(This is a merging of the original two articles and an update that made up my look at the 2002 Fall TV Season (9/23/02, 10/28/02 and 3/21/03.) One, in September, came before most shows had aired. It was more a preview, sharing what I expected, good or bad, based on a show's premise and the people involved. The second, in October, offered reviews of those and the ones that started late. As I combine them and post this to the web in 2003, I'm adding some comments but not attempting to update them all. Many stand as reviews of the shows at that point. Hope you find some of this interesting or useful. Feel free to pass it along to anyone you think might be interested, as long as you include attribution or, better, point them to the site. The footnotes/endnotes are nothing fancy. (A bit of explanation about why it's either. As originally conceived, this article had footnotes, but when I converted it to HTML, they became endnotes in that version.) When you click an endnote number it takes you to that endnote at the bottom of the document; then to get back to your place, you can click the endnote number down there or hit Back in your browser.)

There are shows that matter, shows that are thought-provoking and shows that are just fun. The list of shows that matter — shows that affect our culture, our politics and our views — is short. The West Wing …

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