Watching Mad Men in light of some of the most hysterical critical hype of television history began as a frustrating, disorienting experience for me. This is part of its power.
There’s an uncanny realism at work that overshadows the finer points of narrative: the characterization of the time and space of 1960s America. Don Draper and Joan Harris are two of the most stunning characters I’ve ever seen on a screen, and this has less to do with pure aesthetics than deep-in-my-gut lust.
Why is it so easy to forgive Draper his nasty misogynism and exalt his masculinity? And how could someone create Betty Draper or Joan Harris in 2011, characters whose manipulative capacities and cloyingness seems to reinforce some of the ugliest ’60s stereotypes about women?
It’s not the stories that make Mad Men so damn compelling, renderings of vice and virtue so vibrantly bourn out. So even though I rolled my eyes at the Emmys’ consistent over-appraisal while the pure-hearted Friday Night Lights toiled in obscurity, a year of separation from the show has given me a carnal, unwholesome longing that I hate to love.
—Brian Contratto
Friends, it’s time to pour some “Funky Juice” (white wine, Sprite, ice) and create a “night cheese” platter. Liz Lemon is back.
When 30 Rock premiered five seasons ago, no one ever thought it would go this far. With a similarly themed Aaron Sorkin program premiering in the same season (the short-lived and quickly forgotten Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip), what chance did this oddball comedy have? Perhaps it’s that fatalism that inspired some of the funniest and most bizarre moments ever broadcast on American television.
Some critics (haters) have accused the ensuing seasons of mediocrity. Season six is sure to be fraught with the manic intensity that marked the show’s early days. With critics and some cast saying the show has run its rather unconventional path, the writers will be ready to prove them wrong.
Obviously this review/suggestion/whatever would be incomplete without some brief worship of the goddess divine Tina Fey, who recently told David Letterman that she wants to keep the show going as long as she can. Them’s fightin’ words. 30 Rock is going to be on fire, and we’re going to like it.
To be honest, 30 Rock is made for us. It’s accused of being overly intellectual, self-aggrandizing, and occasionally crass: all Duke students should be watching in solidarity.
—Nathan Nye
In the first episode of season two of Portlandia, Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein, the show’s creators, chase after an attractive Portland mixologist (played by a pitch-perfect Andy Samberg) who has moved, inexplicably, to “SoCal” to work at a beach bar called Windjammers. They hop in a cab and soon arrive in Cali, where they are bowled over by the presence of the sun.
“Ah, my lily white skin!” Brownstein shrieks. “What is that? Why isn’t it covered by clouds?”
With Portlandia, the team of Armisen, a veteran comedian and SNL regular, and Brownstein, best known as the guitarist for the now-defunct band Sleater-Kinney, have created a sketch comedy gem. They have taken the familiar comedic conceit of making fun of alternative culture and embedded it in a city known for its Pacific Northwest peculiarity.
The characters are at once familiar and imaginative: a pair of women who run a feminist bookstore and relentlessly guilt-trip hapless customers, hotel clerks that offer guests complimentary turntables and typewriters, a couple in a restaurant demanding to know whether the cage-free chicken ate a diet of local hazelnuts.
Armisen we knew could act, but Brownstein, a long time resident of Portland, keeps up with him. Their chemistry lends authenticity to the characters and to the oddness of Portland itself, and will entertain the spectrum from hipsters to those who ridicule them.
—Jake Stanley
Game of Thrones returns for its second season this April.
The fantasy show centers on an island kingdom ruled from a much coveted iron throne – one that is literally made of the weapons that it takes to win it. The first season focused on the Stark family from a small northern city. The head of the Stark family is obligated to become the right “hand” of the new king, and unintentionally involves his family in a complicated system of lies and loyalties—the cause of which is a secret surrounding the king himself.
