Mad Men: The Colour Blue
The Colour Blue: Review
This week in the Draper household...something actually happened! And I actually liked it. Betty is just going through the motions of her usual boring day as a housewife, making a little grocery list, doing a little laundry, then oops there's Don's key to his desk draw, wouldn't it be fun to open it? Then suddenly Betty finds she is wedded to a massive identity fraudster. I kinda wish that I didn't have such Draper fatigue at the moment because this moment might have had more impact on me. As it stands, the moment Betty learns about Dick Whitman didn't thrill me as much as Pete stealing Adam's box in S1 or Jimmy Barrett blowing apart the Draper marriage in S2. But at least I have a good reason to sympathise with Betty again. I get the feeling that a lot of fans overlook Don's identity theft and see his infidelity as his main character flaw. Personally, I think the former is much worse. Not only does it make Don a fraud, a deserter, a criminal, etc. The most sinister part is how Don has made Betty an unwitting accomplice in all his lies. I wanted to screeeeeam for Betty when she had been waiting to confront Don and he just told her to make herself pretty so he could show her off at the party. I do wholeheartly agree with any fan who feels there has been too much focus on the Drapers in S3 - on their new baby, their new affairs, their trips to Rome, Gene's death, Sally's angst, etc. Much of it has been time-consuming and tedious. For me, there have been just two significant developments in the Don/Betty story - 1) Don signed a contract that committed him to his false identity, 2) Betty unlocked a draw and discovered the truth. I wish the writers could have trimmed the fat and just focused on those two developments, because those parts are gooooood.
Getting back to some unabashed negativity - the Don & Miss Farrell affair is the most suicide-inducingly boring thing I've ever seen. I'd rather buy a ticket to watch paint dry than watch anymore of these two and their non-existant chemistry. Ugh. And yes, I'm sure this affair will end horribly for Don, but the thing is...who cares? I don't even care to see Don get his well-deserved comeuppance. I just want Don to piss off. Though I'll be generous and say that I did like Don reaching out to the epileptic brother/Adam clone. I still feel so sad over poor Adam Whitman and we've never seen Don show any remorse for, well...driving him to suicide. It's always been something I wanted to see.
Personally my favourite parts of this episode were any scenes with Kinsey and Lane. Because these characters are actually funny and endearing and watchable! It makes a nice change. Kinsey I sometimes find embarrassing, because everyone thinks he is a pretentious ass and HE IS but I always find myself identifying with Kinsey. Any writer can relate to having a Great Idea when drunk and sleepy, forgetting to write it down and losing it. I just love that Paul was such a baby about it. And I love his little footstamping celebration, his theatrical copy presentations and his reminicising over his awesome yet totally sexist Jackie/Marilyn campaign. And I love that Kinsey finds super!Peggy as annoying as I do. Peggy is such an insufferable swot sometimes. But I liked that Peggy told Don not to shout at Kinsey. I really want to see the office underlings standing up for each other against their Big Mean Bosses.
How the hell is Lois not fired? I love her and everything, but how is it that Sal got fired for refusing to be sexually harrassed while Lois gets away with mowing the new bosses foot off? I guess Sterling Cooper just really hate the British and are thankful to Lois for making them go away. I'm kind of bemused by PPL selling the company. I always thought the British take over was meant to tie in with the British cultural invasion in 1964. Like...the Brits can't leave before the Beatles break in America!
Lane can't leave!! God, Lane is even more ME than Kinsey. He's english, he wears dorky glasses, he reads Mark Twain and he likes Pete Campbell? Lane is sooo my POV character on this show. Lane practicing his party speech in his office in front of a very smiley Mr Hooker is the cutest thing I have ever seen! I need some fluffy Pryce/Hooker slash fic now. They are so adorable. And Lane's line asking whether his speech was compelling in a Churchhill way or a Hitler way. That is just priceless *hugs Lane, loves the show again* And the scene where Lane is sneaky with Cooper and Cooper is impressed by his sneakiness. Love it!
I'd even prefer more Roger at this stage. I've decided I'm actually on Roger's side in the whole Don/Roger feud. Because Don is in no position to judge Roger, because Don is just a jealous hycoprite being angry at Roger/Jane and because I think Roger really did value their friendship that Don has stormed out of. So I felt sorry for Roger having to give that 'Don Draper is our Hero!' speech as much as I felt sorry for Betty having to listen to it. Roger's mother is totally hilarious. Poor Jane!
*sigh* I am a disappointed Pete and Peggy fan this season. And I don't even mean Pete/Peggy. Just Pete and Peggy. I can reason with myself when I look at my past fandoms - in Lost, in BSG, in The Wire, etc - my favourite characters were always the supporting characters who got sidelined. The annoying thing with MM is that I thought Peggy and Pete were supposed to be major characters. Like, Elizabeth Moss and Vincent Kartheiser are 2nd and 3rd on the opening cast credits. Yet they never get major storylines anymore. They get subplots and bit parts every episode. And Joan fans are even worse off. Joan is supposed to be a regular and she has been absent for half of the season? No...in S3 Don and Betty are the only regular main characters and everyone else is making supporting guest appearences. So maybe for buget reasons they could only afford to give part-time contracts to the other actors, but it is still very bad for the story. Don and Betty cannot carry the show. That is not so much an insult to those characters/actors - I just don't think the show is giving due credit to the other actors/characters and how badly they are needed (in every episode!) to give the story balance. You can't remove a great character like Joan for X amount of episodes and say that the show is still as good. The consequence of getting rid of those great characters is that the show becomes less enjoyable and less diverse. It's become a huge weakness in S3.
