MAD MEN on AMC - Season 6

that's true. i get the sense they are maybe writing back half of season while shooting 1st half.

yeah I saw Christina Hendricks on Daily Show a while ago and she said she used to call up Matthew Weiner and he would go over her character's arc for that season when she got her first script...but this season she made it sound like he didn't really know.

so yeah, the writing on the fly thing sounds plausible

We're seven episodes in already (my, how fast is it going after the long wait?) and I have to say I do miss Betty/Sally's role in the story by now. Don is a father, someone who recently divorced his wife, and has children growing up. This is virtually invisible. If you'd tune in now you would barely know this.

We had the episode with his son at the cinema, of course, but in a way I thought the situation of divorce and kids growing up would be incorporated in Don's ways and thinking a bit more. Now it's almost as if he only carries that weight when the writers confront him with a scene here and there about it.

i kind of get the feeling that don as a father is something that just gets put on the back burner not only b/c he's not the most devoted father but because the writers can only keep so many balls in the air at once

all in all i wish this was _more_ of a workplace drama/comedy than it already is.

I agree, the writers have some tough choices to make. I think in essence I would like it to be more of a workplace series too. But it's kind of too late now for the family part of it has always played a centre role

yes

(to am)`

Also, there was a whole thing with Sally and Glen last season; hope they don't just drop that.

^^ OTM

so yeah, the writing on the fly thing sounds plausible

― set the controls for the heart of the sun (VegemiteGrrl), Tuesday, May 14, 2013 5:50 PM (14 minutes ago) Bookmark

all shows do this iirc

even if they have arcs plotted out in advance

one reason being a showrunner is really hard, even if you do get to take all the credit afterward

have to say i'm kind of rooting for bob benson - he's gone from weird bit part to wide-eyed prospective joan lover. it's an inspiration to us all.

― ... (LocalGarda), Tuesday, May 14, 2013 9:19 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

otm!

Loved the plane bit, loved that the production 'went there' immediately after raising it as a possibility. Loved seeing Don squirm.

Also: go Bob. You da man no matter what your intentions may be.

that thing about drinking the furniture polish... bob knows how to game the system!

Emily Nussbaum's take on this season.

bob kinda reminds me of breaking bad introducing "todd"/jesse plemons, both are really undefined and their arc could go p much anywhere

'80s Don Draper ‏@80sDonDraper 10m

Pac Man teaches that pills are the only thing keeping the ghosts away.

some quality vintage advertising in here
My grandfather just sent me a program to a 1959 Knicks/Celtics game

i know my life has got a bit boring when I actually start anticipating a new episode of this show soon before it begins

I see a grim future for this show: the ad staff spending the early seventies on drugs, Aaron Stanton still flaunting the tap skills he should have unveiled earlier, and boring, reductive Draper flashbacks.

last 2 eps; the best back2back eps since some time in Season 4 definitely.

is it me or is it really Teal and Orange-y this season?

Peggy kissing beardo = new Daft Punk album sleeve art

everything is off this whole ep. so strange

but if there's never another flashback to don's childhood I am totally ok with that

What did I just watch?

I liked the sense of everything sort of breaking open and apart. I have thought before that that's what the late '60s must have felt like, and not just for the longhairs.

the sound production in this episode is great. all echoey with typewriters and drones and telephones.

this was a good episode. i don't know how "realistic" it is for an adverising agency to hire a doctor to administer speed to employees, but it worked well as a plot device... for most of this episode, don looked like a walking heart attack and i was legitimately worried for him. everything about this episode worked to reinforce the viewers' sense of a general "loss of control" and i think that was neat and, as tipsy said, resonant with how i have always imagined the late 60s

i also liked how the speed didn't help their productivity at all. they basically wasted the weekend and produced only incoherent gibberish

They spelled Chevy wrong!

http://i.imgur.com/giOntby.gif

there had to have been something besides speed in that right?

B-vitamins

okay, THIS is that one great episode that I was waiting for.
not that this is any brilliant deduction, but I get the sense that for the last three seasons mad men has like three, maybe four good episodes a year and everything else is just about positioning the characters.
anyway, yeah. this is why i still watch this show, because it sometimes elevates.

amphetamine + b12 shots were definitely a thing. if anything it seemed a little behind the times. wouldn't all of those guys have been given amphetamines in the military?

that was totally fucking unhinged

speed doesn't make you hallucinate does it? maybe in crazy high doses?

(i have never taken speed obviously, i'd probably just have a heart attack right away)

Man, I was so on edge this whole episode

What exactly is the camera trick they do to make everything look v jittery and choppy? V high shutter speed/nonexistent motion blur?

i think amphetamines + heroin (speedballs) were the big semi-official korea drug? at least that's what the lore is. i don't know about amphetamine & b12, it seems very much like a 60s thing but quick googling only brings up a bunch of adhd stuff.

the throwaway jokes about roger's heart were great

i really dug gleason as a character after only 2 scenes, rip

Man, I was so on edge this whole episode

yeah, it made me a little paranoid. esp. the stuff with the home invasion.

that was hella brazen btw. "come here, give me some sugar!"

are we sure that grandma ida wasn't roger in blackface

The opening scene gave me a scare - I was having LA Noir flashbacks.

FWIW I have a relative who worked in advertising in the 60s/70s and she has always griped about the heavy amphetamine use since it made people burn out after a year or two / could only come up with half-formed ideas that they thought were brilliant. She has used the word "gibberish" in the past; happy to finally see it in MM!

A couple doctors made B-12&speed their whole practice. The Beatles even have a song about one of them - Dr. Robert.

tense, unsettling episode, feel like the season has really picked up the past few weeks

dunno what I want from "Mad Men" anymore but I'm not getting it. Again the show proves it's sharpest when sticking to bullshitting around the office (Peggy and her crew) while being gory about it (the dart in the arm) or just goofy (Ken's tap routine). I'm bored with the continued attempts to "deepen" Draper with portent-filled flashbacks – who gives a damn?