Old Fashioned
Mad Men - Season Three (2009)
rating: 4 out of 5 cravats
on DVD from Netflix
When Lane Pryce expresses relief to his wife that no one in New York has ever asked where he went to school, Mrs. Pryce complains about stateside taxicabs. The tea-drinking harbinger of the modern corporate mentality is more than just the office comedian with a touch of humanity. So solid is Mad Men’s belief in American possibility, regardless of the day-to-day difficulties associated with happiness and fulfillment, that even a half-honest colonizer can see it.
The season’s last episode was incongruous but entertaining. Presumably, the idea was to streamline the cast for season four, and while it was easy to root for our scrappy band of corporate runaways, the tone of their fairy-tale startup wasn’t quite in keeping with anything else in Mad Men. The John Deere massacre, while absurd, at least spoke to the moods and mental states of the nation. Was it Matthew Weiner who kept The Sopranos funny regardless of how bad things got for Tony and the crew? Weiner and the predominantly female writing staff on Mad Men certainly retain their sense of humor with Draper’s Dozen – a good precedent for “serious” TV.
But they overplayed their hands in Season 2 when Grandpa Hofstadt, in the throes of Alzheimer’s, mistakes Betty for her mother and cops a feel. It was weird at the time, but throughout Gene’s tenure at the Draper household, every encounter with the grandkids seems rife with danger when clearly the intention was to give Sally someone who encouraged her in all the ways that mom and dad don’t. Dear Betts, who never really learned how to love her kids the way a mother should, begins to catch on with baby #3, maybe because she believes she’s met someone who really could be a decent guy to her and the newborn both. I hope they give Francis that much, whatever his failings should eventually prove to be. And I kind of hope she marries him.
But I can never quite move past the fact that Don and Betty remain, at least as far as their kids are concerned, monstrously selfish people. Which is why I was glad that Conrad Hilton emerged for some perspective. With an introduction like his scene at the country club bar, and Don squeezing lemons into nicely sized rocks glasses, how could we, and Don, not love him?
Inevitably, Dick is seduced by this odd father figure, but Connie wouldn’t be a wildly successful businessman – or a great foil to Don - without also possessing every impersonal tic that left the real-life Hilton with kids like Barron and great-granddaughters like Paris (who, for the record, I like). Men like Connie don’t care about their children - or people at all - because they’ve never been close to anyone. They have an idea of the life they wanted when they were dirt poor in New Mexico, but the hotel appointments are just the dressings of control.
Conrad dominates the first two thirds of the season but disappears for the rest of it. When Don finally confronts him in his New York suite, Don’s anger about his contract is real, but Hilton can’t look beyond the failure of an ad campaign to appease his moonstruck whims. So Conrad is dismissive and goes, and Don sees once again that there is a need in this world to rely – and be able to rely – on other people. Sterling Cooper Pryce Draper is the same idea, but less succinct, on paper and off the tongue.
rating: 4 out of 5 cravats
on DVD from Netflix
When Lane Pryce expresses relief to his wife that no one in New York has ever asked where he went to school, Mrs. Pryce complains about stateside taxicabs. The tea-drinking harbinger of the modern corporate mentality is more than just the office comedian with a touch of humanity. So solid is Mad Men’s belief in American possibility, regardless of the day-to-day difficulties associated with happiness and fulfillment, that even a half-honest colonizer can see it.
The season’s last episode was incongruous but entertaining. Presumably, the idea was to streamline the cast for season four, and while it was easy to root for our scrappy band of corporate runaways, the tone of their fairy-tale startup wasn’t quite in keeping with anything else in Mad Men. The John Deere massacre, while absurd, at least spoke to the moods and mental states of the nation. Was it Matthew Weiner who kept The Sopranos funny regardless of how bad things got for Tony and the crew? Weiner and the predominantly female writing staff on Mad Men certainly retain their sense of humor with Draper’s Dozen – a good precedent for “serious” TV.
But they overplayed their hands in Season 2 when Grandpa Hofstadt, in the throes of Alzheimer’s, mistakes Betty for her mother and cops a feel. It was weird at the time, but throughout Gene’s tenure at the Draper household, every encounter with the grandkids seems rife with danger when clearly the intention was to give Sally someone who encouraged her in all the ways that mom and dad don’t. Dear Betts, who never really learned how to love her kids the way a mother should, begins to catch on with baby #3, maybe because she believes she’s met someone who really could be a decent guy to her and the newborn both. I hope they give Francis that much, whatever his failings should eventually prove to be. And I kind of hope she marries him.
But I can never quite move past the fact that Don and Betty remain, at least as far as their kids are concerned, monstrously selfish people. Which is why I was glad that Conrad Hilton emerged for some perspective. With an introduction like his scene at the country club bar, and Don squeezing lemons into nicely sized rocks glasses, how could we, and Don, not love him?
Inevitably, Dick is seduced by this odd father figure, but Connie wouldn’t be a wildly successful businessman – or a great foil to Don - without also possessing every impersonal tic that left the real-life Hilton with kids like Barron and great-granddaughters like Paris (who, for the record, I like). Men like Connie don’t care about their children - or people at all - because they’ve never been close to anyone. They have an idea of the life they wanted when they were dirt poor in New Mexico, but the hotel appointments are just the dressings of control.
Conrad dominates the first two thirds of the season but disappears for the rest of it. When Don finally confronts him in his New York suite, Don’s anger about his contract is real, but Hilton can’t look beyond the failure of an ad campaign to appease his moonstruck whims. So Conrad is dismissive and goes, and Don sees once again that there is a need in this world to rely – and be able to rely – on other people. Sterling Cooper Pryce Draper is the same idea, but less succinct, on paper and off the tongue.
posted by NPK at 5:54 AM
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