Nearly two decades after it went off the air, The West Wing has a new streaming home on Netflix.
To paraphrase LL Cool J, don’t call it a comeback. The West Wing has been available to stream before. Putting it on Netflix is just a chance to remind everyone how great this show was.
Now that The West Wing has arrived on Netflix, the Watch With Us team has selected the five essential episodes you need to watch.
Even if you watched The West Wing when it was new, you’re probably going to want to revisit these episodes.
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‘Pilot’ (Season 1, Episode 1)
As much as it might be tempting to jump into an episode from a later point in the series, the pilot episode is essential viewing because it does exactly what it needs to do to introduce the characters and the world they live in. As seen in the video above, series creator Aaron Sorkin didn’t waste any time before utilizing the walk-and-talk scenes that became one of the show’s defining traits. There are very few wasted moments on this network TV show.
One of the most notable aspects of this episode revolves around President Josiah Bartlet (Martin Sheen) and an apparent Biden-esque gaffe that his staff wants to downplay. What really happened isn’t a gaffe at all, and it lets Barlet unleash his rigorous rage against a prominent religious group for refusing to denounce followers who threaten violence in God’s name. The show was originally more about Bartlet’s staff than Bartlet himself, but Sheen’s performance went a long way towards changing that.
‘In the Shadow of Two Gunmen’ (Season 2, Episodes 1 and 2)
Technically, these are two episodes, but “In the Shadow of Two Gunmen” is essentially a single movie-length story that picks up immediately after the first season finale. President Bartlet and a member of his staff have been shot, and it’s anything but business as usual at the White House. Press Secretary C. J. Cregg (Allison Janney) has a standout moment when she makes the argument that good guys with guns are no solution to gun violence.
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The second season’s opening episodes also act like another pilot because they take the time to examine how most of the major characters became involved with Bartlet and his presidential campaign. And it does this while cutting back and forth to the present while Bartlet fights for his life on the operating table. We’re not mentioning the name of the other victim to leave at least some of the surprise intact. But he’s in a bad way as well.
‘Two Cathedrals’ (Season 2, Episode 22)
Sheen gave a lot of speeches and monologues during his seven seasons on the show. But few were as raw as Bartlet’s rant against God in “Two Cathedrals.” Bartlet is a man of faith, but that faith has been sorely tested by the death of his personal secretary, Mrs. Landingham (Kathryn Joosten), the circumstances of which feel like a cruel joke to him.
Through flashbacks, the audience sees how young Bartlet (Jason Widener) was profoundly influenced by a younger Mrs. Landingham (Kirsten Nelson) when she was a secretary at his school. While Bartlet deals with this loss, he also has to face some hard questions about whether he’s going to run for reelection in the face of a cover-up about his health. This is a gripping episode that’s often cited as the best in the series.
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‘Twenty Five’ (Season 4, Episode 23)
Following the fourth season, Sorkin stepped away from The West Wing over creative differences with his fellow producers. For his final episode, “Twenty Five,” Sorkin seemed to delight in writing the entire series into a corner that would be hard to get out of.
The President’s daughter, Zoey Bartlet (Elisabeth Moss), has been kidnapped, and he feels that this compromises his ability to lead the country and see her returned safely. That’s why Bartlet temporarily invokes the 25th Amendment to step aside. But since his Vice President had recently resigned in disgrace, that forces Bartlet to turn over the country to his political rival, Glen Allen Walken (John Goodman), the Republican Speaker of the House. It was an audacious way to close out the season, and arguably one of the show’s most stunning moments.
‘The Debate’ (Season 7, Episode 7)
“The Debate” was an experimental episode in the final season that was filmed and treated like an actual Presidential debate between candidates Arnold Vinick (Alan Alda) and Matt Santos (Jimmy Smits) that was filmed live twice on the same night, once for each coast of the country.
This episode blurred the line between its scripted and unscripted moments, with Smits and Alda as the only cast members who appeared on-screen. It kind of recaptured some of that old Sorkin magic with the way that these two performers played off of each other.
The West Wing is streaming on Netflix.
