The Newsroom - The Complete Third Season

The veracity of television news is once again brought into question in the third and final season of "The Newsroom." This time around citizen journalism, social media and government pressure to reveal sources challenge the ACN team.

Acclaimed Atlantis Cable News (ACN), lead anchor Will McAvoy (Jeff Daniels) and executive producer MacKenzie McHale (Emily Mortimer) are still smarting from "Operation Genoa," a discreet black ops mission the team inaccurately covered, resulting in viewer mistrust. Consequently, they are gun shy when it comes time to report on the Boston Marathon bombings.

While the other networks are leading the ratings with their cavalier approach to journalism, the most wild and damaging misinformation is spread through the citizen "journalists" on social media, not only distorting information but hindering law enforcement.

Nevertheless, the public is uninterested in integrity (nor do they want to make the effort to turn on their television sets when someone will tweet them all the information they care to know), and ACN drops to fourth place in the ratings.

No one appreciates this like senior producer Jim Harper (John Gallagher, Jr.) whose new girlfriend gets fired from ACN for a sending a malicious tweet in McAvoy's name and lands a much better job delivering sensational social media. It makes Jim miss his old heartthrob Maggie Jordan (Alison Pill); now, there's a woman with integrity.

To make things worse, economic news anchor Sloan Sabbith (Olivia Munn) figures out that ACN's parent company will be the victim of a hostile takeover by president Reese Lansing's (Chris Messina) two half-siblings. Saving ACN from them will only happen by submitting the network to some radical changes.

All these things pale to the problems caused by a whistleblower, who leaks details of an atrocity the US Government caused in an African state. Tech expert Neal Sampat (Dev Patel) accidentally commits an act of espionage that brings in the FBI, and Will is imprisoned for refusing to name their source.

The seasons of in this series just get shorter and shorter; this one is down to six episodes. But this lends itself to a tense, fast-paced thrilling season with plenty of action. It's with regret that we say goodbye to this smart and socially responsible look at TV news, but, as the characters point out in the season opener, this is not a third act. This is the beginning of something all its own.

This Blu-ray collection comes complete with an in-depth audio commentary of the series finale with Executive Producers Aaron Sorkin and Alan Poul. Plus each episode has a revealing "Inside the Episode" interview with the show's creator (Sorkin).

"The Newsroom - The Complete Third Season"
Blu-ray
Rated: R / 96 minutes
www.hbo.com/the-newsroom/