True to the nature of HBO shows, Game of Thrones’ graphic scenes focus on love affairs, medieval political scandals, and battles—on the internal struggles that come with trying to keep the throne. The second season will add external attacks on the kingdom. The catch phrase of the first season was “Winter is coming.” In the second season, it will arrive with the anticipated appearance of true fantasy elements: “white walkers” that turn the dead into puppets will attack from the north, and another heir with three live weapons will make a claim to the coveted iron throne from across the sea.
—Katya Prosvirkina
With the fifth and final season of Breaking Bad on the way this year, it’s difficult not to ruminate on all the directions in which the fourth season finale’s loose ends may take the show. If the show has taught us one thing, however, it’s that we might as well give up on that; like Walt and Gus, Breaking Bad tends to stay several steps ahead of its followers.
Of course, that’s not to say that the more obvious plot-points-in-waiting won’t be explored. It’s fairly evident that the show’s wrap-up will provide a prime opportunity for Walt’s cancer to resurface, for his relationship with his partner Jesse to deteriorate further than it already has, and for a years-in-the-waiting showdown with the DEA to become the reality that it inevitably will. In classic Breaking Bad fashion, though, the plot devices of the show—spectacular though they always are—will be less interesting in the end than what it is they have to say about its characters.
From the beginning, creator Vince Gilligan has admitted his aversion to bad guys who go unpunished. And, with Walt’s transformation from “good” to “bad” complete, we have to wonder what fate and the script have in store for the show’s main character. Will Gilligan make good on his insinuations to punish Walt for what he has done? Or has he, just as the character he created, undergone something of a change in his conviction over the last few years? It seems that only the extended, 16-episode season five and series finale will tell.
—Chris Bassil
Just 150 miles away from Durham, Wilmington, NC, is the home to one of the largest full-service film and television facilities in the United States east of California. Production for One Tree Hill, an American television drama that has been Wilmington-based since 2003, wrapped in mid-November 2011 after completing its ninth and final season. Though the show previously garnered criticism, One Tree Hill has managed to outlive previous series competitors and survived a network merger. The show’s loyal fans have followed their favorite characters throughout the years as they progressed from high school to building a family life, friendships and careers in Tree Hill, NC. The relationships remain real and the characters’ personas defined, the final season will jerk its audience’s heartstrings once more. Upcoming previews promise love and heartbreak, betrayal and new friendships and even a major character’s death. In Tree Hill, NC, there is never a dull moment. Series regulars Sophia Bush and Bethany Joy Galeotti will return this season and viewers can expect special appearances by Chad Michael Murray (who left after season six) and Tyler Hilton. In anticipation of a ‘darker and more naked’ season, One Tree Hill viewers can look forward to 13 final, exhilarating episodes.
—Danielle Genet
I’m the type of person who will probably drop everything I’m doing to watch a period drama. Maybe it stems from when I thought British novels were the only literature that mattered; as I grew out of that phase (thank goodness), I began pursuing their cinematic adaptations. Then I discovered Masterpiece Theatre on PBS—the nation’s longest-running prime-time TV drama—a venerable program(me) that adapts Dickens and Austen and also scripts original series. Downton Abbey, now airing its second season stateside, is one of the latter. The international phenomenon follows the aristocratic Grantham/Crawley family and their league of ‘downstairs’ servants in WWI-era England. To me, the show’s merit lies beyond the incredible costumes, sumptuous cinematography, over-qualified British acting stalwarts (read: Dame Maggie Smith) and the six Emmys and four Golden Globe nominations it’s garnered so far. As one of the actors commented, what makes Downton unique is its lack of minor characters. Every narrative and relationship matters, making real that old adage about “be[ing] kind, for everyone is fighting a hard battle.” This season, even though I’m pulling for the class-crossing romance between socialist Irish chauffeur Tom Branson and Lord Grantham’s youngest, political daughter Sybil, I’ve been equally intrigued by the matriarchs’ verbal sparring and the ways WWI seeps into the life of every character. Mostly, I’m excited that Downton has made PBS accessible and cool again, transcending its typical audience of 64-year-olds…and me, I guess.
—Michaela Dwyer
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