The West Wing Season 7
Far and away my favourite moment was Santos asking Vinick to be Secretary of State in The Last Hurrah. Alan Alda absolutely nailed saying "Sec-Secretary of State?" with a touch of hope in his voice.
Other than that, I'm not quite as fond of this season as the others. Like the actor, I didn't care for what they did with Toby and thought he wouldn't have leaked information under any circumstances.
It was great to see Sam again, but I wish we were told why he went back to practising law after he lost the election rather than returning to the White House.
I still don't see the appeal of Josh/Donna. He's a bit of a jerk and she's in love with said jerk - what's to like? I'm at a loss at to why they're a popular couple among slash fans. No lesser a personage than Speranza has written multiple Josh/Donna stories!
The Ticket
Strange way to start, jumping forward three years to the dedication of the Bartlet Presidential Library and giving away the fact that CJ is with Danny and has a baby. Leo isn't there, which is just as well in view of later events!
An uncomfortable episode in which Josh plays down Leo's poor poll numbers, Leo makes some campaign mistakes and Babbish suspects CJ of being the NASA security leak.
Donna goes to Josh for a job. No, Donna, no!
The Mommy Problem
Includes what's effectively a Santos campaign songvid to "Jet Airliner".
Josh: I want you to come to California and Florida with me. You can pick up a bag on the way to Dulles. If the Congressman signs off, I'm hiring you as Director of Communications answering directly to me.
Lou: I don't think so.
Josh: We're talking about the future of civilisation here.
Lou: Yes. I don't have any desire to play tambourine in your one man band.
Josh: I am asking you to meet with the next President of the United States.
The reporter who broke the military shuttle story is sentenced to jail for failing to disclose his source. I'm spoiled for who the leak was and think he should have spoken up by this point.
Santos does his training with the reserves. Do they really paint your name on the side of the plane if you only train two days a year? And how old can you get before they stop inviting you to fly military aircraft?
Message of the Week
Vinick's aide Leon resigns because he doesn't want to work to defeat the first Latino candidate for President.
Mr Frost
Lots of discussion during the campaign about religion and science, ugh. Toby confesses to CJ that he was the leak.
Here Today
Abbey to Bartlet, about Ellie's engagement: God herself may strike me dead, but it is not to be denied that I am not unhappy that my daughter is straight after all.
CJ to Toby's lawyer: I'm sure I didn't just hear you invite yourself into the Oval Office.
Bartlet to Toby: The one thought that hits the hardest is that this was somehow inevitable, that you've always been heading for this kind of crash and burn. That self-righteous superiority: not that you were smarter than everyone, that you were purer, morally superior.
I was spoiled long ago for this storyline and I agree with what Richard Schiff said about it: that Toby wouldn't have done that in ten million years.
The Al Smith Dinner
CJ: Just follow your instincts.
Will: My instincts say to curl up in a ball in the corner of my office.
CJ: Then follow your job description.
Josh reluctantly hires Donna for the Santos campaign at Lou's request.
The Debate (West Coast)
Vinick suggests a debate without formal rules and Santos agrees.
Undecideds
Josh goes to see Toby.
Josh, after Toby pours cold water on his plans: I am constantly amazed at your ability to continue to be a bastard. It really is something. You think I needed to come here to be your punching bag?
Toby: I really have no idea why you needed to come here.
Josh: Yeah, well I don't know either. Nostalgia. It's been a pleasure, really. I'll see you later.
Toby: No you won't. You won't be coming back. At least have the integrity to say that out loud.
I love Josh for going back!
Toby, about Santos: You had to haul him by the hair out of the family bed. Did you never stop to wonder if that was a good choice?
Josh: He stepped up. When presented with the opportunity...
Toby: Man, that job shouldn't have to be presented with anything! It's for someone who grabs it and holds onto it! For someone who thinks the gods have conspired to bring him to this place, that destiny demands of him this service!
(I think he's forgetting that Leo went to Bartlet with the opportunity!)
Santos gives a wonderful speech in a church after a Latino policeman shoots a black 12-year-old.
