The Newsroom season 3, episode 1 premiered last night and the team at ACN covered the Boston Marathon bombing of 2013 as well as some more…local issues.

Day 1

MacKenzie and Will are planning their wedding! But right when they start discussing the details their live feeds show the Boston Marathon bombing; the season is officially set in April of 2013. The team starts doing what they do, and Maggie stops her workout to come to work. Don had jury duty, but he manages to get dismissed.

The entire team is trying to get facts while everyone is tweeting about it, and all of the news outlets like Fox and CNN are reporting the story first. They decide to send Maggie to Boston (despite Will’s protests) along with Elliot when they finally get on air.

Meanwhile Neal gets a weird encrypted email from someone telling him he needs to improve his encryption.

Day 2

Reese is hiding in Sloan’s office and tells Sloan that their numbers are extremely low. Sloan explains their stock isn’t doing well either. During the entire episode Sloan is trying to figure out why their numbers are so poor.

In their catchup meeting, Jim explains they have a witness who doesn’t want to go on record yet and Gary explains there are vigils happening that night. Neal then explains that someone is trying to give him classified government documents. That person wants Neal to get a computer that’s never been connected to the Internet and when he does so they will give him a flash drive by taping it behind the toilet in a public restaurant. No one in the newsroom believes him but at the end Will gives him his credit card to buy that computer.

Day 3

On the third day there are reports that an arrest has been made, but no one has a second confirmation so they won’t go on the air with it. It’s lucky that they don’t, though, because CNN had to retract the report.

That night Maggie calls Will and Mac and tells them she’s going to the precinct instead of city hall because there’s a leak that the police are trying to look into, and Maggie spoke to the wife of the man who’s been suspended for looking into it. She called to let them know she’s not at City Hall like the rest of the press, and they want her to look into it further.

Day 4

Neal heads to the restaurant where his contact said they would put the flash drive, and it’s actually there! He puts the flash drive in the computer he bought and there are indeed thousands of classified documents that pop up.

Day 5

The team goes over the insane amount of social media responses about the bombing and how reporters from BuzzFeed and Perez Hilton manage to get out the theory that a Reddit user created (which ended up being false), and now a woman not involved with the suspects at all has to deal with death threats and harassment from the general public. They’re falling behind the times, but Will still insists they do the real news not like these other outlets.

In Boston Elliot accidentally eats walnuts, which he’s allergic to, so he’s unable to go on camera to present the story and insists that Maggie do it. She does the story, which is talking about once of the suspect’s friends and relaying how awful the suspect was in school and it goes really well!

That night Will and Charlie go meet up with Reese, who tells Will that they’re ranking fourth which means that they’re not making nearly as much money, and he and his mother could only protect them from the company’s board if they’re profitable.

While they’re up there Neal comes up and tells them about how the documents have stories they can actually use, but then Will realizes that because Neal asked his contact to send him more documents he aided and aided the man in committing a felony. Now, Neal needs a lawyer.

And to increase all the stress, Sloan comes up to let them know that someone is trying to buy the company, and that’s why their numbers are so wonky.

It’s a bad day for ACN, folks.