The Dogs Of War - TWW S5E2

 

Original airdate: October 1, 2003

Written by: John Wells (2)

Directed by: Christopher Misiano (15)

Synopsis

• Tensions grow between Jed and Abbey over the implications of how his actions may have contributed to Zoey's kidnapping. Josh calls out a Walken aide over Republicans potentially using the crisis for political gain, only to get slapped down in response. A new intern arrives in Josh's office. A random encounter in Virginia brings Zoey's abduction to an end.

"A truly self-sacrificing act usually involves some sacrifice."

Another emotional downer of an episode tries to turn things around with the relief of Zoey's rescue, but John Wells can't let us even enjoy that for long as dark days in the administration and the Bartlet household are obviously ahead. I'm already starting to miss the touch of humor that Aaron Sorkin always seemed to bring at the right time.

It's dark, again - darkly shot, full of dark shadows, faces half-hidden in the dark. It fits the tone, but where's the joy? Even Zoey's rescue feels ... off-putting and strained. I have mentioned before

that President Bartlet's decision to step away from his office, leaving Speaker Walken in charge in Twenty Five, turned me off during the series' original run, and that I hadn't watched any of Season 5 when it actually aired. Thinking a bit more, I believe I may have given the show a shot at the beginning of the season, and I likely did watch 7A WF 83429 when it was originally broadcast ... but I am certain I was no longer tuning in by the end of this episode, and did not see any of the Season 5 episodes after that until about five years ago and my first full re-watch. The unrelenting darkness and sadness and sourness completely turned me off.

But don't let me talk you out of continuing with this run through Season 5! It's better if you don't go it alone, right? Let's hit the major themes - a couple of which will have some long-lasting impacts.

How about the Jed-Abbey relationship to start? There was obvious tension between them all the way back in Bartlet's Third State Of The Union and The War At Home ... that's when we first discovered that Jed, in exchange for not making his multiple sclerosis condition public, had promised Abbey he'd serve only one term. And so, by starting to govern in a way to gain reelection, he was going back on his word. Abbey was mad about that, rightfully so, as not only was she put in a position to continue her life in the public eye for another term, she'd also have to go through the scrutiny of her role in Jed's coverup (which ended up with her giving up her medical license, you'll remember).

Gratefully, Abbey came to terms with most of that by the time the campaign got into full gear (Manchester, Part II) but now ... it's not just herself she has to worry about. President Bartlet's decision to secretly kill the Qumari defense minister (Posse Comitatus) has become public, enraging Islamic terrorists across the globe - and now it seems some of those terrorists have kidnapped their daughter and are threatening her life. She directly blames Jed for all of this - his continued Presidency, (which he was supposed to have given up) which led to his decision to kill Shareef to protect American interests, which led to the kidnapping and possible death of their youngest daughter. Abbey cannot forgive her husband for this.

When the news breaks that Walken has ordered an attack on Qumar (in retaliation for the movie theatre attack in Turkey in the previous episode), the Bartlet family is watching TV together. Jed, helplessly watching his administration carry out the orders of another leader, launching an attack that results in the deaths of American soldiers and, quite possibly, his own daughter, hands clasped in front of his face, looks over to gauge Abbey's reaction:

Abbey hears the news on the television, but can't focus on anything - especially not Jed:

She tormentedly leaves the room, followed by Elizabeth and Doug, and finally, Ellie ... Ellie, who was one source of support for Jed in the previous episode, now leaving her father alone to mull over his decisions and cope with the results:

Even with what should be the joyous reunion of the Bartlet family when Zoey is rescued, Wells can't give us the "happy ending" we're yearning for. First off, Zoey is discovered purely by chance - a drunk couple having an argument, the wife calls 911, the trooper sent to pick her up can't find her, but pokes his head into a nearby barn and sees a suspicious white van, he calls the FBI ...

The FBI strikes quickly, as Agent Casper outlines the events to the Bartlets in the helicopter:

And Zoey is rescued with the kidnappers being killed.

Abbey finally smiles when she embraces her daughter:

Jed, too, gratefully relieved, kisses her head:

But all is not well. As President Bartlet takes back his office and speaks to the nation, his family (and Charlie) watches from Zoey's hospital room:

Except for Abbey.

Abbey, literally turning her back on her husband as he speaks to the nation.

It's hard for us to watch, and it's obvious it's going to take a lot of time to heal this rift.

The other sobering, intended-to-be-long-running storyline has to do with Josh. In 7A WF 83429 he was worried about the motives of the Republicans meeting with Walken and his staff, convinced they were planning to use this situation of temporarily holding the Presidency to make some moves for crass political advantage. On the Monday morning opening this episode, Amy (yeah, Amy's back!) ends up playing directly to his worst fears and stokes up his conspiracy theories to a dangerous level.

Amy: "They're going to start legislating again, Josh. Partial birth, federal funding for family planning clinics --"

Josh: "Walken does anything by executive order, we overturn it as soon as we get back."

Amy: "A cheering thought to the women whose lives are ruined in the meantime. Do you even know when you'll be back?"

Josh: "Not exactly. Damn it."

Amy: "If Walken's holding partisan pep rallies in the West Wing, leak it."

So Amy gets Josh completely worked up about what the Republicans are doing, and how they're using this tragic national crisis to gain political advantage. I mean, political advantage is Josh's wheelhouse, so he was already heading in that direction - but Amy gives him a huge shove.

This eventually leads Josh to take a Republican press release and read it with the worst possible motives, which then leads us to the one and only White House restroom scene ever filmed in The West Wing.

