The west wing 20 plus years on
Discussion
I never saw it first time round and I'm near mid season 6 now having started binge watching it in October.
It's quite funny watching it in "the future" knowing how thi gs are when they cover the topics of
The middle east
Renewable
China
Iran
The drug war.
I guess it could never get made today as the two main parties are so polarised against each other it would automatically lose half its potential viewers.
It's quite funny watching it in "the future" knowing how thi gs are when they cover the topics of
The middle east
Renewable
China
Iran
The drug war.
I guess it could never get made today as the two main parties are so polarised against each other it would automatically lose half its potential viewers.
I started a thread a year or so back after re-watching. Here's my take...
LimaDelta said:
I started watching this through again. First time was in the early 00s (pretty much as they came out), and then again at some point between then and now, and now I'm back to season 3. What strikes me is firstly, how light, and tame it seems, especially after House of Cards, or even The Thick of It. There is very little downright nastiness to it, and it seems far to gentlemanly to be an accurate portrayal of politics today. Secondly, considering the show portrays the progressive left (as it was at the turn of the millennium), just how casually sexist and racist it is - or perhaps how sensitive we are these days to these things.
For example, when President Bartlett is asked whether his problem with Charlie (his black Personal Aide) seeing his daughter was a race thing, he was reassured, 'it's ok if it is'. I feel writing something like that today would be seen as very contentious and certainly not the way one would portray a Democratic POTUS. There are also a lot of references to the physical attributes, rather than professional abilities of many of the female characters.
I'm not what you would call particularly progressive, but I do find it surprising how quickly societal norms change. It's not like watching an episode of Till Death Us Do Part, but it does seem to have aged a lot in that regard. Maybe I'm just reading too much into it but it seems strange to think that what was the Hollywood ideal of a fantasy Liberal White House would risk being cancelled today.
TL;DR Society moves on.
I don't think it has aged particularly well, and the polarisation of politics is a measurable phenomenon. Tim Urban talks at length about it in his book 'What's Our Problem?'For example, when President Bartlett is asked whether his problem with Charlie (his black Personal Aide) seeing his daughter was a race thing, he was reassured, 'it's ok if it is'. I feel writing something like that today would be seen as very contentious and certainly not the way one would portray a Democratic POTUS. There are also a lot of references to the physical attributes, rather than professional abilities of many of the female characters.
I'm not what you would call particularly progressive, but I do find it surprising how quickly societal norms change. It's not like watching an episode of Till Death Us Do Part, but it does seem to have aged a lot in that regard. Maybe I'm just reading too much into it but it seems strange to think that what was the Hollywood ideal of a fantasy Liberal White House would risk being cancelled today.
TL;DR Society moves on.
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