Tonight: "Mad Men" Concludes (No Spoilers)

This past Friday evening was spent binge watching the last three episodes of "Mad Men" in anticipation of tonight's series finale.  For the most part, this final season has been disappointing, and we have found ourselves saying things like "I'm ready for this show to be over."  However, the penultimate episode last week seemed to be setting up conclusions to the stories of Joan, Pete, Betty, and, possibly, Peggy and Roger.    Still not sure where Don is headed, and I am betting that when the show ends tonight, we STILL won't know, which will lead to endless kvetching across the Internet about such an unsatisfactory conclusion to this long-running series.  Series creator Matthew Weiner and AMC will, of course, defend this as "art", but long time fans of the show will be left with a sense of dissatisfaction.  This seems to happen more often than not when long running series are sent off with a "Grand Finale".

Of course, the series could conclude with an open-enough ending so as to set up a "Mad Men" feature film to bilk fans of their money one last time.  

I could be wrong on all of this, of course.  We'll just be watching - in real time; not gonna wait to see a DVR'd recording - to see how it all ends.

I will say this, though - I am going to miss the spectacular Christina Hendricks (Joan Harris).  

And that isn't the type of picture of Miss Hendricks that you thought I would post, is it?

Television Thoughts - No Spoilers

Some quick hit television thoughts.....

• The season three finale of "The Americans", while not disappointing, it did not pack the punch of previous season-ending episodes.  This entire season seemed to be a bit of a miss-mash of too many plot lines that only confused the viewer (or at least the two viewers that reside at our house).  As friend Fred Shugars has stated, perhaps, one of he overlying themes to emerge from this season is that "you can't trust teenagers".
• We are now halfway through the final season of "Mad Men" with only three episodes remaining.  We have invested six years into watching this series, and it is disappointing that in this last year, our overall sentiment is "Well, we have to watch, but we can't wait for it to be over".  All of the characters have devolved into people that are just plain unlikeable to the point where you just don't care what happens to them. (Possible exception: Peggy Olsen.)  
• Perhaps the producers of "Mad Men" should have just ended it a season to two ago and gone out on top.  It's too bad that long running TV shows feel that they must end a show's run with some blockbuster tie-all-the-strings-together Grand Finale.  It rarely works out to anyone's satisfaction.  Exhibit A of this theory of mine is "Seinfeld".

• Has anyone watched this new TBS sitcom "Your Family or Mine"?  I have tried watching it on two separate occasions, and I could not get through to the end of either episode.  Crude and awful.  And one of the stars is Richard Dreyfuss!  I suppose that at this stage of his career, and Oscar winner like Dreyfuss is entitled to an gig like this to guarantee himself an easy phone-it-in paycheck, but it's a shame to see a guy who starred in such things as American Graffiti, Jaws, Close Encounters, The Good-bye Girl, and Mr. Holland's Opus performing in something as dreadful as this.

"We Bought A Zoo" and Other Topics

Happy New Year, everyone!

I shall kick off 2012 with a very brief review of our New Year's Eve Date Movie: "We Bought A Zoo", directed by Cameron Crowe and starring Matt Damon and Scarlet Johanssen, both of whom were delightful. Very engaging family movie about a young widower with two kids who, in attempt to start over, quits his job and buys a zoo. Yeah, it's fluffy, you can see what's coming, and it will never win any awards, but you can't not like this movie. We thought it would be a light, enjoyable movie, but we both liked it much more than we expected.

A word about two of the supporting actors. Seven year old Maggie Elizabeth Jones, who plays Damon's daughter, just might be the cutest little girl you've ever seen on a movie screen. Thomas Haden Church plays Damon's brother, and he is very much like the character he played in "Sideways", which means he's quite funny.

Good movie.

*****
We came home and proceeded to watch five episodes from Season Four of "Mad Men." Great show. In fact, soon after I finish this blog entry, we will watch two more episodes, and that will wrap up Season Four for us.

*****
Much is at stake for the Pittsburgh Steelers as they take on the Browns on the lakefront this afternoon while the Bengals take on the Ravens in Cincy. The guess here is that the Steelers will hold serve and beat the Browns while the Bengals will be, well, the Bengals and lose to the Ravens, which means a wild card spot, no bye week, and a road playoff game next week for the Black & Gold. Well, the Steelers made this particular bed in losing both games, particularly the second one, against Baltimore. We shall see what happens.

*****
Two huge events await us in 2012.

It's an Olympic Year. No doubt the Games of London will be marvelous spectacle and great fun to watch. Someone who we currently do not even know exists will no doubt become a breakout star during these games. Whom will it be? Man? Woman? American? Asian? European? Someone from some small third world country? The fun will be in watching it unfold.

It's a Presidential Election Year. As has been my policy from the beginning, The Grandstander shall eschew politics in this space, as I prefer to concentrate on fun stuff and not the bitterness and anger that is so prevalent these days. All I will say now is that I hope that this can proceed as an exercise in an almost sacred right of democratic process as envisioned by the Constitution of the United States. Sadly, I fear that it will be a months long exhibition of ugliness among the various participants, and, in one of the lesser developments of the 21st Century, and avalanche of chain emails that purport to be funny, but are really their own exercise of hatefulness. I don't think this is what Washington, Jefferson, Adams and the rest of the founding Fathers had in mind.

*****
Have you noticed that The Grandstander now has a logo? What took me so long?

*****
All that aside, nothing but cheer, prosperity, good health, and happiness to all Loyal Readers in 2012!