The death of the "Will they or won't they?"

[klutzy_girl]

In recent years, it’s been a given that romantic pairs on television had to be subjected to the will-they or-won't-they dilemma-where couples as clearly in love as Ross-and-Rachel, Sam-and-Diane, or Jim-and-Pam were prevented from jumping into bed together for years, as the writers forced them through increasingly tight narrative hoops.

These days,

Comments

[briasoleil]

The Moonlighting Curse was as much, if not more, due to fantastically bad writing than anything else.

At the very least, we didn't get the Dana dating plan, which not only put the Dana/Casey relationship on hold but kept them apart - assumingly permanently, as Sports Night was canceled at the end of the second season.

And Aaron Sorkin repeated his past mistakes, when he kept inventing significant others for Josh and Donna on The West Wing. It was only in the seventh season that they got together. And given certain admissions in season two and three, they had passed the point of no return by season five (and I'm being generous).

I honestly don't understand why tv writers are so afraid of the relationship that seemingly makes them lose their minds at the thought of broaching the subject. Relationships aren't forcibly devoid of conflict, nor are they necessarily uninteresting. They can be both, they can also be neither. That's up to the showrunner and his/her writing staff. I'd rather they embrace the challenge than skirt around the issue ad nauseum.

[aka_gerbil]

Plus, with Moonlighting, there was the fact that everyone seemed to hate each other behind the scenes.

And Aaron Sorkin repeated his past mistakes, when he kept inventing significant others for Josh and Donna on The West Wing. It was only in the seventh season that they got together. And given certain admissions in season two and three, they had passed the point of no return by season five (and I'm being generous).

I think things would have played out a lot differently for J/D if Sorkin hadn't left after the end of season 4. I have read that some of the stuff at the end of season 4 was supposed to be the breadcrumbs that led to J/D, but John Wells had different ideas. (On another note, out of all the things John Wells did, J/D being drawn out is one of my lesser complaints. Leo and Bartlet falling out to an extent. Toby and the leak. Ugh.)

I honestly don't understand why tv writers are so afraid of the relationship that seemingly makes them lose their minds at the thought of broaching the subject. Relationships aren't forcibly devoid of conflict, nor are they necessarily uninteresting. They can be both, they can also be neither. That's up to the showrunner and his/her writing staff. I'd rather they embrace the challenge than skirt around the issue ad nauseum.

This. My personal opinion is that it requires more effort to write a relationship correctly and the writers are just too lazy to try.

[hippiebanana132]

My personal opinion is that it requires more effort to write a relationship correctly and the writers are just too lazy to try. - Exactly this.

[adeline]

(lol this is so off-topic but...)

TOBY BEING THE LEAK MADE ME SO MAD! So mad, in fact, all these years later I'll jump at the chance to capslock about it angrily in a completely unrelated community. XD Ugh, but it was seriously THE WORST. And then I read that CJ was supposed to be the leak all along, but then Richard Schiff asked to be less heavily involved in the show and this was how they chose to lighten his workload. But it is so frustrating all the same! Aaaaaaaaaaah. *rage*

[aka_gerbil]

Capslock away. The Toby thing/leak storyline is absolutely the worst storyline they did. I don't see why they needed the leak storyline at all. If RS wanted less time in S7, it really wouldn't have been an issue since they were spending less and less time at the White House and more time focusing on the campaign trail.

[heirofloki]

OT, AND YET WORTHY OF CAPSLOCK ... AND MULTIPLE !!11s

Wells was on my tv-shit list before he took over. Afterwards, he became the list.

[briasoleil]

Season five was when I stopped watching TWW. I think I've seen it all now, but yeah. I stopped.

Course, I was already so pissed at Sorkin that it didn't take Wells long to lose me as a fan.

[briasoleil]

Well, there is that.

Aaron Sorkin writes some beautiful dialogue. It's insane at how brilliant he is at that. However, he has significant issues in writing for tv. He has yet to write a successful overreaching story arc. He's more miss than hit when it comes to cohesion, consistency and character development. (This week, Donna's dumb. Next week, she's insightful. The week after that, she has no spine. *rolls eyes*) His characters all sound and speak the same to the point of redundancy.

Which isn't to say that John Wells made many improvements. Though I'm thinking the network and directors appreciated his being able to hand the scripts in on time.

Writing a relationship correctly - with all the newness and inherent idiosyncracies that are equally endearing and infuriating - can be one of the most compelling things ever. To view it as an end rather than a means speaks more to the writer's lack of talent - and laziness - than anything else.

[aka_gerbil]

We may disagree on Sorkin and TV and a sucessful overreaching story arch. I think, particularly the first two seasons of TWW, are about as perfect as you can get when it comes to tv. Especially season 2 and the MS story. Guh. So.Freaking.Awesome. I kind of think he's a genius no matter what medium he's writing for. :) I love Sorkin and the way he writes. I think TWW definitely went backwards with John Wells at the helm.

