What I've Been Watching: Rich Kids, Poor Kids, Mad Men

 Once again, I'm a little pressed for time, so I'll be combining my thoughts on three different shows into one post.

 The excellent critic Matthew Zoller Seitz gave this weekend's Mad Men the old Worst. Episode. Ever.

 While I don't exactly agree, I think his piece raises some good points -- especially where the Anna cancer story is concerned -- and, like whatever he writes, is worth the read.

 I mostly found "The Good News" to be frustrating, taking two promising storylines and cramming them together into one episode, so that neither of them really worked.

 Getting to see cold, intense Don Draper turn into the more likable, relaxed Dick Whitman for an episode -- and then back again -- was a treat. And a lot of Don's night out with Lane was a hoot. (Seeing Jared Harris respond to the shushing lady during the Godzilla movie in his pseudo-Japanese will probably never stop being funny). Either of these scenarios -- if stretched out over the course of an episode, sharing time with other characters' storylines -- might've made for a great episode. But using both of them, and then giving Joan so little to do with her story, made for a subpar episode. I don't think it's the worst -- there were a few episodes midway through last season where I was really bored -- but certainly not among this show's best. Let's hope 1965 will be as kind to the viewers, as well as to the folks at SCDP.

                                                                               ***

 A few weeks ago, my girlfriend decided -- pretty much out of the blue -- that she wanted to watch Gossip Girl. She'd never expressed an interest before, but she said that summertime called for something light and "girly." The plan may have been for us to Netflix them and then Megan watch the show on her own, but I started watching with her and now I'm sort of hooked.

 Slightly. I mean, it's not on the level of Lost or even Fringe. But there's something about the show that keeps me watching, even though I think the show could easily be retitled Pretty Rich Kids Making Bad Decisions.

 Because that's the plot of every episode: Person A either lies or hides the truth from Person B, then winds up red-faced when the truth comes out, usually at a party. Repeat for three seasons.

 All the same, I realize I'm not the show's target audience. And to be fair, the characters are all pretty likable, and the dialogue can be clever, even when the plots aren't.

 But what's made Gossip Girl especially interesting this summer is the fact that we're watching it concurrently with Friday Night Lights, a show featuring teenage characters who might as well be living on another planet. On Gossip Girl, the wrong-side-of-the-tracks family (laughably) consists of a young man who's been published in the New Yorker, his sister who interned with a world-famous fashion designer, and their dad, an aging rock musician who owns an art gallery in Brooklyn. 

 The richest kid on Friday Night Lights -- Lyla Garrity? -- wouldn't be allowed within a mile of most of GG's denizens.

 This was a show whose first season I absolutely loved when I saw it a few years ago, and then dropped during the disappointing second season.

 I decided to start from the beginning of season two again, and was disappointed yet again. The acting was still among the best on TV, and these were still the same characters I'd come to cherish in season one. As many, many people have said before, Coach and Mrs. Taylor (Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton) are among the best written/portrayed married couples on TV, ever, and I'd be happy if the show fired its younger actors and spent whole episodes with the Taylors as they flirted and fought.

 But...what happened the the almost documentary-like show about the effects of high school football on a small Texas town? Season two was far more soapy, with characters covering up murders and ripping off meth dealers. One episode even had a "good-kid-being-lured-back-into-a-life-of-crime" plotline that would've seemed dated 20 years ago. By all accounts, seasons three and four returned the show to its stronger roots, so I'm willing to ride this out.

 Tom Coombe

Comments

[Bill White]

This season had its ups and downs, but what a finale for a show I still love. As you said, the Taylors are the best couple on TV, and it's outrageous they haven't been nominated for Emmys before now.

[Tom]

Maybe there's a future list for your blog: best TV couples.