"Tell Spike Lee to sit down and shut up"

I've been waiting for 10 years to hear Aaron Sorkin and Tommy Schlamme's commentary on Sports Night. A couple weeks ago the tenth anniversary edition DVDs came out and I finally got my wish.

Sports Night is, by far, my favorite television show ever. If you know me, you know that saying something is my favorite anything is a rarity. My favorite food, or movie, or band, or song, or book...if you ask me about any of these things I'm more likely to give you a top ten list...or top twenty. I love television and always have so I could probably give you a top fifty list of my favorite television shows. I could tell you what my favorite currently airing shows are (Chuck and How I Met Your Mother). I could tell you what, in order, what my favorite shows were every year of my childhood. First came Sesame Street which was my favorite for several years (more than most, in fact Sesame Street was my first and only guilty pleasure, the first and last time I ever cared enough to hide what I liked from people for fear of what they'd think). After Sesame Street came the Nick at Night years (Gilligan's Island and Get Smart were among my favorites then), then I got really into reruns of Taxi and Three's Company because my local station had them on every night, then came Family Ties, then Growing Pains, then for several years The Wonder Years (in fact, until Sports Night came along The Wonder Years was my all time favorite show), after that was Sea Quest DSV, then Dawson's Creek, then Sports Night...I've had other seasonal favorites since then (Veronica Mars actually gave Sports Night a run for its money). But ask me what my favorite show of all time is and the answer, without hesitation, is Sports Night.

I loved A Few Good Men, and The American President, and if, at the time, I were the type of person to notice the writing credits on movies and shows I liked I could have guessed I'd like Sports Night, but I don't think I could ever have guessed how much I would like it.

Wordy wouldn't be an inaccurate label for Aaron Sorkin's writing and, as such, my appreciation for his work is predictable. He's not just wordy though, he doesn't just use a lot of words, he uses better than anyone else and he manages to make each word drip with subtext so that, if possible, the things his characters don't say, say as much or more than the things they do say.

So, I've been waiting, for ten years, to hear him his commentary and it's finally here. I'm really hoping he explains his bizarre fascination with Zamfir (master of the Pan flute).