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I've got 5 weeks of unwatched "Studio 60 On the Sunset Strip" on my TiVo. Should I watch it or just let it go?
Don't bother. It ain't no "SportsNight" or "West Wing."
14% (2 votes)
It's your personal preference. Give it another episode or two and if it's still not grabbing you, delete away.
29% (4 votes)
Watch all of the episodes. It's a good show and you will come to see that if you actually watch it.
29% (4 votes)
TV sucks, it eats your soul, it is somehow worse than other forms of entertainment, blah blah blah.
14% (2 votes)
The fact that you've got that many unwatched episodes sitting on your TiVo probably says something about the show, no?
14% (2 votes)
Total votes: 14
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Comments
I tried to like it
I've watched about 3 or 4 episodes. I really wanted to like this show, but alas, I don't. The dialouge is expectedly witty and fast, but that's all I liked. All of the characters are unlikable and self obsessed--imagine if every single character in Lost in Translation was moping about like Scarlett Johansen, only Aaron Sorkin was writing the conversations. Plus, there is too much inside baseball and not enough funny to sustain an hour's worth. 30 Rock is much better.
aka Acefantastik
30 Rock is much better?
I caught the free episode that iTunes was handing out ("Blind Date"), and it was... all right. Both plots seemed like they coulda been hilarious, but they just weren't hitting them out of the park. Was that a low episode, or am I just not getting Tina Fey anymore?
(Though I will admit, she looks goooood.)
Actually...
That one was my favorite so far, with the pilot being a close second. Alec Baldwin's battle of wits with the guileless Kenneth was money, and I dunno about anyone else, but I'm always up for a subplot with hot lesbians.
I would rank the five episodes that have aired so far thusly:
#1: "Blind Date" (ep. 3)
#2: "Pilot" (ep. 1)
#3: "Jack-tor" (ep. 5)
#4: "Jack the Writer" (ep. 4)
#5: "The Aftermath" (ep. 2)
A lot of the best bits of the show are throwaway references, like in "Jack the Writer" where the characters realize during a "walk and talk" (yes, that's actually what they call it) that they've just walked in a circle around an equipment locker.
Perhaps not much better, but it feels newer
I think 30 Rock is much better, only because I've actually enjoy watching it. That may have as much to do as my new expectations of television comedy as it is with the percieved relative quality of the two shows--Studio 60 feels very dated, like a West Wing impersonator that just isn't good. 30 Rock, on the other hand, had adapted to the new "Arrested Delevopment/Scrubs/The Office" style of sit-comedy.
aka Acefantastik
Slightly on this side of "meh"
Well, I think a bad Aaron Sorkin Show is probably still better than a lot of other shows... but it's definitely no West Wing. And, you will probably want to go to his house and personally smack him upside the head and tell him to get the hell over Kristen Chenowith, already; but there are worse things to be watching.
Ugh. Bleh. Pfooey.
There has been exactly one episode that wasn't a paper-thin telling of How Smart And Cool Aaron Sorkin Is And Everyone He Knows Totally Wishes They Still Talked To Him Because He Is So Smart And Cool. And that one episode was mawkish and stupid.
I'm still going to read the recaps at TWOP, because they take this shit apart pretty hilariously, but even they're flagging under the sheer tonnage of Aaron's Grudge Fuck Hour.
It's no West Wing -- and I'm talking about fifth-season West Wing here. I have no idea what it's up against, but I'd watch that instead. If you're TiVoing it, just don't even bother.
Shit. Voted "Watch it"
Shit. Voted "Watch it" before I realized I wasn't voting for the Tina Fey version of this premise.
I'd retract and not vote at all if I could.
Blah.
Blah blah blah.
I was ready to give up...
And then I saw Episode 9, "The Option Period", which was far and away the best episode of the series so far. Coming as it did after the decidedly meh two-parter with a stunt-casted and wasted John Goodman, it managed to revive my interest in the show all by itself, which is saying something.
I'm totally serious: last week's episode actually felt like Aaron Sorkin rather than an Aaron Sorkin parody. Much, much better than the earlier ones.
So that's probably the only episode you really need to see, because it's basically almost a clean break between what's happened earlier and what look to be the plot threads going forward. So watch that one and watch tomorrow's, and if you still don't like it, call it quits.
