Let’s Get Mad (Men)!

In her RSC debut, EmTrack2 takes a look at how Mad Men stands above the rest of television today.



There comes a point where you realize how spoiled you are if you watch Mad Men.


Truly, Mad Men ruined television for me. Why? Because it bothers me so much. I spend days at a time thinking about what happened on Mad Men a couple of nights earlier and what is to become of them next Sunday. I can’t sit and watch Supernatural and be so affected. Or Glee. Or any show for that matter. Even when I start watching shows like Boardwalk Empire that are considered to have a similar level of quality, hoping to find that passion and it always falls short for one reason or another. I mean not to take a whack at these shows, they have their moments and I can understand wholeheartedly why anyone would like them, but they are lacking at one thing or another and it is troublesome. (Don’t get me wrong, I still watch other shows. Downton Abbey is fantastic  and I fell in love with the BBC series Sherlock. But, even then, still lacking.)

But Mad Men never does fall short. It has a passion to it, characters I hate and love, leaving me to remind myself that no matter how real these people seem, they’re not. There was no Don Draper in the sixties who left his Betty to later marry a Megan after a year of drunken unhappiness. There was no Peggy who came to us as a shy catholic girl still living in the fifties to a woman becoming the very man who frustrates her so. These people didn’t exist. But, by god, the feelings I have for them are so great and numerous that they might as well be real. 

I used to describe Mad Men as a show about “beautiful people doing terrible things.” I take it back. It’s much more than their looks and how they dress and how they act.  It’s about human beings being, wonderfully and tragically, human. They end up with the wrong people, lash out, hide their emotions very well or not at all, and, as a spectator, it’s heartbreaking. 

These people are all of us, in some way or another. And it scares the hell out of me because no other show has done this for me yet. It’s special, and it knows it, flaunting it’s brilliant writing and dreadfully complex characters in my face, batting it’s sultry eyelashes in my direction with it’s promises of beautiful and talented people that it always seems to fulfill.


Mad Men is the perfect temptress and I love every waking minute of it.

TV Seasons are Ending!

Hey everyone! So, as the month of May continues on, many TV seasons are approaching their end. There were a TON of new shows this year, many of which I decided to tune into. However, I didn’t stick with all of them. Sometimes it’s hard to keep up! (Especially with the Kardashians. Ha, get it? And no I do NOT watch that show!) In any case, even if I continue to watch some of these new shows, there are some that stand out more to me than others.

The biggest success of this year, in my opinion, would have to be Fox’s New Girl, starring Zooey Deschanel. I only caught on to New Girl towards the middle of the season, but from the first episode I saw, I was hooked. I know the show can be criticized sometimes because Zooey really takes the quirky to a new extreme, but I think that’s kind of the point. I think she embraces it and just tries to have fun with that silly mentality. And you know what? It works. I’m laughing at every episode I watch, and it’s not only because I think Zooey is “adorkable.”

The three guys she shares an apartment with are just as funny, if at times funnier, than she is. Jake Johnson (as Nick), LaMorne Morris (as Winston), and Max Greenfield (as Schmidt) round out the cast perfectly. Johnson and Deschanel have a nice chemistry going, and it drives me insane how pathetic he is, but that just means he’s going a good job as an actor. Greenfield is a total smart-aleck as the douche-y Schmidt; every time he does something stupid, he has to put money in the “douche jar.” All things considered, it’s Morris who stands out the most among the guys. His storylines aren’t really as developed as much as the other two guys’, but even without them, Morris manages to hold his own and gets the best jokes. The dynamic between the three of them works so well, and Deschanel awkwardly fits in (in a good way!) as the odd one out in the household.

It’s really refreshing to see a comedy with such a simple concept do so well, especially with no laugh track to speak of. I bet it stays on the air for a long time — it seems very promising. If you’re curious, Hulu has some episodes available, so I’d recommend taking a peek if you haven’t already.

