil servants united in their effort to do what they think is best for the country, in this season the show devolves into arguments, bickering and darkness among all the characters.

And darkness in every sense of the word. As if realizing how miserable the writing and stories are, the producers try artificially to heighten the drama by turning off the lights (NBC is owned by General Electric, right? Someone really should have been paying the electric bill!) and shooting several scenes in near darkness so that you may think something is wrong with your television.

Certainly you'll think something is wrong with your favorite characters, as people you once liked because they crackled and sparkled with life and wit suddenly experience lobotomies and personality disorders (witness C.J. counseling a recovering Zowie, by offering the witty line to say to a TV interviewer: "Just say, the help helped!" . . . ah that's the kind of wit we loyal viewers had tuned in for four straight seasons before now to hear, right?).

The season picks up after Aaron Sorkin masterfully kissed off NBC by leaving the show as decapitated on screen (with the temporary resignation of President Bartlet while awaiting the fate of his daughter, Zowie, who had been kidnapped at the end of Season 4) as it was off screen when Sorkin was forced out. Given this impossible situation, the show's new writers resolve the kidnapping without really explaining how the government agents found Zowie, who kidnapped Zowie, or why. Meantime, they resolve in a few minutes the public revelation that Bartlet had ordered the assassination of Shariff (a storyline that had been building all through Seasons 3 and 4).

After that, well, it's hard to say what, if anything, happens that's worth even reviewing. The President and the first Lady don't speak to each other. Will devolves into a shrill ghost of who he once was and goes off to work for the new Vice President, an empty suit and an empty character. Then Will keeps showing up in the West Wing (as though we'd ever seen VP staffers on a daily basis before). There are some bioterror episodes, the government is shutdown, we learn that CJ once slept with former Vice-President Hoynes, the President and Leo start to bicker and fight on Israeli policy, and we of course have to end with sound and fury, signifying nothing, with Donna and Admiral Fitzwallace being blown up in the Gaza Strip (don't ask why Donna was going on the trip, it makes no sense - like everything else about the season).

Finally, season 5 introduces some really AWFUL recurring characters. Toby gets a tart for a research assistant during the government shutdown who inexplicably gets Sam's old office for awhile. Josh meanwhile gets a smarmy intern (really annoyingly played by Jesse Bradford) who offers nothing to the show but villainry (a favorite John Wells trope to try to spice up a show he no longer knows what to do with; see e.r.'s Dr. Romano for further examples). Then, we replace everyone's favorite national security adviser, Dr. Nancy McNally, with an obsequious and annoyingly pious deputy NSA adviser Kate Harper (a nothing character that Mary McCormack really has nothing to do with).

In short, there is NOTHING, NOTHING, NOTHING about this season to recommend it for purchase. If you have not done so already, purchase the first four seasons - they are television gold and recommend a high water mark for network drama in the past two decades. Do not bother wasting any time or money on any of the West Wing seasons that follow the first four, which are the real witty, dramatic and idealistic "West Wing" that fans love and remember fondly.

This was not The West Wing's best season, but has some really great episodes. As bad as it got, it beats 95% of what is available to watch now on television.