The Wedding
Edie: Do you realise you have a breakfast every half hour between eight and one?
Josh: The later ones... must be lunches.
Josh doubts his strategy and Democrat heavyweights put pressure on Santos to replace Josh as his campaign manager.
Bartlet: You know if you win this damn thing, you're stuck working here another four years?
Leo: I like to think of the Vice Presidency as more of an emeritus position.
Bartlet, about the complaints about Josh: It's always like that around this time.
Leo: Absolutely. ...Who'd they want to replace me?
Bartlet: OK, so maybe not always.
[Lovely smile from Leo.]
Donna to Josh: I'm bored. I'm an attractive woman waiting to be entertained.
Running Mates
Opens with a message from Martin Sheen about John Spencer's death.
Leo, during practice for the VP debate: Anybody got a cigarette?
Annabeth: We just started.
Leo: I know. I'd like to smoke it then have someone shoot me.
Annabeth, about Leo's "smirk": In the right context, extremely effective. Commanding, reassuring, even devastatingly sexy.
Leo: Sexy?
Annabeth: In the right context. In a debate, under the best of circumstances, it reads as smug and condescending.
Santos calls Leo to offer enocouragement.
Santos: Piece of advice?
Leo: Please.
Santos: Don't let all those advisors mess you up. All of that well-intentioned counsel can get you so self-conscious you can't remember your shoe size.
Josh: Somebody's leaking. You told a friend, they told a friend, the friend told the Washington Post?
Lou: I haven't spoken to a friend in two months.
Annabeth: I don't think I have any friends left.
Ronna: All my friends are in this room.
Josh calls Toby to talk about his concerns about Leo's performance in the debate.
Josh gives Leo a hug after the debate.
Internal Displacement
CJ hurries away from dinner with Danny when he tells her news about the President's son-in-law.
Danny: Can I see you again?
CJ: Sure, it was swell.
Danny: When?
CJ: As soon as we're out of office.
A day in the life of CJ as Chief of Staff.
Duck and Cover
A California nuclear accident gives anti-nuclear Santos a big boost.
The Cold
Amazingly fun beginning with the Santos staffers waiting for poll data to come out online. Big smiles at the computer turn into running down the hotel hallway banging on doors, then Josh and Donna's first kiss!
Josh later apologises, which I'm sure she doesn't want him to do at all:
Josh: It was totally inappropriate. I feel terrible.
Donna: Don't worry about it. It was bound to happen sometime.
Vinick's campaign manager Sheila resigns to give him a scapegoat.
Donna tries to give Josh the key to her hotel room, but someone else at the table returns it to her before he picks it up. Josh, you could still knock quietly on the door even without the key.
Two Weeks Out
Toby calls Josh with campaign advice.
Welcome to Wherever You Are
Everybody on the campaign is on their last legs. I've lost all sympathy for Toby at this point.
Election Day Part 1
We see Josh and Donna in bed together but not enough of what happened up to that point!
Lou is not impressed with Josh's thank-you speech to the campaign staff, which she prompted him to make. "You might want to work the phrase 'thank you' in there somewhere."
Chalie tells CJ she should look at her job offers because he'd like to keep working with her.
Annabeth finds Leo unconscious in his hotel room.
Requiem
The President bows to Leo's coffin before acting as a pallbearer.
Josh: You didn't want to ask me if you could stay over?
Donna: I didn't know if we were at that point.
Josh: So it's OK to have sex in a hotel but not in my apartment?
Donna: It's a step. Some people get uncomfortable; I assumed you'd be one of those people.
Josh: Uncomfortable with sex in my apartment?
Donna: Are you really going to try to convince me that I'm the one who finds this awkward and hard to navigate?
Josh: No.
Josh to Santos: My job as Chief of Staff is to keep you from making political mistakes and this is a whopper. If you're looking for a yes man, I'm not it.
Ainsley Hayes reappears! Where has she been between leaving the White House and taking the new job she doesn't like?
Bartlet to Josh: He loved you like a son, you know that don't you? Leo and I are the past. You're the future.
