by Mark Spriggs

Created on: August 20, 2009   Last Updated: August 21, 2009

I like TV drama, I like Sci-fi, I like crime and police procedurals, but I do have fairly high standards about where I'll spend my valuable time. From 1999 through to 2006 my time was very firmly spent watching the superb West Wing.

Fast paced, well acted, tight dialogue and a fantastic ensemble cast, coupled with real world issues dealt with in an intelligent and witty way without the ridiculous need for the 'good guys' to always win. Drama does not get better than this and I have enjoyed much over the last 30 years to know, the series had me hooked from the first minute of season one and by the time we met Martin Sheen's portrayal of an articulate and personable President at the end of episode one I was drooling, the wit of his verbal riposte over issues posed throughout the episode was a beacon to the dreary repetitive dialogue of many series and soaps.

Drama involves relationship, conflict, disagreement and/ or a journey for the characters to travel on be it emotionally or literally and this came through across the whole series, stories within stories, arc within arcs drag you in to the fictional world and the viewer could not help but be captivated and become involved with the diverse group of characters arrayed before them. I can not heap higher praise on a series of such quality.

Two further virtues that I do want to extol; the first is in response to the criticism once leveled by a reviewer that people only watched the West Wing to feel smarter afterwards. And? When you deal with real world, big issues in an entertainment format you have a lot of information to convey in a short and essentially stimulating time, this is what this amazing series does, and does brilliantly. Islam (particularly post 9/11), abortion, freedom of speech, privacy even foreign policy issues are all covered alongside political footballs like the budget and the death penalty. The fashion that the President kneels to give confession after a harrowing episode where all the characters bar the President are running around trying to save a condemned prisoner on the eve of his execution is particularly poignant.

The second virtue is in my opinion the best televised drama ever broadcast, the episode at the end of season 2 called 'Two Cathedrals'. In the midst of a storm around his non-disclosure of MS, the death of his PA whom he had known for 50 years and the pressure of announcing his run for re-election come together in 44 minutes of exquisite viewing that you can't turn away from. The zenith has to be the one to one with God in the national Cathedral, yelling about his disappointment in the almighty for the trouble, only a few minutes later to be scolded by the 'ghost' of his dead assistant, what follows is Dire Straits 'Brothers in Arms and a piece of of cliffhanging subtlety that took me a long time to forgive.

If you have never seen Aaron Sorkin's masterpeice then go now, stop reading, and see a re-run or buy the DVDs because you have missed out and there is a little hole in you that needs filling. Television art has never been taken higher and it will need the exceptional to come close.

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