# List of The Newsroom episodes

The Newsroom is an American television drama series created by Aaron Sorkin, which premiered on the premium cable network HBO on June 24, 2012. The series concluded on December 14, 2014, and consists of 25 episodes over three seasons.
Jeff Daniels stars as Atlantis Cable News anchor Will McAvoy, who takes a mandatory leave of absence after a public tirade about America's shortcomings during a political debate. Upon his return, he discovers that most of his staff have quit. Seeing an opportunity to return to the glory days of televised news instead of ratings-driven infotainment, his boss Charlie Skinner (Sam Waterston) has hired Will's ex-girlfriend MacKenzie McHale (Emily Mortimer) as the new executive producer. McHale shares Skinner's vision of TV news, and she and Will immediately butt heads. The series is executive produced by Aaron Sorkin, Scott Rudin, and Alan Poul.

## Series overview

| Season | Episodes | Episodes | Originally aired | Originally aired |
| Season | Episodes | Episodes | First aired | Last aired |
| 1 | 10 | 10 | June 24, 2012 (2012-06-24) | August 26, 2012 (2012-08-26) |
| 2 | 9 | 9 | July 14, 2013 (2013-07-14) | September 15, 2013 (2013-09-15) |
| 3 | 6 | 6 | November 9, 2014 (2014-11-09) | December 14, 2014 (2014-12-14) |

## Episodes
### Season 1 (2012)

| No. overall | No. in season | Title | Directed by | Written by | Original air date | US viewers (millions) |
| 1 | 1 | "We Just Decided To" | Greg Mottola | Aaron Sorkin | June 24, 2012 (2012-06-24) | 2.14 |
| After delivering a public speech on America's shortcomings as a nation during a question and answer session at Northwestern University, acclaimed Atlantis Cable News (ACN) anchor Will McAvoy (Jeff Daniels) returns to his job to find that most of his staff have left or are leaving, and that his new executive producer is his ex-girlfriend, MacKenzie McHale (Emily Mortimer). His boss, Charlie Skinner (Sam Waterston) explains that he has hired McHale to build on Will's performance at Northwestern and create a new, improved version of ACN News. Breaking news about a potentially disastrous oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico hits. McHale's choice for her number two, Jim Harper (John Gallagher, Jr.), ascertains that the oil leak (the Deepwater Horizon oil spill) is uncappable and will flood the Gulf of Mexico. He lobbies for that to be the focus of any reporting rather than the search for survivors since the environmental disaster is the larger and more important story. News Night does an hour show on the event, interviewing sources that no other network had on-air. MacKenzie tells Jim that he should romance Maggie Jordan (Alison Pill) even though (or possibly because) Maggie is going out with departing News Night producer Don Keefer (Thomas Sadoski). MacKenzie promotes Maggie from Will's assistant to an associate producer. The opening scene at Northwestern takes place on March 30, 2010, the rest of the episode takes place on April 20, 2010. |||||||
| 2 | 2 | "News Night 2.0" | Alex Graves | Aaron Sorkin | July 1, 2012 (2012-07-01) | 1.68 |
| Mac asserts control over the new incarnation of News Night and enlists on-air economist, Sloan Sabbith (Olivia Munn), to do a nightly segment. Jim takes the fall for Maggie's mistake when doing the prep work for a report on SB 1070. Charlie (Sam Waterston) forbids company president Reese (Chris Messina) from continuing his furtive meeting with Will, and MacKenzie unwittingly informs the team of her infidelity from years earlier. Takes place on April 23, 2010. |||||||
| 3 | 3 | "The 112th Congress" | Greg Mottola | Aaron Sorkin & Gideon Yago | July 8, 2012 (2012-07-08) | 2.21 |
| While doing an editorial, Will apologizes for previous newscasts and promises his viewers a better show, which angers the CEO of ACN's parent company. Jim helps Maggie when she suffers a panic attack. Don presents 10 o'clock anchor Elliot (David Harbour) with a challenge. Takes place on November 3, 2010. Flashbacks take place between April and November 2010. |||||||
| 4 | 4 | "I'll Try to Fix You" | Alan Poul | Aaron Sorkin | July 15, 2012 (2012-07-15) | 1.94 |
| Will becomes tabloid fodder after a confrontation with a gossip columnist on New Year's Eve, which threatens to undermine his credibility on a current news investigation. Don urges Maggie to set Jim up on a date with her roommate, Mac's boyfriend pitches a story about the government's inability to prosecute financial crimes and Neal (Dev Patel) tries out his Bigfoot theory on anyone who will listen. Concludes with coverage of the shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. Takes place between December 31, 2010, and January 8, 2011. |||||||
