I think Sally is grounded enough to handle the Dick Whitman story, however it's told to her.
― copter (waterface), Tuesday, 25 June 2013 14:01 (ten years ago) link
nyt has like three madmen stories in the arts section today
― i didn't even give much of a fuck that you were mod (forksclovetofu), Tuesday, 25 June 2013 16:13 (ten years ago) link
http://franklinavenue.blogspot.com/2013/06/we-found-it-actual-la-location-of-don_25.html
― Ⓓⓡ. (Johnny Fever), Tuesday, 25 June 2013 16:55 (ten years ago) link
Apparently, another house on the same street is the one featured in the "Thriller" video.
― Ⓓⓡ. (Johnny Fever), Tuesday, 25 June 2013 16:57 (ten years ago) link
Did they intentionally find a house that looked like an Edward Hopper painting?
― "Turkey In The Straw" coming from someplace in the clouds (Sparkle Motion), Tuesday, 25 June 2013 17:37 (ten years ago) link
I think, if anything, Don's going to seem a lot more sympathetic to Sally if he actually shows her who he is. As a father, he's the mostly-absent cipher who goes off to work and does the normal family time activities but hasn't ever really related to his kids except for the rare occasion.
Actually seeming like a human being with a backstory that's more than white collar breadwinner father is going to make him seem a lot more relatable, even if he does keep fucking up. Sally's seen just enough to think that he's a liar, an idea her mother fostered.
― mh, Tuesday, 25 June 2013 17:44 (ten years ago) link
I don't really have a big problem with the flashbacks but at times I do think Don's trauma has suffered from over-explication. but of course at the same time uncovering that trauma (and neutralizing it?) seems more and more the guiding theme of the show. So maybe making it explicit (even if it sometimes feels like a dark fable of some sort) is the point.
That's a hopeful and humanizing way to take on that trauma that makes Don who and what he is--I'll be fascinated to see if they continue down that road and still make it compelling.
― ryan, Tuesday, 25 June 2013 17:48 (ten years ago) link
guys peggy was wearing chanel no 5 to signify that she's now a marilyn instead of an irene dunn
― 1 P.3. Eternal (roxymuzak), Wednesday, 26 June 2013 00:48 (ten years ago) link
http://i.imgur.com/webGMb3.jpgin Echo park
― ω (carne asada), Wednesday, 26 June 2013 12:53 (ten years ago) link
the wide shot of the house looked really weird.
― 1 P.3. Eternal (roxymuzak), Wednesday, 26 June 2013 13:50 (ten years ago) link
I think it was just bad digital paint to age the house.
― El tres de 乒乓 de 1808 (silby), Wednesday, 26 June 2013 16:14 (ten years ago) link
wide establishing exterior shots are not really a thing this show does v often
― the Spanish Porky's (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, 26 June 2013 16:24 (ten years ago) link
A better version of this priceless treasure
http://25.media.tumblr.com/1683f4de47f228a23c75a4ade26ab978/tumblr_mowgbcZKA91r3s62po1_500.gif
― Ⓓⓡ. (Johnny Fever), Wednesday, 26 June 2013 16:32 (ten years ago) link
bless you, Johnny Fever
― set the controls for the heart of the sun (VegemiteGrrl), Wednesday, 26 June 2013 16:43 (ten years ago) link
it's technically angelino heights, not echo park.
― paula deezen (get bent), Wednesday, 26 June 2013 17:16 (ten years ago) link
http://video.vulture.com/video/Epic-Rant-By-Pete-Campbell-Of-M
― hewing to the status quo with great zealotry (DavidM), Friday, 28 June 2013 19:33 (ten years ago) link
So great: http://madmenwiththingsdrawnonthem.tumblr.com/
― Ⓓⓡ. (Johnny Fever), Friday, 28 June 2013 20:47 (ten years ago) link
https://gs1.wac.edgecastcdn.net/8019B6/data.tumblr.com/c4965f674e7e734f67baa24a9bde5784/tumblr_mor5v2nRJi1qdbluio1_500.jpg
otm
― r|t|c, Saturday, 29 June 2013 09:10 (ten years ago) link
Slate has a theory that the Chevy account is an extended metaphor for Vietnam. I don't totally buy it, but it's rather compellingly argued:http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2013/06/25/mad_men_vietnam_video_essay_how_season_6_s_chevy_storyline_reflected_a_violent.html
― Murder in the Rue McClanahan (jaymc), Saturday, 29 June 2013 15:16 (ten years ago) link
I just re-watched seasons 1-4 and I think one thing that became clear to me was that the show is almost always, in one way or another, addressing its historical context but very rarely is there any kind of direct or 1-to-1 relationship between the lives/business of the characters and the historical events around them. It's not even a typical kind of dramatic irony where we know more than they do. Instead, it's almost like the relationship between history and the show's "present" is more oblique and impressionistic, rather than causal. They keep enough verisimilitude to make sure that characters are aware of and respond to major events (as in the episodes with the assignations) but more often history is this amorphous thing going on outside their walls and then refracted into their lives. The episode with the fog of pollution seems interesting in retrospect because it's a moment where those two approaches (the surreal/oblique and the factual) seem to meet.
