DISQUS

Bathed and shaved? Hmmph. That duck's head doesn't even look damp.

@Wossy has said that Russell Brand is NOT on Twitter. He's trying to get him to start. So whoever is @russellbrand and posted one lone tweet in September '08 is NOT the author of My Booky Wooky.

Oh, Ms. Peel, thank you.

I've never entirely understood how IAWL became a Christmas movie (apart from the Christmas tree in the background of the final scene), nor how it got its reputation for mawkishness (apart from the saccharine mewl of ZuZu's final line). It's such a dark film, dark as the darkest parts of "Meet John Doe." Capra has a reputation for sentimentality and, yeah, you see it in stuff like "Mr Deeds Goes to Town," but the best Capra remembers the darkness of his earlier films, like "The Miracle Woman" or "The Bitter Tea of General Yen." He was knowing about relationships, too, and about the power of sexual attraction--just watch another great, early film, "Platinum Blonde," with its amazing performance by the tragically short-lived Robert Williams.

Capra's choice of Stewart was inspired as well. He needed a sympathetic actor, since he was going to send him so far down into Hell that the flames might not reflect well on him. But he saw the kind of darkness in Stewart that didn't really get drawn out again until the thrillers of Hitchcock and the westerns of Anthony Mann.

The alternate Bedford Falls that George Bailey sees is not so far-fetched, either. The roads not travelled are perhaps less likely for the lovely Mary, but the fate of Violet, for example, or the Martini family truly could be but for the grace of God and George Bailey. The movie came out not long after the end of the war, and most of the people in its audiences had probably seen just the sort of hard times that the alternate Bedford Falls presented; it wouldn't have been hard for them to believe, either.

I confess that the film still and always makes me tear up throughout, from the heart-wrenching scene with Mr Gower right through to the end. Perhaps it's the notion of redemption that makes it a Christmas film but, frankly, that's a message that's not unwelcome or unnecessary any time of the year.

I really am partial to the Mr Magoo version.

But I saw the Patrick Stewart one-man show on Broadway back in the mid-'90s. What a tour-de-force! And it addressed exactly the point you make in your first paragraph. He was doing it right around the time of Gingrich's Contract with America, and when he got to the line, "Are there no workhouses?" he got just a huge reaction from the audience. It really IS a subversive text for a modern consumer corporate Christmas.

You know, I don't get all the '80s scorn. I had the greatest times of my life in the '80s.

Sure, Reagan was president, AIDS was rampant, greed had apparently morphed into a virtue, cocaine appeared to rule society, and the US was invading a country that had committed no wrong against us (at least it was only Grenada).

I was a bartender at the Grand Hyatt New York. I worked nights, played during the day, and danced all night. It was the decade of Heartbreak (where I danced with Timothy Hutton and Amanda Plummer on my 25th birthday), the Palladium, Limelight, the Underground, the Tunnel, and AM/PM for after-hours. We danced to the B-52s, to Gang of Four, to Soft Cell, to Joan Jett. The movies weren't so tragic, either--sure, there were cheesy teen flicks, but that's an eternal scourge, isn't it? I remember "The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai," "Heartbreak Ridge" (the first intimation that Clint Eastwood wasn't the right-wing tool we'd all assumed him to be), "This is Spinal Tap," "Ghostbusters," "Broadcast News," "The Princess Bride," and, on the international front, "Diva," "The Fourth Man," and "My Life as a Dog."

It wasn't all shits and giggles, for sure. AIDS was a huge part of a New York restaurant worker's life, back when the answer to "How many straight New York waiters does it take to change a lightbulb?" was "Both of them." I lost a lot of friends, and even more acquaintances. I remember the night one of my co-workers took me to The Saint, when Grace Jones was performing, and we danced for hours under the planetarium sky, surrounded by an army of sleek, sweaty, shirtless men. How many of them made it out of the '80s alive?

But mostly I just remember how much fun I had. All the teams that played the Mets and the Yankees stayed at the Grand Hyatt, and I got to know a lot of ball-players, who would leave me tickets to come watch them play. I was young, and cute, and the world was my oyster.

So don't go hating on my big decade, OK?

What I can't understand is why Don thought Cooper would even care. Wouldn't an Onjectivist only care about the man in front of him, rather than his past? I was praying that Don would call Pete's bluff, which Cooper handled exactly the way I assumed he would. Pete really is an idiot. Don had no reason to look so nervous.

Kudos to Rachel, by the way. Nice to see a woman with balls on this show. Even more than Joan.

Geez, I thought it was dreadful. I thought the dialogue was stilted, the actors affectless, and the accents kept slipping all over the Atlantic Rim. The only time the screen came alive was when Jason Dohring was on as Josef. He managed even to make his lines sound witty, which is a real indicator of his talent.

I thought O'Loughlin in particular was just dismal. And the professor wasn't much better. A PhD in "mythical anthropology"?? REALLY??

My DVR cramped up and didn't record the Thursday show, so I had to wait to watch it until last night. I have to say I agree with everyone on this page, with the exception of Karina (sorry! Nothing personal!)

But I'm surprised no one picked up on Cooper turning Red into the white, girl elevator operator near the end there. Now sure what the point was, but they went to the trouble of setting it up, so I thought I'd remark on it. According to the NYTimes, Weiner had the cast watch "The Apartment" as homework, so I have to say I found it kind of ham-handed that they worked it into the script.

This WAS a boring episode. Everyone picked the least attractive options, with the exception of Don. I guess that's why he's our hero.