Josh accosts Walken's aide Steve Atwood as he's trying to take a leak, accusing him of undermining the Bartlet administration under cover of the kidnapping crisis.

Josh: "You're campaigning in the middle of a national tragedy. Zoey Bartlet's out in a field, breathing through a straw - you're test-driving sound bites for the next election? Straight answer, Steve, once in your life: what are you guys up to? Closed-door meetings, planting quotes in the Times ... What's next? Spontaneous speeches on the House floor questioning President Bartlet's fitness to lead?"

Atwood tries to set him straight:

Atwood: "You don't get it, do you? Republicans are in awe of Bartlet. He recused himself in the only way he could. In the way envisioned by the Constitution."

Josh is not mollified, but Atwood has a particularly telling way of describing how far off the deep end he has gone.

Atwood: "No. You beat the terrorists at their own game. We're not stupid, Josh. We try to use this to our advantage, it'll blow up in our faces. We'd seem callous and unfeeling, in contrast to Bartlet's extraordinary gesture of courage and patriotism. And anyone who thinks otherwise ... has a particularly craven way of looking at politics."

Josh has always been a political operative first, perhaps always starting out from a, well, "craven" way of looking at situations, but he's also always had the humor and humanity and soul to overcome it. That appears to be melting away, and it's not going to get better for a while.

Speaking of Josh and longer-running story threads, he gets a new intern. A brash, privileged Ivy League youngster is sitting in his office on Monday morning, awaiting instructions. Ryan Pierce is his name, Harvard graduate and self-described descendant of a former President, and we can tell right away he's going to clash with Josh, not to mention Donna:

Donna: "Am I being passed over?"

Josh: "What?"

Donna: "If you're going to bring someone in over me, you can at least have the common courtesy --"

Josh: "I don't even know who that guy is."

In my view, I see Ryan as an attempt by Wells and the producers to entice younger viewers to the show - much in the way the addition of Chekov and his Beatle-esque haircut to the cast of Star Trek in 1967 was meant to do. I don't think it was a particularly smart move, not least because Ryan doesn't prove to be a very sympathetic or likeable character, but that's just my opinion. He sticks around for quite a while, so you'll get your opportunity to make up your own mind about him. 

A few other things happen in this episode - the opening scene, with Leo's surreptitious meeting with the mysterious Angela Blake, is just set-up for storylines to come (although her line, "If she dies, his approval ratings will go through the roof" is certainly something); the revelation that Admiral Fitzwallis is hoping to retire and go sailing in the Caribbean; our first meeting with Secretary of State Berryhill, mentioned many times before but never seen until now; the continuing search for a new Vice President

(You might notice that Berryhill is featured prominently among these final five options, even with a dart in his photo - the options are trimmed to four at the end, as Josh removes one of the candidates - but if you will recall in Commencement Josh had added Leo to his list. I guess he's taken him off by now.)

- but let me spend just a moment on the speeches.

Leo mentioned to Toby in the previous episode that he needed to get to work on two speeches - when Will asked why two, Toby explained they'd need one if Zoey was found alive and another if, well, she wasn't. Toby starts on the first muscular, revenge-oriented option, but Will has a few ideas that Toby finds ... lacking.

Will: "It's a new and difficult time. He needs to acknowledge that we've all been visited by our own mortality."

Toby (reading Will's edit): "'I know I am not alone in thinking how fragile is the safety and security we all take for granted.' You're leading with failure. What kind of message is that? If we go two lines without using the phrase 'unimaginably large military arsenal' we're out of our minds."

Will: "You want me to start on the second one?"

Toby: "You're already doing it!"

Later, as Bartlet wanders the West Wing, he stops by Toby's office and asks to see the speech he knows they're working on. Jed takes a look at Toby's work, then, without looking up, he quietly asks:

President: "Where's the other one?"

Toby: "What other one?"

President: "The other speech."

Toby: "We only wrote one."

Bartlet levels a steady, wordless gaze at Toby. Toby pulls Will's second speech out of a drawer and hands it over.

The President looks it over, his breath catching as he reads a speech intended to be given after the death of his daughter. It's a fine bit of acting from Martin Sheen.

"The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away ..."

Bartlet asks to keep the speech, and ends up using it as the basis for the address to the nation after Zoey is rescued.

The twin crises of Zoey's abduction and the related constitutional handover of Presidential power finally come to a close - although too late to keep me as a viewer during the show's original run! What we, the audience, are left with is a broken relationship between Jed and Abbey, and a top adviser who's obsessively consumed by his mental image of how the Republicans are trying to screw over the administration. Not exactly the groundwork for thrilling, uplifting storylines as we move ahead into Season 5, in my opinion, but let's see together. After all, it's dangerous to go alone. 

Tales Of Interest!

- Another episode full of darkness and shadows and tough-to-see scenes, which is kind of a thing for Season 5, it seems.

- It's approximately 72 hours from the morning of Zoey's graduation, which was Saturday, May 7, until President Bartlet's reclamation of his office after her rescue on the morning of Tuesday, May 10. The actual time it took for viewers to see these events over four episodes (created by two separate show runners) covered almost five months (from Commencement airing on May 7 to this episode's debut on October 1).

- When the administration needed secret polling in The Fall's Gonna Kill You, to measure public opinion over the possible reactions to President Bartlet's revelation of his MS coverup, Leo trusted Josh to go to his pollster, Joey Lucas. Now, when Josh thinks the administration could use secret polling about the electorate's reactions to President Bartlet's stepping away from the office, Leo brushes him off - only to contact a different secret pollster, Angela Blake.

