As for the journalistic folk hero of our time, Will McAvoy, he continues his struggle with connecting to people. It’s interesting that after two seasons, Sloan tells Will what the rest of us figured out since the first episode: his break-up with Mackenzie made him an unlikable prick that sought out the favour of strangers by doing a show that made him popular as opposed to the show he makes now. But it’s news to Will, and it took a whole episode to get there.
Feeding Will’s issues is Nina (or Lady MacBeth, as Mackenzie calls her), the tabloid reporter who Will has apparently struck up a relationship with. Nina suggests that Mackenzie and Charlie are maybe making Will do the show they want, but Will says they’re not his puppet masters and he’s doing the show he wants to do. In that case, what does it matter what other people think, asks Nina. Well, it matters to Will, who’s running his own focus group polling to find out how much people don’t like him anymore.
Nina’s idea is then to have Will do ACN Morning, a little puff journalism, maybe the thing to get Will’s likeability rating up again. While appearing on the morning show, Will’s asked about his high school athleticism and asked to do a demonstration, throwing five footballs through a rubber tire. Naturally, Will throws that first ball and it hits a light stand, a performance that Sloan later compares to the image of 1988 Democratic Presidential nominee Michael Dukakas riding in a tank (as in he looked lame). Will hates himself for taking Nina’s suggestion, and breaks up with her there and then.
But back to the main story, Charlie and Mackenzie make their way to Maryland to interview General Stomtonovich. After a brief talk, during which the general is the first to mention Sarin in relation to Genoa, Stomtonovich agrees to an interview if they shoot him in the dark and alter his voice. Also, he’ll do the interview in his own home while still being able to watch March Madness because he says after the interview, “I don’t know how many years I have left when this thing goes to air.”
The next day Jerry interviews Stomtonovich with Maggie. The general only wants to talk to Jerry since Jerry’s the one he researched and trusts, so Maggie leaves the room and Jerry interviews Stomtonovich alone. While talking Genoa, the general answers Jerry’s questions as if they’re hypotheticals, but in the editing room, Jerry cuts it make it seem certain and undeniable that the U.S. committed war crimes. Despite Jerry’s assurances that this was the raw footage, Charlie and Mackenzie remain sceptical. Jerry’s enraged, they have more than enough confirmation and anyone else would have went to air by now. Jerry calls out the News Night staff for running scared.
This is what’s problematic with the Genoa story. First of all they bring in a new character, Jerry, to be the quarterback, thus maintaining the infallibly of the core characters. Then Genoa is loaded with so much confirmation that it’s hard to believe that the story turns out to be B.S., which we know it does. Now, Jerry fakes the final evidence, which means he really has no ground for his wrongful termination suit. The fine art of the story arc has never been Sorkin’s strong suit as a writer, so it’s curious to see how this goes from here in the final three episodes.
Flash-forward to Charlie’s turn at deposition. He says that the special Sunday report in which News Night covered Genoa aired at 9 pm and drew 6 million viewers, and by 10:05 pm, says Charlie. He knew they had a problem.
The episode spread through about five months of 2012, from the end of March to September. The montage covered all the greatest hits of the news’ greatest hits, any one of which probably would have allowed Sorkin to get on his high horse, but either by design or by fate, he didn’t take the bait. I’m anxious to see how the whole Genoa story plays out, and it seems that Sorkin has at last realized that his own stories are more fun to play with than revisionist history of the real world, not to mention the still irksome relationship drama he enjoys.
So what do you guys think? Captivated by Genoa? Have you seen an improvement in The Newsroom? Let us know in the comments below.
