Coldness is a problem for me too which is probably why it took me a while to warm to Mad Men, but then there were events later in the season that knocked my socks off: I found Peggy's continuing successes incredibly moving and exciting, and her tragic "situation" at the end absolutely gutting. The lesbian and gay characters both broke my heart. The story of first "vibrator" thrilled me to pieces. And best of all, one of my least favourite characters, Betty, surprised me into loving her, with that final startling scene in the psychiatrist's office where she reveals just how much she knows about her husband and situation.
I'm just so impressed with the quality of the writing and so amazed that I am able to sympathise with such seemingly unsympathetic characters, that actually, I think the coldness might be a deception. Because coldness, to me, implies a lack of compassion for characters, and that's not something I would say about Mad Men. They might not be particularly likeable but they are all so recognisably human that I get a sense not that the creative team hates human beings but that they see us for what we are: flawed, maddening and marvellous. Like, for every scene with Don behaving like a hateful piece of shit we get one where he reveals his tortured soul or his undeniable talent or his capacity for love. You know?
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branchandroot
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Date: 2008-06-13 12:54 pm (UTC)I'm just so impressed with the quality of the writing and so amazed that I am able to sympathise with such seemingly unsympathetic characters, that actually, I think the coldness might be a deception. Because coldness, to me, implies a lack of compassion for characters, and that's not something I would say about Mad Men. They might not be particularly likeable but they are all so recognisably human that I get a sense not that the creative team hates human beings but that they see us for what we are: flawed, maddening and marvellous. Like, for every scene with Don behaving like a hateful piece of shit we get one where he reveals his tortured soul or his undeniable talent or his capacity for love. You know?