| 5 | 5 | "Amen" | Daniel Minahan | Aaron Sorkin | July 22, 2012 (2012-07-22) | 1.95 |
| While covering the forced ejection of Egypt's president, the team learns of a protest in Madison, Wisconsin, that is condemning the Governor's plan to balance the budget to the detriment of teachers and other public sector union employees, leading everyone to try to cover the stories simultaneously. Will becomes convinced of a conspiracy by the Koch brothers to "rig the system" in their favor by fighting for Citizens United and then abolishing the Unions. Takes place between February 10 and February 14, 2011. |||||||
| 6 | 6 | "Bullies" | Jeremy Podeswa | Aaron Sorkin | July 29, 2012 (2012-07-29) | 1.74 |
| Sloan pinch-hits on Elliot's 10:00 pm show during the Fukushima nuclear crisis following the devastating earthquake, but she puts the network in jeopardy by revealing an off-the-record conversation during her on-air Q&A of a Tokyo power company representative. Also, Will battles insomnia which leads to a revealing therapy session, as he admits to bullying an aide to presidential candidate Rick Santorum during an interview. Takes place between April 11 and April 13, 2011. |||||||
| 7 | 7 | "5/1" | Joshua Marston | Aaron Sorkin | August 5, 2012 (2012-08-05) | 1.76 |
| During a party at Will's apartment Charlie receives a call from an anonymous source telling him that he will receive an email from the White House Press Secretary. The email informs him of an impending nationwide presidential address. Will, who is high after eating a large share of marijuana cookies, joins the team as it races to the ACN newsroom to discover what the address will be about, and some assume it is to announce the death of Osama bin Laden. The news that bin Laden has been killed by American special forces is soon confirmed and Will, still high on marijuana, is able to report it. A portion of Obama's speech announcing bin Laden's death aired at the end of the episode, and an additional portion of the audio was played over the credits. Takes place on May 1, 2011. |||||||
| 8 | 8 | "The Blackout Part I: Tragedy Porn" | Lesli Linka Glatter | Aaron Sorkin | August 12, 2012 (2012-08-12) | 1.84 |
| The ratings for News Night are in free fall after choosing not to cover a pair of popular tabloid stories. Will and Mac are forced to find a way to bring enough viewers back to justify ACN's quest to air a Republican debate. Will considers writers for an all-access profile, Sloan is upset by the lack of coverage of the emerging debt-ceiling crisis, and Charlie learns the identity of NSA whistleblower codenamed "Late for Dinner". Takes place between May 27, 2011, and June 1, 2011. |||||||
| 9 | 9 | "The Blackout Part II: Mock Debate" | Alan Poul | Aaron Sorkin | August 19, 2012 (2012-08-19) | 1.96 |
| A blackout interrupts the interview with a witness who can bring congressman Anthony Weiner's career to an inglorious end. Afterward, it is showtime as Will and the crew preview their new debate format for Republican Party officials, Adam Roth (Adam Arkin) and Tate Brady (Jake McDorman). Jim begins the vetting process for Solomon Hancock, the NSA whistle-blower. Lisa (Kelen Coleman) goes off script during an on-air interview, while Neal begins his trolling assignment. Takes place between June 1 and June 3, 2011. |||||||
| 10 | 10 | "The Greater Fool" | Greg Mottola | Aaron Sorkin | August 26, 2012 (2012-08-26) | 2.30 |
| The title of the episode alludes to the greater fool theory. Will suffers an acute case of bleeding from a stomach ulcer and is hospitalized. There, he learns that an elderly black Tennessee resident will not be able to vote because of recently passed voter ID laws in 33 states; this is then the main story when he returns to News Night. Charlie tells the NSA whistle blower, Solomon Hancock, that he cannot use him because he is "contaminated"; later, Hancock commits suicide by throwing himself off the Queensboro Bridge. Sloan tries to draw attention to congressional intransigence on the debt ceiling and ponders a job offer. Everything is overshadowed by a showdown long in the making. It finally explodes as Will, Mac and Charlie confront Leona (Jane Fonda) and Reese during a volatile lunch meeting. TMI gossip columnist Nina Howard (Hope Davis) has information that can destroy Will's career and life by revealing that he was high during the bin Laden report. That bombshell is defused, however, when it is revealed that the magazine obtained the information through hacking MacKenzie's voicemail. Takes place between August 1 and August 8, 2011. |||||||

### Season 2 (2013)

| No. overall | No. in season | Title | Directed by | Written by | Original air date | US viewers (millions) |
