‘The Morning Show’ returns to portray one doomsday scenario of a legacy media giant in the digital age

Category: Television and Streaming

Inspired by Brian Stetler’s 2013 nonfiction book Top of the Morning: Inside the Cutthroat World of Morning TV about the cutthroat politics of morning television, Apple TV+ The Morning Show examines on- and off-camera drama and specific culture behind a network broadcast morning news program.

Its 2019 debut season was concerned mostly with the infighting between ‘America’s Sweetheart’ Alex Levy (Jennifer Aniston) and Bradley Jackson (Reese Witherspoon), a spitfire crusader field reporter from Texas who happened to be at the right place at the right time. After unmasking Alex’s former co-anchor, Mitch Kessler (Steve Carell), as a serial sexual predator, the show explored the repercussions for his victims as well as for those at UBA who ignored, enabled, or colluded in his despicable behavior. It ended with Alex and Bradley making explosive on-air revelations about UBA’s sexually toxic work environment. 

Set in the first three months of 2020, the second season (2021) dealt with the aftermath of Mitch’s dismissal, the changes wrought by #MeToo movement on UBA, and a wrongful-death suit filed against the network by a victim’s family. In the midst of a once-in-a-century Covid-19 pandemic, the reckoning was coming for many of the characters, but the show zeroed in on Alex’s epic freakouts triggered by obsessional fears of being canceled for her complicity with the disgraced co-anchor. When she was quarantined, she had all the time in the world to reflect on how fame, power, and privilege had corrupted her.

The highly-anticipated third season mirrors an unprecedented and profound sea change developing in the TV industry in the digital age. It asks the pressing question: Should a billionaire with an outsized aversion to the press be handed keys to a legacy media company at a time when truth matters more than ever? Who’s going to be a savior of UBA? Or a champion of the free press?

On the verge of financial ruin as a result of investing big bucks on its streaming service, UBA CEO Cory Ellison (Billy Crudup) seeks out Hyperion CEO Paul Marks (John Hamm), a narcissistic billionaire with a God complex à la Elon Musk, to negotiate the sale of the network. Titanic’s Captain Cory is the kind of captain who would be the first to abandon ship leaving his crew and passengers behind, but he is confident that he can outsmart the corporate bully. Paul is a deep-pocketed disruptor/predator with abundant resources who wants to change or entirely displace UBA with innovative technologies and make the old way of doing business obsolete. Those who attempt to expose or challenge his autocratic management style will be silenced, period. Cut from the same cloth, the two egomaniacs engage in back-stabbing power plays.

Since her on-camera talent future is bleak (might be replaced by AI), Alex believes she can shake things up if only the network pays her dues. Her ambition and drive to lead UBA to a better future puts her on a collision course with Machiavellian CEO Cory. On top of that, romantic entanglements among star-crossed quartet breed conflicts, resentments, and complications and invite passive-aggressive retaliation. Is Alex capable of speaking truth to power?

Things are going well for Bradley; she is now anchoring the evening news, wins a journalism award for her January 6 iPhone reporting, and moves into a huge apartment. However, her deep-rooted rescuer/fixer habit of overprotecting her ‘family’ frequently brings about calamities from within and without with ripple effects felt in the love triangle among Bradley, Your Day America (YDA) anchor-reporter Laura Peterson (Julianna Margulies), and Cory who loves ‘in his own way.’

No TV show has ever been this unflinchingly and brutally honest about the current predicament the legacy media faces. Although I enjoyed a hostile takeover and boardroom drama à la Succession, it is a little too close to home for this digital immigrant who turned her TV addiction/passion to profession two decades ago — the Second Golden Age of Television. 

The writing has been on the wall for the old system for quite some time, but the final nail in the coffin for me was a TV industry veteran’s prediction that in the near future there will be Apple, Amazon, Netflix, and one other  platform (possibly NBCUniversal, Warners, and Paramount combined) about a month ago. The digital natives might roll their eyes and utter “Yeah whatever,” but this existential crisis is all too real for a dying breed who grew up watching linear television — Broadcasting and Cable TV — where content is delivered according to a predetermined schedule to all viewers at the same time.

Trust me I’m not one of those Chicken Littles telling you the sky is falling. I know for sure the end is nigh! I wish the show carries a disclaimer about the disturbing acquisition scenario informing “WARNING: This is not a drill.” Unfortunately, the ‘unsinkable’ Titanic is going down fast and there’s nothing I can do about it, but to grieve the greatest loss of my life.

The 10-episode third season of The Morning Show returns on Wednesday, September 13, 2023 with the first two episodes, followed by new episodes every Wednesday through November 8, 2023.

About the Author

Meg Mimura is a TV critic who actually watches shows zealously in search of thought-provoking and paradigm shifting human drama worth our precious time. She is a member of Television Critics Association. Follow her on Twitter.