So I sorta DO buy the Chevy = Vietnam thing, since it's exactly the way the show seems to operate. Excerpt that the "=" is a lot less direction than a simple equation.
― ryan, Saturday, 29 June 2013 15:45 (ten years ago) link
assassinations, I meant! Though for once auto-correct is strangely appropriate.
― ryan, Saturday, 29 June 2013 15:46 (ten years ago) link
I like this one:
http://25.media.tumblr.com/3afa2bd31b2fe92e5bb853016a31592b/tumblr_mnvg1oGtCE1qdbluio1_500.jpg
― Mr. Mojo Readin' (C. Grisso/McCain), Saturday, 29 June 2013 18:07 (ten years ago) link
Clues to the ending of ‘Mad Men’ have been embedded within the show since its very beginning
https://medium.com/sterling-cooper-draper-pryce/e96804523838
― hewing to the status quo with great zealotry (DavidM), Sunday, 30 June 2013 09:10 (ten years ago) link
thats good
― 1 P.3. Eternal (roxymuzak), Sunday, 30 June 2013 16:08 (ten years ago) link
the more I think about this the more I think that yeah it doesn't end with Don's death (too trite and too pat) but with his abandonment of the Draper persona entirely
― what's up ugly girls? (Shakey Mo Collier), Tuesday, 20 August 2013 20:34 (ten years ago) link
I hope it ends well.
― the husbster (self-professed octopus expert) (stevie), Tuesday, 20 August 2013 20:41 (ten years ago) link
don kills skyler
― socki (s1ocki), Tuesday, 20 August 2013 21:55 (ten years ago) link
Making Ad.
― Chewshabadoo, Tuesday, 20 August 2013 22:07 (ten years ago) link
'80s Don Draper
Not all of us were raised in a cushy cabbage patch. Some of us had to crawl our way out of a garbage pail.
― what's up ugly girls? (Shakey Mo Collier), Tuesday, 3 September 2013 18:39 (ten years ago) link
From Mad Men Screenshots with Things Drawn On Them:
http://31.media.tumblr.com/837eefc1274b67aad7b9096104b38b07/tumblr_mowvjlR8HW1rkdtsao1_500.gif
― A Made Man In The Mellow Mafia (C. Grisso/McCain), Tuesday, 3 September 2013 18:55 (ten years ago) link
lol
― what's up ugly girls? (Shakey Mo Collier), Tuesday, 3 September 2013 18:56 (ten years ago) link
bob benson's on that robin williams sitcom about advertising. i think if i pretend he's the same character, like orlando or something, that show won't be completely fucking unbearable.
― balls, Tuesday, 3 September 2013 21:27 (ten years ago) link
They're doing a Breaking Bad (only with fewer episodes):
http://blogs.amctv.com/mad-men/2013/09/mad-men-serves-seven-and-seven/
― I wish to incorporate disco into my small business (chap), Tuesday, 17 September 2013 21:53 (ten years ago) link
Seems a little stingy to only give us one extra episode out of the deal, but there you go.
― I wish to incorporate disco into my small business (chap), Tuesday, 17 September 2013 21:56 (ten years ago) link
New thread: MAD MEN on AMC - Seasons 7(a) & & 7(b)
(Also this be my 10,000th post. Yay me)
― A Made Man In The Mellow Mafia (C. Grisso/McCain), Tuesday, 17 September 2013 22:02 (ten years ago) link
Five or six episodes in. The MLK episode was straightforward and very good. Not sure about the merger yet--seems like a narrative contrivance, may get better. In the RFK episode, two things bothered me: 1) Pete Campbell losing his temper (with his mother, with his secretary) is sometimes plain bad acting; 2) Don's control stuff with his neighbour's wife was really silly and not worth whatever point was being made (one that has probably been made countless time already anyway). I was starting to feel music was disappearing, but "Love Is Blue" worked surprisingly well, I liked the Mitch Ryder song (think I knew it, but never associated it with him), and Friend & Lover's "Reach Out in the Darkness" as a backdrop for RFK was perfect.
― clemenza, Friday, 16 January 2015 05:12 (nine years ago) link
The Doctor Robert, Quack M.D. episode--bizarre. But first "Reach Out in the Darkness," now Mama Cass; the people who made this, they're 100% in sync with me again.
― clemenza, Friday, 16 January 2015 06:15 (nine years ago) link
"Reach Out of The Darkness" might be the show's greatest music cue--so perfect in contextual nastiness & irony.