Writing a relationship correctly - with all the newness and inherent idiosyncracies that are equally endearing and infuriating - can be one of the most compelling things ever. To view it as an end rather than a means speaks more to the writer's lack of talent - and laziness - than anything else.

Absolutely. Unless it's Shonda Rhimes and Grey's Anatomy. I think her inability to write a couple well is not due to lack of talent or laziness but a very screwed up view of relationships. IMO, it's definitely a case where the written work says so much about the writer...

[briasoleil]

We'll have to agree to disagree on Sorkin. His very name generally makes me see red. Nonetheless, I will always contend that he's a master wordsmith. He just needs a showrunner with a very firm hand, someone who's capable of plotting and can recall details and isn't afraid to consult the show bible. And maybe to cover other bases, who should also be Arab, muslim and a woman.

While I believe the fandom to be generally anti-HH, I do believe that he has the werewithall to competently write a relationship.

[stars_inthe_sky]

I think I've read somewhere that Sorkin has said he's never had a functional relationship and thus doesn't know how to write one (although the Bartletts managed pretty well, I thought). As he's an otherwise supremely talented person, I'm not sure I buy that, but I think it's the excuse. And I agree that things would have been different had he stayed past Season 4 (like more Danny)!

[aka_gerbil]

I hadn't read that about Sorkin. On the otherhand, Tommy Schlamme (and I'm sure I've spelled that wrong) has been married quite awhile, so maybe he could have helped.

I am of the mind though that J/D, at the earliest, couldn't have happened until season 5. Particularly in the earlier seasons, despite the attraction, they were very much in a supervisor/supervisee position. Something had to change to change that dynamic before it would be appropriate for them to be together. Beyond that, I think they worked better getting together later on after both had grown up some. *shrug*

That whole show would have been so different if Sorkin had been around past season 4. The show was never anything but a drama, but it also had this... whimsy, maybe, about it in the earlier seasons that it lost when it became Wells Wing.

[stars_inthe_sky]

I think your last point is totally valid. And I think what they lost wasn't just the whimsy, it was the fullness of the characters. Early on, you could see why and how they all ticked, and why they were where they were in spite of whatever flaws they had. By the end, though, the President was the sage professor, Toby was irascible, CJ was a paranoid Berkeley shiksa feminista, Josh was a little boy, etc. Donna got more interesting, I guess, and I liked several of the new characters (Kate and Annabeth and Vinick in particular), but they really didn't know how to handle Sorkin's stable. Especially poor Will, who never really got to be characterized much at all.

As for Josh and Donna, totally true. That's actually why I was ultimately satisfied with their ending--they'd become equals, even if it took a while. (And seeing as how when they met, she was a college dropout and he'd been a Hill bigshot for a while already, it probably would've taken a good long while in real life anyway.)

[aka_gerbil]

And I think what they lost wasn't just the whimsy, it was the fullness of the characters. Early on, you could see why and how they all ticked, and why they were where they were in spite of whatever flaws they had. By the end, though, the President was the sage professor, Toby was irascible, CJ was a paranoid Berkeley shiksa feminista, Josh was a little boy, etc. Donna got more interesting, I guess, and I liked several of the new characters (Kate and Annabeth and Vinick in particular), but they really didn't know how to handle Sorkin's stable. Especially poor Will, who never really got to be characterized much at all.

This! This! This! This exactly. I also hate how everyone seemed to get angry with everyone else when, except in the case of J/D, it was totally unnecessary.

As for Josh and Donna, totally true. That's actually why I was ultimately satisfied with their ending--they'd become equals, even if it took a while.

Absolutely. Beyond the technicality of the situation of being supervisor/supervisee, I think they both personally viewed each other in that way and not as equals. Technical workplace issues aside, they wouldn't/couldn't make it as a couple until they viewed each other as an equal rather than something less/something more.

[briasoleil]

I read that about him, as well. However, he'd been around a number of successful relationships for quite a long time. At the time, Brad and Jane were still together. Richard and his wife. Tommy and his wife. Martin has been married for ages to the same woman. John Spencer had been with his companion for quite a while, as well. So, it seems a little disingenuous to say that because he hadn't experienced a successful relationship himself, he was thus incapable of writing it. In which case, he'd be left with dysfunctional relationships and his addiction issues.

As I said above, Aaron Sorkin is a gifted writer when it comes to dialogue. He has a way with words that seems impossible. However, he's not infallible. He can't plot, overreaching story arcs were beyond his capabilities, he lacked consistency and cohesion, he couldn't maintain adequate character development. And he was an Islamaphobe and racist (against Arabs) to boot.