Another show that left an impact on me was NBC’s Smash. Being the Broadway and theatre nerd that I am, this show is totally captivating for me. With people like Angelica Huston, Christian Borle, and Debra Messing in the cast, you can really do no wrong. I get that not a lot of people may be into the whole song and dance vibe of the show, but it’s really just like Glee, with more serious and mature plotlines. However, I do suggest this show with reservation; if you’re not very into showtunes, it may not be your kind of show. If you are interested, I would say watch a clip from the show on Hulu first to get a better idea of what it is like. 

I could talk about this show at length, but I’ll just give you the basics. It’s about how a show gets produced and how a production team gets the final product to Broadway. It centers on a new musical about Marilyn Monroe and intertwines the actors’/producer’s/director’s/etc. personal lives with the story of the musical. Every episode features songs: some old, some new, and some originals written my Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman (the writers of Hairspray). However, I don’t think it’s been doing so well in the ratings. It did get picked up for a second season but who knows if that’ll go like the first season did. I’d like it to stick around because there’s not much like it on TV and it’s just super fun.

So those are my two picks for best new tv shows of the season! Of course I didn’t watch every new show, but those stood out the most among the others I did watch. Happy Monday y’all!

Red Shirt Podcast #13: Favorite TV Characters

Television is awesome. And many of the things that make television shows great are the characters in it. As such, we felt a “Favorite TV character podcast” would be awesome. And lo, was it so. Enjoy!

From the Archives: The Inbetweeners Review

Hey guys. Huge 8itch (Thomas) doesn’t think he’ll be able to get an article up today, so to tide you over, here’s another one of my articles from my old blog. Enjoy!


Needless to say, British people are awesome. They make great over-the-top bad guys and always seem to be the most unlikable of “villains” in most romantic comedies. Unless, of course, they’re the ones seducing our women (which still makes them villains in most guys book :P).

Most importantly, British people know how to make people laugh. Anyone who’s watched anything by Monty Python is well aware of this. So when I went into watching The Inbetweeners, my first modern British comedy series, my standards were incredibly high.

So how’d it do? Let’s just say I put everything else on hold until the series was done, and then proceeded to watch it again.

The premise of The Inbetweeners is far from complicated. Four boys in high school try to do the impossible: get laid. Really, that’s it. There’s really nothing more to the show (with the exception of a possible satirical point in “Work Experience” about the views of the upper-middle and lower classes, but given the tone of the rest of the show, I have to believe it was an accident), but that’s part of what makes the whole experience so much fun. It’s truly a show in which the audience is asked not to think but to enjoy. And boy, is it enjoyable.

Simon Bird plays Will McKenzie, a newcomer to the school who had to drop out of private school because his dad left his mom and took away much of their financial security. Don’t worry if that sounds serious to you, the other boys in his group make fun of it (especially since his mom is supposedly hot; I honestly don’t notice looks since my girlfriend and I fell in love, but hey, if the actors find her hot, you probably will too). In fact, every piece of drama that adds character to the show is presented in such a lighthearted way that you don’t get bogged down by the drama and can instead focus on the laughs. It’s nice to see a comedy remembering its a comedy (I’m looking at you, latest season of Entourage).

Anyway, as the main protagonist who provides the internal monologue for the series, you expect him to play the straight-laced boy to whom all the ridiculous events occur, but that isn’t really the case. In all actuality, he may be the worst character in terms of morals in the show. He’s obnoxious, pretentious, has no respect for his fellow man (or woman, to be honest). It’s hard to root for good things to happen to such a (and let’s be reasonable about this) a massive t***, which is why the series is so satisfying when things inevitably go horribly wrong.

Will’s pretentiousness is matched by Jay Cartwright (played by James Buckley), an incredibly insecure teen who makes up the most ridiculous of stories to seem cool. Unless, of course, you truly believe he lost his virginity at the age of eight and routinely has threesomes while on vacation in a trailer park.

