Mad Men: Wee Small Hours
Wee Small Hours: Review
Oh, I'm definitely going to avoid MM fandom this week. I've only glimpsed at it this morning and I can see vitrol is through the roof. In about a minute I've already seen about ten "I hate everyone but Carla!" messages. Is there an echo on the internet? Let's all be outraged together! *sigh* It's just not fun anymore. I felt even more sour on Mad Men fandom yesterday with the accouncement that Kater Gordon is leaving (or fired) from the writing staff. Apparently Kater started out as Matt Weiner's assistant but rose through the ranks to become a member of the writing team. Whatever the reason she is leaving, I'm sad about it since Kater wrote 'The Fog' and co-wrote 'Meditations on an Emergency'; two episodes I really liked. But of course, I don't know the circumstances. Nobody knows the circumstances but it hasn't stopped MM fandom making a lot of derogatory insinuations about the shows creator. I've heard everything from "Weiner had an affair with her!" to "Weiner is a sexist egotist who didn't like sharing his Writing Emmy with a woman!" plus weird ideas that Matt and Kater are real life versions of Don and Peggy. I really can't be bothered arguing with bloody-minded speculation.
So the episode. I didn't think it was bad, but it was a downer. Let's start with Don (recently voted the most influentional man of the year, God help us) who proved again in this episode that he is kind of a bastard. Maybe it's just me, but I find Don nosediving into his own hubris more watchable than Don's feeble attempts at being good. I think Don is headed for a big crash and burn at the end of this season. He is doing his damnest to alienate everybody. He fucked up with Betty long ago, but now he has pissed on his friendships with Sal, Roger, Peggy, etc. I still think Don is on course for his biggest betrayal yet this season. I think this is the reason why Sally Draper has had so much screentime. Because now Don has had sex with Miss Farrell (every MM fan wins that £5 bet they made with themselves!). Another affair isn't going to hurt Betty anymore than all the other ones. But if Sally finds out about this then "the Drapers screwing up their kids" arc will get its climax.
I can almost feel sorry for Don when he is sharing scenes with Connie who seems to be obsessed with both glorifying Don and tormenting him. Connie's moon request was just...so stupid, but it's kind of funny how shameless Connie is about driving Don crazy with impossible demands and sleep deprivation. Fans think Miss Farrell is a bunny boiler too. I can't decide if I'm rooting for her to be crazy or not.
Sal has been fired?!!! I'm going to have to say that to myself a few times because my brain still refuses to believe it. Sal is becoming a more tragic figure than Joan. And I've been saying since last week's story with Pete that "sexual obligations" are a deep problem in MMs social culture. It is not something we are only seeing in isolated incidents. It is a whole society. Betty won't put out, so Henry Francis won't come to her fundraiser and entertain her bored housewife fantasies. Sal won't put out so Lucky Strike Lee has him fired. And Don, who knows the painful secret that Sal is carrying around with him - is completely unsympathetic, bitches about Sal not submitting to the obligation code and follows with a homophobic kick while he is down. Obviously there have been a lot of offensive comments made by MM characters, but for some reason those two words - "You people" - were more hurtful and offensive than anything I can remember hearing before. And poor Sal. The one guy with a more understandable reason to cheat on his wife is the most reluctant to do it. Though that may not be true for much longer by the looks of the park that Sal was lurking around when we saw him at the end.
The one thing that didn't depress me in this episode was seeing more of Harry. We really haven't had enough of Harry and his cute little bowtie and his hapless ineptitude in S3. His plan to do absolutely nothing and hope that somehow the big bad situation will go away on its own was so dunder-headed but I can never seem to hate Harry. Though I'm still shocked by how heartlessly Sal was fired. This business is so cruel. I was already hating SC/PPL for the way they spat out Guy and will soon spit out Pete or Ken...but Sal's firing was another level of cruel. I kept waiting for the horrible decision to be reversed somehow.
Some fans seem to think that leaving Sterling Cooper is like the Mad Men equivilant of characters being killed off. But I don't believe Joan or Sal are leaving the show. I still think that Pete and Peggy will also leave Sterling Cooper before the end of S3. Obviously Don can't leave anymore so the old dream of those five characters seperating and opening up a new shop cannot be. But I don't think the writers will just take away these other characters and leave us with Don's world-eating personal angst. At least, I really hope not. Maybe instead we'll see Sterling Cooper being rebuilt from within and the characters who left coming back to revolutionise it. I wouldn't mind seeing the narrative split off in different directions for a while to follow characters who are not Don.
Man, Pete can't even smoke a cigarette right. He can't do anything right! The melodramatic dying-of-smoke-inhaltion scene was the only funny part of the episode for me. That and all Roger's lines. Not my favourite episode for sure. Though I still like how the theme of civil rights is creeping in and how different people react to it. Fans seem to hate Miss Farrell but she's the one who is getting her kids to listen to the Martin Luther King's speech while our girl Betty gripes about how it's not a good time for civil rights - reminicient of Don saying it wasn't a good time for Peggy to want equal pay. I'm liking the theme of change in S3. These characters aren't racist and misogynist in obvious outward ways. They are just so inconvinenced by their cosy white privilage being challenged.
