TiVo Community Forums Archives - West Wing 4/30 **SPOILERS**

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West Wing 4/30 **SPOILERS**
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Posted by: dmaneyapanda

Hmm, interesting episode tonight. I'm not sure if finding out the VP was resigning so early in the episode made it more or less enjoyable in retrospect.

And I don't remember seeing anything about this last week. What's up with Matthew Perry in a co-starring role? Will he stay on through the Friends endgame, or is this a few episode arc for him? I think Emily Procter was supposed to be a long term play...until CSI:M stole her away.

Posted by: Maui

The plotline wasn't alluded to last week at all. It was shown in last weeks previews though.

I am guessing Matthew Perry will pop up in occasional episodes here and there but nothing real regular. That's only a guess though

Posted by: dmaneyapanda

Sorry I was unclear. I didn't mean the plotline wasn't alluded to. I meant I didn't see any discussion here on the boards about the Matthew Perry guest appearance.

Posted by: pyrite504

BTW, I thought Perry fit in extremely well with the show. He'd do good to be attached to it when Friends gets put to rest.

Posted by: disco

I agree, pyrite...I was pretty surprised at his fitting into the role. He added humor to the show, on a rather serious ("Life on Mars"??) episode.

Posted by: Rob Helmerichs

Matthew Perry had a major part in last week's episode as well (his job interview)...

Posted by: hughvh

quote:
Originally posted by dmaneyapanda
Hmm, interesting episode tonight. I'm not sure if finding out the VP was resigning so early in the episode made it more or less enjoyable in retrospect.

I thought it was necessary or we wouldn't be able to follow Mathew Perry connect the dots to the VP.

Speaking of which, can someone explain to me how he made the connection between the Gossip Columnist and the mistress? How would he know who to look for in the VP's phone records?

Posted by: Agent86

The gossip columnist wrote an article in the paper about the mistrress coming out with a book. However, the article didn't state that she was his mistress, it just stated that she's been at the white house for a really long time and had stories to tell.

- Agent 86

Posted by: hughvh

Ah, that was what the whole scene with Charley was about. I thought it was about giving Toby a hard time.

How can anyone ever watch this show without TiVo? I would be lost without the replays.

Posted by: Philosofy

There were a couple of clues that said something was up: first, the mistress was a DC socialite, but got a HUGE amount of money for the book deal. That was odd. Then, somehow (and I missed how), they linked the gossip columnist to the NASA story, and CJ's call confirmed it. If they suspected the mistress of leaking things, they weren't looking at the VP's phone records, they were looking for whoever called her, and it turned out to be the VP. It was confusing, but I think if I re-watched it, it would hold water and become clearer.

Posted by: sschwart

I definately think we needed the delivery of the letter of resignation at the beginning. It very much set the tone for the episode. I also think without it, people would not know what was going on until the last 10 minutes or so, and be bored for the first 50. Knowing where it was leading let you take a seemingly ridiculous claim about life on Mars, and a claim about a court settlement, and think they were important.

Though, what's with everyone giving Toby a hard time about Andy suddenly? That was out of the blue.

-Steve

Posted by: jboehm

Was anybody else totally disappointed with the audio quality last night? The voices were all muddy especially in the basement office.

Posted by: dmaneyapanda

quote:
Originally posted by Medieval Guy
Matthew Perry had a major part in last week's episode as well (his job interview)...

???

I'm aware of this. Hence my surprise about not seeing anything about his guest appearance after last week's episode.

Some days I think I must not be communicating effectively...

Posted by: Graymalkin

I think Matthew Perry was there for just two episodes. He has to get back to that junior copy writer job next week. :D

Posted by: old7

My wife brought up this point.

In the episode last night they implied that the affair had been going for awhile, correct. If I was a socialite that had a book to print why wait until after the election to bring it to press? It had to be in the works during the election, at least.

If there was no way that it could have been ready then why not wait until the VP was the nominee for the next election. Sure it is a couple of more years, but think of all the info that you could gleam by then. There would have to be much more money at that time, too. It is not like anything that would be coming out was time sensitive and would be released prior to the book coming out. She would have to realize that no mater when the book came out it would ruin his career.

Or did I miss something?

Old7

Posted by: Rob Helmerichs

Well, they couldn't publish it for this election because she hasn't written it yet (the newspaper article was about her landing a contract). And they wouldn't hold it for four years because there's no way on Earth they could keep it under wraps that long.

Posted by: murgatroyd

quote:
Originally posted by Philosofy
There were a couple of clues that said something was up: first, the mistress was a DC socialite, but got a HUGE amount of money for the book deal. That was odd. Then, somehow (and I missed how), they linked the gossip columnist to the NASA story, and CJ's call confirmed it. If they suspected the mistress of leaking things, they weren't looking at the VP's phone records, they were looking for whoever called her, and it turned out to be the VP. It was confusing, but I think if I re-watched it, it would hold water and become clearer.

It's important to keep the sequence clear, because it's like watching dominoes falling when you do.

1) 6:00 AM "Life on Mars" incident happns. CJ tosses story to Joe as a first-day-hazing thing. Clearly she thinks the life-on-Mars aspect makes it looney-bin territory. VP connection is that he's associated with the NASA commission involved in the news story, but Joe's unwilling to go straight to the VP with it, since he's brand new.

2) 11:00 AM Joe hears via talking to Josh and Donna that there is another reporter who has got a piece of a story and knows stuff that not many people know. Then they all talk to Leo and Joe finds out the real answer to the NASA story, any classified stuff is the DOD's domain. They know they have a leak and Leo wants them to fix it.

So far we have a vague idea that something is not quite right in the West Wing and it's got something to do with the VPs office. Then the crucial step:

3) Joe stumbles onto the gossip columnist and the book deal via overhearing Charlie talking about it with Toby. The crucial connection is that the gossip guy is at the Post, the same newspaper as the science editor who has come over to ask about the NASA story.

From there, Joe looks at the phone records to see who the book writer had talked to at the White House. When he saw all the calls from the VP, the evidence chain was complete.

5:00 PM He asks CJ to call the gossip guy and confirm without telling her why because it sounded like a nutcase idea, but once it's clear that the gossip guy is the missing link (and startled to be found out, too) then Joe lays down the evidence -- here's the gossip column with the book deal, the 2 leaked stories, and look at the phone records, who talked to the book writer, it't the VP himself. Bam bam bam bam.

Jan

Posted by: johnjohn

Nice timeline murgatroyd. A couple questions still remain, though. How is the information flowing from the socialite to this newspaper? Via the gossip columnist?! Wouldn't he care more about the affair than the "life on mars" story? It seems very weak to think that a gossip columnist acting as a blind source to reporters at his own paper ... and is -believed-. Why was the science editor in such a huff? Because the gossip columnist repeated something he heard from a freakin' socialite?

Posted by: Jonathan_S

Remeber that during the phone call w/ CJ Stu mentioned that he used to be a pretty good reporter, he just switched to gossip 'cause the pay was the same and the work was a lot easier.

Assuming that he was telling the truth (which I think in the context we can safely assume), that would have given him more credit when he went to the science editor with the story. Presubably he did some follow up and didn't just pass on raw gossip.