Red is COLD, man.

Multiple chins Yes, those were definitely fat-face implants on Peggy in the previews. And I wouldn't be a bit surprised if she IS pregnant, but just swimming down that long Egyptian river, DeNial. After all, she got birth control pills the afternoon before she slept with Pete, right? So how could she get pregnant?

She is such an odd combo of knowingness and naivete that I'm not really sure where she'd fall on this one. But she is SO definitely fatter for next week, and they've got to confront it eventually.

Nice catch on the "Decider," [b]TJ[/b]. I was HOWLING with laughter at that one.

Multiple chins Yes, those were definitely fat-face implants on Peggy in the previews. And I wouldn't be a bit surprised if she IS pregnant, but just swimming down that long Egyptian river, DeNial. After all, she got birth control pills the afternoon before she slept with Pete, right? So how could she get pregnant?

She is such an odd combo of knowingness and naivete that I'm not really sure where she'd fall on this one. But she is SO definitely fatter for next week, and they've got to confront it eventually.

Nice catch on the "Decider," [b]TJ[/b]. I was HOWLING with laughter at that one.

I saw Zep at the Garden in 1975, the "Physical Grafitti" tour. I thought they were absolutely splendid, and I left MSG buzzed on more than the aromatics. Of course, I was 16, so I might just have been caught up in the moment (and from having snuck in to the Garden with an old Ticketron ticket and a tightly-folded $1 bill for the easily-bribed ticket-taker), but I thought it was an AMAZING concert.

Tristan--yes, Peggy got birth control in the first episode, and then had sex THAT NIGHT. It takes at least one cycle for the Pill to become effective. So, odds are she got knocked up by Pete.

I didn't think Peggy was really shooting pigeons--that was part of her reverie, yes? The shrink oughtta love that one.

I'm still confused as to how Pete actually turns out to be the smart one in the office. Cause, you know...not bright. I didn't get the ad buy strategy when he said it--and, frankly, I didn't find the Mamie's funeral story half as funny as his buddy did, but then I was never in a frat--but when Roger and Bertram came in it all became clear. And you know what? It WAS a good strategy.

Given Don's own dimness about it, I have yet to understand why McCann-Erickson (or anyone else) wuold court him so aggressively.

I still feel like this show isn't really taking us anywhere, though--that it's a lot of stylistic flourishes and grandstanding, without any there there.

But I did like Don and Roger walking off while the boys were tussling.

cgeye--I also use the CC option, and was confounded by "Theorello" until they mentioned both the exclamation point and Tammany Hall. You might also have caught the captions referring to "BBDO and YNR" instead of BBDO and Y&R.

SADDEST PROFESSOR
Runner up--Andrew Crocker-Harris (Michael Redgrave), "The Browning Version"

Oh, wait. That was an English public school, not a college. HEll, I don't care--he was heart-breaking.

MOST CLICHED COLLEGE EXPERIENCE:
"High Time" (Bing Crosby, 1951)
I don't think they miss a single one, from the Chemistry final cram to the Fall bonfire.

If your family owned upper Manhattan... ..then your name is Dyckman, not Dykeman. Kristen, don't let the shockingly incompetent closed-captioning trip you up!

Other than that, your synopses are PITCH PERFECT. Unlike the show.

If your family owned upper Manhattan... ..then your name is Dyckman, not Dykeman. Kristen, don't let the shockingly incompetent closed-captioning trip you up!

Other than that, your synopses are PITCH PERFECT. Unlike the show.

fatherflot, yes--I think that was a Dr. Johnson allusion, which is why it initially made me laugh out loud for the first time in the series. But then I thought about it being said, in all seriousness, in 1960, and it just pissed me off.

For those of you not watching the show with Closed Captions, you're missing a surreal treat. Not only are our captioneers members of the "would of, should of, could of" school, but they thought those caviar blinis were "caviar balinese" and that Don was threatening to abandon his wife on an "ice flow." But my FAVORITE part was when someone (Don?) toasted by saying "L'chaim" and the captions informed us that he was "[speaking Jewish]".

I have to think Weiner must be behind these as well.

Who was it who mentioned "Twin Peaks"? Yes, they're definitely going for the Lynchian corruption- under-the-sunny-facade approach. But it's not been given enough context.

Combining the creepy extremism of Hair Fetish Boy with the tired cliches of Anxious, Unsatisfied Suburban Housewife and Emotionally Crippled Blueblood Son and Emotionally Distant Blueblood Dad and Bohemian/Slightly Slutty Ad Artist Girl and god knows how many else...it's just a bunch of symbols standing in for a story.

When I was listening to the DVD commentary for "Hot Fuzz," Edgar Wright mentioned that he and Simon Pegg got Roger Ebert's "Little Book of Movie Cliches" so that they could make sure they included every last one of them in their screenplay. But they were doing it to take the piss. What's Weiner's excuse?

I'm also really not buying the ad agency angle. Those steel campaigns Draper came up with WERE crap. "Oh Little Town of Bethlehem"? Puh-leeze. I actually DID like "The Backbone of America." It was much better than Don's two attempts. I thought he was supposed to be such a natural at this?

And he and Sterling really disdain the notion of pitching to a client in a bar? Who ARE they, anyway?

The one scene I liked was Sterling handling the non-firing of Campbell. I wasn't sure how that would be handled without Don losing face.

I agree that Kartheiser's not right for Pete. I DO still see sulky Connor. Whereas Campbell isn't supposed to be sulky--he's supposed to be overprivileged, arrogant, and troubled.