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I don’t know what everybody’s talking about: The Newsroom, HBO’s Aaron Sorkin-penned drama about cable news, is great. Here are the best parts (spoilers ahoy!):
1. This guy:
Why don’t they give him 10 o’clock? He’s such a persistent interviewer, although I’m not sure that “Why is America the best ever?” is the right hill on which to die fighting the New York Jets.
2. The former executive producer’s manscaping
Does he not button his shirt because he’s evil, or is he evil because he won’t button his shirt?
3. Sound relationship advice from 30 Rock‘s avian-bones woman to the intern:
When he calls you tonight at 11 and wants to come by, don’t lay on a tone of voice, just tell him real nice that you’re hanging with your roommates and you’ll see him at work. Do that three times, and he’ll get the idea.
It’s good, but has Sorkin considered a Don Quixote metaphor?
4. Anything-Goes Sexual Politics: The new executive producer says she won’t report the intern and Chesty to HR, but she probably should! If she’s an intern and he’s an executive producer…
5. Banter:
NEW EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Jim Harper, my senior producer.
JEFF DANIELS, scoffing: Senior? Is he old enough to drive at night?
And that’s one of the Sorkinisms he wrote up just for this show!
6. The Nice Senior Producer’s Extended Oil Clan: How lucky is it that his sister and college roommate aren’t just both in the oil industry, but work for the two companies that are involved in the Deepwater Horizon explosion? Not sure, but it’s very There Will Be Blood.
7. Dev Patel’s Master’s Degree in Petroleum Engineering: He’s so good at rattling off figures about individual wells five minutes after hearing they’re on fire. But is he good enough to join the senior producer’s cartel?
8. Loyalty: It’s very important to me.
9. Sam-Waterston-as-Puppet-Master Reveal: This was actually OK. And here I thought he was just an alcoholic Marine with dandyish tendencies and a well-nursed memory of a Vietnam hostess bar.
10. The Big Reveal: The foreign correspondent woman was in the audience flashing him signs. I thought we were about to get some Beautiful Mind-level twistiness, but nope, it just ended with NEWS.