Men That Are Mad - Consume!

Men That Are Mad Compel You To Consume

You must consume.. because you are a consumer! Duh. That's what the whole show is about - these guys finding a way to market whatever they have to you.

So tonight was the season finale of another pretty entertaining season of Mad Men. If you weren't up to speed... Well, the episode had very little to do with the actual plot point of the rest of the season build up and we got no resolution on the whole "Will the company be saved?", so it's sort of pointless to bother catching you up.

Those of you who watched the preview last week probably still had no idea what this season finale was going to be about. Then again, that's the case every week. Mad Men's previews have got to be some of the worse. Can you actually tell what the next episode would be about based on the one or two random lines and jump edit cuts? You get no context for the phrases. You might as well make shit up.



But this episode was completely out of left field. It resolved California stuff.. in a sense. We found out that Jane's boobs are getting bigger.. Oh yeah, and I guess as a result she's also preggo's. But again - THEY'RE BIGGER!

Which comes as a surprise to many. Alan Sepinwall usually talks to Matthew Weiner after each season finale to post-mortem it. This time, Weiner was only available for about 15 minutes.

Yesterday.

Before anybody had seen the finale.

I thought I heard a faint scream coming from the direction of New Jersey. Quote of the decade:

There's been a lot of speculation ever since the episode where Joan goes to the abortion clinic over whether or not she actually did it. Obviously, you don't want to spoil it if it comes up in the finale, but did you intend for it to be as ambiguous as many people have taken that storyline?

No. I really didn't. But you have to watch the show. I don't have control over what people see. That is a perfect example of people bringing what they want to bring to the show. And Joan is so strong that we know that whatever decision she made, she made that decision and it's good for her. But you do have to watch. I'm not going to say there is no ambiguity to the event; I just didn't know that people would interpret it the way they did.

What made this even funnier was that, at least initially, Sepinwall was fairly firmly convinced that Joan had the abortion.



I guess it put to rest the whole concept of the abortion. Which should put a lot of people's bitching to rest that are both Pro-life/Pro-Choice. I do have one thing I have to say though, I'm still Pro-fashion and I'm tired of people trying to... um. mimic the show.

We all see that the characters carry the outfits of the time well, but that's no reason why you should attempt tossing your body into the ring. Even if they did release a sort of Style Guide to dressing like what your average Mad Men character would dress like back in that era. There's actually been a lot of style/Fashion guides as to how to dress like they do at the Ad Agency.



You people need to just stop it. As a proud owner of a couple of different fedoras I can honestly say that YOU SHOULD NOT GO NEAR ONE! Never put it on your head. By no means can you possibly ever hope to bring back the fedora look. Not even Indiana Jones had a chance in hell in making the fedoras any cooler or remotely possible of being brought back to fashion. While I love the ones I have I know full well that they should never be put on my head and taken into the outside world.

What I'm saying is you should stop trying to be Don Draper. Why? Because it's a simple matter of you not even having the basics that make up Don Draper. You're not even a fraction of cool as he is. Besides, it's not like you want to be Don Draper anyway. He stole a guy's name and is a complete asshole to people - not to mention an alcoholic. He's probably the last person you'd want to aspire to be like.



I mean, I realize the urge. Don Draper just oozes that cool - everything a dude wants to be. What with his ability to get hussies with a couple of words. He walks around in cool, well fitted suits. But guess what, you probably can't handle your alcohol that is aged 16-20 years. But face it. You'll never be them. You'll never be Roger Sterling at some night club and you're never going to be even that pretentious bearded guy who loved that old chick who died earlier this season.

You know why you can't be like that? Because you're not Jon Hamm. John Hamm has that charisma that you will never have, not even in your most alcohol fueled haze. It just isn't going to happen.. So STOP!




Most of all, the main reason why you will not ever be like Don, and shouldn't try is because.. IT'S NOT 1962. You're world, is not his world and it hasn't been for a good 50 years. Don doesn't face going on Xbox live or pre-ordering Fables III.

