Argobot

Was Twin Peaks the first prestige Dead Girl drama? If so, you could argue that its influences touches dozens of movies and TV shoes that put a missing or dead beautiful in the center narrative. This is a good essay on the subject: http://lareviewofbooks.org/essay/oldest-story-toward-theory-dead-girl-show

Everyone just looks like a dad now!!!!

I find it weird and little distressing that people were bothered by a woman's voice.

Sorry if my response came off as unnecessarily harsh. It was more a reaction to a frequent way this show gets discussed than any one particular post. As I said, Mad Men is a show that repels speculation, something that I enjoy (and perhaps am overly protective of). It's interesting that you describe the opening theme as suicidal. I've never interpreted it in that way, mostly because the ending shot is of a (not dead) man's silhouette on the couch. The fall through the credits doesn't read as death but more as plummeting through excess and then ending right back where you started, which is basically Don Draper's MO in every season. Then again, I really love the episode where Lane commits suicide and there's the shot of him sitting in front of that huge window and you think for just a moment that maybe he's going to jump but the next time you see him he's hanging from his office door. It's a nice little bit of indulgence that I completely bought.

Mad Men is certainly not the worst example of the Internet overanalyzing a TV show, but it still frequently happens. http://www.vulture.com/2013/05/who-is-mad-mens-bob-benson.html http://www.hitfix.com/the-fien-print/mad-men-boss-weighs-in-on-sharon-tate-db-cooper-theories The Sharon Tate/Megan comparisons got so bad that Weiner had to directly address them. It's kind of a distressing result of a post-Lost (maybe even post-Twin Peaks) world where audiences are convinced that there's meaning in everything and completely misinterpret very obvious narrative ques in favor of outrageous speculation. It's why I can't stand the conversation around the identity of the jumping man in Mad Men's opening credits. What show are you watching where you think that is in any way relevant to what's happening on screen?

For a show that trades off 60s nostalgia, Mad Men weirdly benefits from a lot of 90s nostalgia. Many of the side characters are from popular 90s and early 2000s TV shows and their appearance always leads to excited reactions online. It's kind of funny to witness. Was anyone else disappointed that they skipped right ahead to 1970. I kind of wanted to see the show deal with the Manson murders during the summer of 69, but maybe Matthew Weiner was so tired of the Megan Draper is Sharon Tate conspiracy theories that he wanted to skip right on by it.

This episode really drove home the sadness of a wasted life. Ken's subplot was a literal representation of this, which is why I did not find his return as the new Dow ad man triumphant. (Go buy that farm and write your book Ken! What are you doing?) Don trying and failing to reconnect with Rachael fits the theme as well, since we're clearly meant to think of her as one of his great loves and potentially a woman that he could have actually been happy with. I really loved how the waitress/Rachael reinforced that point when she told Don that maybe he's always been dreaming about Rachael. It really got to the loss that Don is feeling and perhaps has always felt w/r/t his relationship with Rachel. Maybe now Don will stop wasting time at casting calls and actually try to do something with his life.

One of the many things I like about Mad Men is how antithetical its writing is to playing the "How Will This All End?" game. It's not like other critically-acclaimed television that creates the idea of building towards some grand finale (shows like Lost, Game of Thrones, Breaking Bad, etc), it's much more content to just let the slow-burn of its characters' lives unfold over several seasons. That's why I suspect it will have a satisfying ending because unlike other TV shows that implicitly or explicitly promise a conclusion that they ultimately fail to deliver on, Mad Men is promising nothing but more of what we've seen for seven seasons. The specifics of where the characters end up after the finale is the least important part of that. Matthew Weiner is one of my favorite interview subjects, because he is constantly baffled by the speculation and theories that surround Mad Men. I love his response to the overly literal way that the finale of Season 7 Part 1 was interpreted: http://www.vulture.com/2014/05/matthew-weiner-interview-mad-men-mid-season-7-finale-joan-hates-don-bert-cooper-dance.html "

I should clarify that these women were also stating that there was no problem with the way that women are portrayed in games. It just really reeked of a standard practice of women trying to fit in with their male peers by objectifying other women. I participated in some of that behavior myself when I was younger and am glad to have grown out of it. Obviously, there's nothing wrong with wanting women to look sexy! It's just frustrating since that's the only option for women characters and having women act like this is not a problem just contributes to this gross system.