| 11 | 1 | "First Thing We Do, Let's Kill All the Lawyers" | Alan Poul | Story by : Ian Reichbach and Aaron Sorkin Teleplay by : Aaron Sorkin | July 14, 2013 (2013-07-14) | 2.22 |
| Will describes the events of the past year while in a deposition with ACN lawyer Rebecca Halliday (Marcia Gay Harden), and they are briefly interrupted by Maggie, whose hair is now very short, unevenly cut and bright red. Reese Lansing is denied entry to a House committee hearing on SOPA due to Will's comments on the Tea Party as "the American Taliban". Jim Harper assigns himself as ACN's correspondent for the Mitt Romney presidential campaign to get away from Maggie because of his feelings for her. To replace him, Mac calls Jerry Dantana (Hamish Linklater), a producer for ACN's Washington D.C. bureau. Maggie is living with Don, but the two break up after Don discovers a video of Maggie declaring her love for Jim (from the Season 1 finale) posted online. Cyrus West, one of the panelists for News Night, gives Jerry Dantana a tip about a black ops mission called Operation Genoa. Takes place between August 23 and September 12, 2011. |||||||
| 12 | 2 | "The Genoa Tip" | Jeremy Podeswa | Story by : Dana Ledoux Miller & Adam R. Perlman and Aaron Sorkin Teleplay by : Aaron Sorkin | July 21, 2013 (2013-07-21) | 1.88 |
| Jim meets Hallie Shea (Grace Gummer), an embedded reporter with the Romney campaign. Charlie Skinner takes Will off the 9/11 tenth anniversary story because of his American Taliban comment, and Will is condemned on the House floor as a result. Maggie and Sloan track down the person who posted the YouTube video of Maggie's confession about Jim in front of the Sex and the City tour bus, and try to make a deal with her to take it down. However, Maggie's best friend Lisa, (Kelen Coleman) discovers the video and decides to end their friendship. Maggie wants to do a story in Africa and pitches it to Mac. Don tries to convince Will to strengthen coverage of the Troy Davis execution. Jerry Dantana tells Mac about Operation Genoa, a mission allegedly conducted by Marine Special Operations (MARSOC) to rescue two captured Marines by using sarin gas against the enemy. Neal is arrested while filming an Occupy Wall Street protest, and Will goes to the police station to bail him out. Takes place between August 25 and September 21, 2011. |||||||
| 13 | 3 | "Willie Pete" | Lesli Linka Glatter | Story by : Michael Gunn & Elizabeth Peterson and Aaron Sorkin Teleplay by : Aaron Sorkin | July 28, 2013 (2013-07-28) | 1.80 |
| Will meets Nina Howard, a gossip columnist, to convince her not to publish a story about him being taken off the 9/11 anniversary broadcast. Jerry and Mac meet Gunnery Sergeant Eric Sweeney who confirms the Genoa story. They take the story to Charlie Skinner. Maggie prepares to leave for Africa. Neal struggles to convince Mac to do a story on Occupy Wall Street (OWS), but Mac is eventually convinced and allows Neal to find an OWS member for an on-air interview with Will. On the Romney press bus, Jim voices his disgust at the limited answers he receives from the Romney campaign spokespeople, and the lack of questions being asked by the other reporters. Hallie musters the courage to start asking hard questions after Jim's rant. Jim and Hallie, along with a third reporter, Stillman (Cameron Gharaee), are kicked off the press bus after Jim fails to convince the rest of the reporters to take a stand with them. Jerry assembles a team to continue researching Genoa and their search eventually leads to a source who seems to have described the entire event on Twitter. Takes place between September 23 and September 30, 2011. |||||||
| 14 | 4 | "Unintended Consequences" | Carl Franklin | Aaron Sorkin | August 4, 2013 (2013-08-04) | 1.62 |
| Rebecca Halliday interviews Maggie about the events of the past year, hoping to establish her credibility as a witness to an interview she conducted as part of Genoa. Maggie and another producer, Gary Cooper (Chris Chalk) leave for Africa. They go to an orphanage in Uganda to do a PR story about the work of US troops. While there, Maggie befriends a little boy named Daniel. After the soldiers leave and the reporters are left at the orphanage overnight, armed cattle raiders arrive and loudly demand their camera in Lugisu. Daniel is shot and killed while Maggie is carrying him on her back as they evacuate. Maggie explains that, after the incident, the trip was cut short, and she was sent home to be debriefed by HR and to undergo psychiatric evaluation. She admits that she was shaken by the incident, particularly as the bullet that killed Daniel would almost certainly have killed her had he not been on her back, but insists that she does not have posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Remembering