The Newsroom was back on the air for its second season last night, with a good show that got Neal at the beginnings of Occupy Wall Street in August 2011 New York, and the team into much more.
Actually, the much more entails what may be a departure for the series, at least insofar as what we saw in the first season last year. "Genoa" is some kind of project so secret and so powerful that it could "bring down a President" and change the world. We get little more than a whisper about it in the opening episode. It could conceivably be a fabrication of the source who brings it to "News Night" - but likely not - or it could be something that turns out to be related to, I don't know, the real NSA leaks. Or it could be something in between - that is, a true story told by the source, but with no connection to our reality.
One could wonder why, with so many overtly tectonic news developments happening at this time, The Newsroom not only dabbles with the fictional, but makes it an apparent centerpiece of this season. The answer, of course, is that this is fictional television, and as such is entitled to choose what parts of its story are based on real events, and how real those events may be.
But I do especially enjoy the second take The Newsroom gives us on events that we lived though in the real news, which is why I think Neal on Occupy Wall Street was the high point of last night's episode. The inability of the conventional media to understand and thus report accurately about Occupy Wall Street - something which I critiqued them about in my own appearances on television at the time - was well presented by the Occupy Wall Street non-leader whom Neal got to interview. But we all know that News Night is not quite conventional media, which is why its story - the show that we watch - is so riveting. I'm therefore much looking forward to seeing how this OWS thread develops.
Meanwhile, it was also good to see at least one personal relationship moving in the right direction - to wit, Don breaking up with Maggie, after he sees her YouTube video in which her lack of feelings for Don are clear. It will be good to see Jim back from New Hampshire and closer to Maggie.
And the election of 2012 indeed looms large - in the October 2012 "present" of this season, and its August 2011 extended flashbacks - which provides yet another inducement to look forward to The Newsroom. I'm especially fond of revisiting elections with happy endings.
See also The Newsroom and McLuhan ... The Newsroom and The Hour ... The Newsroom Season 1 Finale: The Lost Voice Mail
#SFWApro
Actually, the much more entails what may be a departure for the series, at least insofar as what we saw in the first season last year. "Genoa" is some kind of project so secret and so powerful that it could "bring down a President" and change the world. We get little more than a whisper about it in the opening episode. It could conceivably be a fabrication of the source who brings it to "News Night" - but likely not - or it could be something that turns out to be related to, I don't know, the real NSA leaks. Or it could be something in between - that is, a true story told by the source, but with no connection to our reality.
One could wonder why, with so many overtly tectonic news developments happening at this time, The Newsroom not only dabbles with the fictional, but makes it an apparent centerpiece of this season. The answer, of course, is that this is fictional television, and as such is entitled to choose what parts of its story are based on real events, and how real those events may be.
But I do especially enjoy the second take The Newsroom gives us on events that we lived though in the real news, which is why I think Neal on Occupy Wall Street was the high point of last night's episode. The inability of the conventional media to understand and thus report accurately about Occupy Wall Street - something which I critiqued them about in my own appearances on television at the time - was well presented by the Occupy Wall Street non-leader whom Neal got to interview. But we all know that News Night is not quite conventional media, which is why its story - the show that we watch - is so riveting. I'm therefore much looking forward to seeing how this OWS thread develops.
Meanwhile, it was also good to see at least one personal relationship moving in the right direction - to wit, Don breaking up with Maggie, after he sees her YouTube video in which her lack of feelings for Don are clear. It will be good to see Jim back from New Hampshire and closer to Maggie.
And the election of 2012 indeed looms large - in the October 2012 "present" of this season, and its August 2011 extended flashbacks - which provides yet another inducement to look forward to The Newsroom. I'm especially fond of revisiting elections with happy endings.
See also The Newsroom and McLuhan ... The Newsroom and The Hour ... The Newsroom Season 1 Finale: The Lost Voice Mail
#SFWApro
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