You look really foolish wearing the clothing. Especially when your normal 9-5 is at some walmart or some call center. There's a reason why there's white and blue collars to separate the classes. Those who wear the white ones look odd wearing something the blue ones would wear. Those who were the blue collars look completely unnatural with what the white ones. And those of you who wear fucking video game, threadless or regular t-shirts have no business wearing a suit. Ever.



I guess the hope now is that the show is done for the season, we wont have to deal with these extremely strange clothing choices for another year because those of you trying to pull off the look... just stop. It's not working for you to go through your dad's closet.

January In November

January In November

Yes, it's January in November. At least in the November issue of GQ. While I'm a firm believer that the print media is as dead as the skeletons that everyone hung up yesterday for Halloween, there's still some magazines that I pick up on a regular basis. Men's Health is one of those. GQ, on the other hand. Well, let me just say that I usually wear a comic book T-shirt and jeans. So my fashion sense isn't as good as the next guy who reads GQ for the articles. Remember, I'm here to push the agenda of hot pictures.

So anyhow, January.. in November. Yes, her name is January Jones and with a name like that, I'm sure she grew up with a lot of stupid James Bond level jokes. Hell, I don't think "Christmas Jones" would be a worse name than January Jones. I guess the whole "Christmas comes only once a year" would be annoying. Then again, April is also pretty bad of a name.



But I come to you with this post with news that Madmen will reach the season finale later tonight. For a network that I would have otherwise never watch, because really, what was the last Classic Movie you've seen on AMC? Add in commercials and I'd rather just make it a Blockbuster night.

AMC now has a couple of my favorite shows. I personally can't wait for the remake of The Prisoner and I'm excited as to when Breaking Bad will return and I can't wait for The Walking Dead to get produced. Especially interesting how they can take 2-3 shows and rotate them around for a whole year's worth of shows. Especially to have them be so high in quality.



On to specifically Mad Men. To watch this show is to take a trip in a time machine back to the 60's. It has the feel of the Sopranos. You can consider this to be a megamovie in that it should be watched together. So those of you who will discover this on DVD and have a marathon of a viewing, you should consider yourself the lucky ones. But for those of us who are plowing in episode after episode, we may be on the edge of our seats as this slow paced story fleshes itself out, but we're certainly not minding it.

So far e have about 26 hour long cycles of this intelligent and exquisite portrait of life in the 1960's for ad men and women around them is a bit overwhelming as it protarys the ideology. I would relate it to Revolution Road. In that, it shows how fucked up life was for women in that day and age (again, I'm a pure feminist, yo)



Each story gets stretched out for long periods of time. Especially since this is only a 12-13 episode season, it does mean that a lot of stories being told get some very extended telling. And it's not without its faults. There are times when story development takes place and yet it seems to have never happened by the next episode. I don't mean the little stuff, but major plot developments that are just dead ends. For example.

Pete declaring his love for Peggy/Baby confession- This was two whole seasons of story and yet was wrapped up, never to be spoken of again, in a very brief conversation at the end of season 2. This should be a major development, Pete especially should be kinda fucked up by it but isn't. Yes I know he doesn't want kids and I know he has the one line in season three "your decisions effect me", but the dude has a baby and it's not even worth a slight mention?



Betty's steamy/illegal/awkward relationship with the creepy kid down the road and his wacky mom- I guess these people must have moved away after Betty found the kid living in her backyard. No mention of these interesting characters, no further exploration of what Betty was thinking when dealing with the kid. This was a story line that I actually wanted to see more of because it seemed like it would explain more of Betty, but we get nothing. Another loose end just left flapping in the breeze.



