As court summons are served and hostile-takeover rumours fly, The Newsroom grits its digital teeth for a third and final season – more determined than ever to "do the news well" in our wickedly competitive digital universe where Tweets and Instagrams can trump old-school professionalism.
The puppet master pulling the tightest of strings behind the scenes, of course, is Aaron Sorkin, the show's creator and screenwriter, who is also famous for scripts that turn actors into political motormouths – as well as for hefty dramatic winners such as The West Wing and The Social Network.
“This season, the final season, explores a lot of themes,” says Sorkin. “When does a whistle-blower become a criminal? When does protecting your source become being an accomplice?”
A glance at the series star Jeff Daniels's face usually confirms he's got something compelling sizzling in that thespian brainpan, with an acting range that runs the gamut from cretin (Dumb and Dumber) to soul-wrenching poignancy (Pleasantville).
But it’s his current turn as the scrappy intellectual news anchor Will McAvoy that won him the Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series last year.
It doesn’t hurt, either, to machine-gun the show’s dialogue with the talented likes of the network chief executive Jane Fonda and the news boss Sam Waterston, who run the Atlantis Cable News network, along with the executive producer Emily Mortimer and their newsroom staff of John Gallagher, Alison Pill, Thomas Sadoski, Olivia Munn, Dev Patel and more.
When we last checked in on The Newsroom, Obama had just been re-elected president, Will popped the big question to Mac (Mortimer), who said yes, and they both kept their jobs when their resignations were refused (after the Genoa debacle).
The new season picks up five months later as the team tackles several real-life news stories while two major fictional storylines are interwoven: the possible takeover and fight for control of ACN and the repercussions that follow the handover to Neal Sampat (Patel) of secret documents leaked by a mysterious source (à la Edward Snowden).
This raises two big questions: to what lengths can Will and his crew go to protect their source? And will their ship be sunk by social media?
“There’s this pull towards social media, but does that mean that social media is necessarily always the best way of getting facts?” asks Mortimer.
Or, as Patel says in character as the internet scanner Sampat: “It’s funny the things people try to control when they feel like they’re not in control.”
"The Newsroom is classic Sorkin – smart, riveting and thought-provoking," adds Michael Lombardo, the president of HBO programming. "I'm sure this farewell season will be one to remember."
And it’s a ton of pressure to be the go-to guy to deliver a classic Sorkin monologue, but Daniels takes it in stride: “We all want that speech. That’s the beauty of his writing. He writes for actors. He writes scenes that you get to play, that you get your teeth into.”
With 10 episodes in the first season, and nine in the second, it appears HBO is calling a rather stingy tune for the series' swansong – with only six episodes – especially when The Newsroom's second season won more critical praise and hit an edgier stride despite the pompous, annoying to some, bits of Sorkian chatter.
However, one might also argue that more North American dramas are adopting the British way of doing things by only giving a series as many hours as the story merits – and that it’s a random act of kindness for HBO’s potentates to fund a proper farewell.
After all, as every journalist knows, every story needs a final word.
The third and final season of The Newsroom begins at 11pm on Monday, on OSN First HD