Ranking Every HBO Drama Series From Worst To Best

39. The Newsroom

Aaron Sorkin’s distinct style is a love it or hate it proposition - he writes TV his own way, and if you’re not down with that, he’s got tens of thousands of words for you that will boil your blood. On The Newsroom, though, he reached peak Sorkin, all the smugness and score settling without the wit, drama, or collection of decent characters.

The Newsroom begins by ripping off the film Network (they get away with this by having characters state “This is like that scene from Network”) and only gets more annoying from there. Jeff Daniels plays noble news anchor Will McAvoy, a WASPy boomer who’s always right about everything and doesn’t hesitate to put lessers in their place.

Through McAvoy, Sorkin opines on all the ills he sees in the modern world. There are more embarrassing scenes than you can shake a stick at, peaking with a scene set on a plane during the assassination of Bin Laden that has to be seen to be believed.

None of the characters are at all likeable despite the hard graft of an overqualified cast, and it limps on for three entire seasons. At its worst it’s fun to hatewatch, but for the most part it’s just dull.