Blake Harrison plays my personal favorite, Neil Southerland. Neil is simply the biggest idiot in all of London. One of the funniest moments in the series came in the third episode (“Thorpe Park”) where Neil was entirely unaware that his fellow coworkers taking his clothes meant they were hazing him and proceeded to entirely gross out his friends. It’s a wonderful scene from start to finish. Episodes in which Neil plays a significant role are automatically better as a whole than those without.

Joe Thomas rounds out the main cast as Simon Cooper. Simon is actually the character you would think Will would be (that is to say, a reasonable human being). As a hopeless romantic, you can’t help but root for Simon to be successful in his exploits, and you can’t help but share his frustration with his friends’ horrible advice that usually ends up thwarting his plans.

Emily Head plays Carly D’Amato, Simon’s love interest. She does a great job of alternating between being intrigued by him and his charming personality and being disgusted with the things that he does under the guidance of his friends. The two have great chemistry that truly comes across well throughout the episodes.

None of the five actors above have large resumes (or, really, any resume; understandable, given they are teenagers) but that may be the reason the show works so well. You truly feel as if the show is simply following four slightly-below-average teenagers on their quest to get laid, and thus the show works. The concept is brilliant, and the actors deliver in such a way as to make me convinced that their script writing process (for which the writers ought to be congratulated; the dialogue is some of the most realistic I’ve ever seen, which was greatly appreciated) was merely the five of them discussing their interactions of the day.

Greg Davies is the only actor with significant roles previously; he plays the school’s headmaster, Mr. Gilbert. His comedian background shines through as he consistently steals every scene in which he is present. Balancing his need for Will to do things for the school and his overall disgust with Will’s character is executed perfectly, and he appears just often enough to be properly utilized without overusing him and losing what makes the character special.

While I love this show, there are some noticeable complaints. The show is very one-note, and if you didn’t like the joke the first time, you probably won’t enjoy it the fiftieth time either. The Inbetweeners is also built on the same sex and potty humor that most twelve year olds find hilarious at times. While the show possesses far greater wit as a whole, there were moments that made me feel as if the show was beneath me (though there is no possible better vomit scene than the one from “Bunk Off”. I don’t want to give it away, but it’s really freakin’ funny. Just saying).

If you’re looking for high brow humor, look elsewhere. But if you’re looking for a fun way to spend an afternoon, The Inbetweeners is a great option. There were only eighteen episodes, each about 24 minutes long, so it’s more than easy to catch up. If any of you give it a try, let me know in the comments. 🙂

"It’s a Bird…It’s a Plane…Wait…It’s a Clone?"

Hello world! I guess it’s my turn to introduce myself to the reader’s out there and post something really random. My name is Dallas (Sallad), and I like a wide variety of things, mainly food and Biology. As a warning, expect my post topics to be extremely random, I’m not even sure how my own mind works. It’s an enigma. *dun dun dun*

I’m sure most of you have probably wondered what my random title is about. I’m a huge Bio nerd (And one of the few science-y people in our group >.<), but I really like genetics. So then, I thought about cloning. Cloning is a thing that has been a staple of sci-fi shows and movies for years, but it's really prevalent in a show called Clone on BBC. The basic plot is centered on the creation and education of the world’s first human clone. The clone was intended to be used as new type of “super soldier,” but it turns out the clone was more likely to hug someone than shoot them. I haven’t watched much of the series, but it is definitely super random. Eventually, the clone and his creator go on a journey, hoping to find something that will trigger his superhuman abilities, all while avoiding some team of security agents whose mission is to kill the clone. Anyways, if you’re into slightly strange shows, this one may or may not be up your alley.

Sorry, for the short post, I’ve been having a lot of writer’s block lately, but I assure you guys there will be more to come. 

From the Archives: How HBO Changed My Life

So, before I started this blog, I had another blog simply titled “Chase’s Blog About Stuff”. It was the same kind of idea I had for this site, except it was just me, and I talked about sports randomly too.

