The Newsroom Recap: Springtime for Cairo and Madison

Sorkin is happy and high. At least if this show’s any indication. But let’s see what he has in store for us. I’m sure it will be thoughtful and provocative about the state of our culture and our need to be entertained superseding our ability to be an informed populace.

Probably not.

In case you didn’t hear, Sorkin fired his entire “writing” staff this week. Except his ex-girlfriend. Leave it to Sorkin to hear criticism of his writing, since he’s gotten sole credit on four of the five episodes so far, and assume the problem is everyone else on his staff. Never change, Aaron.

Show opens with Elliot giving a field report from Cairo. Why? I know anchors have gone on location but Elliot’s never been a foreign correspondent. Oh, never mind. It was to put Don in the control room because SQUEE! Don. Elliot’s hunkered down in his hotel room and bemoaning, on live TV, his inability to get news. While Mackenzie looks off soulfully, or gasfully, Don gestures in the background to let us know he knows how dumb this all is.

This is not my doing.

It’s February 10, at the height of the Egyptian uprising, and Don’s cranky because they’re not getting the story. Mackenzie, forgetting that she and Don hold the same title, scolds him to calm down. Don’s like, “Yeah, not going to happen.” But a commotion breaks out in Tahrir Square and Elliot runs out of his “undisclosed location” to see what’s going on. With Elliot unavailable Will reminds us what the Arab Spring was about and how Mubarak was a lying liar who lies.

By the way, just for contrast, here’s Rachel Maddow covering the same events:

Not nearly as dramatic but then, since they’re reporting at four in the morning, most of the footage would be from earlier in the evening. As Will tries to fill time Don’s going all Tom Servo comparing Elliot to Evita singing on her balcony. Heh. Elliot comes back and starts talking about gun shots and the police converging but who cares! It’s time for Maggie to be adorably klutzy and knocking a clear glass door into Jim’s face because she has a very important story.

Doc Brown took her for a ride in the Delorean and she knows that this relatively minor protest by teachers in Appleton, Wisconsin will become a huge, weeks-long demonstration and jibber jabber jibber jabber, Maggie, Jim and Don all start talking over each other for no reason whatsoever except to establish that they’re professional. What?

They’re pointing and talking and talking and pointing…

So while a huge international story is in flux and constitutes one of the few times “Breaking News” actually IS breaking news, Mackenzie decides to take Will off Cairo to cover the quaint teachers’ protest in Wisconsin and it’s a race between Jim and Maggie to get their video package put together. Maggie’s cued up with the editor because the magic of hindsight knows this story is about to be huge even if it’s only teeny tiny on February 10, so Jim gets up on a soapbox about union rights while also asking to cut his own piece even though he’s not union. Oh Sorkin, how did you manage to have your cake and eat it, too?