When the West Wing ended last year, I wasn’t quite sure what to do with myself for intelligent TV. Aaron Sorkin’s brilliant show, political fantasy la-la land for liberals the world over, I was in heaven. I’d have voted for Jed Bartlett in a second. Why can’t we have politicians like that, for real?

But I digress. The end of the West Wing was the end of an era, much like when Angel ended. With Buffy, Angel and Firefly We’d had a total of 12 and a half glorious seasons of Joss Whedon – the golden days of Camelot – and then there was little to fill the gap, except perhaps Battlestar Galactica and the West Wing.

I’d not even considered that Aaron Sorkin (the writer and creator of West Wing) might “pull a Joss”. That is, go on to create another show for me to fall in love with. Well, I think he might have done just that. I just watched the first episode of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, and I can say, this will be one to keep in your RSS feed, TiVo, VCR, whatever.

It’s a show about a political satire comedy sketch TV show which has been losing its satire and becoming just as plasticcy and ho-hum as most of the other programming out there. In the opening minutes of the first episode of Studio 60, the fictional show’s producer walks onto the set in the middle of a live broadcast and starts mouthing off in true Aaron Sorkin style about what a pile of dogshit the show and the network in general have become, pandering to religious zealots, and creating theme tunes to a war overseas which makes no sense. This ballsy, gutsy rant made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, and I was sold on this show.

Folk in the US – watch this show. Others who can obtain by more nefarious means – do so. Spread the word, cause this show from the same stable as the West Wing (with a few welcome familiar faces – Bradley Whitford who played Josh Lyman, and CJ’s beau whose real or character’s name I can never remember) is gonna make you happy.

Instead of writing political lefty fantasy in Washington, Sorkin’s writing clever entertainment fantasy in Los Angeles, and you’re gonna love it!