Maggie's recollection of Daniel playing with her blonde hair, Rebecca curses as she realises that Maggie had cut it herself after having a flashback to that moment, something that would cast doubt on her mental state. Will interviews Shelly (Aya Cash), one of the Occupy Wall Street protesters and embarrasses her on air. Jerry and Neal learn that she knows a person who may have knowledge of Genoa, but she will not lead them to the person until Will apologizes. After Sloan and Don exacerbate the situation, Shelly gets a visit from Will, who admits he deliberately went for her in order to dispel rumours of bias; then reveals that they have already found the source; he gives the team a report he wrote for an NGO, where he documents the use of chemical weapons. Jim is insulted by the Romney Campaign's spokesperson, Taylor Warren (Constance Zimmer), and is offered a 30-minute exclusive interview with Mitt Romney, but gives it to Hallie. Takes place between September 30 and October 3, 2011. |||||||
| 15 | 5 | "News Night with Will McAvoy" | Alan Poul | Aaron Sorkin | August 11, 2013 (2013-08-11) | 1.82 |
| Bombs explode in Syria and a couple pretending to be victims of the blast prank call the station. Nude photos of Sloan are leaked online by a disgruntled former boyfriend. She confronts him, punches him in the face, and takes a photo. A Rutgers student, about to be interviewed by Will, posts on Twitter that he will announce he is gay while on the show and Mac stops him from going on when a mistake is made in a report on the shooting of Trayvon Martin. Don tries to correct a statement he made to a reporter at WorldNetDaily. A confidential source gives Charlie a cargo manifest from Operation Genoa that contains a classified item, which Charlie believes is sarin gas. Jim suspects Maggie (who is still shaken from her ordeal in Africa) is drunk at work. Will learns that his father has died. Takes place on March 16, 2012. |||||||
| 16 | 6 | "One Step Too Many" | Julian Farino | Aaron Sorkin | August 18, 2013 (2013-08-18) | 1.89 |
| The staff has its first Red Team meeting about Operation Genoa. Charlie Skinner says the story is not ready to air. The team finds another source for the Genoa story, former USMC Gen. Stomtonovich (Stephen Root). Charlie and Mac go to Maryland to meet him and he agrees to be interviewed. Jerry conducts the interview alone after Gen. Stomotonovich asks Maggie to leave the room, as he was not told in advance she would be present and has not had her checked out. Gen. Stomtonovich affirms the existence of sarin gas and his belief that its use may sometimes be justified, but does not say that it was used during Operation Genoa. On his return, Jerry edits the raw footage of the interview so that it appears the General said that sarin gas was used during the operation. After the interview, the staff holds a second Red Team meeting, where Charlie Skinner says the story is still not ready to air. Hallie arranges a double date for her and Jim with her friend and Neal. To Jim's dismay Taylor Warren, the Romney campaign spokesperson, tags along. Warren later reveals that she was recently fired. Will is concerned about his likability with the audience, has a focus group done, and at Nina Howard's urging, attempts to change his public image. Several months later, ACN gets a call from a Lance Corporal, thought to be dead, who was a member of the MARSOC team on Operation Genoa. Later, Charlie recounts his recollection of events to Rebecca Halliday and reveals that the story about Operation Genoa was not true. Takes place between March 21 and August 25, 2012. |||||||
| 17 | 7 | "Red Team III" | Anthony Hemingway | Aaron Sorkin | August 25, 2013 (2013-08-25) | 1.47 |
| The staff is being interviewed by Rebecca Halliday and recount how they all failed to discover the Genoa story was false. In a flash back to a few months ago, the third Red Team meeting is being conducted and Will is presented the story. Will reveals that he heard the same story from a source. Charlie says that the story is ready to air. ACN airs the story on September 9, 2012. The next day, revelations from various sources cause the staff to start questioning the story's accuracy. Mac is suspicious and reviews the tape of the interview with the General. She discovers that Jerry edited it and fires him. It is revealed that in addition to the edited interview, Cyrus West (the first source) has political ambitions and exaggerated Operation Genoa, Eric Sweeney (the second source) is discovered to have a traumatic brain injury, Charlie's source provided him with a fake manifest in order to get back at him for firing his son, who is dead (a result of a drug overdose suffered after relapsing when he was fired from ACN); the Lance Corporal, who was interviewed by Mac, was asked leading questions and merely repeated what he heard from Mac and other sources in the interview. Meanwhile, riots are beginning in Cairo because of an American film insulting Islam and a terrorist attack on the American consulate in Benghazi occurs. Will, Charlie, and Mac are all prepared to hand in their resignations to AWM CEO, Leona Lansing, but she rejects them. Takes place between September 9 and September 11, 2012. The final scene takes place in the early morning hours of November 6, 2012. |||||||