Needless to say, I like this site a lot better already.

Before that blog crashed and burned due to vacations in which I couldn’t get any articles out and the mayhem that is college orientation, I posted 7 true articles. The first was on HBO, a channel I had never before experienced, and the impact and importance I believe it has on the television world. I stick to most of what I said with a notable exception: I put Starz in the same category as HBO when I should have written about AMC. I had not actually seen a show from Starz yet, but I had heard great things about the Spartacus series. After watching it with Jason (Junior Varsity), I can see I was mistaken (review coming soon-ish), and that change is reflected below.

I’ll be posting articles from my archive over time, but for now, I hope you enjoy “How HBO Changed My Life”:

While movies and video games are indeed very popular, there is no form of media more widespread than television. The print media is all but dead, and movies can’t come into your home until they’ve been “formatted to fit your television screen” (the fact that they have to tell us that the movie had to be reformatted to fit our screen implies that there are people at their houses watching the movie wondering “How did they do that? It’s impossible!” and driving themselves mad with fits as they try to wrap their head around it. Honestly, we get it. Images have been adjusted to fit my television. Much appreciated. You don’t have to brag about it at the beginning of every movie). And many people don’t have the disposable income to immerse themselves completely in the video gaming world, if at all (and, let’s be honest, if you didn’t have a controller in your hands starting at a young age, maneuvering through all the controls to figure out how to make the character do what you want is not the easiest skill to learn). 

This has put television in a class of its own as an artistic medium. Almost everyone owns a television nowadays, and the vast majority of people at least have basic cable. Assuming people buy the most basic of cable packages, one can assume the average individual with a television has around 70 channels at their disposal at any given time, supposedly covering all demographics to appease the massive audience it has. There’s so much saturation in television, “I Didn’t Know I Was Pregnant” actually exists, and has multiple seasons! I mean, really! (There’s probably room for a whole other rant here, but I’ll let it slide for now. Let me know in the comments if you’re interested in hearing about how reality television has completely and utterly failed me).

All of this leads me to only one question: Why does so much of it suck?

A medium with such a large built in audience should be able to take risks, or at least it would appear so at first glance. After all, Fox, NBC, ABC, and CBS have all had horrible flops and come out of them completely intact. It seems logical that they would invest their hard earned cash into meaningful shows with true artistic merit that challenge the very fabric of our society and push us to do the same. Instead, they wallow in reality t.v. shows like “America’s Got An Hour of Time to Kill Before They Head to Bed” and “Dancing with D-List Celebrities about whom You Never Cared and Probably Never Will Again Once They’re Eliminated”. 

As Occam’s Razor states, the most obvious answer is usually the most accurate one. The big networks make the vast majority of the revenue from advertisers. Those ads make them money as long as the viewership is large, so the key to make the most money is the make the most cost effective shows that give the highest viewership. As long as America watches reality television, it’s so cheap to make that networks will never stop.

But what about shows like House M.D., you might ask? Well, I had followed House until the seventh season, but the predictable plots (just once, I want it to be lupus, then I can stop watching half an hour in and do something else) and characters that started to go in and out through Fox’s revolving door depleted the meaning. Besides, the schtick got old. I get it, House is depressed and doesn’t like other people because of it. Healing him made him boring, but once he’s happy, having him go back to the stupid behavior from when he was miserable is irrational. Eventually, after 155 episodes, the sarcastic quips lose their zing, the characters lose their edge, and the only reason everyone’s still on board is the built-in audience that keeps hoping the show will return to its glory days.

I had all but given up on television as a medium capable of holding my attention for an extended period of time until my friend showed me a completely legal and not in any way immoral way to catch up on the shows I had heard were truly worth it; shows that were built by channels not dependent on ad revenue, but instead on loyal subscription buyers who would only stay around if the product remained strong. 

