Mad Men is back!

[Chip R]

Originally Posted by WMR

Is Joan's baby Roger Sterling's?

Yes.

[WMR]

I CANNOT believe Peggy left Sterling Cooper. Obviously, Don could not believe it either.

Surely she will return to Sterling Cooper some day...

[MWM]

This season lost me somewhat. I was afraid this was going to happen with all the fanfare coming into it. What made this show so great, IMO, was that it was pure character exploration. There weren't that many wild plot twists. It was very subtle in that regard. The plot was secondary to the characters.

This season the characters have become much more one dimensional and they've littered us with all these fantastical plots that don't seem fitting with the previous seasons of the show. It appears to me they're reaching for a more mass audience now and have lost much of the genius of the show. This almost always happens to these kinds of shows.

[WMR]

I've enjoyed this season. I'm glad Betty is getting less and less attention. What a boring character.

[RiverRat13]

Originally Posted by MWM

This season the characters have become much more one dimensional and they've littered us with all these fantastical plots that don't seem fitting with the previous seasons of the show.

Such as?

[MWM]

Originally Posted by RiverRat13

Such as?

Pete and his train car buddy's wife. The whole Joan being asked to prostitute herself to land a big account (just a stupid story line, IMO). Kinsey and the Hari Krishna thing with his girl seducing Harry. Lane has become a pathetic whiner of a character with no redeeming qualities and I want to fast forward every time he's on screen.

It's just my opinion, but what I loved about the show was the depth of the characters and how little the underlying plots really mattered in my enjoyment of the show. It was all about exploring the complexity of these people. My perception of season 5 is that they've said "ooooo, everyone's watching now, let's see how creative we can get with 'intriguing' plot twists." It's become way to soap opera like for my taste.

All the characters seem to have lost that depth that I liked so much. They have one characteristic they're focusing on this season at the expense of all others. Every character could be labeled pretty easily in season 5 if you ask me. Even Don has become someone very uninteresting. I have no problem evolving a character, even maturing in Don's case which is what he seems to have done. But there's nothing all the "interesting" about him anymore. He's all googly-eyed over his new wife and struggles some with her chosen career path, but he's become boring, IMO. That's something I never thought could happen. I can't think of any characters that are all that interesting this season.

I still like the show and look forward to watching it. It's just lost some of its appeal for me.

[Razor Shines]

Should have searched for this thread before posting in the TV thread. This past episode may have been my favorite episode in the show's history. I may be forgetting some but either way it's up there.

I thought Peggy smiling just before she got on the elevator was perfect. I'm sure she's going to battle SCDP for some accounts and that will be fun.

[RiverRat13]

Originally Posted by MWM

Pete and his train car buddy's wife. The whole Joan being asked to prostitute herself to land a big account (just a stupid story line, IMO). Kinsey and the Hari Krishna thing with his girl seducing Harry. Lane has become a pathetic whiner of a character with no redeeming qualities and I want to fast forward every time he's on screen.

It's just my opinion, but what I loved about the show was the depth of the characters and how little the underlying plots really mattered in my enjoyment of the show. It was all about exploring the complexity of these people. My perception of season 5 is that they've said "ooooo, everyone's watching now, let's see how creative we can get with 'intriguing' plot twists." It's become way to soap opera like for my taste.

All the characters seem to have lost that depth that I liked so much. They have one characteristic they're focusing on this season at the expense of all others. Every character could be labeled pretty easily in season 5 if you ask me. Even Don has become someone very uninteresting. I have no problem evolving a character, even maturing in Don's case which is what he seems to have done. But there's nothing all the "interesting" about him anymore. He's all googly-eyed over his new wife and struggles some with her chosen career path, but he's become boring, IMO. That's something I never thought could happen. I can't think of any characters that are all that interesting this season.

I still like the show and look forward to watching it. It's just lost some of its appeal for me.

I disagree. I think this season has been fantastic. The Joan storyline parallels Sal when Don basically asked him to prostitute himself out to keep Lucky Strike. It was interesting to see that Don had no problem asking Sal to do what he would not even think of asking Joan. Pete is morphing into old Don... bored with the suburban life and figuring there has to be more out there. Of course, he doesn't have the Don factor to be Don but he's a guy who thought that work alone would fulfill him and is finding out that isn't the case. I don't see how Pete sleeping with the train guy's wife is any more of a soap opera than Don sleeping with Jimmy Barrett's wife. I totally agree with you that old Don is better and I think we'll eventually see that Don back, but there has to be some sort of change or attempt at changing of your main character over five seasons. Especially a character like Don.

I can see where you don't like the storylines as you're going to like what you're going to like. But I can't see where you'd characterize them to be out of the ordinary for Mad Men. I don't see it being more of a soap opera than past seasons at all.

[RBA]

Originally Posted by MWM

Lane has become a pathetic whiner of a character with no redeeming qualities and I want to fast forward every time he's on screen.

I didn't expect it until Joan tried to open his office door. I guess, fewer fast forwarding for you?

[gilpdawg]

Ho-lee CRAP! Amazing episode. Amazing season. This may be the best Mad Men season so far. It's very rare that a 5th season of any show is such high quality, usually you're on the downswing by then. If this isn't the best show of the past 10 or so years I don't know what is. I guess you could throw Breaking Bad in the running.

[Redsfaithful]

Originally Posted by gilpdawg

Ho-lee CRAP! Amazing episode. Amazing season. This may be the best Mad Men season so far. It's very rare that a 5th season of any show is such high quality, usually you're on the downswing by then. If this isn't the best show of the past 10 or so years I don't know what is. I guess you could throw Breaking Bad in the running.

The Wire actually made it's debut 10 years ago.

But Mad Men and Breaking Bad would be my 2/3 in some order.

[gilpdawg]

Originally Posted by Redsfaithful

The Wire actually made it's debut 10 years ago.

But Mad Men and Breaking Bad would be my 2/3 in some order.

Forgot about The Wire.

[bucksfan2]

Originally Posted by Redsfaithful

The Wire actually made it's debut 10 years ago.

But Mad Men and Breaking Bad would be my 2/3 in some order.

I think the wire puts those two series to shame. I am 3 seasons through Breaking Bad and it continues to get better. The first season was a little slow to get started but it really picked up. I would go 1. The Wire 2. Mad Men 3. Breaking Bad. But that is up for debate.

[MWM]

You have The Wire, Lost, The Sopranos, Breaking Bad, Rescue Me (I liked better than Mad Men), Curb Your Enthusiasm (if we're counting comedies). But Mad Men is definitely on the list. This was actually my least favorite of the seasons, but it was still very good and I look forward to watching every week.

I think Lost was genius until the last season, maybe the best thing I've ever seen. But the ending left me a little empty as I just don't think they had any good way to wind things down.

[Unassisted]

Originally Posted by MWM

It's just my opinion, but what I loved about the show was the depth of the characters and how little the underlying plots really mattered in my enjoyment of the show. It was all about exploring the complexity of these people. My perception of season 5 is that they've said "ooooo, everyone's watching now, let's see how creative we can get with 'intriguing' plot twists." It's become way to soap opera like for my taste.

IMO, the long delay between seasons gave Matthew Weiner so much time to come up with ideas that he's struggling to fit all of the story arcs into a single season. This season seems to be aimed so heavily at giving every character in the ensemble something meaty to do, that it's sacrificing depth.

Frankly, in previous seasons, I was turned off by some of the pugnacious quotes by the actors about the earth-shattering importance of this show to the medium. It's still just a show, it's not a cure for cancer. But it's also a good show and if the mistakes of this season take some of the air out of those inflated egos, I don't mind if it slips a bit.