The Wedding (The West Wing)

Infobox Television episode
Title = The Wedding
Series = The West Wing


Caption = Barlet waits to walk Ellie up the aisle
Season = 7
Episode = 141
Airdate = December 112005
Production = 2T6209
Writer = Josh Singer
Director = Max Mayer
Guests = Janeane Garofalo
Lily Tomlin
Nina Siemaszko
Ben Weber
Steve Ryan
John Aylward
Robert Foxworth
Matthew Del Negro
Diana-Maria Riva
Richard Jenik
Episode list = List of "The West Wing" episodes
Season list = Infobox The West Wing season 7 episode list
Prev =
Next ="The Wedding" is episode 141 of "The West Wing". On Ellie Barlet's wedding day, the Bartlet administration must deal with increasing tensions in Central Asia, while Josh has a lot of turbulence of his own as things are coming down to the wire for Matt Santos' Presidential campaign.

Plot

It's time for Ellie's White House wedding, but things may get derailed by the looming threat of war between Russia and China over the recent events in Kazakhstan. China is threatening to invade the country to remove the pro-Russian government that came about after a China-leaning President there was assassinated. Kate Harper and C.J. reach out to the Chinese President and just as it seems like he will order a military offensive, President Bartlet angrily asks if the Chinese President if he remembers his own daughter's wedding. When he's told "Yes", President Bartlet then asks if WWIII might just be delayed long enough for him to walk Ellie down the aisle. The Chinese President agrees to hold off on any actions for a few hours, and the wedding goes ahead as planned.

On the sidelines of the wedding, Ellie's poor husband-to-be is left in the Oval Office for a long time while the President rushes to prevent war in Central Asia. The President finally talks to him and comes away impressed that he's not Doug Westin 2.0. Ellie is exasperated for a different reason: Kate Harper has invited Will Bailey to the wedding as her date, after Ellie had him banned for vetting her guest list at the President's request.

Josh, meanwhile, has to face the competing demands of limited finance for Santos' advertising and demands from various Democrats for more funding in their Congressional races and key markets. A Congressman from Illinois repeatedly criticizes Josh's decisions and strongly suggests that Leo McGarry take over the campaign. Leo isn't interested in that, and when it looks like Matt Santos may be wavering, Leo kindly but firmly tells Santos that Josh has taken him as far as possible and it'll be his own decisions that lead to a victory--or a loss--in the Presidential election.

External links

* [http://epguides.com/WestWing/ The West Wing Episode Guide]