‘The West Wing’ 25 Best Episodes, Ranked
Please read this as the compliment with which it is written: American politics have never felt cozier than in the halls of NBC’s “The West Wing.”
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Whereas most Americans today are rightfully cold and jaded about the democratic process, on Sept. 22, 1999, when Aaron Sorkin premiered his fast-talking take on the inner workings of the White House, there was a genuine curiosity about how government worked. For a moment in time, Americans were getting weekly –– often far-fetched, but better than nothing –– lessons in politics and history from the administration of President Jed Bartlet (a never-better Martin Sheen).
“The West Wing” was the ideal TV show for adults who spent their childhood watching the “Schoolhouse Rock” segment “I’m Just a Bill” on repeat: It was a cultural phenomenon that made it cool to care about government, thanks to a likable cast of characters and a healthy dose of elegantly rendered soapy drama. Over the years, the series has been praised as a prime example of broadcast TV at its best, and won four consecutive drama series Emmys. But almost in equal measure, “The West Wing” has also been dismissed as an unrealistically idealistic and naive softening of the finer points of our democracy. Nevertheless, across seven seasons, it occupied an unimpeachable spot in the era of appointment TV.
Twenty-five years later, some Americans probably wish their understanding of and exposure to politics was as digestible and civil as it was under President Bartlet. Thankfully, the show has proven to have staying power, with its cast serving as persuasive spokespeople for the importance of democracy in recent elections. Nearly all of them reunited in 2020 for HBO’s “A West Wing Special Benefitting When We All Vote,” a filmed stage recreation of a pivotal episode meant to encourage voter registration.
On the occasion of the show’s 25th anniversary, Variety has ranked the 25 best episodes from the show’s run. As with most series that run the better part of a decade, the quality of “The West Wing” waned in its later years, especially after the departure of three key figures after Season 4 — Sorkin, series star Rob Lowe and director Thomas Schlamme. There were gems to be found in the aftermath, but we are sticking with the high points of the Bartlet administration.
25. “The Supremes” (Season 5, Episode 17)
This may be a controversial pick right out of the gate, but it’s hard to deny the performance Glenn Close delivers as a potential Supreme Court Justice nominee Season 5 is one of the show’s weakest, but this laughably optimistic exercise in Supreme Court maneuvering was still entertaining for its insistence that nominating a candidate from each party to the Supreme Court in order to appease everyone would ever actually work. That being said, it also gave Close some dynamite opportunities to act circles around … everyone. Today, this is considered one of the most divisive episodes in the entire series’ run, but it gained renewed prophetic relevance in 2016 because of its notable similarities to the death of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia and the subsequent nomination of Merrick Garland by President Barack Obama.
24. “Celestial Navigation” (Season 1, Episode 15)
On occasion, “The West Wing” lets its characters try on the hats of their coworkers in a moment of need, with varying degrees of disaster. The most entertaining example of pinching hitting happens in this Season 1 installment, when press secretary C.J. Cregg (Allison Janney) gets a root canal and deputy chief of staff Josh Lyman (Bradley Whitford) has to fill in for her in the press room –– a job he immediately blunders by vaguely promising the president has “a secret plan to fight inflation.” There is no secret plan, of course, and chaos reigns in the White House for a solid 24 hours. Luckily, Josh rebounds, and regales a group of students about the challenges of speaking for the president and the country. Also, props to Janney’s outstanding post-dental surgery acting. If all that wasn’t enough, the guest star roster includes Edward James Olmos as Bartlet’s defiant Supreme Court nominee and CCH Pounder as the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, both giving excellent performances.
23. “The Debate” (Season 7, Episode 7)
The long-awaited debate between presidential candidates Arnold Vinick (Alan Alda) and Matt Santos (Jimmy Smits) gets a spot on this list for sheer guts and creativity. This partially scripted, partially improvised episode was staged as if it were a real presidential debate and broadcast live (once for each coast), with Alda and Smits appearing as the only main cast members on screen, along with real-life journalist Forrest Sawyer as the moderator. Two real candidates would never agree to this free-for-all format, but it gave Alda and Smits an electric field of play, and MSNBC even did a poll of viewers afterward to see who won. Talk about commitment to the bit!