Transition
Sam, after Josh barges into a legal meeting he's in: I thought you'd never call.
Donna to Josh: There's a window. I'd say four weeks. If we can't get it together in that time to figure out what we want from each other, then clearly it's not worth the trouble.
Helen Santos offers Donna the job of her Chief of Staff and Josh offers CJ any job she wants in the new administration.
The Last Hurrah
Moving contrast between Vinick going outside in his bathrobe to pick up the morning paper and Santos waving to cheering crowds.
I absolutely loved Santos offering Vinick Secretary of State and the Santoses deciding to send their children to a public school.
Institutional Memory
CJ to reluctant staffers responsible for writing budget in their last two weeks in office: Do it! And send the damn thing out for departmental review. Now!
She is inundated with job offers and goes to see Toby.
Santos to CJ: I'm the President-Elect of the United States and I'm asking you to help your country, so I'm probably not going to take no for an answer. So you go home and think about it and call me back with a yes.
Toby: For a moment I actually thought you came here because you gave a crap and wanted to see how I was doing!
CJ: I gave a crap enough to inquire if you wanted a pardon, despite the fact that you walked out on me and walked out on the President while we still had a job to do. You don't need a pardon, you need a frying pan to the side of your head!
CJ to Danny: Franklin Hollis wants me to take ten billion dollars and go and fix the world.
Danny: That sounds like fun. Does that sound like fun to you?
Tomorrow
Helen, just before the inauguration: We could make a run for it, you know. Catch the first plane out of Dulles, head down to Panama.
Santos: I hear Uruguay is nice.
Helen: Southern hemisphere, it's summer down there.
Santos: Cheaper housing.
Helen: We speak the language.
Santos: What about the kids?
Helen: [shrugs] We'll send them a postcard.
Bartlet to Santos: You know what I'm going to miss the most? The Marine Corps Band.
Why is CJ sitting in her office during the inauguration? Why is Donna's new office so much bigger than Amy Gardiner's when she was Abbey's Chief of Staff?
Josh, smiling at Santos, who's standing behind the Oval Office desk: You look good back there.
Other than that, I'm not quite as fond of this season as the others. Like the actor, I didn't care for what they did with Toby and thought he wouldn't have leaked information under any circumstances.
It was great to see Sam again, but I wish we were told why he went back to practising law after he lost the election rather than returning to the White House.
I still don't see the appeal of Josh/Donna. He's a bit of a jerk and she's in love with said jerk - what's to like? I'm at a loss at to why they're a popular couple among slash fans. No lesser a personage than Speranza has written multiple Josh/Donna stories!
The Ticket
Strange way to start, jumping forward three years to the dedication of the Bartlet Presidential Library and giving away the fact that CJ is with Danny and has a baby. Leo isn't there, which is just as well in view of later events!
An uncomfortable episode in which Josh plays down Leo's poor poll numbers, Leo makes some campaign mistakes and Babbish suspects CJ of being the NASA security leak.
Donna goes to Josh for a job. No, Donna, no!
The Mommy Problem
Includes what's effectively a Santos campaign songvid to "Jet Airliner".
Josh: I want you to come to California and Florida with me. You can pick up a bag on the way to Dulles. If the Congressman signs off, I'm hiring you as Director of Communications answering directly to me.
Lou: I don't think so.
Josh: We're talking about the future of civilisation here.
Lou: Yes. I don't have any desire to play tambourine in your one man band.
Josh: I am asking you to meet with the next President of the United States.
The reporter who broke the military shuttle story is sentenced to jail for failing to disclose his source. I'm spoiled for who the leak was and think he should have spoken up by this point.
Santos does his training with the reserves. Do they really paint your name on the side of the plane if you only train two days a year? And how old can you get before they stop inviting you to fly military aircraft?
Message of the Week
Vinick's aide Leon resigns because he doesn't want to work to defeat the first Latino candidate for President.
Mr Frost
Lots of discussion during the campaign about religion and science, ugh. Toby confesses to CJ that he was the leak.