- Walken's mention of being a "Truman fan" is fitting, considering Walken is from Liberty, Missouri - which is only about 10 miles north of Independence, where Harry Truman lived much of his life and where the Truman Presidential Library is located. His comment about Truman being a Republican if he were alive today is way off base, though, for anyone who's read anything about Harry Truman.

- With all the focus on Qumar (on and off ever since The Women Of Qumar, and certainly a geopolitical hot spot in episodes like College Kids and Debate Camp, where we saw maps of the country), isn't it odd that we see a Situation Room map that doesn't include Qumar at all? (Remember, according to the maps we've seen before it should be located in what is southern Iran, along the Persian Gulf directly across the Strait of Hormuz from the United Arab Emirates.)

Here's a good look at a map of Qumar from 7A WF 83429:

And here's a map in the background of the Situation Room from this episode ... with no Qumar shown!

- Why'd They Come Up With The Dogs Of War?

"Cry 'Havoc!' And let slip the dogs of war" is a line spoken by Mark Antony after Caesar's death in William Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar. President Bartlet quoted that line to Leo as he asked about President Walken's attack plans in the previous episode, 7A WF 83429. 

Quotes    

Blake: "The people need to believe that when he comes back he'll be able to govern effectively, even if he can't secure the safety of his own family. They need to know he's willing to sacrifice his own child's life for his country."

Leo: "Would you be?"

Blake: "I wasn't stupid enough to run for President." 

-----

Ambassador Yusef: "We are one of the only friendly governments you have left in the region that is growing younger, poorer, and more radical every day. If you undermine us, who do you think will take our place?" 

----- 

Donna: "You have 132 phone messages."

Josh: "Half of them want me to switch my long-distance carrier."

Donna: "There'd be at least as many faxes if we had a fax."

Josh: "We don't have a fax?"

Donna: "The FBI boosted it for evidence."

-----

Ryan: "You guys always walk so fast?"

(He trips and falls)

Josh: "Yes." 

-----

President Walken: "If Truman were alive today, he'd be a Republican."

Debbie: "Oh, I doubt that very much."

President Walken: "You know, it's funny. This was never an ambition of mine. I never wanted to be President of the United States."

Debbie: "Neither did Mr. Truman."

-----

President Bartlet: "You going to run again?"

Walken: "I haven't decided."

President: "If you do, let me know. I'll come campaign for you."

Walken: "I'm not so sure that'd be a plus in my district, Mr. President."

President: "You stick around for the press conference?"

Walken: "Thank you, sir, but I think the nation's best served by seeing only one President at a time." 

 

Story threads, callbacks, and familiar faces (Hey, it's that guy!)

• Our first look at Angela Blake, played by Michael Hyatt (The Wire, Nightcrawler, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend). Leo asked Margaret to set up a meeting with her in the previous episode, and she plays a big role in upcoming storylines.

• We finally get to meet Secretary of State Will Berryhill, whose name has been mentioned many times over the past four seasons. He's played by William Devane (Knots Landing, 24, Marathon Man). No stranger to political drama, he played President John F. Kennedy in the 1974 TV movie The Missiles Of October - which also featured a young Martin Sheen as Robert F. Kennedy.
  

• We meet Josh's new intern, Ryan Pierce (Jesse Bradford, known for Swimfan, Bring It On, and the Marvel One-Shot Item 47), apparently an effort by the producers to draw in younger viewers with a fresh, young, wisecracking face. It's ... not really a successful effort.

• We haven't seen Nancy in a while (played by Martin Sheen's daughter Renée Estevez).

• Blake throws out a mention of a "failed Mars probe," which we saw in Galileo.

• Leo is still wearing his wedding ring. Remember, his wife left him in Five Votes Down and the divorce became final in The Portland Trip.

• The "brutal assassination" of Defense Minister Shareef is brought up by Ambassador Yusef. That happened in Posse Comitatus, with the fallout continuing throughout Season 4. We also hear the five Ba'ji sleeper agents that went missing in Commencement are still at large.

• We get to see Andy and the twins, Molly and Huck. She apologizes for what she said "Saturday," when she turned down Toby's offer of marriage and the house - which happened only two days before the events of this episode (but was broadcast five months prior in Commencement).

• Donna says the FBI took their fax machine for evidence. The picture of Zoey with a ransom note was sent to Josh's fax machine in Twenty Five. Now, why the FBI would need the actual fax machine for evidence seems a little bit tenuous.

• There's recall of the search process for a new Vice President, something that's been underway since Vice President Hoynes resigned in Life On Mars.

• President Bartlet's glass paperweights remain on the Oval Office desk.

• We get a reminder that Josh graduated from Harvard as Ryan examines his diploma, with the additional information that he graduated cum laude (even though, as CJ says in A Proportional Response, he missed the dean's list "two semesters in a row"). When Josh goes on to say his girlfriend earned summa cum laude that year, we might be led to believe he's talking about Amy ... but Amy wasn't his girlfriend in college (she was dating Josh's roommate, as we were told in H. CON-172) and we learned in Red Haven's On Fire that she did her undergrad at Brown, not Harvard (both Josh and Amy did go to Yale Law School, however).

• The West Wing tradition of "walking and talking" gets a shout out as Ryan has trouble keeping up with Josh and Donna walking through the halls ("You guys always walk this fast?").

• One last fleeting look at President Walken's dog Bess, as she stretches across a chair in the Oval Office while he calls the parents of soldiers killed in the Qumar attack.