You must be kidding
Now, I'm willing to overlook the fact that Matt Albee is a self-centered prick that Aaron Sorkin thinks will be more likable if he's all Hamletty and indecisive, but his dealings with Ricky and Ron (even if you discount the previous two months of him fucking with them constantly for no appreciable reason) managed to careen wildly between condescending and childishly vengeful, and his motivation was supposedly benevolent? Why am I supposed to root for this character to do anything but fall behind a bookshelf and suffocate?
And do not even get me started on the Harriet plot. Clean break? More like "throwing the last eight weeks of characterization completely out the window." Well, except the fact that Harriet still doesn't get to win any arguments. But at least this time, it's because she's a girl, and girls don't know any better. It's amazing how she manages to be on the exact wrong side of every argument, even when she flips from What Every Christian Everywhere Believes to the other side. Sarah Paulson is less of a human being in my eyes for agreeing to do this one episode alone, much less the previous eight.
Since she's the fantasy-doll version of Kristin Chenowith that Aaron gets to pose and preen all he wants, could she just fuck him and get it out of his system? Harriet is a Christian for the sole purpose of apologizing for it. She's a woman for the sole purpose of being told by men what's best for her. She's a... actually, that's pretty much her whole character right there. Oh, wait -- I forgot the fact that she's a slut who bangs baseball players because she likes guys who treat her like shit but can't admit it to herself.
Come to think of it, I'm trying to think of any of the actors who have not been lessened by appearing on this show.
Matthew Perry? Great comic actor in a potentially great role -- the clinically insane genius. Except, of course, that this particular one isn't insane, he's just too brilliant for everyone else to handle.
Bradley Whitford? Okay, maybe, except that Sorkin clearly can't figure out what to do with him besides stand around and flirt with the other helpless female in the primary cast.
D.L. Hughley? "Hey, we've got this great part -- you'll be the black comedian who's the leader of the show and gets to make all these great Aaron Sorkin speeches about race and entertainment and such." "I'll take it!" "Actually, Aaron's sort of off his game, so your great speeches will actually be shamelessly stereotypical crap. And you're not really the leader of the show -- you kind of share that with, um, Nate something. And Kristin Chenowith -- I mean, some blonde chick. But you'll also get to be the token druggie! So, you'll be like, the... senior stereotype. Kinda. And, um, the potentially interesting black character will be played by someone else that we introduce in episode 6." "Shit."
And the show itself... oh, man, do not get me started on how unfunny and unrealistic the show-within-the-show is.
I don't mind suspending some amount of disbelief over premises or characters. But when I have to suspend disbelief over every premise, and every character with more than one line per episode, then I just can't lie back and enjoy the soothing Sorkiana washing over me.
I die a little every time I think of how much I wanted this show to work and how godawful it is.
Fair enough.
But throwing out the previous eight weeks of characterization vis-a-vis Harriet is exactly what needed to be done, IMHO. It's not a good sign when I hate your female lead and want her to get run over by a train.
Since I'm generally oblivious to entertainment journalism, I didn't really follow Sorkin's personal life; so I find it easier to ignore the parallels on the show that are his scripted ways of sniping at the people who done him wrong. That means I miss all the ways the show comes across as a one-sided retelling of a life in broadcasting as narrated by a super-genius whom the entertainment world just doesn't understand. Which may help explain why I'm enjoying the show a bit more than some of the critics I've been reading.
Speaking of one-sided, I find it quite characteristic of Sorkin shows that the token "Other" loses all their arguments. The arguments on Sorkin shows are pretty Socratic, in the sense that your opposition is not there to forcefully defend an alternative viewpoint so much as to say "that's a good point, Socrates" every few sentences so it looks less like a monologue.
I guess the difference is that this time the "Other" is a primary cast member rather than a guest star, so she looks like a complete twit whose opinions are demolished as untenable every week. But I can ignore that -- when they're not rubbing my face in it for half an hour every episode, as they haven't been for the past couple weeks -- because she drives Matthew Perry crazy, and that's what you come to see.
Well, gee.
I think it's neat. Like Ajax, I'm not all that up on Sorkin's personal life except to realize that some aspects of the show reflect it. I vote you watch, but I might've picked the "other" option if it was available on the poll, and suggested you watch an ep or two (maybe even watch them in reverse from the latest one) and see if it's really your bag, baby.
I enjoy it. When I get
I enjoy it. When I get behind on the episodes, I watch it on the TiVo or on the iPod while I'm working out at the gym. I get the feeling it has the potential to be better, but whatevs. It's still entertaining (to me) as is.