Mad Men

AMC has the best programming on television. I’m aware of what a bold statement that is but I personally think that Breaking Bad is THE best show and Walking Dead a shambling 2nd. Thanks to the all-mighty Netflix I can now complete the AMC hat trick and find out if January Jones can relay any emotion beyond “none”.

Mad Men is set in the 1960s, at the fictional Sterling Cooper advertising agency on Madison Avenue in New York City.The focal point of the series is Don Draper (Jon Hamm), creative director at Sterling Cooper and the people in his life, both in and out of the office. Secretary Peggy Olson (Elisabeth Moss), Office Manager Joan Holloway (Christina Hendricks) and resident wiener Accounts man Pete Campbell (Vincent Kartheiser) are just a few of the people who do as little as possible while you are tuning in every week.

I have watched the first 2 seasons and i think that is more than a fair shake. I can understand if someone recommends Dexter but says “just wait until episode 3 or 4, it really gets going!” but no one can tell me that after season 2 the show really hits its stride. “I know that the first 26 episodes of Mad Men start off slow but just wait for eps 27 and 28…it ramps up!” ummmmm no thanks.

The show has a few good things going for it like the always manly Jon Hamm as vagina-crusher, ad man Don Draper. When it comes to being faithful to his wife, he is a complete scumbag but beyond that he is a stand up. no-nonsense 1960’s man’s man. The entire show could be about Don Draper smoking, drinking and breaking hearts and that alone would get me to watch and wish I looked that good in suits. Christina Hendricks is one of the other good looking reasons to watch Mad Men, her figure seems so unrealistic at times that she reminds of the Kamino cloners in Star Wars: Attack of the Clones. She’s still hot though…so is January Jones….Elisabeth Moss is not…I wonder if there is a Mad Men porn parody yet? OH WOW! THERE IS!. “This isn’t Mad Men: The XXX Parody” for those who find that sophisticated early 60s ambiance a big turn-on.

No one cares about production except nerds so of course I liked the production. The costumes are pretty spot on and I might have asked if a tie would make me look like Don Draper while I was shopping the other day. The sets are great and all the little details from the era are fun to spot. I loved laughing at the dated slogans and ad campaigns that would come up.

For every hour that I watch the show I would guess that about 15-20 minutes of actual plot comes across. Mad Men is comparable to The Walking Dead in that regard except that in Walking Dead someone could die horrifically at any given second to keep it interesting while in Mad Men someone just sleeps with someone else with zero nudity. Snooze. The 20 minutes when shit is actually going down is usually very interesting and would make a great TV series.

My main problem with Mad Men is that there is no tension or consequences to anything in the show. Everybody sleeps with someone else that they aren’t married to, no one seems to care about anything besides smoking and there is no clear antagonist. Vincent Kartheiser’s (Conner from Angel mother fuckers!) character Pete Campbell would be the closest thing to a villain in the series but that would be like saying Ned Flanders is the bad guy on The Simpsons.

Mad Men wastes so much time doing and showing absolutely nothing. I could take the show to HBO for some much needed nudity, cut each episode down to 30 minutes and add a robot assistant for Don named “Jinx” and become a billionaire.

THE BEST:  Don Draper is a great role model for womanizers everywhere.

THE WORST:  Mad Men is booooooooring.

THE LINE: “I told him to be himself. That was pretty mean I guess.” -Roger

THE FINAL: 2 out of 5 It’s just like trying to meet a hot girl. Everyone has spotted her, looks real pretty but after a few minutes you realize that the computer might be turned on but the internet ain’t hooked up.

-Rob-

The Walking Dead

Zombies. The word, image and concept frightens me to my handsome core. In October of 2003, bearded writer Robert Kirkman unleashed The Walking Dead onto comic book nerds everywhere. Kirkman took a concept that I didn’t think was possible and made it a reality…a never ending zombie movie. Of course it was a black and white comic book and not actually a movie but it was something I always wondered about after the credits would roll in any zombie flick. What happens next? Do all the zombies fall over and stay dead? Do they Thriller dance over the earth and that’s the end of the human race? The answer is just like the title’s antagonists, it just never stops. Several attempts were made to turn the comics into a movie which makes zero sense because unless someone planned on making 20 movies then they were going against the concept right from the start. Enter the gun carrying lunatic director of The Shawshank Redemption Frank Darabont and the network with the best shows on television AMC. Together they created something besides internet porn that make me lock my door.

Southern Sheriff’s Deputy Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoin) awakens from a coma to discover that the world he knew has been devoured by reanimated corpses with a taste for flesh. As Rick searches for his missing wife Lori (Sarah Wayne Callies) and son Carl he encounters others who are struggling to survive in their dangerous new world. Like other AMC series it is a short form consisting of 6 episodes for the 1st season but jumping to 13 for the 2nd. Each episode is an hour in length but the start of each season is built more like a movie clocking in at 90 minutes and yet you still want it to be longer (that’s what she said).