• President Bartlet says he'll bum a smoke off one of the Secret Service agents. In Posse Comitatus we famously saw him toss a borrowed lighter back to one of the agents after telling Governor Ritchie, "In the future, if you're wondering, 'Crime, boy, I don't know' is when I decided to kick your ass."

DC location shots    

• The parking ramp where Leo and Angela Blake meet must be somewhere in DC, considering the shot of the Capitol dome in the background. This was confirmed by director Christopher Misiano in the DVD commentary, who said they filmed scenes for five different episodes during that trip to Washington ... including several episodes that didn't yet have complete scripts.

They Do Exist! It's The Real Person, or Thing    

• The parking garage meeting between Leo and Angela Blake is meant to remind the viewer of the clandestine meetings of Washington Post reporters Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward with their Watergate scandal source "Deep Throat," described in the book and movie All The President's Men.

• Blake quotes a New York Times/CNN poll; later we see a front page of USA Today, as well as a mention of Roll Call. Interesting choice for the prop USA Today to feature the Jefferson Memorial photo on a story about the new Speaker of the House of Representatives ...

• Blake has a retort about Bartlet's constitutional maneuver involving the Dean of Columbia Law.

• Berryhill's line to Leo about informing Qumar of the American attack as it's happening ("Doesn't it remind you a little of the Japanese on December 7th?") is a reference to the 1941 Pearl Harbor attack, and the Japanese diplomatic message delivered to Secretary of State Cordell Hull after the attack had already begun.

• Leo refers to the Gutenberg Bible as he talks to the Qumari ambassador.

• The MSNBC logo is seen several times, as NBC continues with their synergistic decision to feature their real 24-hour cable news network instead of the previously used fictional CND network.

• Andy mentions finding a house that's a three-minute walk from the Rayburn Building, which houses offices for Representatives just south of the Capitol Building. The building is named for former Speaker of the House Sam Rayburn.

• Leo scoffs at Josh's concerns about Republican treachery by saying "This isn't the grassy knoll" - which is a reference to conspiracy theories over the assassination of President Kennedy in Dallas in 1963.

• President Bartlet quotes Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. , although in a slightly abridged version ("The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral. Returning violence with violence only multiplies violence, and deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars"). Bartlet also stops before the most famous part of that quote, "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that."

• Ryan Pierce appears to claim that President Franklin Pierce is his "great-great-grandfather." This is actually impossible, for a couple of reasons. Franklin Pierce left no direct descendants; his three children all died in childhood. Also, for Ryan to be his great-great-grandson means Franklin Pierce would have to have been born around 1875 (using a rough 25 years per generation). He actually was born in 1804 and died in 1869, which would seem to work out to something like a great-great-great-great-great grandfather.

• There also does not appear to be a "Pierce bedroom" in the White House, as Donna refers to.

• Josh tells Ryan about his time working at the Harvard Crimson newspaper.

• Presidents Truman and Eisenhower are mentioned, as well as Truman's documented reluctance to be President.

• The Al Jazeera news outlet has the new demands from the kidnappers with Zoey's picture.

• We see a can of Hype Energy drink on the table in the Situation Room.

• President Bartlet says Zoey has been taken to Walter Reed Medical Center.

End credits freeze frame: President Bartlet leading Toby and Josh on the way back to the Oval Office to sign the 25th Amendment letter.

Previous episode: 7A WF 83429

Next episode: Jefferson Lives

7A WF 83429 - TWW S5E1

 

Original airdate: September 24, 2003

Written by: John Wells (1)

Directed by: Alex Graves (15)

Synopsis

• The search for Zoey continues, and fears grow for her safety when President Walken orders attacks on Qumar. Walken's visible comfort with his growing control over the executive branch causes dismay among President Bartlet's staff. News of President Bartlet's order last year to kill Shareef, possibly leading to Zoey's abduction, shatters relationships in the Bartlet family.

"Find Zoey Bartlet and find her fast, but so help me, if she turns up dead, I'm gonna blow the hell out of something and God only knows what."

We enter a dark period in the history of The West Wing. No, no, I don't mean the series gets terrible or anything - although it definitely doesn't measure up to the excellence of the past four seasons. No, I'm not really talking about the themes - although yeah, there's a lot of sadness and exhaustion and depressing elements going in here.

I mean it's dark: literally dark. Devoid of light. Starved of illumination.

This is a conscious decision by director Alex Graves and director of photography Thomas Del Ruth, as Graves expounds upon in the DVD commentary. He wanted to evoke impressions of early morning/late evening, to bring in more contrast in the lighting of scenes, to make things look different than a typical West Wing episode since Jed Bartlet has removed himself from power and his daughter is missing and the possibility of a military attack could have dire consequences for her safety. It does all that, for sure - but it's really hard to see some of what's going on here.

We jump right in pretty much immediately on the heels of the ending of Season 4 and Twenty Five. As that episode ended with President Bartlet leaving the Oval Office and Speaker Walken taking the oath as acting President, this edition starts with the press conference bringing the news to the world. A dizzying presentation of fuzzy TV screens, the camera angle dashing this way and that, the overlapping voices of reporters frantically describing the extraordinary scene - it's designed to throw us off-balance and make us feel the disorientation of the characters, and it works.

As we continue through the day - and all this is just one day, with Zoey going missing around 11:00 pm on Saturday night and this episode covering the following Sunday - some things settle down a little, other things are stirred up, and no one feels satisfied or comfortable by the time late Sunday night comes around. And the divide between Jed and Abbey, caused by word of Jed's order to kill Abdul Shareef, may be permanent.

