Designated Contriver

Just a note about the ABC series Designated Survivor: I think commenting fits in context with The West Wing because ABC certainly was appealing to The West Wing fans in their marketing. They advertised heavily on The West Wing Weekly podcast before the premiere, and there was plenty of promotional talk referring to TWW.

Well, in the words of Lloyd Bentsen: I know The West Wing. I've watched The West Wing. The West Wing is a beloved series of mine. You, Designated Survivor, are no The West Wing.

I bought into the marketing. I jumped right in with Designated Survivor last fall. I was anxious to see how a new political drama might work, and I thought the hook was terrific: How would a low-level Cabinet member deal with rising to the office of the President after a disaster strikes everyone else in the line of succession? How would he build his administration? How would he deal with crises, both foreign and domestic? How would staff members held over from the previous President react, and how would he create and work with his own staff in the White House?

Unfortunately, we didn't get much of that. A little, sure, although laughably lame and unrealistic, in my opinion. I mean, what's with the focus on Kirkman's "illegitimacy" because the President was about to fire him from his HUD secretary post? He hadn't been fired, so he still was a Cabinet member - I can't believe there would be that much angst over that issue. Particularly when we got to the point of the governor of Michigan flat-out ignoring the federal government on that basis (and getting arrested. What?). Also, the episode where all the governors came to Washington to have Kirkman tell them how to have their elections to fill House seats. Why would there be any gamesmanship over that? Wouldn't the governors be just as anxious as anyone to have those elections? Why would their personal opinions of Kirkman have anything to do with setting up elections to refill those House seats? Ridiculous.

What we did get was plenty of conspiracies, mustache-twirling villains worming their way into positions of power, crazy family subplots (is Kirkman's son really his, or his wife's former lover's???!?!??), a White House Situation Room that looked like Dr. Evil's lair, and lone-wolf FBI agents who could have solved multiple plot points by JUST TELLING SOMEONE ELSE WHAT THEY KNEW. That wasn't what I tuned in to see, so even though the advertised theme of Designated Survivor was really interesting, and I like Kiefer Sutherland's take on his role, I gave up on the show after about four episodes.

It looks like I wasn't alone. The series debuted strongly, but quickly faded in the ratings (it just returned to the air this week after a winter hiatus). ABC blamed the ratings slide on "politics fatigue" and the unrelenting news cycle of Trump, but why couldn't it be because the show we got wasn't the show we were promised? Not only that, but the network replaced the original showrunner and wants to point the series in a different direction - unfortunately not in the direction I would prefer. Away from the conspiracies somewhat, it appears, but more towards a soap-opera relationship-oriented show. So we'll get to have more affairs, more questions about paternity, more Scandal than The West Wing. Pfui.

Frankly, while I don't actually watch it much (my wife does), it seems Madam Secretary is a much better modern-day comparison to The West Wing than Designated Survivor. Plus, Tea Leoni, Tim Daly, and Bebe Neuwirth are top-notch. So maybe give that a try, if you haven't.