I started writing this after re-watching the 1st season and now I’m finishing it after having watched the start of  the 2nd and I would definitively have to say I’m a die-hard for this show. Yes, I am a fan of the books so liking the show should be easy but not all comic adaptions work out, have you ever seen Green Lantern? GONG! The Walking Dead works on every level. The look of the show goes in the opposite direction of other horror media by being primarily shot during the day to give you more of a clear view of the disaster and desolation that has occurred. The zombies look like something that shuffled out of my night terrors and aren’t just extra’s covered in grey paint like the zombies you find in some knob job’s home-made zombie movie.

The cast is as close to the books as you can get with the exception of the douche-y Shane (Jon Bernthal) and the new original characters. Survivors Glenn (Steven Yeun), Andrea (Laurie Holden) and Dale (Jeffrey DeMunn) all bring something different to the table and make you care when people get nixed. So AMC are ruthless cutthroats and they fired Darabont and slashed the show’s budget so I guess time will tell how the 2nd season shakes down. Makes perfect sense to me that if you have something that’s amazingly successful that you try to run it into the ground as quickly as possible…of course the most successful thing I ever did was reach the 1,000,000 population point of Sim City…then I ran my city into the ground by deleting all the roads so what do I know. Thank you very much if you are still reading this mess.

If you were thinking of checking out the show then it’s not too hard to find, AMC constantly has Walking Dead marathons and their site streams all of the episodes. The Walking Dead is a must for horror fans with a strong dramatic narrative, a few one-note characters and some genuine scares. Jump on the bandwagon while you still can because it might not be perfect but it is the best Drombie…Zombra?….the best scary show out there.

THE BEST:  It is a really good way to think about what you yourself would do when the zombie apocalypse finally goes down. Not me though because my plan involves laser cats.

THE WORST:  Some of the characters that they added that weren’t in the books are kind of one-dimensional stereotypes…..”T-Dogg” !?!? really?!?!

THE LINE:  “This is what takes us down. This is our extinction event”   -Dr. Jenner

THE FINAL:  4 out of 5   Emperor Palpatine likes the show but wasn’t really scared of zombies until some dick-bucket wrote a book about zombie stormtroopers called “Death Troopers”

– Rob –

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1520211/

Breaking Bad

Breaking Bad is by far the best thing on television. In fact, I question your intelligence if you do not watch this show. The show follows high school chemistry teacher Walter White (Brian Cranston) as he enters the world of crystal meth cooking after he discovers that he is dying of lung cancer and is driven to make sure his wife Skyler (Anna Gunn) and son Walter Jr (RJ Mitte) will be financially taken care of after he drops. Enter former student and current meth chef Jesse (Aaron Paul) as Walts partner into his new “profession” and Hank (Dean Norris) Walts DEA agent and brother-in-law to the equation and the craziness is off and running.

Check it…take the action of Hunter, the awesomeness of The Wire and the subject matter of Weeds and you get 46 minutes that could only be better spent at a slide, puppy and fireworks factory. Breaking Bad is one of those rare shows that pulls you in and at the end you always let out an “awwwwww shit” as you have just been thoroughly satisfied and, just like dating a girl on her period… you have to wait a week for more. Couple the tension of Dexter with the acting of any Bryan Fuller production and you get a show that kicks you in the stomach in a good way.

Seasons 1 and 2 are pretty much a 2 man show with Walt and Jesse being the centers of attention and everyone else just talking scenery. Seasons 3 and 4 added much stronger characters creating a more rounded ensemble cast, but the continued reason to tune in every week is still Brian Cranston. The man has won 3 Emmys for his role and honestly, when he is not on the screen is when I get up to make sweet delicious nachos. The only other time I give 4 Care Bears is when Bob Odenkirk guest stars and shocks me into thinking why he didn’t get steady work before. Luckily, he becomes a regular in season 4.

The show has an exploding plot, and with a 13 episode season format you can easily get caught up. Walter’s ever increasing dangers in the work place and his looming illness give the sense that they won’t keep the show around past its prime.

Go watch it right now. Stream it, steal it or enjoy the greatness that is AMC programming ……frankly, I don’t give a damn.

THE BEST:   BRIAN. FUCKING. CRANSTON. You can consider Malcolm In The Middle a commercial in this guys career.

THE WORST:  The rest of the cast is like watching Coronation Street with the sound too loud and no booze in the house.

THE LINE:   “What’s the point of being an outlaw if I gotta have responsibilities?” -Jesse-  “Darth Vader had responsibilities….building the Death Star” -Badger-  “True Dat! Two of ’em Yo!” -Skinny Pete-

THE FINAL:   5 out of 5  Watch the damn show or stick to watching King of Queens reruns.

– Rob –

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0903747/