Let's go into that first. With John Wells (ER) taking over for Aaron Sorkin as showrunner (and as writer of this episode), there was concern by some viewers that the show would veer away from political maneuvering into more, shall we say, soap-opera-y relationship-oriented storylines. While Wells claimed that wasn't his intention, this element of the Season 5 opener doesn't do much to allay the concern. Jed, stuck in the White House residence staring out the large arched window, seems lost and sinking into depression. Abbey, holding back tears, spends her time consoling friends who call to console her. When the Bartlet children and grandchildren arrive, there's a moment of comfort and an opportunity for a little smile, but mostly it's a reminder that Zoey is still being held captive somewhere, her absence the entire reason for this family gathering.

And then ... after President Walken is informed that Danny Concannon is going public with his story that President Bartlet ordered the assassination of Abdul Shareef, he orders the administration to release the story first, confirming the facts while denying Danny the scoop. The connections perhaps linking the killing of Shareef to Zoey's abduction are evident. Abbey finds out by watching television with her daughters.

Her stoic reaction as she leaves the room leads Elizabeth to recognize that her mother was blindsided by the news, and she goes to her solitarily distracted father to ask, "Dad? Did Mom know?" And that leads us to a tense, uncomfortable familial conflict in the kitchen - and let's be frank, is there anything less West Wing-y than a family drama playing out in their kitchen? Abbey tries to deflect Jed's weak attempts at an apology, or at least an explanation, and it's clear she remains silently furious at her husband.

Jed: "It was a difficult decision!"

Abbey: "Made by you, not us."

Jed: "I did what I thought was necessary,"

Abbey (walking out of the room): "Your decisions, Jed, not ours." 

All of this playing out right in front of Elizabeth and Ellie, uncomfortably put in the middle of their parents' conflict - it's stressful and hard to watch! Elizabeth goes with her mother, while Ellie stays behind for a moment to hug her father.

(I'll just say, while this particular family drama is grounded in a realistic way as to how a mother might react if she knew her husband's decisions had put their children in danger, it's a bit of a different situation when the husband is the freaking President of the United States. Of course your children are going to be in danger, it comes with the job, some consideration for a specific decision he makes in defense of the nation should be a little bit understandable. But we're talking about emotion, not logic, and that makes sense - plus I think there's little doubt that deep down Abbey still holds resentment for Jed going back on his one-term promise he made to her that we saw in Bartlet's Third State Of The Union/The War At Home - if he had not been re-elected to a second term, this Shareef/Qumar situation might never have been a factor for the Bartlet family.)

The Walken decision to pre-empt Danny and the Washington Post hits CJ and her relationship with the press. She had promised to give Danny an exclusive on the five missing Ba'ji sleeper agents, a scoop taken away when Agent Mike Casper announces that fact to the press corps (again, that's gotta be an understandable move considering the President's daughter has been kidnapped). Then, she and Leo convinced Danny to wait three days before publishing his story on the administration ordering the killing of Shareef, and then that news gets released by the administration first. CJ, who already got into a shouting match with Danny after the first press conference, gets left in a terrible position.

President Walken: "Release it before Concannon has a chance to file the story."

CJ: "Sir, we convinced Danny to hold the story several days ago. Undercutting him would be going back on our agreement."

President Walken: "Your agreement. Release it."

So, CJ makes a decision to undercut Walken instead. When she brings Danny into her office to tell him the White House will have no comment on his story, she stops him as he leaves:

CJ: "Post the story now. (emphatically) Right now." 

Walken is no dummy. As he heads into a press conference to deal with questions over the assassination story published online by Danny and the Post, he brings CJ in close to fix his tie ... then pointedly muses as to how Danny could have possibly known to get his story out ahead of the administration release.

Even so, the acting President and the Press Secretary end up coming to a sort of cautious understanding.

President Walken: "You know I'm not the enemy. The things that unite us are far greater than things that divide us. We both believe in democracy, preservation of American values, protection of our citizens in a sometimes hostile world."

CJ: "Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness?"

President Walken: "Yeah."

CJ: "That's what's in your statement?"

President Walken: "Something like that." 

Josh remains convinced that this is all a horrible mistake, that the Bartlet administration has shot itself in the foot by giving up power (even temporarily), and that the Republicans stand to make huge political gains with Walken in the Oval Office. I think his attitude reflects that of many of the viewers (this storyline actually caused me to stop watching the series entirely for almost all of Season 5), an attitude that gets reflected with this scene with Leo walking into the Oval asking to see "Mr. President," only to have this great reveal of Walken and not Bartlet as his staff moves out of the camera's way:

Again, this is all the very first day of the handover, just hours after Walken was sworn in in the midst of a massive governmental crisis, but Josh simply can't help himself. It doesn't make it any easier when Walken's staff starts moving furniture out of the West Wing right away.

And when they bring the Republican leadership into the building to talk about naming a new Speaker of the House, it's just about enough to make Josh lose his mind.

Josh: "Is that Duke?"

Donna: "Yeah?"

Josh: "Oh, please don't let it be Duke. He hates me."

Will: "Tomlinson?"

Josh: "He hates me, too."

Ed: "Jim Arkin?"

Josh: "Arkin really hates me."

Donna: "Are you detecting a pattern here?"

Josh's ongoing frustration with the Republican leadership will really inform the first part of Season 5.