22. “Life on Mars” (Season 4, Episode 21)
While still on “Friends,” the late Matthew Perry made an interesting detour from the West Village to the White House as Joe Quincy, a conservative lawyer who happens upon a scandalous bombshell: Vice President Hoynes (Tim Matheson) has been having an affair with a socialite that led to leaked classified information. By the end of the episode, Hoynes has resigned, taking one of Bartlet’s staunchest allies –– and frequent thorns in his side –– off the board. Beyond political implications that will be wide-reaching (especially two episodes later), it was just a thrill to see Perry walk-and-talk with the best of ‘em for a few episodes –– a clear reminder why he was cast to lead Sorkin’s next series, “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.”
21. “Duck and Cover” (Season 7, Episode 12)
Being president and making decisions that will affect the lives of millions is one thing. Campaigning to be president and making decisions that could haunt your legacy if you make it to the White House carries a whole host of other issues. In this episode, Bartlet responds to an accident at a California nuclear plant that could cause an explosion. As he figures out what to do, the Vinick and Santos campaigns work out their own response strategies –– stances that could have an effect on who gets elected. Vinick has the much tougher job, as he helped put the plant online a quarter century ago. Santos, meanwhile, wants to stay on message and let the press interrogate Vinick’s connections to the plant and the crisis. The series depicts two election cycles in its run –– Bartlet’s reelection campaign and this bout between Vinick and Santos. What makes this ticking time-bomb episode so fascinating is how stances taken even before getting elected to the White House can have consequences by the time you get there. Bartlet’s campaign didn’t have any meaty quandaries like this one.
20. “Process Stories” (Season 4, Episode 8)
What happens when an incumbent administration wins an election? They party just as hard as if they had lost. Seeing the Bartlet team breathe a sigh of relief was a refreshing change of pace for the series, especially after the tight-fisted run up to Election Day. But there was still drama when the dust settled. Deputy White House Communications Director Sam Seaborn (Lowe) panics when his half-hearted deal to run for a congressional seat in California becomes a reality –– with the endorsement of his friends. Amy (Mary-Louise Parker) reveals she is basically a bookie betting on down-ballot races. And the president’s multiple sclerosis flares up while he celebrates victory with supporters, reminding him and First Lady Abbey (Stockard Channing) that his second term is going to be much harder than his first.
19. “Posse Comitatus” (Season 3, Episode 21)
After Sept. 11, the threat of terrorism in the world of “The West Wing” was largely placed on the fictional Middle Eastern country of Qumar. In the Season 3 finale, the president contemplates using a visit from Qumari defense minister Abdul ibn Shareef as a means of killing the known terrorist, an action that would violate numerous international laws. It is among the most conflicted audiences ever saw Bartlet, who usually stood as the show’s pillar of strength. By the time his kill order unfolds against the booming score of a stage production of “The War of the Roses” that he’s attending, it’s the dawn of a new era for the administration. He even manages to have his first proper, yet private showdown with the Republican candidate in his reelection campaign, Josh Brolin’s Florida Governor Robert Richie. Simultaneous to all of that, CJ’s slow-burn romance with her Secret Service Agent Simon Donovon (Mark Harmon) ends in tragedy when he is killed in a robbery after their first (and last) kiss.
18. “In The Room” (Season 6, Episode 8)
Political divides and international crises are all in a day’s work for the president. But President Bartlet dealt with a different kind of dark specter hanging over everything he did in the White House –– what if his MS suddenly got so bad he couldn’t do his job? This episode, set largely on Air Force One, is a reminder of just how fragile his good days were. A literal pressure cooker in many ways, the episode finds the president staring down his legacy on a trip to China when he becomes paralyzed by his condition. The severe nature of his attack put into perspective the trivial optics-driven stories that often plague the president’s daily chatter (in this case, a Penn & Teller magic trick performed at his daughter’s birthday). It also showcased Sheen’s incredible range in understanding how his character would respond to this imperative and impaired moment. The fact that it’s happening just as Bartlet’s potential successor, Vinick, is formalizing his challenge for the highest office in the land is not lost on us.
