The Newsroom - Season 1 Episode 2 - Recap and Review - News Night 2.0

The Newsroom is a televised contradiction, in a lot of ways. It purports to have ideals, and to be a show about rediscovering one's own idealism in the midst of a cable news age that is essentially “broken.” Yet, while the show has Mackenzie MacHale (Emily Mortimer) trying to talk the curmudgeonly Will McAvoy (Jeff Daniels) into being the “integrity” and “moral center” of News Night, the cable news show around which The Newsroom is set, it rings hollow. Not because the message is a bad one. Rather, it rings hollow for the sheer amount of cynicism that pervades the show's environment and, strangely enough, its ethos. I haven't seen many dramas on TV that are this inherently cynical, and I think that might end up hurting the show before long. Of course, this episode took a strangely comedic (if not sitcom-esque) approach to its personal stories tonight.

The episode begins with Will and Mackenzie having a talk about the nature of their relationship: They were once together. Something happened. And then they weren't together. Easy enough, except Will demands that Mackenzie make certain nobody knows the “why” of their breakup. Though it's a fairly common storyline on shows that take us backstage in the entertainment business, the two colleagues who were once together, it seems more rote than usual here. Perhaps it's because there are more interesting things for this show to concern itself with than office romance, like the news of the contentious SB1070 immigration bill in Arizona that the team covers tonight. But I think the issue, more pointedly, is that this show is better than this storyline. Or, at the very least, it's better than how it's told. When Mac hires a sexy young economic analyst (played by Magic Mike's Olivia Munn) to do a nightly five-minute segment on the show, it gets tongues wagging around the office, with the assumption being that Will and Mac's relationship ended because he'd been unfaithful. When Mac emails Will that people think it was him who cheated on her when, in fact, she had been the one cheating on him, she accidentally forwards the email to the entire office, sending Will into a rage. The twist on the cheating dynamic was surprising enough, but the way we got there was just too ridiculous to believe. Especially in the context of the very real stories being covered by the News Night team.

Among those stories is the aforementioned SB1070 immigration bill. In fact, it was set to be a cornerstone story for the new, revamped News Night, with Will interviewing Arizona governor Jan Brewer. The interview goes up in smoke due to a mishap with Brewer's rep, a former flame of Maggie's (Alison Pill) who cheated on her while she was hiding under the bed. Because this show needs that kind of absurdity, I guess. I can only imagine that actually happened to someone involved with the show, and Sorkin felt it was too good not to put in. But it's just silly that so much of what goes on in this newsroom hinges on bad blood between exes. Speaking of which, when three wildly unqualified talking heads take Governor Brewer's place on the show (an online professor, a militiaman, and a beauty pageant contestant), it's a disaster primarily because of the bad blood between Will and Mac, with Will ignoring Mac's pleas from the control room to keep the show moving, and opting instead to throw to the guests for a soundbite, even when what they have to say is of little or no value.

I will say this, the segment above is some of the best scripted-trainwreck TV I've seen, owing to Aaron Sorkin's sorcerer's gift for dialogue. But it's as cynical as Sorkin gets, with Will acting through a haze of passive-aggression and sarcasm, as when he chidingly sticks up for Sarah Palin's latest grammatical gaff just to appease the right-wingers that a network executive told him are amongst his biggest audience. Yet, in maintaining the contrast between idealism and cynicism, we're shown that Will has principles of his own. Will arranges a taxi service for an illegal immigrant whose driver's license was revoked, preventing him from going to work or dropping his kids off at school, telling Neal (Dev Patel) to make sure no one knows about it, the classic gesture of “The old codger who's secretly a big softie.” Perhaps, come Christmas, he can dress in green felt. Until that time, the contrasts in this show will continue to bother me. That said, at least it's entertaining, and it even approaches greatness once the show focuses on the business of reporting the news. Not many scripted dramas have taken us behind the scenes of this kind of environment, and it makes for exhilarating TV when the gang gets down to brass tacks. Moreover, the addition of Olivia Munn as Sloan Sabbith could add a bit of fire to the proceedings, since I've yet to see her play a character this caustic. It's a strong cast with stronger material about 75% of the time. It's just that other 25% (with the manufactured relationship drama and the questionable gender politics) that could create problems.

Credit: HBO