Category Archives: TV

Mad Men 6×10 – A Tale Of Two Cities

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The ubiquity of drug use has run rampart this season. Sure it relates to its prevalence in America circa 1968, but it also underlines this season’s – and 1968’s – tackling of chaos and waywardness and the futile attempts to manage it. This theme has been well managed by this season, but by its very nature, it leads to episodes and characterisations that don’t really amount to much. Now Mad Men has never focused heavily on driving forward narrative arcs, but by the end of each episode we should get a better sense of these characters, who they are and what they want. What we get in this episode is two very enjoyable story lines that don’t really amount to much and a couple of less interesting side tales of office politics.

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Mad Men 6X09 – The Better Half

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I was a little late to this episode, due to an avalanche of uni assessments that I left as late as possible to start tackling. A few day after it aired (in the US), I saw on my Facebook newsfeed (not naming anyone……SUE!) ‘Ugh.. Don and Betty. Yuck. And why!?’. My first thought was, ‘cool, someone who watches Mad Men’. My second thought was ‘Wait…..What????!!!!!’. So my whole viewing experience came down to waiting for that moment. It was to the show’s credit that it didn’t really feel like a big deal, or even a major faux pas for Don, who I think we all gave up on seasons ago, in the fidelity department. And for whatever their relationship lacked, Don and Betty always valued their sex life.

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Arrested Development Season 4

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Phew! To be honest, that was bit of slog, but I’m glad I stuck it out.

After the first four or five episodes I was a bit worried about the episode pacing and lack of any kind of story closure or even stakes. Everyone kept telling me ‘it gets better, it gets better’ and it does, but not to the extent that it solves or rectifies all the issues I had with the first half of the season.

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Arrested Development 4×01 – Flight of the Phoenix

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It must be said that I was equally concerned and excited about this new Netflix commissioned semi-season of Arrested Development. I was concerned not because I loved the first 3 seasons of the show – which I absolutely do – and thought these new episodes would pale in comparison after a seven-year creative hiatus. It’s not that I thought the actors wouldn’t fit their roles after almost every actor went on to become highly successful on the big screen. It’s not that I was concerned the limitations of the 4th season’s production (actor availability, unfocused episode order, varying episode length) would ruin the show’s essence. It’s not that I thought the show would lose its looseness and sense of style and become forced and stilted. It’s not that I thought the show would be so burdened with overcoming it’s success (well critically, if not in ratings) or the cultural comedic icon it has become, that it will be relegated to 30 minutes of ‘her?’ and chicken dances until nothing new is really said and it feels like a poor derivation of itself (looking at you Community season 4).

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Mad Men 6×08 – The Crash

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This is an awfully strange episode, but not quite strangely awful.

At this stage (episode 8) in both seasons 4 and 5, things really started to pick up steam and those episodes represented the best of what Mad Men has to offer. I haven’t been getting the same feeling from this season. Now don’t get me wrong, it’s still one of the best shows on television and I haven’t disliked any episodes this season, but it also hasn’t built up an unparalleled level of quality that the best Mad Men seasons offer. I think that has something to do with the idea of chaos that Mad Men has been playing with recently.

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