The biggest shoe to drop in the episode involves Leo, President Walken, and the U.S. military response to Zoey's kidnapping. Admiral Fitzwallis and other military leaders have drawn a direct connection between Zoey's abduction and the missing Ba'ji agents, which leads them straight to Qumar. Fitzwallis wants an immediate military strike. Nancy McNally, as well as Leo, urge caution, with Leo particularly worried about how military action might spur Zoey's kidnappers to do something unthinkable. 

President Walken is willing to hold off, at least until something else happens. And then it does. A suicide bombing at a movie theatre in Turkey kills dozens, including American sailors from a US Navy ship. The Ba'ji terrorist group claims responsibility, and Walken is forced to respond. Leo's desperate attempt to consider Zoey's safety gets a numbing reply:

Nancy: "So, a bombing and an invasion?"

Fitzwallis: "We'll be in and out in three days."

Leo (with an outburst): "We bomb Qumar and they kill her!"

(The room falls quiet)

President Walken (calmly, not looking at Leo): "They're going to kill her anyway. (pause) When do you want to go, Admiral?" 

These Situation Room scenes confirm the wisdom of President Bartlet's momentous decision to walk away from the Presidency for the time being. Leo, his nerves on edge, his emotions on a hair trigger with exhaustion, is still thinking like a Bartlet friend and family stand-in. His immediate concern is for the safety of Jed's daughter. President Walken knows there are higher, more important responsibilities for the security of the country, and personal considerations have to take a back seat. It's the kind of choice no one should ever expect a father to make, and I think Leo finally gets his head around that, in some way, at least, with this scene. It really does drive the point home that Jed did the only thing he could do for the good of the country by stepping away.

The episode ends with the Bartlet family at a private Mass, praying for Zoey's safety, for guidance, for protection, and for solace. The might of the U.S. military is on the move, with the attack slated for early the next morning. Zoey's whereabouts remain unknown, and Jed and Abbey remain at odds. 

Donna pulls Josh away from his office for a moment, to see the public outpouring of support for Zoey and the Bartlet family along the White House fence.

And we are left to ponder what the new day might bring. Hopefully a little sunlight.

Tales Of Interest!

- The Season 5 opening credits appear to be exactly the same as the last half of Season 4. I don't think there are any changes at all, even the photos/video clips appear to be the same. Stockard Channing appears in the credits, as she's featured in this episode. 

- The events of Commencement and Twenty Five all took place over the day and night of May 7. We know this because of Charlie's note, with the date he and Zoey set to dig up the champagne buried at the arboretum confirming her graduation day was May 7. This episode covers the events of the next day, from early in the morning until the night of May 8 (which is a Sunday here, although the actual May 8 in 2003 was a Thursday).

- Even though we have new writers and showrunners, we still have multiple-time West Wing director Alex Graves behind the camera. That gives us plenty of series trademarks, like seeing characters through video screens, and multiple instances of the camera point-of-view spinning around characters.

- We also get some shuddering, blurred-motion camera shots to indicate stress and uncertainty and shakiness (Graves mentions in the DVD commentary that he learned the technique from seeing it in the film Mad Max), and very, very strong use of bold colors in the lighting.

- Speaking of bold lighting choices, this episode may be one of the darkest-lit in series history. Here's some samples of really, really dark scenes (Graves says in the DVD commentary he wanted the early morning scenes to look like early morning, but I mean ... this is after the sun came up!).

Abbey and Jed on Sunday morning. Note: it's about 6:30 am. Sunrise was around 6:00. It shouldn't be this dark!

A very dark Roosevelt Room

The pressroom, darker than we've ever seen it before.

Leo's office, darker than dark

Jed and Leo, again at the window (this time at night)

Donna's office area - where are all the lights?

- Leo gets off an elevator leading to the residence. We've never seen that before - in fact, the only other time a White House elevator was ever seen in the series was the one that carried Sam and Toby to their secret meetings in the lower levels in 18th and Potomac.

- Also for the first time we see the kitchen in the Presidential residence.

- Elizabeth and Doug arrive with two children, a girl and a boy. We learned in Pilot Elizabeth had a girl named Annie (who was 12 years old in that episode and would be at least 15 now); but also in Game On we saw two young girls go up on stage to greet Jed after his debate with Gov. Ritchie. We are left to assume those girls were grandchildren, but if there is only one granddaughter ... why were there two? And was either one of them actually Annie, as seen here?

Annie

The as-yet-unnamed grandson

Girls joining President Bartlet onstage at the debate - is either one of them Annie? And who is the other?

- There's just a quick glimpse of Gail's fishbowl on CJ's desk; while there's some online debate that it might be a white van (because of Zoey's abduction), to me it just looks like rocks. We also saw the fishbowl completely empty of any decoration in Commencement (which was literally just the previous day, and CJ hasn't really had time to play around with decorating it with the crises going on. Maybe Carol did it ...).

- Stockard Channing received an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Performance by a Supporting Actress in a Drama (for this episode along with No Exit) - the award went to Drea de Matteo for The Sopranos.

Quotes    

Leo: "What are all these people doing here?"

Margaret: "They work here."

Leo: "It's 5:30 in the morning."

Margaret: "I'll make sure they know." 

-----

Josh: "Lincoln and Kennedy had children who died. They didn't take a sabbatical."

Toby: "Who's been calling?"

Josh: "Congressional leadership."

Toby: "Lincoln never got a ransom note from Jefferson Davis. He's putting country before family. I'd carpet bomb Mecca to get my kids back." 