17. “Manchester” (Season 3, Episodes 1 and 2)
Season 2 left viewers hanging on Bartlet’s indecision over whether to run for reelection after admitting his MS to the entire country. But this rousing field trip of an episode wastes no time answering that question, and immediately putting everyone at a crossroads in the aftermath. Sequestered in rural Manchester, New Hampshire amid preparations for the president’s official reelection campaign launch, the episode features the first clash between the current staff and the team working to get them another term under campaign adviser Bruno Gianelli (Ron Silver). It previewed what was to come with the competing agendas of running the country and fighting to keep the job. Plus, it ends with one of Bartlet’s trademarked call-to-action speeches that just made you want to find a ballot box.
16. “What Kind of Day Has It Been” (Season 1, Episode 22)
Even a series as cerebral as “The West Wing” wasn’t immune to the temptation of closing its first season with a huge cliffhanger. But Sorkin was smart about how he played it. The episode starts with the chaos and then rewinds, hanging it over the heads of anxious viewers for the next hour. He also puts the president in the crosshairs of an assassin’s bullet, but ultimately making Bartlet collateral damage in an attempt to kill his personal aide, Charlie (Dulé Hill). White supremacists are targeting Charlie, a young Black man dating Zoey (Elisabeth Moss), the president’s daughter, and the administration who elevated him to a position just feet from the Oval Office. It gave the episode a chilling reality check that even with the president within range, some people’s prejudices run deeper than mere political differences.
15. “Somebody’s Going to Emergency, Somebody’s Going to Jail” (Season 2, Episode 16)
Big Block of Cheese Day! One of the show’s most enduring fictitious traditions was this spin on a story in which Andrew Jackson demonstrated the accessibility of the White House by having a two-ton block of cheese in the lobby for anyone to snack on. (In reality, the inspiration for the story came from a massive block of cheese gifted to Thomas Jefferson in 1802 by the town of Cheshire, Massachusetts.) Chief of Staff Leo McGarry (John Spencer) uses the show’s version as an annual means of getting senior staff to meet with fringe groups not often given an audience at the White House. This year, Sam must navigate the tricky emotional waters of finding out his dad has been having a 28-year affair, while working to get a former White House staffer pardoned on charges of espionage and treason. Wielding his influence and knowledge of the case, Sam’s fiery determination makes waves in the FBI, which has proof the man was guilty of being a spy. A respected man’s shortcomings is a brutal pill to swallow on the day Sam is processing his own disappointment in his father, but Lowe was never better on the show.
14. “In This White House” (Season 2, Episode 4)
This episode makes the list for one reason, and one reason only: Ainsley Hayes (Emily Procter). In one of the best character introductions in the show’s run, Ainsley is a Republican North Carolina lawyer who absolutely obliterates Sam on the topic of public education on the political talk show. It is such a persuasive performance, the Democratic administration hires the incredibly capable lawyer as a member of its counsel, giving Ainsley a conservative-out-of-water dynamic with everyone. Again, certainly a fantasy in the days of partisan politics. But a fun showcase for Procter, who was eventually lured away to help lead CBS’ “CSI: Miami.” Her dozen appearances on the show remain one of its best character arcs.
13. “Pilot” (Season 1, Episode 1)
The one that started it all is also the episode in which Bartlet tells a stubborn Christian group to get their “fat asses out of my White House” until they denounce extremists among their followers. Whether that would ever happen in reality is debatable. But at the outset, when the staff and the cast were already remarkably functional, this was a thrilling entrance for one of the most beloved presidents in popular culture. In just a few scenes, the show proved this was a man his staff would be willing to wage literal and figurative war for –– and one the audience could endorse for the next seven seasons.
12. “Hartsfield’s Landing” (Season 3, Episode 14)
This episode gets a major bump in our estimation because it was revisited by nearly the entire cast in 2020 for a filmed stage production intended to promote the importance of voting. Looking back, it really does have all the ingredients of a quintessential episode of “The West Wing.” The president corners Sam and Toby (Richard Schiff) into emotionally charged chess matches; an escalating international crisis unfolds in the Situation Room; and Josh and Donna (Janel Moloney) lead a preachy lesson in fictitious American political history that is so well written it feels like it should be real. There is even an escalating prank war between CJ and Charlie, for a dash of humor.