| 18 | 8 | "Election Night, Part I" | Jason Ensler | Aaron Sorkin | September 8, 2013 (2013-09-08) | 1.76 |
| Will, Charlie, and Mac are trying to convince Leona and her son Reese to accept their resignations. Taylor Warren, formerly with the Romney campaign, is on the ACN election night panel. She gives Maggie a tip about a candidate in California who has condemned Todd Akin, but made a similarly controversial statement several years ago about rape and abortion. The candidate's staff, in order to get ACN to not run the story, gives them a tip that CIA Director David Petraeus will resign because of an affair and that the Commander of US Forces in Afghanistan will be investigated for a relationship with a Florida socialite, who was receiving harassing e-mails from Petraeus' mistress. Sloan discovers a supposedly autographed copy of her book was sold at a charity auction, but she did not actually sign it and asks Neal to track down the buyer. Mac asks Neal to fix the information listed on her Wikipedia page which wrongly states that she was President of the Oxford Union when she actually went to Cambridge, but he has trouble finding an outside source to confirm the information. Don is told by Rebecca Halliday that he will be named in a separate lawsuit by Jerry Dantana. Jim accidentally calls a race too early and spends the night watching it, hoping he will end up being correct. Will tells Mac that her request to be fired at the end of the election night show will be granted. Takes place on Election Night, November 6, 2012. |||||||
| 19 | 9 | "Election Night, Part II" | Alan Poul | Aaron Sorkin | September 15, 2013 (2013-09-15) | 1.67 |
| ACN decides to proceed with the story about the candidate in California instead of the Petraeus story. Leona decides to let Reese make the decision on whether to accept the resignations of Will, Charlie, and Mac. Will learns that senior staff will also resign as a result of Genoa and tries to convince them not to. Hallie believes that Maggie cut her own hair and tells Jim of her concern. Jim discovers that his ex-girlfriend (Maggie's roommate, Lisa) has a second job working for a caterer at the campaign watch party. He meets Lisa and encourages her to return to speaking terms with Maggie. Sloan realizes that Don was the one who bought the book, gives him a signed copy, and kisses him. To fix Mac's Wikipedia page, Neal proposes a plan for Jim to give Hallie an article Neal has written under Hallie's name to confirm that Mac was President of the Cambridge Union. Hallie writes the article herself as a gift from "new media". Reese decides not to accept Will, Charlie, and Mac's resignations, but Will and Charlie have already decided not to resign. After Jim confronts her about the truth regarding what happened to Maggie's hair, Lisa begins to rebuild bridges with her. Will asks Mac to marry him and she accepts. The ACN staff celebrates. Takes place on Election Night, November 6, 2012. |||||||

### Season 3 (2014)

| No. overall | No. in season | Title | Directed by | Written by | Original air date | US viewers (millions) |
| 20 | 1 | "Boston" | Anthony Hemingway | Aaron Sorkin | November 9, 2014 (2014-11-09) | 1.21 |
| Experiencing a loss of viewer trust from the Genoa retraction, the news team treats a breaking story about the Boston Marathon bombing with guarded caution. Maggie and Elliot are sent to Boston, and after he has an allergic reaction, she steps in to report in impressive fashion. Sloan, using a computer program that allows her to review financial information in great detail, follows a tip from a friend about a company that may be bought out. Reese gives Sloan data showing heavy losses, but asks her to "be kind" and think big picture when she reports on the company. Neal is contacted by an anonymous source and given a file containing confidential and stolen documents regarding riots overseas. Neal asks his source to send two more documents, and teaches the source how to do it. When they learn of this, Reese, Neal, Charlie, Mac, and Will realize that Neal has likely and inadvertently assisted in committing espionage. Will, informed that ACN has dropped to fourth in the ratings, suggests that he quit. Sloan figures out that the company being taken over is AWM itself, and that they will be the victim of a hostile takeover by Reese's two half-siblings. Jim informs everyone that the second suspect in the bombing was found in a boat in someone's backyard, and Will replies that they need to get confirmation before he goes on the air to say that. Will backtracks on his resignation, stating that they will stand behind Reese, then tells Neal to get legal representation. Takes place between April 14 and April 19, 2013. |||||||