----- 

President Walken: "Get your people in place, Admiral. We don't go today unless we're provoked. Find Zoey Bartlet and find her fast, but so help me, if she turns up dead, I'm gonna blow the hell out of something and God only knows what."  

Story threads, callbacks, and familiar faces (Hey, it's that guy!)

• Our favorite news anchor Ivan Allen appears again. Remember, he had just showed up in Twenty Five on a TV news program in the background, with the CND network logo and being called "Keith Nantz". Now we see him on MSNBC - which is weird, since these two telecasts must have aired within an hour or two of each other (we begin this episode the exact same time as Twenty Five ends). This is actually his 13th credited role on The West Wing since A Proportional Response, where we've seen him bouncing between local TV news stations and the CND/MSNBC cable networks.

• Finally we meet the oldest Bartlet daughter, Elizabeth, played by Annabeth Gish (Mystic Pizza, The X-Files, Halt And Catch Fire). Her appearance marks the end of the longest reveal in West Wing history, as she was mentioned (along with her daughter, Annie) in Pilot.

• Elizabeth's husband Doug Westin is played by Steven Eckholdt (Melrose Place, L.A. Law, Friends). While Doug doesn't do much in this episode (except for asking Jed "How are you holding up?") we'll see plenty of him in the future. 

• The Bartlet's middle daughter Ellie returns as well, played by Nina Siemaszko. We met her in Ellie.

• President Walken's chief of staff Steve Atwood is played by well-known character actor Zeljko Îvanek (Oz, Homicide: Life On The Street, Madam Secretary, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri).

• Debbie Fiderer is back after missing for a few episodes, last seen playing poker in Evidence Of Things Not Seen; we also have the return of Assistant Secretary of State Bob Slattery (Thomas Kopache, last seen in Red Haven's On Fire).

• Senate Minority Leader Triplehorn, played by Geoff Pierson, appears in the meeting with Democratic congressional leaders. That's the same guy who was upset about Hoynes apparently locking up all the best precinct workers for the 2006 campaign in Swiss Diplomacy.

• All the familiar reporters are seen, well, almost. While we (dimly) see Mark, Steve, and Chris in the early press conference scene, and Danny several times, there's no sign of Katie in this episode.

• I've been keeping track of President Bartlet's glass paperweight collection over the course of the series (seeing it move from one side of his desk to the other, or even disappear once in a while). I guess it's comforting to see that, even though furniture is getting moved out of the building on Walken's first day, those paperweights remain.

Although Walken did waste no time bringing his dog, Bess, into the Oval Office.

• Look, there's Ed and Larry! Haven't seen them since the poker game in Evidence Of Things Not Seen.

• Also, Ed and Larry's discussion of the faltering economy and the word "recession" reminds us of something:

Larry: "If the economy is heading into a recession --"

Josh: "No, no, no! We don't ever use that word around here!"

Larry: "What word, recession?"

Josh: "No!"

Will: "If we say it, it gives it credence."

Larry: "What should we call it?"

Josh: "I don't care. Call it a boat show or a beer garden, or a bagel."

Ed: "So if it is a ... bagel, the Fed thinks it's going to be a mild bagel."

There was a similar attitude about that word in Swiss Diplomacy:

Margaret: "Ways to fight a possible recession."

Leo: "What did we say?"

Margaret: "Don't say 'recession' in this building."

Leo: "You just did it again!"

Margaret: "What am I supposed to call the meeting?"

Leo: "The 'robust economy' meeting."  

• Toby is asked about the twins a couple of times, and there's mention of Andy calling. Remember, the twins were literally born a few hours before this episode takes place. 

• We have seen tension between the First Couple before. In Bartlet's Third State Of The Union/The War At Home, we discovered Jed had promised Abbey to only serve one term as President, as the probability of his MS worsening in a second term was significant (and, as she said, his one-term promise was supposed to make up for him hiding his disease from the voting public). The disquiet between husband and wife continued up to the events of Manchester, when Abbey finally told Jed, "I'm leaning toward voting for you." I have a feeling this time, it's going to be more serious - putting his children in jeopardy by secretly assassinating an official of a country known for terrorism against the United States may very well be unforgivable in Abbey's mind.

• Leo asks Margaret to get him in touch with Angela Blake ("in New York?" she responds). That's someone else that's going to be very significant really soon.

• We hear the names "Mitchell" and "Haffley" as potential GOP candidates for the new Speaker of the House. One of those names is going to be playing a huge role in upcoming episodes (spoiler alert: it's the one Josh calls a fascist).

• By the way, we've seen a lot of other GOP House bigwigs in the past (just to name a few: Randall Thomas, who took the lead at the podium to sandbag the administration after The Leadership Breakfast, and was also the initial leader of the oversight committee looking into President Bartlet's coverup of his MS in Ways And Means; Henry Shallick [Corbin Bernson], deputy majority whip in The Leadership Breakfast and Capital Beat guest in Bartlet's Third State Of The Union; Peter Bruno, who chewed out Sam and Josh over the White House drug investigation in Take Out The Trash Day, and actually ended up chairing the investigative committee questioning Leo in Bartlet For America). In reality, you'd think one of those names might be mentioned in the new Speaker discussion.

• The long-term story threads of Abdul Shareef's assassination (which began in Enemies Foreign And Domestic) and President Bartlet's multiple sclerosis (revealed in He Shall, From Time To Time ...) continue. Also, the fact there's no Vice President in office (after Hoynes' resignation in Life On Mars) continues to be important, with Josh looking for candidates and Walken saying if there's no progress by Tuesday (in two days) he's going to start getting involved in naming a new VP.

