The Great West Wing Rewatch: 7.15 "Welcome to Wherever You Are"

Joel: I can only imagine what it would have been like to try and put this episode together. Just the choreography of the episode is impressive. Figuring out who goes where, who says what when, and making it all flow smoothly while see seming hectic and disjointed is a feat all on its own. At some point watching this, you have to stop trying to follow every single storyline that’s going in every possible direction, and just sit back and let the chaos of the episode wash over you. There are scenes on the bus in this episode where five or six different topics are being discussed at the same time. People are talking over each other, holding a conversation with someone while simultaneously talking to someone else on the phone. Most of what is discussed are topics that could easily fill a full storyline on a different episode, but here they only get a handful of lines before we’re on to the next topic of discussion. On top of that, Bon Jovi keeps randomly popping up when you least expect it.
I also love the variety of what is being discussed throughout the episode. Santos has, in many ways moved past the campaign and is already trying to start the actual governing part of the job he’s been trying to get for the past year. On the other side of that, we have Donna who’s trying to make sure that Santos doesn’t look silly on Leno, a show where everyone is supposed to look silly. Throw all that on the fact that everyone is getting a fraction of sleep they need, nobody can remember where they are in the country at any given moment, and being perpetually late for everything, this episode might have the most accurate feel of what it’s actually like to try and work on a presidential campaign in the final weeks.

Chris: My one real complaint for this episode is that at the beginning they do that thing where they find an excuse to have a character sing on the show just because they have an actor that can sing well and for some reason that drives me up a wall. It's not a huge complaint as Bill Lawrence has been super guilty of doing this with both his shows Ground Floor and Undateable and yet I still watch but still, we get that Kristen Chenoweth can sing.

Toby kinda gets what's coming to him and I have to side myself with the jerk District Attorney because the only person that's sabotaging anything is Toby himself. If Toby gives the information that his now-deceased brother was Toby's source then Toby will be the only person that goes down but Toby's silence is endangering the President, CJ and Leo for seemingly no reason. I understand upholding the legacy of loved ones that have passed but not at the expense of the well being of those still alive.