*hopes episodes 12 and 13 will make it all better*
This week in the Draper household...something actually happened! And I actually liked it. Betty is just going through the motions of her usual boring day as a housewife, making a little grocery list, doing a little laundry, then oops there's Don's key to his desk draw, wouldn't it be fun to open it? Then suddenly Betty finds she is wedded to a massive identity fraudster. I kinda wish that I didn't have such Draper fatigue at the moment because this moment might have had more impact on me. As it stands, the moment Betty learns about Dick Whitman didn't thrill me as much as Pete stealing Adam's box in S1 or Jimmy Barrett blowing apart the Draper marriage in S2. But at least I have a good reason to sympathise with Betty again. I get the feeling that a lot of fans overlook Don's identity theft and see his infidelity as his main character flaw. Personally, I think the former is much worse. Not only does it make Don a fraud, a deserter, a criminal, etc. The most sinister part is how Don has made Betty an unwitting accomplice in all his lies. I wanted to screeeeeam for Betty when she had been waiting to confront Don and he just told her to make herself pretty so he could show her off at the party. I do wholeheartly agree with any fan who feels there has been too much focus on the Drapers in S3 - on their new baby, their new affairs, their trips to Rome, Gene's death, Sally's angst, etc. Much of it has been time-consuming and tedious. For me, there have been just two significant developments in the Don/Betty story - 1) Don signed a contract that committed him to his false identity, 2) Betty unlocked a draw and discovered the truth. I wish the writers could have trimmed the fat and just focused on those two developments, because those parts are gooooood.
Getting back to some unabashed negativity - the Don & Miss Farrell affair is the most suicide-inducingly boring thing I've ever seen. I'd rather buy a ticket to watch paint dry than watch anymore of these two and their non-existant chemistry. Ugh. And yes, I'm sure this affair will end horribly for Don, but the thing is...who cares? I don't even care to see Don get his well-deserved comeuppance. I just want Don to piss off. Though I'll be generous and say that I did like Don reaching out to the epileptic brother/Adam clone. I still feel so sad over poor Adam Whitman and we've never seen Don show any remorse for, well...driving him to suicide. It's always been something I wanted to see.
Personally my favourite parts of this episode were any scenes with Kinsey and Lane. Because these characters are actually funny and endearing and watchable! It makes a nice change. Kinsey I sometimes find embarrassing, because everyone thinks he is a pretentious ass and HE IS but I always find myself identifying with Kinsey. Any writer can relate to having a Great Idea when drunk and sleepy, forgetting to write it down and losing it. I just love that Paul was such a baby about it. And I love his little footstamping celebration, his theatrical copy presentations and his reminicising over his awesome yet totally sexist Jackie/Marilyn campaign. And I love that Kinsey finds super!Peggy as annoying as I do. Peggy is such an insufferable swot sometimes. But I liked that Peggy told Don not to shout at Kinsey. I really want to see the office underlings standing up for each other against their Big Mean Bosses.
How the hell is Lois not fired? I love her and everything, but how is it that Sal got fired for refusing to be sexually harrassed while Lois gets away with mowing the new bosses foot off? I guess Sterling Cooper just really hate the British and are thankful to Lois for making them go away. I'm kind of bemused by PPL selling the company. I always thought the British take over was meant to tie in with the British cultural invasion in 1964. Like...the Brits can't leave before the Beatles break in America!
Lane can't leave!! God, Lane is even more ME than Kinsey. He's english, he wears dorky glasses, he reads Mark Twain and he likes Pete Campbell? Lane is sooo my POV character on this show. Lane practicing his party speech in his office in front of a very smiley Mr Hooker is the cutest thing I have ever seen! I need some fluffy Pryce/Hooker slash fic now. They are so adorable. And Lane's line asking whether his speech was compelling in a Churchhill way or a Hitler way. That is just priceless *hugs Lane, loves the show again* And the scene where Lane is sneaky with Cooper and Cooper is impressed by his sneakiness. Love it!
I'd even prefer more Roger at this stage. I've decided I'm actually on Roger's side in the whole Don/Roger feud. Because Don is in no position to judge Roger, because Don is just a jealous hycoprite being angry at Roger/Jane and because I think Roger really did value their friendship that Don has stormed out of. So I felt sorry for Roger having to give that 'Don Draper is our Hero!' speech as much as I felt sorry for Betty having to listen to it. Roger's mother is totally hilarious. Poor Jane!
*sigh* I am a disappointed Pete and Peggy fan this season. And I don't even mean Pete/Peggy. Just Pete and Peggy. I can reason with myself when I look at my past fandoms - in Lost, in BSG, in The Wire, etc - my favourite characters were always the supporting characters who got sidelined. The annoying thing with MM is that I thought Peggy and Pete were supposed to be major characters. Like, Elizabeth Moss and Vincent Kartheiser are 2nd and 3rd on the opening cast credits. Yet they never get major storylines anymore. They get subplots and bit parts every episode. And Joan fans are even worse off. Joan is supposed to be a regular and she has been absent for half of the season? No...in S3 Don and Betty are the only regular main characters and everyone else is making supporting guest appearences. So maybe for buget reasons they could only afford to give part-time contracts to the other actors, but it is still very bad for the story. Don and Betty cannot carry the show. That is not so much an insult to those characters/actors - I just don't think the show is giving due credit to the other actors/characters and how badly they are needed (in every episode!) to give the story balance. You can't remove a great character like Joan for X amount of episodes and say that the show is still as good. The consequence of getting rid of those great characters is that the show becomes less enjoyable and less diverse. It's become a huge weakness in S3.
*hopes episodes 12 and 13 will make it all better*