I just got finished watching the most recent episode of The West Wing, entitled “The Warfare of Genghis Khan.” This was what could have been one of the best shows of the series; however, it instead stands as an example of how a great show has become simply a good show in the absence of the series creator and past writer of most of the episodes, Aaron Sorkin.

As is often the case in such shows, there was a main plot and a few sub-plots. The main story was about a mysterious atmospheric nuclear test in the Indian Ocean; no one claimed responsibility, and so North Korea and Iran were the main suspects. The main subplot was about NASA representatives lobbying Josh to approve a mission to Mars. (It would be interesting to find out if that particular story idea was there before or after the current administration rolled out their announcement to do the same thing.) The other subplot was about the vice president wanting an issue to do something about, and being handed the boring choice of “good government.”

One of my bigger problems with the episode, certainly from a personal vantage, was a scene where a NASA official (a pretty young woman, of course) takes Josh out stargazing. I hope they would do it well, but, as is predictable, they did not; whomever did the opticals obviously did not have the experience of stargazing, or at least they could not apply that knowledge to the visuals they created. The images they showed Josh looking at through the telescope were way too big, way too detailed–they looked like publicity stills or something, seen through a cardboard tube.

Visions through a telescope don’t look like that. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen planets and so forth through a telescope, but they look far less detailed and “pretty,” but at the same time infinitely more amazing. They don’t have so much color. But they have the feeling of being real. And I suppose that’s just not something you can put on a TV screen, but they most definitely could have done a better job. Shown something more real. Brighter, more washed out, a bit jiggly perhaps. But real. Maybe my experiences as an amateur astronomer in my younger days made it impossible for me to enjoy those scenes, but there’s a magic which still I think could have been shown there.

But that’s not where Sorkin’s writing was lacking. I thought, halfway through the episode, that nothing here was really funny. A joke Josh told about landing on the sun at night–it didn’t work. The story he told later on about the singer who had a rough life and death, but his music just left the solar system–it didn’t click, not the way it did with Sorkin. The banter and little jokes that littered the script when Sorkin wrote, they’re notably missing. His talent at the turn of a phrase, it is just palpably not there.

By the end of the episode, Josh gets sold on the Mars thing–but the story ends with him not quite having the sales pitch down. The other subplot with the vice president ended with him taking on the boring and ultimately worthless task he’s been given. And in ending it like that, the writer missed a great tie-in: give the Mars mission to the vice president. Who is, let’s not forget, the head of the space program. Would have brought the story elements together quite nicely, but they dropped the ball on that one.

Another Sorkin trademark was ending the episode on a song played in the background while we saw the final scenes play out wordlessly–the singing of “The Little Drummer Boy” at the end of “In Excelsis Deo,” the use of “Somebody’s Going to Emergency, Somebody’s Going to Jail” in the episode of the same name, or the song “Hallelujah” in the third-season ender, “Posse Comitatus.” This time they played the song Josh mentioned, “Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground” by Blind Willie Johnson. But somehow it just didn’t work. A bit from Sorkin’s writing–he may not have chosen to play the music after considering the piece and how it would play–but maybe more, somehow, the direction or the editing, or even the version of the song they chose. Somehow it just didn’t… click, the way it used to.

It is still a very good show. One of the better shows on TV. I still watch it, and of course will, and I would still very much recommend it. The only problem is, it’s not great anymore. Maybe they’ll pick up. But I have this regrettable feeling it never will be exactly what it used to be.

Let’s just hope that Sorkin is now working on something new that we can enjoy as much.