Mad Men returns. Thumbs up or down?

Sepinwall liked it.

http://bit.ly/Ztm896

I am not a fan of the 2 hour format and thought this one was a bit ponderous.

But I am elated about having it back on Sunday nights for its 12-week penultimate run.

 

Wow. That's some review. Did he receive dictation from Weiner?

My review of the episode is that it was elegant enough, mostly a bore and relatively nihilistic, with camerawork designed to thrill guys like Sepinwall who want the camerawork to say something in every angle and transition. In other words, the standard Mad Men episode on its own creative Valium.

 

OK episode, but felt a little long.

Sterling was awesome, as usual.

"How did she die?"

"She had a stroke, in the bathroom."

"Well, I asked, didn't I?"

That, and it seems like Peggy has almost become Don in the professional sense. She's very hard on her employees.

 

Loved the line when Don returns and the art guys are smoking pot: "I smell creativity."

Thought they screwed up with Peggy referring to the second AFL-NFL championship game as the "Super Bowl" but apparently it was in use at the time, though not officially until the Jets-Colts.

I like that Don finally has something close to a friend on the show in Dr. Rosen. Of course, he ends up sleeping with his wife when the Doc has to deal with a patient, but still....

Figure the cigarette lighter he accidentally swapped with the GI means the last thing he kept from his "Dick Whitman" era is getting ready for the Tet offensive.

 

A reasonable summation.

 

When Teddy told Peggy "You're great in a crisis," was I the only one who thought of "That's what the money is for!"

 

The dissent.

www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2011/feb/24/mad-men-account/?pagination=false

 

Sepinwall and AV Club loved it. Several good friends on Facebook evidently did not.

 

<i>"For a drama (or book, or whatever) to invite an audience to feel superior to a less enlightened era even as it teases the regressive urges behind the behaviors associated with that era strikes me as the worst possible offense that can be committed in a creative work set in the past: it’s simultaneously contemptuous and pandering."</i>

Spot on. The ol "you loathe it but you secretly love it" cliche. Mad Men's been doing that since its inception.

 

Huh. That makes a lot of sense. We do a lot of that in real life, too, applying contemporary standards to past times and giving showy thumbs-down reactions. Most people, in most eras, were doing the best they knew how at the time. Tendency to tsk-tsk is dumb -- and likely to be among many things tsk-tsked about in future eras.

 

Rodger drops acid and likes it. Everyone else smokes weed. This is 1968ish, were drugs that prevalent among the bourgeois in the late 60's?

 

Hey, two hours of my fav show, what's not to like? Well, Don just seemed off to me; probably what was intended. Loved the late 60's vibe throughout.

Ms. Law pointed out that while Sally's aged, Bobby seems to be the same age!!

Never would have thought that was Linda Cardellini from Freeks and Geeks with Don in bed.