― Don A Henley And Get Over It (C. Grisso/McCain), Friday, 16 January 2015 06:48 (nine years ago) link
The Doctor Robert, Quack M.D. episode--bizarre.
And very funny.
― the joke should be over once the kid is eaten. (chap), Friday, 16 January 2015 10:41 (nine years ago) link
This season is where the quality started to wane for me.
― the joke should be over once the kid is eaten. (chap), Friday, 16 January 2015 10:42 (nine years ago) link
I'm so invested in the characters at this point, I'm still immersed in everything, and there are still great moments and sequences. On the whole, though, I agree. Three problems: 1) there are so many characters, some of them are by necessity falling by the wayside--they don't really seem to know what to do with certain people (e.g., Bert Cooper; even Peggy's in a rut). 2) Don's philandering isn't that morally interesting anymore, just repetitive. When he's in the middle of his affair with the neighbour's wife, and he has a fit about Megan's kissing scene, you'd think even he'd be aware of the irony. 3) The increasing...irrelevance of the campaigns? When Don or somebody gets really excited about a campaign now, I'm often thinking "You still think stuff like this has anything to do with what's going on in the world?" Not always, but often.
― clemenza, Friday, 16 January 2015 15:51 (nine years ago) link
It isn't as good as the previous one but I think this is the funniest season. All the stuff with Pete and his mother is hilarious.
I think most people (including me) lost patience with Don's cheating; perhaps the writers thought it necessary for him to get to that point but I thought it was boring to spend as much time as they did on it.
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Friday, 16 January 2015 15:56 (nine years ago) link
not to give anything away for clemenza but the neighbor-cheating thing has a payoff that's central to Don's character, and which wouldn't have made sense to happen as part of his earlier affairs
― Οὖτις, Friday, 16 January 2015 16:35 (nine years ago) link
Appreciate that. I know it's weird to be responding to comments about something in progress that you've seen--I'll try to be clear where I am.
― clemenza, Friday, 16 January 2015 16:56 (nine years ago) link
I do agree that the whole "you are my prisoner in this expensive hotel room" was ridiculous but I think that was kind of the point, to show how Don's tricks/obsessions are tired and outdated and stupid by this point
― Οὖτις, Friday, 16 January 2015 17:05 (nine years ago) link
Finished up last night. Yes, the payoff to Don's affair with Sylvia was big. (Curious if she'll be back in Season 7--would assume so.) The last few episodes were all over the place but pretty good. Liked the way the '68 convention was integrated. I find Pete an ongoing annoyance at this point, and I'm surprised so much time is devoted to him. (I found all the stuff with his mother unnecessary.) One character who's gotten more shaded and compelling as the story moves along is Ted. Glen's return at Sally's boarding school was excellent. Joan jumping the gun on Avon (and getting confronted by the other partners--first time, really, she seemed completely at a loss, and that added some complexity to an already great character), Glen's return, and Ginsberg going off on the war were all good. Hope there's lots of Sally and Betty in 7. Lots of bumps along the way--I wouldn't call it a consistent show anymore. Reading back through this thread, I was surprised by the Megan-is-dead theory; that had never occurred to me at all. The two external realities that I would think have to play a role in 7 would be the war (even more so than what there's been so far) and black militancy--there's been a progression from invisibility (the elevator operator who was reluctant to answer a direct question) to a tentative civil-rights era presence (Dawn) to, I would assume, something more urgent and confrontational.
After wondering why music was no longer important, it came back in a back way in the last few episodes. "(There's) Always Something There To Remind Me," "Piece of My Heart," "Porpoise Song," and "Both Sides Now" all excellent.
― clemenza, Saturday, 17 January 2015 15:47 (nine years ago) link
I find Pete an ongoing annoyance at this point, and I'm surprised so much time is devoted to him.
never heard this opinion before!
Pete is a combo of broad comic relief and just, for me, a really interesting creation as a character. He's allowed to be despicable and sorta sympathetic at the same time.
― ryan, Saturday, 17 January 2015 15:54 (nine years ago) link
like, he's basically the one character who always shows his cards. and that's endearing in this crowd.
He's unusual, for sure...His weirdness just grates on me at this point for some reason. He has the occasional quiet moment that I like, like his season-ending goodbye to his daughter. (His wife is almost as weirdly stylized as he is.)
― clemenza, Saturday, 17 January 2015 16:00 (nine years ago) link
This was a good time for The Monkees on TV--One of the US nostalgia channels had recently started airing the reruns again, and "Goin' Down" was prominently featured on an S5(A) ep of Breaking Bad. I saw them on tour that summer and they played those clips alongside some other stuff ("Last Train To Clarksville" in After Hours for one) right before they took the stage.
― Don A Henley And Get Over It (C. Grisso/McCain), Saturday, 17 January 2015 16:26 (nine years ago) link