The Battle of TV Vice Presidents Has Begun
Veep premiered last night and it’s pretty good, you should check it out. Armando Ianucci is brilliant as always (If you haven’t seen In the Loop yet, you need to check that out as well) as is Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who is probably locked in to a deserved Emmy nom already.
I’m sure we’ll have more coverage of Veep as the season goes on, if only because I’m already tired of disparaging that other new HBO comedy that I actually like quite a bit. But something completely different that I find interesting: We now have two major shows featuring vice presidents of the United States as main characters, Veep and Homeland. And as I love comparing apples and pomegranates, this naturally means that the two shows will be locked in a bitter TV vice president face-off for the near future.
Being only one episode in with Veep, I shouldn’t be making judgements this early. But as of now, this is starting out as a blowout. Would either Veep’s Selina Meyer or Homeland’s William Walden make good real life vice presidents? No. Very much no. But Veep at least plays its governmental incompetence for laughs, whereas Walden is the worst part of his show. On top of being a shallow two-dimensional dick, he seems to control the entire United States defense infrastructure, which seems rather odd for a VP (even in the post Cheney era). If there is anything that should make people worried about Homeland’s second season, it’s the fact that the actor playing Walden, Jamey Sheridan, is being lifted to series regular.
But it’s early in the game. In the spirit of the NHL playoffs, right now we’re only 10 minutes into the first period but Veep already has a three goal lead. That’s a damn good start, but not insurmountable in this completely imaginary contest that I just made up.
One caveat: If Futurama’s Headless Body of Agnew ever shows up again, all bets are off.