I had no idea there was a single rider line! I'm not sure if I'd want to do that though, after having a less than stellar experience with the single rider line on Goofy's Fly School. Cars is a fine ride, even though I also do not care for (and have not seen) the movie. I definitely understand why it's such a popular ride. Nothing will ever bet the joy of the Haunted Mansion though. Also:

There's a new Feminist Frequency video, about a positive female character (in this case, the Scythian from "Sword and Sworcery). I was with this video until it showed what the Scythian's ending is But then Anita commented that the ending is not ideal for all women characters, just a nice deviation from the norm of the hero's quest narrative. I liked that she highlighted how important having blank slate characters that are women can be. I know that during games with silent protagonists, I generally assume they're male because I'm so trained to see that as the default. I remember playing Portal and being shocked and actively happy when I realized I was playing as a woman. It felt like such a rare treat. Sadly, a lot of the negative reaction I've seen to this video claims that Anita expects all female characters to be blank slates and exhibit no personally. Which? I have no idea how people can watch this video and come to that conclusion, but I guess it helps that they are so determined to disagree with everything that she says. A depressing number of women detractors have been proudly stating their love for sexualized women characters and how they have no problem with seeing some T&A in their games. I really want to sit down with those women and explain that while objectifying other women might make it seem like they will be welcome in the boys' club as the only Cool Girl, it never pays off in the long-term and ultimately you are ensuring that the bullshit gender divide continues.

Let me repeat what has already been said multiple times in this thread: What an awful episode! It wasn't dull like some of the recent episodes have been, it was just actively bad to the point where it started to become fascinating. Who knew that James' faux-noir plot could get worse! Even though I've seen these episodes before, I was sure that last week was the end to that plot was really shocked when it returned in this episode, and somehow managed to have even less closer or meaning. I was actually with the Wyndam Earle stuff before, but then this episode couldn't figure out what kind of villain they wanted him to be. Is he a calm, super detective? A raging wacko? A master of wearing the goofiest Luigi mustache disguise? Why would sending Caroline's wedding clothes to various police departments mean anything to Cooper? He and Caroline were not married and I find it really hard to believe that he would even recognize that clothing (imagine the woman you're having an affair with taking the time to show you all of her wedding stuff). It's something that I assume seemed cool and like what a deranged murderer would do, but it immediately falls apart when you start to think about it for longer than a few seconds. What a massive train wreck of an episode. At least we got an Albert and Truman hug out of it.

Big bad is a term that was never uttered on Buffy, but became the default way fans described each season's main villain (different one each season). Well, I think maybe Spike called himself the big bad once, but since you have no idea who Soike is that doesn't matter. Sexing down the house is a dumb phrase I made up to refer to an episode where two characters have such aggressive sex it knocks down the condemned building they are having sex in.

You're right that the show does telegraph that something will happen with Andrew Packard, but it comes so late in the game when the mill plot has devolved into a complex web of nothing. It keeps trying to top itself and ends just being incredibly boring. Plus, we already had Catherine fake her death and now we find out that her brother did as well? I guess it runs in the family.

Season 6 is Warren and Evil Willow and Spike/Buffy sexing down a house. "We're adopting a baby!" is this show's sexing down a house.

This was all good, but the best part (to me) is the Buffy the Vampire Slayer comparison. This part of Twin Peaks is like Buffy Season 6.