I’m writing, of course, about HBO.

See, the Sopranos has always been put forth as the father of the modern television drama and as the standard by which all modern shows must be compared. I was skeptical at first (13 episode seasons? What is this madness?), but I went in with an open mind and was promptly rewarded for it.

The Sopranos isn’t just good. House was good, and I already ripped a show I had enjoyed to shreds three paragraphs ago. The Sopranos is by far the greatest show I’ve ever seen, so much so that I have plowed through 18 episodes in four days (a review of the whole series will be up as soon as I finish the whole series, which, given I have four and a half more seasons, could be a while. If you want a review of each season, let me know in the comments). The characters are all well-developed and react appropriately when their environment changes. The cinematography is gorgeous, with every scene shot such that it perfectly matches the atmosphere of the characters present. The drama feels real, with no one ever reacting on sudden whims known in the business as “plot devices”. Watching these characters develop in front of my eyes was the most satisfying experience I have ever had with a medium that didn’t involve a controller.

In my opinion, the key is the in the writing. There is never any doubt that these are bad men. They are mafiosos intent on taking out those who stand in their way or refuse to pay them their due respect. Instead of trying to make them likable, the writing and characterization emphasizes their internal struggles as reflected by their actions to reveal the humanity of an otherwise inhuman group of individuals. It’s an incredibly powerful message, and I’ve come out of each episode I’ve seen with at least one “wow” moment that made me realize something either about myself or the world around me. In other words, my humble thanks goes out to all those involved in the making of this show. Thank you for an overwhelmingly enjoyable experience.

To summarize succinctly: if you haven’t done so already, check this show out, along with the other stuff that channels like HBO and AMC are making. They’re so far above the cable networks in the race for quality it’s mind-boggling. If you want a high quality television drama with characters you can watch develop and a truly immersive story, avoid the networks and enjoy the channels built with people like you and I in mind.

Podcast Follow-up: The Black Dawn

Hello, Junior Varsity here, reporting on The Black Dawn series, which we mentioned previously in our first podcast.

Now that I’ve seen the whole thing, I’m much more satisfied than my initial impressions. It is true that the series has a very low budget, however, I think it should be said that Star Trek had a low budget when it first started. Black Dawn might not be on proportion with Star Trek, but it has a lot going for it.

Take the story. At the first glance, one might be tempted to let it go, simply because the scenario seems so implausible. But over the course of the seven episodes, everything about the phenomenon is revealed in a very good way. They tell you what the virus is, where it came from, how it came into being, and even why those specific people survived.

At first, I thought the reason might be because the virus targeted people who carry specific genes (like that episode of Fringe: The Bishop Revival, season two). But the answer here isn’t as obvious as that. I don’t want to give it away, so you’ll have to watch to find out.

Overall, the show went places I didn’t really expect it to go, and it certainly wasn’t shy about killing off its characters. I think the story did a good job of showing honest reactions to a sudden viral onslaught. I mean, suddenly finding yourself with only twelve other people and not knowing why, people are going to behave in funny ways. For similar movie tastes, I would point to the upcoming movie, The Divide. The Divide is about a group of people who get trapped in a bunker by an apocalyptic scenario as well (although it’s not a virus…it’s something else…meteors maybe? missile attack?) Anyway, the mind-bending-crazy-ness is obviously present in the trailer for that, which I think can be found on Youtube, here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJCxT2d5hzk

Looks freaky, doesn’t it? Also really awesome.

I was curious about The Black Dawn and looked into it after I watched the first episode. For more information, you can visit the project’s webpage, here: http://www.theblackdawn.com/

I was surprised by the end how much I was invested in the characters. The acting is pretty good, sometimes a little over the top, but I thought there were some quality moments of truth going on. All seven episodes that I watched are available for free on Hulu. Check it out.

Now that you’re all updated on that, enjoy the rest of your day and I will see you for my regular post on Saturday!

-Junior Varsity out.