Category: Television

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Top Ten Letterman

Top Ten Reasons we’ll miss David Letterman

10- Marquee on 53rd and Broadway
9-  Preserved Old Ed Sullivan Theater. Regis
8-  Memories of City Squire Motor Lodge. Red Coach Grill
7-  One hour earlier in San Fran
6-  Paul Shaffer. Chris Elliott under the stairs
5-  Snark before it was invented
4-  Early morning crazy Dave comes to Late Show
3-  Rupert Jee. Larry ‘Bud’ Melman. Mujibar & Sirajul
2-  Jaundiced political acuity
1-  Gorgeous suits. Worldwide pants

Let’s see if I can stay awake for tonight’s final bow.

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mAd Fine

Thank you, Matthew Weiner. For the fitting finale. And best television show of our era. Person to Person. Call from Don to Peggy where she reminds him how much he is missed and puts the Coke account in his head. Call from Don to Betty where they make their poignant peace. And the right plan for the kids.

Pete’s life looks ideal as he boards a LearJet with his original family. Joan stays true to character and chooses financial and career independence. Roger is a standup guy assuring their son’s future. How long will his new zou bisou wife last? Who cares? It’s Roger. Peggy continues her career at McCann. Albeit with a bit of a schmaltzy twist. That was the only unlikely and unsatisfying storyline.

Sally stays strong and will hopefully have many adventures. And then there’s Don. Just as his struggle with Dick is about to hit bottom again, he is resurrected from the ashes. Yoga. Connections. Revelations. Survival. Take him back to McCann with the biggest campaign in its history. Of course, Don creates the iconic Coke ad, hippies on a mountain singing about love and harmony.

It’s the Real Thing?!  It’s the Draper thing for sure.  Well done.

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mAd Pen Ultimate

Hopes dashed for a fond farewell. Penultimate episode devolves into personal story lines. Unlikely reconciliation. Dick Whitman stranded at a seedy motel. Betty and Sally’s relationship wrought with realism. Rang true. But, please. Let’s get back to the Ad Biz! It’s time to plead for a truly Mad End. How about Sterling, Draper, Campbell & Holloway get swept up by dragons. They are dropped into Khaleesi’s Crownlands to promote her rule. Game of mAd thrones. Tyrion hooks up with Joan.

In golf. Players. No orange is the new red. Rickie ditched his traditional Sunday color and won. 3-hole playoff was so much fun. Plus one.

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mAd Horizons

Joan continues to be the stalwart survivor. Sizes up the situation, takes her $2.5 mil and splits. Never will she rely on a man to rescue her. Baby Daddy Roger can’t be trusted to step in. He’s making excuses to Peggy as she roller skates into her new career at McCann. Hope the others take my advice.

And then there’s Don. Betty doesn’t even want a back rub from him. At McCann, as he sits in the conference room with a cast of too many around the table and watches some guy give his original best schpiel from five years ago, he bolts. In search of the elusive ideal mommy. Windows loom. He always likes playing the stranger. Lost horizon. Ageless? Or.  Still wishing for Shangri-L.A.

Sterling, Draper, Campbell & Holloway

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mAd Prey

Who will survive the transition from Sterling Cooper to McCann Erickson? Staff seems smart enough to know their days are numbered. Don may have a role, but he will be a little fish in a big pond. Roger’s corporate power is gone. Pete has always appreciated Joan’s value. Without his nudge, she wouldn’t be a partner. Now, as Joan faces a frat culture, she is rightfully realistic about her future. The consistent pragmatist, will she choose old rich dude or stay the course until she’s sidelined? Peggy will survive as a creative soldier. Her heart-wrenching sacrifice cannot be in vain. Everyone has made trade-offs. Careers over family.

In the end, they are all just prey. I hope there will be a new agency in L.A. Sterling, Draper, Campbell & Holloway.  We’ll see. Last three.

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Jimmy Kimmel 4/21

Yesterday was 4/20. Hashtag hash day. Jimmy Kimmel’s Pot Quiz. Learned new brands. Purple Haze. Blue Dream. Pineapple Kush.

IMG_0049Today is 4/21. Aetna anti-smoking cigarettes day. mAdBen has been hanging with Jimmy’s sidekick Guillermo in the heart of Hollywood to shoot a spot for Jimmy Kimmel Live tonight. Check it out at 11:35pm ABC

11moreminutes.com

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mAd Dreams

Creepy Glen, Weiner’s son is back and uses his Vietnam-eve deployment to give Betty one last shot. He’s unrecognizable as a tall skinny eighteen, but still creepy. Meanwhile Don is encouraging Sally’s friend to flirt with him. Always wiser than her parents, she tells him that they both are immature gluttons for attention. Joan finds new love in an older rich guy from L.A. with an eye job. She remains centered if a little rattled by what having a young son means to her personal life. Peggy retains her creative career dreams as Don’s are becoming more dim.

Take away. Wish I’d bought a penthouse on the Upper East Side in the early 70’s for $85,000. Or kept a little apartment on 12th Street in the Village. 4 to go.

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Zou Bisou Adieu

MadMen7. Know when to fold ’em. Don got zoo bisou’d up the wazoo. Au revoir Québeciennes, Maman et Megan. They took him to the blanchisserie. Funny. Should have ended le mariage in L.A.  And. What was with the waitress Diana off-ramp? No contextual sense. Yet. Mommy flashback? Another dead child in his past? If not, yuk. Icky couple in the elevator. Did we have to see matronly neighbor again? Hope Matt Weiner recovers his taste for the last five episodes.
Game of Thrones needs a boost, too. Sometimes it’s better to say adieu plus tôt.

Tom Brady wearing Joltin’ Joe’s #5 at Fenway couldn’t pass a baseball.

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bAd Don is Back!

When we left MadMen7 last year, Don had finally shed his Dick (capital D), and returned to being fabulously Draper. Roger took advantage of bittersweet circumstances to enter the M&A era keeping Sterling Cooper intact. Under McCann Erickson. As the 1960’s ended, everyone was gathered around their televisions to watch the first lunar landing in awe. Bobby Morse took us and Bert out in style. The Moon Belongs to Everyone. The Best Things in Life Are Free.

It is next year. Episode 8. bAd Don is back. Yay! If that’s all there is to life, then let’s keep dancing. Joan remains the best character. Bottom line no drama. All the men could learn from her. Wolf Hall will have to wait for a binge.

I did have Wisconsin, Joe.

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2014

GOOD

mAdBen & Neil deGrasse Tyson at CannesLions. 10383719_841943909179198_4846207022091497883_o-2

Parts Unknown. Bourdain in Massachusetts.
MadMen7. Bobby Morse’s dancing exit.
Of Mice and Men O’Dowd Franco
Realistic Joneses. Letts Collette Hall Tomei
Sushi Nakazawa
Eleven Madison Park

BAD

Rape of the leaves. Construction next door.
Sochi Olympics. Return of Putin.
Crying Wolfowitz. Right-wing and media fear-mongering.
Ebola.