This episode felt like a transition from this show lightly lampooning soap opera tropes to just full on being a soap opera, horrible writing and all. Of course Wyndam Earl plays chess. Was the implication that Dr. Jacoby slept with the teen witch widow? Even if it wasn't, what a garbage subplot. It's so painful to see everyone, including Cooper and Truman, succumb to it. M. T. Wentz, Thomas Eckhart, and Andrew Packard are all in the running for being the least interesting side characters. Pete's uninterested reaction to seeing his not-dead brother-in-law mirrors my own. Best parts of this episode were Pete's distraught reaction to forgetting hot dogs (and the musical accompaniment) and the gif I made.

I assume the True Detective mention was in reference to the antlers/general artistry of the dead body. Flimsy excuse to post this great article on the relationship between Twin Peaks and True Detective (spoilers for the latter). http://grantland.com/hollywood-prospectus/carcosa-or-bust-the-satisfyingly-weird-mysteries-of-true-detective/

To push back a little (on my own post, even), where does the women's desire for that kind of sex come from? Is it influenced by the way society depicts women and sexuality? And if that's the case, doesn't that make it open for criticism? I read an essay about a very explicit porn company, where the entire premise is bringing a woman to a public space, like a bar, and having the bystanders, who are just members of the public and not porn actors, humiliate the woman in these incredibly degrading ways. Calling her names, groping, bondage, etc. Even though the woman consented to be in this video and even admitted to getting pleasure out of it, a part of me really objected to what I was reading and made me question why a woman would want to be treated that way and if any comes from the way that society in general degrades women and makes them feel worthless.

That goofy article makes me want to actually have an intelligent discussion of male sexual desire. There's a trend I've noticed among ostensibly progressive, straight men where their progressivism makes them feel guilty for the kind of sex that their straightness causes them to want. I'm talking about oral sex or any other act that could potentially be seen as demeaning to the woman in the situation. I've had countless personal conversations and read numerous articles with the idea that men internalize feminism to mean that they should feel guilty for wanting their partner to give them a blow job. That guilt, while it comes from a well-intentioned place, feels incredibly insulting to the women involved. It's a case of men wanting to protect women and thereby removing any agency from their independent choices. Anyone have thoughts about this?

Haha, someone tagged that guy in a thread and now he's responding to me on Twitter. Weeeeeeee

Here's a fun (not fun) article written by a man who JUST WANTS TO ABOUT FANTASY SEXY LADIES WITHOUT ALL THESE MEANIES YELLING AT HIM. https://medium.com/@adrianchm/i-want-to-murder-some-nazis-and-save-a-damsel-in-ddistress-5bfe944412a4 Bonus: I think he means "DDistress" because the damsel presumably has DDs? Fuck off.

I also got that sense, which again, is incredibly insulting to women. (She's bewitching the men! Women are strange creatures that enact otherworldly magic to insnare innocent men!! Fart.) Again, it's such a bleak contrast to Laura, who also was almost preternaturally talented at making men fall in love with her. The difference being, however, that Laura was incredibly malleable and let herself be shaped into whatever men desired from her. It seemed like she had power and agency, but really, it was men's desires that dedicated what she did. The widow character has none of that tragedy, and seems to either woo men simply because she's pretty (dumb) or maybe because she cast a spell (insulting and dumb).

Everything with women in this post-Laura Palmer part of the show has gotten worse. Remember when this show was good at giving women depth and complexity? Now everyone is a dumb cartoon character. Audrey is almost kissing Bobby (??), Josie is in a maid's outfit, Lucy is stomping around the sheriff's office, acting like a stereotype of a jealous woman. All the new women introduced are equally one-note, like the widow and James' noir lady. I find James' plot incredibly insulting. This show once wonderfully dealt with abuse among family members in such a heart-wrenching, mature way. Now we have this gorgeous woman, who kisses 18-year-old James after he mumbles something about also knowing what it's like to be alone. James gets to kiss and probably rescue this adult woman because Twin Peaks has devolved into a garbage fantasy with cardboard women. Spoiler: James' plot