It's natural that a show based on advertising gurus could provide excellent taglines. Where the truth lies is playful, elegant, and hints at the cruelty and hypocrisy intrinsic to the show. Indeed, that's the essential gamble the creators of Mad Men have taken: Each week, they're expected to possess the wit of a team of advertisers, present a plausible dating of archetypes, and always maintain a certain genius in Donald Draper. They've been totally successful in what can be a pretty risky format. I'm reminded of a relatively short-lived show called "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip" starring Matthew Perry as head writer of an SNL-style show... anyone? (I had to look it up). It didn't work because the writers didn't understand what Tina Fey would later knock the fuck out of the park with 30 Rock. Rock's NBC, and it's show-within-a-show TGS with Tracy Jordan, are ludicrous inventions, not any kind of emulations/simulation of a true television institution like Saturday Night Live. Pardon the digression.
Mad Men took another gamble: Which of these characters do you find likable? Most of them have insidious natures, and none of them are people you might like to actually meet or know. So what makes them compelling? That Martin Scorsese succeeds (on a higher artistic plane) despite his despicable roster of human beings in Goodfellas, is undeniable. But it begs the same question as Mad Men: Are we being used in a well-crafted exercise in style? Are we investing in advertisements for men? The question is nearly inconsequential for a 2 hour film of Goodfellas' status, but after three seasons of a television series, the use of artful ambiguity to suspend characters may become tedious and transparent if it's not supported by important human attributes like love... and humor. For now, who cares. The show kills.
Here's a clip from the end of season two, when Sterling and Cooper are trying to land the Kodak account by "reinventing the wheel"... the wheel being a slide projector. Ladies and gentlemen: Donald Draper, the man who sneezes and finds a tagline in his handkerchief...
This post is not even close to being 'idiot' enough.
ReplyDeletevince we haven't named you Director of Content yet so I'm afraid you'll have to deal with it. don't worry, back to idiot shit starting now.
ReplyDeleteSlashfilm.com seems to be on my wavelength, in a review of Mad Men Season 3. "But unlike The Sopranos, where Matthew Weiner sharpened his teeth... I can’t shake the feeling that I don’t really know this ensemble of characters. Not in the existential way, either. Too often this season of Mad Men was akin to knowing and understanding well-calculated, animated, and intelligent chess pieces. Mad Men is still one of my favorite shows and deserves all of the ratings and awards it can get, but this is the season where I paid more attention to Weiner’s strings, manipulations, and alignments of traits and events, than to any genuine character investment as a fan. And not by choice."
ReplyDelete-- Read the full review here:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.slashfilm.com/2009/11/10/matthew-weiner-talks-mad-men-finale-an-update-on-his-film-you-are-here-plus-thoughts-on-season-three/