Here Today
Abbey to Bartlet, about Ellie's engagement: God herself may strike me dead, but it is not to be denied that I am not unhappy that my daughter is straight after all.
CJ to Toby's lawyer: I'm sure I didn't just hear you invite yourself into the Oval Office.
Bartlet to Toby: The one thought that hits the hardest is that this was somehow inevitable, that you've always been heading for this kind of crash and burn. That self-righteous superiority: not that you were smarter than everyone, that you were purer, morally superior.
I was spoiled long ago for this storyline and I agree with what Richard Schiff said about it: that Toby wouldn't have done that in ten million years.
The Al Smith Dinner
CJ: Just follow your instincts.
Will: My instincts say to curl up in a ball in the corner of my office.
CJ: Then follow your job description.
Josh reluctantly hires Donna for the Santos campaign at Lou's request.
The Debate (West Coast)
Vinick suggests a debate without formal rules and Santos agrees.
Undecideds
Josh goes to see Toby.
Josh, after Toby pours cold water on his plans: I am constantly amazed at your ability to continue to be a bastard. It really is something. You think I needed to come here to be your punching bag?
Toby: I really have no idea why you needed to come here.
Josh: Yeah, well I don't know either. Nostalgia. It's been a pleasure, really. I'll see you later.
Toby: No you won't. You won't be coming back. At least have the integrity to say that out loud.
I love Josh for going back!
Toby, about Santos: You had to haul him by the hair out of the family bed. Did you never stop to wonder if that was a good choice?
Josh: He stepped up. When presented with the opportunity...
Toby: Man, that job shouldn't have to be presented with anything! It's for someone who grabs it and holds onto it! For someone who thinks the gods have conspired to bring him to this place, that destiny demands of him this service!
(I think he's forgetting that Leo went to Bartlet with the opportunity!)
Santos gives a wonderful speech in a church after a Latino policeman shoots a black 12-year-old.
The Wedding
Edie: Do you realise you have a breakfast every half hour between eight and one?
Josh: The later ones... must be lunches.
Josh doubts his strategy and Democrat heavyweights put pressure on Santos to replace Josh as his campaign manager.
Bartlet: You know if you win this damn thing, you're stuck working here another four years?
Leo: I like to think of the Vice Presidency as more of an emeritus position.
Bartlet, about the complaints about Josh: It's always like that around this time.
Leo: Absolutely. ...Who'd they want to replace me?
Bartlet: OK, so maybe not always.
[Lovely smile from Leo.]
Donna to Josh: I'm bored. I'm an attractive woman waiting to be entertained.
Running Mates
Opens with a message from Martin Sheen about John Spencer's death.
Leo, during practice for the VP debate: Anybody got a cigarette?
Annabeth: We just started.
Leo: I know. I'd like to smoke it then have someone shoot me.
Annabeth, about Leo's "smirk": In the right context, extremely effective. Commanding, reassuring, even devastatingly sexy.
Leo: Sexy?
Annabeth: In the right context. In a debate, under the best of circumstances, it reads as smug and condescending.
Santos calls Leo to offer enocouragement.
Santos: Piece of advice?
Leo: Please.
Santos: Don't let all those advisors mess you up. All of that well-intentioned counsel can get you so self-conscious you can't remember your shoe size.
Josh: Somebody's leaking. You told a friend, they told a friend, the friend told the Washington Post?
Lou: I haven't spoken to a friend in two months.
Annabeth: I don't think I have any friends left.
Ronna: All my friends are in this room.
Josh calls Toby to talk about his concerns about Leo's performance in the debate.
Josh gives Leo a hug after the debate.
Internal Displacement
CJ hurries away from dinner with Danny when he tells her news about the President's son-in-law.
Danny: Can I see you again?
CJ: Sure, it was swell.
Danny: When?
CJ: As soon as we're out of office.
A day in the life of CJ as Chief of Staff.
Duck and Cover
A California nuclear accident gives anti-nuclear Santos a big boost.
