In the build up to the showing of this I was quite sceptical as so much time had past since the West Wing had left our screens but with the genius of Aaron Sorkins writing and the pure class of the old team making this possibly the best one off show during the COVID-19 pandemic Just truly wonderful seeing all the favourites reprise there classic roles Cregg/ Lyman for 2025 anyone???

Like many beloved tv shows, fans want to get them back - see all those beautiful individuals in their respective roles. In this case we can look behind the curtain (literally) and have an episode retold in a way that we have not seen before - as a play on stage. Of course one of the most beloved individuals of the show has passed - while making the show back then. He is being replaced here by another fine actor as we learn at the beginning of the show.

We also get a lot "breaks" - these breaks are being used to encourage people to vote. You never get a clear message on who to vote. Which is a great thing, because you should vote the way you feel is right. Of course that doesn't mean that one can read things into what is being said, when actors talk about health care, voter supression and other things. It is clear what they think, even if it isn't said out loud. The fact that mainly figures of one political party went ahead and were part of this, also shows something ... who actually cares about certain values and who doesn't - no matter what they might try to tell you later on.

Some of these segments in between may "bore" after the fact ... but there are also a lot that seem to predict what happened ... they warned us. Michael Cohen warned the American public too - in 2019 at his testimony. He knows the guy, so he knew there would not be a peaceful transition ... on the other hand, anyone sane and with a bit of logical comprehension could also tell ... maybe not the degree it happened (with the insurrection),but the direction this would take.

The episode they chose is quite fitting to the whole voting theme ... and as especially the first 4 seasons go, is as good as it gets. If you are not too afraid or too bored I reckon, to look back and cringe, because you know what happened, even after all the warnings, even after all the debunking the show does (about election fraud and manipulation to name some more topics tackled) ... you'll get a look at a show that still can be considered one of the best ever made ...

I re-watched the original episode and this is a good re-telling of it with a laudable mission of getting out the vote. Presenting it on stage with no audience and minimal sets was well handled and I didn't miss the old sets. The actors from the show slipped into their old roles like riding a bicycle.

I was less than satisfied with Sterling K. Brown in the Leo McGarry role, replacing the late John Spencer. Spencer had a wry sense of humor and a way with the Sorkin dialog that hit all the right notes, He was also a sort of gnome-like figure with a wizened visage, (I could see him playing a live-action Yoda or Casey Stengel). Sterling K. Brown plays him like a stone-faced statue. I was trying to think of who i would rather have seen in the role. and Samuel Jackson came on to urge people to vote. Why not him? He's not identical to Spencer either but he's more interesting than Brown, who seems to have won a Dule Hill look-alike contest with that beard.

And where did Allison Janney get that hairdoo? It makes her look 20 years older. Actually, I guess she is. They all are. Which is why if they bring this show back, they need a new cast. Actually I thought it would have bene interesting to have Alan Alda win that 2006 election and see what the writers could do with a moderate Republican administration , contesting the Democrats but also the militant right wing of their own party that ahs done so much to wreck our politics since then. Maybe they can do something like that now.

As to this being candy for the left wing in this country, the only reason why getting out the vote is considered a partisan issue is because the Republicans have said they would lose if everybody voted and are trying to suppress it.