11. “Shibboleth” (Season 2, Episode 8)
The comedy of Allison Janney using a flashbulb to test how photogenic two turkeys named Troy and Eric are is still a Top 5 CJ moment from the series. As Thanksgiving approaches, CJ keeps the two turkeys in her office as finalists for the president’s ceremonial pardon (which is a real thing!). But her guilt over sending Troy to the dinner table ends with the president drafting the turkey into the military, kind of. If that wasn’t enough comedy gold, this is also the episode in which Bartlet calls the Butterball hotline for tips on stuffing recipes and fumbles his attempt to sound like an average citizen from Fargo, North Dakota. Seriously, the episode is funnier than an entire season of “The Bear.” For those still hungry for a helping of melodrama, we encourage you to revisit the heartwarming scene when Bartlet gives Charlie a carving knife given to his family by Paul Revere!
10. “Twenty Five” (Season 4, Episode 23)
“You are relieved, Mr. President.” After four years of letting the sage wisdom of Jed Bartlet guide viewers through a host of domestic and international conflicts, those five words hit like a gut punch. Following the news that Zoey has been kidnapped, Bartlet invokes the 25th Amendment, temporarily stepping down from the presidency to focus on her safe return It allows the starkly opposed Republican Speaker of the House, Glen Allen Walken (John Goodman) to assume the top job, and he wastes no time in dismissing his predecessor. It was one of the darkest finales the show ever produced, and that’s saying something considering Season 1 ended with gunfire. In “The West Wing’s” mission to engage viewers about the importance of government and the chain of command, this startling shift of power was sobering, to say the least. It also served as Sorkin’s final statement on the series: After four seasons, Sorkin left because of “creative differences,” and executive producer John Wells (“ER”) took over for the rest of its run.
9. “Dead Irish Writers” (Season 3, Episode 15)
Who doesn’t love a good birthday party with 300 of your closest friends demanding your attention on the eve of an ethics hearing that will strip you of your medical license in front of the entire country? That is what Abbey faces in this lively episode that won Channing an Emmy. While Abbey spends much of the series fluttering in and out of the White House, this episode was a reminder that she, too, made sacrifices in order for her husband to take the top job. By the end of the episode, she has forfeited her license for the remainder of his presidency, due to her role in hiding his MS diagnosis. But not before drunkenly commiserating with CJ, Donna (who learns she is technically a Canadian citizen) and Amy with a few bottles of wine in the residence. By the time she has the band play “O Canada” to soften the sting of Donna’s true nationality, it’s hard not to love the First Lady.
8. “In Excelsis Deo” (Season 1, Episode 10)
After a homeless Korean War veteran is found dead wearing a coat he donated to Goodwill, Toby finds himself drawn into the man’s story, and somewhat misguidedly wields his proximity to the president to get the man a proper funeral at Arlington National Cemetery. In a show of “The West Wing’s” instantaneous popularity, the moving burial scene was filmed on location at Arlington with the cooperation of the United States Department of Defense. But what’s most memorable about the Christmas episode is the unexpected pairing of Toby and the president’s secretary, Mrs. Landingham (Kathryn Joosten), who reveals she lost her sons in Korea and joins him for the man’s funeral.
7. “Bartlet for America” (Season 3, Episode 9)
Viewers repeatedly got to see senior staff reaffirm their commitment to the president throughout the series, but this episode’s focus on Leo’s own past with Bartlet was an essential piece of the puzzle. Facing the firing squad of the United States House Committee on Oversight and Reform over the president’s MS coverup, Leo flashes back to the moment when he first approached the then-New Hampshire governor about running –– a future he scribbled on the back of a napkin in three words, “Bartlet for America.” Coupled with scenes of Leo’s relapse with alcohol on the night of Bartlet’s third debate and the reverberating consequences, it illustrated the complicated road these two men walked all the way to the White House — and Spencer’s performance is tremendous. Tell us you didn’t join Leo in sobbing when the president gave him the framed napkin for Christmas.
6. “17 People” (Season 2, Episode 18)
The president’s MS diagnosis and the subsequent cover up while he ran for and served in office dominated the series in its early seasons. As a narrative device, it was at its most effective in installments like this, when an ever-inquisitive Toby deduces something is going on. It forces Bartlet and Leo to make him the 17th person aware of his condition. Whereas most of those previously told people were largely supportive of the president’s efforts to keep it under wraps, Toby outwardly detests the predicament it puts everyone in. His sound, albeit insensitive, objections strike such a cord with Bartlet, he will end up confessing to the nation four episodes later. Infamously soft-spoken until the time called for it, Toby knew this was one of those moments.