The Cold
Amazingly fun beginning with the Santos staffers waiting for poll data to come out online. Big smiles at the computer turn into running down the hotel hallway banging on doors, then Josh and Donna's first kiss!
Josh later apologises, which I'm sure she doesn't want him to do at all:
Josh: It was totally inappropriate. I feel terrible.
Donna: Don't worry about it. It was bound to happen sometime.
Vinick's campaign manager Sheila resigns to give him a scapegoat.
Donna tries to give Josh the key to her hotel room, but someone else at the table returns it to her before he picks it up. Josh, you could still knock quietly on the door even without the key.
Two Weeks Out
Toby calls Josh with campaign advice.
Welcome to Wherever You Are
Everybody on the campaign is on their last legs. I've lost all sympathy for Toby at this point.
Election Day Part 1
We see Josh and Donna in bed together but not enough of what happened up to that point!
Lou is not impressed with Josh's thank-you speech to the campaign staff, which she prompted him to make. "You might want to work the phrase 'thank you' in there somewhere."
Chalie tells CJ she should look at her job offers because he'd like to keep working with her.
Annabeth finds Leo unconscious in his hotel room.
Requiem
The President bows to Leo's coffin before acting as a pallbearer.
Josh: You didn't want to ask me if you could stay over?
Donna: I didn't know if we were at that point.
Josh: So it's OK to have sex in a hotel but not in my apartment?
Donna: It's a step. Some people get uncomfortable; I assumed you'd be one of those people.
Josh: Uncomfortable with sex in my apartment?
Donna: Are you really going to try to convince me that I'm the one who finds this awkward and hard to navigate?
Josh: No.
Josh to Santos: My job as Chief of Staff is to keep you from making political mistakes and this is a whopper. If you're looking for a yes man, I'm not it.
Ainsley Hayes reappears! Where has she been between leaving the White House and taking the new job she doesn't like?
Bartlet to Josh: He loved you like a son, you know that don't you? Leo and I are the past. You're the future.
Transition
Sam, after Josh barges into a legal meeting he's in: I thought you'd never call.
Donna to Josh: There's a window. I'd say four weeks. If we can't get it together in that time to figure out what we want from each other, then clearly it's not worth the trouble.
Helen Santos offers Donna the job of her Chief of Staff and Josh offers CJ any job she wants in the new administration.
The Last Hurrah
Moving contrast between Vinick going outside in his bathrobe to pick up the morning paper and Santos waving to cheering crowds.
I absolutely loved Santos offering Vinick Secretary of State and the Santoses deciding to send their children to a public school.
Institutional Memory
CJ to reluctant staffers responsible for writing budget in their last two weeks in office: Do it! And send the damn thing out for departmental review. Now!
She is inundated with job offers and goes to see Toby.
Santos to CJ: I'm the President-Elect of the United States and I'm asking you to help your country, so I'm probably not going to take no for an answer. So you go home and think about it and call me back with a yes.
Toby: For a moment I actually thought you came here because you gave a crap and wanted to see how I was doing!
CJ: I gave a crap enough to inquire if you wanted a pardon, despite the fact that you walked out on me and walked out on the President while we still had a job to do. You don't need a pardon, you need a frying pan to the side of your head!
CJ to Danny: Franklin Hollis wants me to take ten billion dollars and go and fix the world.
Danny: That sounds like fun. Does that sound like fun to you?
Tomorrow
Helen, just before the inauguration: We could make a run for it, you know. Catch the first plane out of Dulles, head down to Panama.
Santos: I hear Uruguay is nice.
Helen: Southern hemisphere, it's summer down there.
Santos: Cheaper housing.
Helen: We speak the language.
Santos: What about the kids?
Helen: [shrugs] We'll send them a postcard.
Bartlet to Santos: You know what I'm going to miss the most? The Marine Corps Band.
Why is CJ sitting in her office during the inauguration? Why is Donna's new office so much bigger than Amy Gardiner's when she was Abbey's Chief of Staff?
Josh, smiling at Santos, who's standing behind the Oval Office desk: You look good back there.