6 reasons why The Newsroom is Aaron Sorkin's worst show yet

The celebrated West Wing and Social Network scribe stumbles with his new HBO drama, which critics blast as self-important, preachy, and exhausting

 Jeff Daniels as Will McAvoy in "The Newsroom"
(Image credit: HBO/John P. Johnson)

Aaron Sorkin and HBO seemed like an unbeatable match. Sorkin is the Emmy- and Oscar-winning scribe behind The West Wing and The Social Network. HBO is the renowned network that aired The Sopranos and The Wire. The mere fact of the pairing sent expectations skyrocketing for The Newsroom, Sorkin's new HBO drama about behind-the-scenes tensions at a cable news program, which premieres Sunday night. Dismayed critics, however, have lambasted the series as "obvious and self-congratulatory… manipulative and shrieky" — a rare miss for the lauded writer who's also behind the heralded Sports Night and polarizing-but-still-admired Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. Here, six reasons The Newsroom fails to measure up to Sorkin's best work:

1. Sorkin's once charming dialogue has become self-important

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