| 21 | 2 | "Run" | Greg Mottola | Aaron Sorkin | November 16, 2014 (2014-11-16) | 1.28 |
| Charlie and Reese confront Reese's half-siblings, Randy and Blair (Kat Dennings), about their hostile takeover. After some heated back-and-forth, Leona arrives and offers to buy their shares for a higher price. Neal and Will meet Rebecca Halliday to discuss Neal's legal situation and she confirms that he has committed espionage. She and Will agree that ACN should not run the story. Mac asks her friend, Molly (Mary McCormack), an FBI agent, about espionage charges and the media. Molly tells her that reporters are never charged with espionage but can be charged with contempt. Mac tells Rebecca, Will and Neal they have to run the story. Returning from Boston, Maggie overhears an EPA official, Richard (Paul Lieberstein), on the phone with a reporter, making off-the-record disparaging remarks about the President. Maggie reveals that she overheard, but Richard makes her feel that she has violated ethics and she tells him she won't use any of the story. Richard then gives her an exclusive story and a report that carbon dioxide levels are higher than they have been for millions of years. Don informs Sloan that he purchased stock prior to Sloan reporting it in a newscast. Sloan fears that this is illegal and that their relationship may be against the ACN handbook. Sloan inadvertently informs Jim that she has been sleeping with Don. Hallie sends a middle-of-the-night tweet from the ACN account making a joke in poor taste about the Boston Marathon and Republicans. Though she quickly deletes it, other news sources pick it up and Charlie fires her. After the ACN senior staff discuss Neal's situation with Rebecca, Will realizes that Neal has already confirmed a portion of the leak (concerning Equatorial Kundu), forcing ACN's hand. Will has Neal give him the name of his source, then tells him how to get out of town. As the FBI execute a search warrant on ACN computers, Molly informs Mac, Will and Charlie that Neal will likely be charged with espionage if he is found to have assisted the source in any way. Neal escapes the building, destroying his phone and the note Will gave him telling him to run. Takes place on April 20, 2013. |||||||
| 22 | 3 | "Main Justice" | Alan Poul | Story by : Jon Lovett & Aaron Sorkin Teleplay by : Aaron Sorkin | November 23, 2014 (2014-11-23) | 1.19 |
| The news team hollowly threaten to do a live broadcast of the FBI raid on the newsroom in order to persuade them to stand down, which works. Charlie is informed by Leona and Reese that to keep the company running they will need to sell ACN to Lucas Pruit (B. J. Novak), a young, idealistic libertarian billionaire. Don meets the new HR rep, Wyatt (Keith Powell), who believes Don and Sloan are in a relationship. Maggie's segment on the EPA report goes to air with Will interviewing Richard. However, the interview does not go well, as Richard continually remarks that the effect of human CO$_2$ emissions into the atmosphere is unchangeable. Will, Mac, Charlie, and Rebecca meet the Attorney General's representative in Washington to discuss Neal's situation, but Will does not offer up any information other than describing how he orchestrated much of the situation himself. At the White House Correspondents' Dinner, Charlie has a meeting with Lucas to discuss buying the network, Mac is approached by a woman named Lily (Clea DuVall) who says, and then confirms, that she is Neal's source, and Will is subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury. Takes place between April 20 and April 27, 2013. |||||||
| 23 | 4 | "Contempt" | Anthony Hemingway | Story by : Deborah Schoeneman & Aaron Sorkin Teleplay by : Aaron Sorkin | November 30, 2014 (2014-11-30) | 1.38 |