5. “20 Hours in America” (Season 4, Episodes 1 and 2)
The series was never more confidently funny than when it stranded Josh, Donna and Toby in the land that Daylight Saving Time forgot (aka, a Republican county in Indiana). With the assistance of guest stars Amy Adams and John Gallagher Jr., they make their way back to Washington by truck, train and automobile –– all while being forced to work out their differences on debate strategy as they move through the “real America” on the road. It is on the nose, sure. But paired with quieter moments in the White House (Bartlet steering clear of stock market superstitions) and heavier stories among the staff (CJ deals with the aftermath of Simon’s death), it is a remarkably well-balanced one-two punch season opener.
4. “Let Bartlet Be Bartlet” (Season 1, Episode 19)
Few episodes were as consequential as this come-to-Jesus moment in the series’ freshman run when an internal memo questions the president’s effectiveness because of his timid nature. It forces the Bartlet administration to take a long, hard look at itself and what it wants to do while in office, effectively changing the course of the entire series with Leo’s new mandate to let the staff and the president off the leash. “Let Bartlet Be Bartlet” became the credo with which the administration handled the next term and a half. For better or worse, it started here.
3. “Noël” (Season 2, Episode 10)
Christmas episodes often find it hard to resist using the classics like “It’s A Wonderful Life” and “A Christmas Carol” to teach their characters some eleventh-hour lessons. But for this Season 2 holiday outing, Josh has anything but a silent night as he is forced to confront the fact that he has a worsening case of PTSD from being shot during the attempted assassination in Season 1. Watching Whitford push and pull against recurring trauma specialist Dr. Stanley Keyworth (Adam Arkin) was riveting and heartbreaking for a character that typically provided levity to the series. But Whitford proved he had the range. In Josh’s defense, anyone of us would have buckled under the racket of carolers singing nonstop indoors 50 feet from your office.
2. “In the Shadow of Two Gunmen” (Season 2, Episodes 1 and 2)
This two-part season opener is a staggering feat of television, because in addition to picking back up with the aftermath of a shootout on the president and his staff, it also serves as an extended origin story for nearly every major character and their first foray into the Bartlet orbit. The way the show finds each person siloed in their natural habitat before they became part of the team is absorbing and fascinating, and made all the more stark each time it jumps back to the emergency room as doctors try to save the president’s and Josh’s lives. The collision of a past ripe with potential and a present fueled by chaos is “The West Wing” as its most dramatic and compulsively watchable.
1. “Two Cathedrals” (Season 2, Episode 22)
Every great TV series has that one episode that checks all the boxes. It’s expertly written, masterfully directed and brilliantly acted. “The West Wing” hit that trifecta with the end of Season 2. There was a lot going on: Bartlet, Abbey and the staff are preparing to reveal his MS to the country (and manage the aftermath) when his beloved and long-time secretary Mrs. Landingham is killed by a drunk driver after buying her new car.
Tragedy galvanizes people. It cripples them, and builds them back up. The loss of Mrs. Landingham, the woman who kept Bartlet’s head on straight for the better part of his life, did all the above to the president. We see why it is so devastating through flashbacks to his days as a college student struggling to find his voice against his abusive father (played by Lawrence O’Donnell — now an MSNBC host, then an ex-political adviser turned “West Wing” writer), for whom she first worked. But it’s in his grief that the notably devout Catholic curses God in protest of Mrs. Landingham’s tragic end — and does it in Latin, no less — before lighting up and stomping out a cigarette on the church floor, a nod to the childish whims of his youth. It’s a blazingly vulnerable performance from Martin Sheen, who carries the momentum through to the end, leaving the audience and America quite literally hanging on his decision whether or not to seek reelection. Shockingly, Sheen never won an Emmy for the series despite getting six nominations (though Whitford, Schiff and Spencer all picked up statues for other episodes on this list). But his work is undeniable. If there is a single moment when “The West Wing” became one of the greatest shows of all time, this was it.
Adam B. Vary contributed to this list.
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