Mad Men is pinging my fanometer

[superplin]

Mad Men is making me miss my fandom days of geektastic episode analysis. If I were writing one of my old-style essays on this week's "Mystery Date," I'd start with wondering what it means to be a man. There's a different one behind every door, just waiting for you... and these days (in 1966), some of them might even be women. Turns out they can be

Comments

[superplin]

It's funny, it feels real in a lot of ways to me, but somehow not so real that I can't enjoy it as a story. (Like, say, Breaking Bad, which I think is a very good show, but which is a little too gritty for me to wholly embrace.)

[superplin]

Heh, I forget there are people here now who weren't around (me) in my Buffy fandom days, which was what I created this LJ for in the first place. Worlds collide! I'm glad you enjoyed it, at least; I used to really put a lot of time and energy into those essays, but just don't have enough of either these days. They used to be my primary creative outlet, so it was fun to channel my old "rambly casual supergeek" voice after so many years.

This season is totally kicking ass so far. It may even surpass season 3, which was my favorite until now (and the only one I own on DVD). I'm loving it hardcore.

[entelein]

While I thought Mystery Date was a strong episode, it still made me wonder how many females they have on writing staff. At times I've really identified with Peggy, and I think Christina Hendricks really gives Joan tons of depth, but the show still seems to me to have a very focused lens on the male issues of that time. It bothers me that the women on the show still feel like ornamentation. I thought a several of the visuals in the episode were *potentially* really powerful (bodies under furniture, bodies on top of furniture, sleeping women, drugged women, etc.), but lacked some sort of ... resonance

[superplin]

Interesting. I see it a bit differently: the POV of the show is, for the most part, the POV of "society" at the time, so distinctly male. I guess that's why it doesn't bother me; a lot of the show's themes come to light specifically because they are portrayed in a way they would never be shown today: I think anything more direct could be overkill. They resonate because we bring our contemporary sensibilities to the interpretation. For example, to me all the examples of women cowering or discarded bodies you list (including the ones that are described rather than shown, or Dawn sleeping on Don's couch) are powerful because they aren't given much emphasis.

(And then today I watched this video about how women are portrayed in advertising, even today, which was particularly incisive coming on the heels of this episode--especially the last bit about eroticizing violence.)

[entelein]

In a not-so-tiny 'Eff You, Hollywood' sort of way, I think that this POV is a bit of a cop-out. We *regularly* get quiet, intimate moments with Don that belie his outer shell. We had the whole California storyline. We saw him become incontinent from alcohol, for cry eye

[superplin]

Oh, and I thought I'd read something about the writing staff, so I looked it up (on that great omniscient source, Wikipedia, but the article seems well documented). Here's what it says:

As of the third season, seven of the nine writers for the show are women, in contrast to Writers Guild of America 2006 statistics that show male writers outnumber female writers by 2 to 1.[24] As Maria Jacquemetton noted:[24]

We have a predominately female writing staff-women from their early 20s to their 50s-and plenty of female department heads and directors. [Show creator] Matt Weiner and [executive producer] Scott Hornbacher hire people they believe in, based on their talent and their experience. "Can you capture this world? Can you bring great storytelling?"

I'm not sure whether the gender or age distribution is more surprising, actually.

[superplin]

I thought it was awesome, too--I can't even imagine how much more strongly it must've hit if you remember all of those things going on when you were young. I'm hoping you at least didn't have a grandmother like Sally's.

In fact, I'd also want to write an essay on "A Tale of Two Grandmothers," although I'd probably want to wait until a bit later in the season, or even after it's over. Comparing and contrasting Joan's mom and the elder Mrs. Francis would be a fascinating exercise...

[superplin]

I think you should absolutely start watching Mad Men! It's way better viewed directly than through the lens of my contortionist thoughts.