The British are coming! Don didn't get the promotion and now has a new bo---oh wait NEVER MIND, he just got run over by a tractor- Probably the biggest yet hilarious moment I've ever had in a TV show. But this is not the first time that "major changes are coming to SC" has resulted in "really nothing has changed, continue on." By this point in the show I was a prepared for the writers to throw something into the mix to prevent anything from actually moving forward. Another example of a strong character being introduced that could challenge and put Don in a new situation and yet we have a Deus Ex Machina roll in and put Humpty Dumpty back together again. I have low expectations that anything much will change with SC despite all of the talk of SC being sold.

But that's not to say it's not worth viewing. I really like the show, even if they decide that it's so unnecessary to not tie some of the aspects up. Then again, The Sopranos left a lot of stuff open ended that will never have any closure. Hell, we still don't even know if Tony lived or died at the end of that episode. So don't take my harsh criticism as anything more than a little venting.



The characters are key here. And in this little highlight you've seen a lot of Betty, played by the before mentioned January Jones. Seriously, that's her name. Her husband, the show's main focus character Don Draper, isn't the most loving to her. He means well but clearly is not being all that faithful. Her response, and really a well written act of trying to find her own footing as a person, really does have a lot of women empowerment to it. So don't take the whole idea of the show out of context. It may have a lot of boys club feel to it, but there's a lot of female empowerment in the series.

So while we wait for the season to end tonight and hopefully some stories to get wrapped up, enjoy these pictures of January. I'm sure you wont complain about the view. They are.. rather.. yeah.. they're something. Though, I have to say that there was one image of January Jones from an older GQ magazine that I think beats the shit out of all the new ones. It's very simple and yet is very much hot as all hell;

Keeping It Old Fashioned

Keeping It Old Fashioned

You know the old saying about not trying things you see on Television in life? Well, that's a load of shit. Jackass viewers break their arms all the time. Me, on the other hand, we'll, I'm all for mimicking more comforting television indulgence.

Perhaps I've seen one too many episodes of Mad Men, but I've grown to enjoy the taste of an Old Fashion. This drink is said to be the oldest cocktail around. It predates anything else you could ask your bartender for and is the first documented cocktail around. So why not take it old school and try one? It's really good, I must say.



I'm a scotch whiskey drinker mainly, but I've enjoyed my fair share of bourbon in the past. After an episode of Mad Men where Don Draper made one I thought to myself "You know, that looks pretty good" and much like how I decide to try making anything, be it bacon wrapped hot dogs, pulled pork, tuna poke or whatever else I fancy, I looked up a couple of recipes and here's my take on this old drink.

Here's the way I would make it, which is really good and I would recommend anyone try it to really try something new that isn't Jack and Coke. It may take a couple more minutes than pouring two items into a glass, but you'll get a justified reward for doing that work if you're willing to try it.

What you will need is:

4 parts bourbon
1 part soda water
1 dash of bitters (you can get this at any liquor store, one small bottle lasts forever)
2-3 maraschino cherries, depending on taste
1 large glass (to mix the bourbon, Soda water and bitters)
1 small tumbler glass (to serve in)



What you do is you pour the bourbon, soda water, and bitters into a large glass filled half way with ice (Cracked if you can.. and really, to crack ice you simply hit it with the back of the soon) and stir.

Put the cherries at the bottom of the second, smaller glass (flat bottomed tumbler), mash using the back of a spoon so the juice covers the bottom of the glass. You can also toss in orange slices into this if you want. The trick is to make sure you're smashing.. this is called muddling, which you could use a muddler for, but hey, why get more tools dirty?

Pour the mixed bourbon into the tumbler, add an olive, cherry or twist of lemon on top and drink up. The final product shouldn't be sweet but not too bitter either. You should be able to taste the alcohol and a hint of cherry.



It's made this way so it'll be more pleasant to drink than straight bourbon yet wont destroy your taste/palate like an over-sugared drink like daiquiris would. Hence it's the perfect before-dinner cocktail along with the martini.

Hopefully you'll be enjoying this drink soon. I know I'll be making one tonight to catch another episode of Mad Men as well as the start of a new season of Curb Your Enthusiasm.