Anyway. Back to the real world I go...
Oh, I'm definitely going to avoid MM fandom this week. I've only glimpsed at it this morning and I can see vitrol is through the roof. In about a minute I've already seen about ten "I hate everyone but Carla!" messages. Is there an echo on the internet? Let's all be outraged together! *sigh* It's just not fun anymore. I felt even more sour on Mad Men fandom yesterday with the accouncement that Kater Gordon is leaving (or fired) from the writing staff. Apparently Kater started out as Matt Weiner's assistant but rose through the ranks to become a member of the writing team. Whatever the reason she is leaving, I'm sad about it since Kater wrote 'The Fog' and co-wrote 'Meditations on an Emergency'; two episodes I really liked. But of course, I don't know the circumstances. Nobody knows the circumstances but it hasn't stopped MM fandom making a lot of derogatory insinuations about the shows creator. I've heard everything from "Weiner had an affair with her!" to "Weiner is a sexist egotist who didn't like sharing his Writing Emmy with a woman!" plus weird ideas that Matt and Kater are real life versions of Don and Peggy. I really can't be bothered arguing with bloody-minded speculation.
So the episode. I didn't think it was bad, but it was a downer. Let's start with Don (recently voted the most influentional man of the year, God help us) who proved again in this episode that he is kind of a bastard. Maybe it's just me, but I find Don nosediving into his own hubris more watchable than Don's feeble attempts at being good. I think Don is headed for a big crash and burn at the end of this season. He is doing his damnest to alienate everybody. He fucked up with Betty long ago, but now he has pissed on his friendships with Sal, Roger, Peggy, etc. I still think Don is on course for his biggest betrayal yet this season. I think this is the reason why Sally Draper has had so much screentime. Because now Don has had sex with Miss Farrell (every MM fan wins that £5 bet they made with themselves!). Another affair isn't going to hurt Betty anymore than all the other ones. But if Sally finds out about this then "the Drapers screwing up their kids" arc will get its climax.
I can almost feel sorry for Don when he is sharing scenes with Connie who seems to be obsessed with both glorifying Don and tormenting him. Connie's moon request was just...so stupid, but it's kind of funny how shameless Connie is about driving Don crazy with impossible demands and sleep deprivation. Fans think Miss Farrell is a bunny boiler too. I can't decide if I'm rooting for her to be crazy or not.
Sal has been fired?!!! I'm going to have to say that to myself a few times because my brain still refuses to believe it. Sal is becoming a more tragic figure than Joan. And I've been saying since last week's story with Pete that "sexual obligations" are a deep problem in MMs social culture. It is not something we are only seeing in isolated incidents. It is a whole society. Betty won't put out, so Henry Francis won't come to her fundraiser and entertain her bored housewife fantasies. Sal won't put out so Lucky Strike Lee has him fired. And Don, who knows the painful secret that Sal is carrying around with him - is completely unsympathetic, bitches about Sal not submitting to the obligation code and follows with a homophobic kick while he is down. Obviously there have been a lot of offensive comments made by MM characters, but for some reason those two words - "You people" - were more hurtful and offensive than anything I can remember hearing before. And poor Sal. The one guy with a more understandable reason to cheat on his wife is the most reluctant to do it. Though that may not be true for much longer by the looks of the park that Sal was lurking around when we saw him at the end.
The one thing that didn't depress me in this episode was seeing more of Harry. We really haven't had enough of Harry and his cute little bowtie and his hapless ineptitude in S3. His plan to do absolutely nothing and hope that somehow the big bad situation will go away on its own was so dunder-headed but I can never seem to hate Harry. Though I'm still shocked by how heartlessly Sal was fired. This business is so cruel. I was already hating SC/PPL for the way they spat out Guy and will soon spit out Pete or Ken...but Sal's firing was another level of cruel. I kept waiting for the horrible decision to be reversed somehow.
Some fans seem to think that leaving Sterling Cooper is like the Mad Men equivilant of characters being killed off. But I don't believe Joan or Sal are leaving the show. I still think that Pete and Peggy will also leave Sterling Cooper before the end of S3. Obviously Don can't leave anymore so the old dream of those five characters seperating and opening up a new shop cannot be. But I don't think the writers will just take away these other characters and leave us with Don's world-eating personal angst. At least, I really hope not. Maybe instead we'll see Sterling Cooper being rebuilt from within and the characters who left coming back to revolutionise it. I wouldn't mind seeing the narrative split off in different directions for a while to follow characters who are not Don.
Man, Pete can't even smoke a cigarette right. He can't do anything right! The melodramatic dying-of-smoke-inhaltion scene was the only funny part of the episode for me. That and all Roger's lines. Not my favourite episode for sure. Though I still like how the theme of civil rights is creeping in and how different people react to it. Fans seem to hate Miss Farrell but she's the one who is getting her kids to listen to the Martin Luther King's speech while our girl Betty gripes about how it's not a good time for civil rights - reminicient of Don saying it wasn't a good time for Peggy to want equal pay. I'm liking the theme of change in S3. These characters aren't racist and misogynist in obvious outward ways. They are just so inconvinenced by their cosy white privilage being challenged.
Anyway. Back to the real world I go...