New Drama Showdown: "Last Resort" vs "Revolution"

As we all know, the networks have been searching for the next Lost for some time.  There was The Event, Persons Unknown, V, Alcatraz, and a whole bunch of other short-lived shows I can't even remember that failed to hook and capture the public in the immediate, visceral way that Lost did.  I was reading an interview with Zeljko Ivanek where he was talking about being bummed he didn't get to work with Blair Underwood more on The Event, and while I love Zeljko and I love Blair Underwood, the sad truth is that The Event was terrible.  Just really, really bad.

My love of Lost got me into a quandary with some of my best friends when the sixth season aired.  I had been pretty obsessed with Lost since about mid-way through the second season, when I watched the first season DVDs and then went off to a new college and realized I could buy episodes on iTunes.  That shit hooked me pretty hard.  After I graduated and moved back home, I made a bunch of people start watching. I swore to them that the writers knew what they were doing and all the loose ends would be neatly tied up if they would just be patient.  Now, I still maintain that Lost was, for the most part, a great show, and after careful consideration, I even became a fan of the finale.  But fuck, the writers really dropped the ball during season six.  The episodes aren't all terrible and we do get some satisfying answers, but they spent WAY too much time introducing unnecessary new characters, faffing around with Charles Widmore, and getting to the heart of the Jacob/Smoke Monster thing and not enough time wrapping things up satisfactorily with the original cast and some of the mysteries they'd been developing for years.  Don't even get me started on the alternate reality/limbo thing - while I do like the finale, the build-up to it was frustratingly dumb.  Anyway, this is all to say that Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof robbed me of some of my well-earned reviewer credentials and to this day, my friends still give me shit when I recommend a mysterious drama.

Well, I'm hoping that I can redeem myself now.  There are two new dramas this year that have already found some success with the Lost style of a large, diverse ensemble cast and gradually-revealed mysteries, and it turns out that they're both pretty good.  One is already pulling ahead of the other in my book, though.

it's a mad mad mad mad Mad Men world

with the season 4 premiere almost upon us (Sunday @ 10pm on AMC), i felt it appropriate that the first real post be devoted to what may be the best all-around show in the history of television. it's hard for me to put into words what really connects with me besides the obvious, but i'm going to try. bullet points, don't fail me now.

What Makes Mad Men Awesome:

- so rarely on the small screen does so much hotness coincide with such good, consistent acting. seriously, think about some of the more lauded dramas. House? Hugh Laurie is good, but the show is hopelessly formulaic and i kind of hate everyone else, especially after they killed off Kal Penn so he could go work for Obama. The Sopranos? good acting, not so much hotness. Lost? TONS of hotness, but inconsistent acting with demerits taken for Emilie deRavin and Matthew Fox pre-season 6. but Mad Men - has some of the most beautiful people in the world, and they can all act their asses off. Rich Sommer (Harry Crane): yummy with or without glasses. Michael Gladis (Paul Kinsey) has a great baritone and can wear facial hair like nobody's business. January Jones (Betty Draper) is cute if you're into that skinny blonde Grace Kelly thing. Christina Hendricks (Joan Harris nee Holloway): SWOON. Jon Hamm (Don Draper): double swoon into a melted puddle of impure thoughts. it is really unbelievable how fucking hot Jon Hamm is - in fact, we might want to be careful, he could be an alien sent to earth to subtly enslave us with his otherworldly good looks. just sayin'. and, oh yeah, and he's an awesome actor, be it drama or comedy. put them together, and you have magic:

if that clip doesn't make you want to (a) watch Mad Men or (b) get yourself out of that skirt, then stop reading now. there's no hope for you.

- the show is so visually stunning i can't take my eyes off it. even if we move beyond the carnal eye candy to the costuming and set design - the attention to detail, in relation to both the time period and the characters themselves, is astounding. this show is literally a feast for the eyes, and i hate that phrase so you know it's true. and it's not just the set design, but the lighting, and the directing, and really just the way everything is put together perfectly to create just the right tone. but so much of this has been said before, what i really want to get to is the emotion of the show.

- that leads us first to the writing, which is, to put it succinctly, powerful. it is smart without being pretentious, symbolic without being heavy-handed, and doesn't contradict itself (one of my major pet peeves). the writing allows for natural pauses and silences and allows for the actors to carry a scene on a single glance (see Joan at the end of that scene where her drunk husband tells her to turn off the light). no one part of the show is trying to outshine any other; they all work together so harmoniously that it's nearly a miracle.

- the beautiful people and the top-notch acting and the perfectly accurate production values all come together to present this authentic experience that bores to the heart of who we are and what makes us that way. the story of Don Draper is at once familiar and unknown; we are used to successful men not always being what they seem, yet despite his deceitful behavior we love Don Draper. we root for him, because he is lost. he is so utterly lost to himself and he is unable to reach out for help. yet he knows other people so well - he understands the human spirit - and thus is insanely excellent at his job. where these two sides of him, the confident ad man and the lonely, poor, lost, and broken little boy intersect is where the emotional sparks fly.

take this clip. this is, for me, the essence of what compels me to watch Mad Men. there are many more stories, many great characters, and the way the story flows within historical events is remarkable. i love Peggy, and Joan, and Sal, and Betty and Sally and even Pete Campbell - and might be talking a bit about their characters and inner turmoils as this new season unfolds and more and more is brought to light (i'm especially excited for Joan's husband to go off and die already). but the powerful reality of pain and repressed yet universal emotions that exist in Don Draper is what brings me back, and it's what i'm left thinking about once the episode's ended.

well, that...and doing Jon Hamm. and then smoking a cigarette. or ten. followed by a gin martini. best night ever, y/y?

Jon says yes.

Images via photobucket, alley cat store, the washington post, the austin chronicle, bgay.com