The Newsroom Series Review
The TV Series 'The Newsroom' was written and produced by Aaron Sorkin and premiered on HBO on June 24, 2012.
Aaron Sorkin was previously also the creator and writer of the Emmy Award-winning political drama The West Wing produced by Warner Bros. Television.
As in The West Wing, Aaron Sorkin was known for writing fast paced dialog. And that fast pace in this three season, 25 episode series about a fictional Atlantis Cable News channel (ACN) was no different.
When The West Wing came out, I had no interest in what I assumed was a comedy series portrayal of the White House, and I did not care to even check it out. Likewise, I felt the same way about The Newsroom, and never gave it any notice. It was almost 25 years after The West Wing was released that it became one of my favorite TV Series. And, now, 13 years after its premier, having watched The Newsroom, I found it to be a really great series as well.
The acting, production and especially the writing of The Newsroom was exceptional. What made The Newsroom so personally enjoyable to me is that I'm such a political junkie I spend hours upon hours each and every day glued to watching cable news channels.
What made The West Wing so enjoyable for me was the extreme political nature of the show, and learning more or less how the West Wing of the White House functioned, and more about the nature of the advisors to the President of The United States.
So, I did not expect story of The Newsroom to hold much of the same political overtones of Constitutional rights, freedoms and the separation of three branches of government. But, I found the opposite to be true.
The Newsroom reminded me that because of the Constitutions' First Amendment and the Freedom of Speech and Freedom of the Press, our ability to be free at all stems from the truth of the information we are able to receive.
The Newsroom series made clear to me once again, that there is a actually a fourth branch of government power, and that power lies in a free and unfettered press, who's responsibility it is to speak truth to power, and truth to the people, in order to ensure the people are given true informational news with which we can maintain our freedom.
The story of The Newsroom, grapples with many of these concepts while attempting to focus on disseminating the news, rather than broadcasting sensationalistic stories in order to boost ratings, advertising and corporate income. When news stories are sensationalized, facts become exaggerated, and truth suffers and becomes a victim.
The search for truth in the News Media today is ever more difficult and ever more important given the access of the Internet and the myriad of social media platforms. And now, with the inclusion of artificial intelligence, the search for the truth can be not only merely elusive, but the trust of what is real or true can be sometimes unobtainable.
The Newsroom struggles with this 'trust' waging a battle for freedom of information. And, that should remind us that we are only as free as our freedom of information, and our trust in what is truth.