• As we saw in Twenty Five, Nancy continues to argue caution about attacking Qumar, including telling President Walken any attack on the nation "would be the first time in our history that we have violated the foreign soil of an ally." Now, I have my doubts about that fact (we've seen military operations in Syria [A Proportional Response], Colombia [The War At Home], and Haiti [Two Cathedrals/Manchester], not to mention sending troops into Equatorial Kundu in The California 47th, although perhaps none of those nations were considered allies? It's a tough argument to make, particularly with Colombia). Also, if you go back to 20 Hours In America, Part Two, when Nancy was first made aware of Qumar's involvement in planned terrorist attacks inside the United States, she flat-out recommended a nuclear strike on the country ("I am, however, beginning to lean towards reducing our nuclear arsenal one at a time, if you know what I mean"). So her stance has evolved, I guess we'd say.

• We get some more good looks of the map of Qumar, a fictional country located in what is actually southern Iran, along the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz. Our first look at a map of the nation was seen in College Kids.

Here's an actual map of the area in southern Iran, with my hand-drawn rough guesstimate of the borders the show used for Qumar.

 

DC location shots    

• The scene showing the public display of signs/candles/flowers for Zoey was filmed along the sidewalk outside the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on 17th Street NW, just west of White House. That area has been used in The West Wing many times, as far back as Enemies.

They Do Exist! It's The Real Person, or Thing    

• We see plenty of news network logos, particularly MSNBC and C-SPAN logos. There are also several mentions of CNN, and even an on-screen shot of their logo (which was rarely, if ever seen over the past four seasons). Other real-life media outlets that are referred to include Fox [News] (which as far as I can tell has been mentioned just once before, in Inauguration: Over There) and Al Jazeera. No sign of the fictional CND network we've seen so many times over the past four seasons.

CNN logo

C-SPAN logo

• Presidents Lincoln and Kennedy are specifically named. Josh's referral to both of them losing children while in office is factual: Lincoln's 11-year-old son Willie died in the White House in 1862, while Kennedy's son Patrick was born prematurely in 1963 and died less than two days later.

• We also have mentions of Confederate President Jefferson Davis, President Truman, and his friend and former Speaker of the House Sam Rayburn.

• Businesses mentioned include Kinko's (which was bought by FedEx in 2004 and saw the name retired in 2008), Xerox paper, and Bekins moving company.

• Fitzwallis' statement "bombing Tripoli stopped Libya" refers to an actual 1986 attack on the country, in retaliation for a terrorist bombing of a discotheque in West Berlin. His claim has a couple of errors: first, in trying to correct Nancy's argument about attacking allies, Libya (led by Muammar Gaddafi) wasn't really an ally of the United States at the time; also, the attack only had a limited impact on Libya's ongoing terrorist activities.

• Toby compares Walken's staff taking over rooms in the West Wing to the Visigoths, who sacked Rome in the 5th century.

• President Bartlet quotes Shakespeare with the words, "Cry 'Havoc!' And let slip the dogs of war" from the play Julius Caesar. The Dogs Of War is the title of the next episode.

• One of Josh's candidates for Vice President is compared to Norman Thomas, who ran for President six times on the Socialist Party ticket.

• The Presidential Succession Act of 1947 does exist, and it actually was President Truman's idea to move the Speaker of the House and the Senate president pro tem up in the line of succession ahead of Cabinet members.

• Here's a splashy front page of The Washington Post, which of course is an actual newspaper.

• We see a Notre Dame alumni mug in the kitchen. Martin Sheen insisted that President Bartlet be a graduate of Notre Dame.

• The sort of "choosing sides" or at least the Bartlet daughters choosing whom to comfort is interesting in light of what we know about the daughters already. In Ellie we saw both Jed and Ellie feeling like they'd always been unable to connect with each other, with Ellie feeling like she couldn't make her father happy and Jed flustered at why he couldn't fully act like a dad with her. So it's telling that Ellie is the one to stay with Jed and give him a hug after the fight with Abbey, as well as Ellie being the one to walk into the church hand-in-hand with her father.

• Donna's throwaway line "Elvis is in the building" (referring to Haffley) tells us Elvis Presley existed in this timeline.

• Here's an interesting little gem - as the Republicans gather in the Roosevelt Room to discuss naming a new Speaker, we hear this:

Josh: "Do we have any hidden cameras or tape recorders or something in there?"

Will: "Not since the mid '70s."

That certainly seems to be a sly little reference to secret White House recording devices that became public as part of the Watergate scandal in 1973-74. That event has never been mentioned in the series before, and President Nixon - who was forced to resign as a result of that scandal - has only seen his name come up twice in passing, neither time specifically in regards to his being President (there was a reference to Nixon and getting pandas from China in Six Meetings Before Lunch, and a "Nixon-Eisenhower thing" [meaning Vice President Nixon] in 17 People).  

• While we're told sailors from the USS Raleigh were killed in the movie theatre bombing in Turkey, the last of four Navy ships bearing the name Raleigh was decommissioned in 1991.

• Something new the show is doing: in the past I've taken note of the various logos we see on the laptops being used by the characters. We've seen Gateway, Apple, and HP logos in the past. Looks like the producers of the series are no longer interested in providing computer makers free advertising, as both CJ and Toby are using laptops that have a White House seal or something placed over the company logo on the laptop cover.

End credits freeze frame: President Bartlet, considering the dark at the window in the residence.

Previous episode: Twenty Five

Next episode: The Dogs Of War