| Preparing to air the Kundu story, the team gets the first reporter who wrote the story, along with his family, out of the country safely. Mac has a meeting with Lily in Washington to ask her to extend the deadline to broadcast the story before she leaks it, but she does not promise to. The story is ready to air but Reese says they cannot run it. Instead, Don sends it to his former teacher who works for the Associated Press. Pruit tells the team his new vision for the company, including user-generated content, which Charlie does not like. Sloan and Don keep dodging the human resources rep, however he already knows they are dating and was merely amusing himself. Sloan and Charlie try to find another buyer for ACN, but are unsuccessful when they find out the new buyer has just been using them as leverage to buy another company. Jim and Hallie fight over their views of journalism and break up after she writes about a fight they had for her new online column. Will continues to defy the government by refusing to name the source of the stolen documents and is held in contempt and sentenced to jail. Before he goes to jail, he and Mac get married at the courthouse. Takes place between April 27 and May 3, 2013. |||||||
| 24 | 5 | "Oh Shenandoah" | Paul Lieberstein | Aaron Sorkin | December 7, 2014 (2014-12-07) | 1.36 |
| ACN continues its charge towards younger ratings by sending Don out to get a story on campus rape and the Internet reporting of rape, and having Sloan interview Neal's temporary replacement, Bree Dorritt, about ACN's new celebrity sighting/stalking app. Will, still serving his contempt detention for refusing to reveal his source, has a troubling conversation with a new cell mate (Kevin Rankin), who is later revealed to be Will's vision of his dead father. Jim and Maggie attempt a fruitless search for Edward Snowden at a Russian airport, eventually ending up on a false-alarm 13-hour plane flight. This, along with Maggie's constant badgering that Jim call Hallie to make amends, causes them to finally argue about their mutual attraction. Jim demands to know why Maggie hasn't recognised his feelings for her, and Maggie in turn confronts him over the fact that he had gone on to date Hallie despite having full knowledge that Don had broken up with her, and why. To escape the resulting awkwardness, Jim changes seats with another passenger, but Maggie, after thinking things through, eventually gets him to return to his original seat beside her so that she can kiss him. Sloan berates and condemns Bree's app on the air, and after the show, Pruit storms into the studio in a blind rage and demands Mac and Sloan's firing. Charlie informs Pruit that only he has the power to fire anyone and clashes with Don over his objection to interviewing a rape victim in front of the student she accused. On the way to talk about the situation privately, Charlie has a heart attack and newsroom staff run to his aid. As Will is released from prison, he is told by Mac that Charlie has died. Takes place between May 3 and June 24, 2013. |||||||
| 25 | 6 | "What Kind of Day Has It Been" | Alan Poul | Aaron Sorkin | December 14, 2014 (2014-12-14) | 1.62 |
| Set around Charlie's funeral service and wake, a series of flashbacks show how his vision created the new format for News Night, how he hired Mac, how Mac told the young student at Will's first episode question and answer scene how to be the first at the microphone to ask a question, how Charlie led Will into becoming a better journalist, and other pre-series situations including Don and Sloan's first meeting. Neal returns from Venezuela and is disappointed at how the new team is running ACN Digital and tells them they are going to rebuild it. Leona talks Pruit into rectifying his emerging negative image with women by hiring Mac as the network president, replacing Charlie. Mac and Will find out that she is pregnant, and Will quits smoking as a result. Mac makes Jim the show's executive producer after offering the job to Don, who chooses to stay with and improve the 10 o'clock news show. Jim arranges for Maggie to be offered a field producer's job in D.C. and Maggie has mixed feelings about this until she talks to Sloan. Jim also offers her the senior producer position but Maggie decides to take the job in D.C. Maggie questions why their relationship will succeed if Jim's previous long-distance relationships failed, and is caught off guard with his response: "I wasn't in love with them." The newsroom staff prepare and broadcast their next News Night. Takes place on June 27, 2013. Flashbacks take place three years earlier in 2010. |||||||

## Ratings

| Season | Season | Episode number | Episode number | Episode number | Episode number | Episode number | Episode number | Episode number | Episode number | Episode number | Episode number | Average |
| Season | Season | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | Average |
| | 1 | 2.14 | 1.68 | 2.21 | 1.94 | 1.95 | 1.74 | 1.76 | 1.84 | 1.96 | 2.30 | 1.95 |
| | 2 | 2.22 | 1.88 | 1.80 | 1.62 | 1.82 | 1.89 | 1.47 | 1.76 | 1.67 | – | 1.76 |
| | 3 | 1.21 | 1.28 | 1.19 | 1.38 | 1.36 | 1.62 | – | – | – | – | 1.34 |