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You are here: Home / TV & Movies / Television / Rubicon/Mad Men Open Thread

Rubicon/Mad Men Open Thread

by John Cole|  August 15, 20109:45 pm| 36 Comments

This post is in: Television

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Not a fan of Mad Men myself, but I know a lot of you are. Rubicon is much more to my liking. I think the “tie scene” just a few moments ago was just great.

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Reader Interactions

36Comments

  1. 1.

    Punchy

    August 15, 2010 at 9:51 pm

    Never heard of/seen either of these shows.

    Family Guy rerun is just awezum, however.

  2. 2.

    DougJ

    August 15, 2010 at 9:54 pm

    @Punchy:

    I’ll need a Sullivan link to decide what to think of the “Family Guy” rerun.

  3. 3.

    Omnes Omnibus

    August 15, 2010 at 9:56 pm

    @DougJ: I am sure the answer is in a Goldberg piece.

  4. 4.

    sherifffruitfly

    August 15, 2010 at 9:56 pm

    I watched the rubicon pilot or something on hulu a few weeks ago. I don’t recall being very impressed, but mebbe I didn’t give it enough of a chance.

  5. 5.

    DougJ

    August 15, 2010 at 10:00 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    We’ll have to see what Tyler Cowen thinks of Megan McArdle’s take on it to know for sure.

  6. 6.

    Omnes Omnibus

    August 15, 2010 at 10:02 pm

    @DougJ: Green balloons!

  7. 7.

    Seanly

    August 15, 2010 at 10:07 pm

    Are John Cole and I the only ones who like Rubicon?

  8. 8.

    apocalipstick

    August 15, 2010 at 10:10 pm

    I’m enjoying Rubicon. I don’t for the life of me understand people who moan, “It’s so slow,” especially if those same people like Mad Men(MM is a great show, but the pace is glacial). Rubicon‘s pace reminds me of those great ’70s conspiracy thrillers like The Parallax View and even All the President’s Men. Now, I could be wrong. The payoff could turn out to be a dog’s breakfast, but the ride so far has been nice.

  9. 9.

    mr. whipple

    August 15, 2010 at 10:11 pm

    What if I don’t watch Mad Men or Rubicon? Can I hang here or do I have to go to GOS?

  10. 10.

    arguingwithsignposts

    August 15, 2010 at 10:13 pm

    @mr. whipple:

    What if I don’t watch Mad Men or Rubicon? Can I hang here or do I have to go to GOS?

    It’s not just you. I don’t get the MM fascination either.

  11. 11.

    mr. whipple

    August 15, 2010 at 10:15 pm

    @arguingwithsignposts:

    I like the redhead.

  12. 12.

    arguingwithsignposts

    August 15, 2010 at 10:17 pm

    @mr. whipple:
    Well, that goes without saying, doesn’t it?

  13. 13.

    schrodinger's cat

    August 15, 2010 at 10:26 pm

    @mr. whipple: She seems to be quite popular with men.

  14. 14.

    General Stuck

    August 15, 2010 at 10:31 pm

    Getting ready to fire up Inglorious Basterds. heard it was pretty good.

  15. 15.

    schrodinger's cat

    August 15, 2010 at 10:31 pm

    I watched the first season, got bored with the second season and haven’t watched since.

  16. 16.

    mr. whipple

    August 15, 2010 at 10:34 pm

    @schrodinger’s cat:

    Crap. I thought I found an unappreciated diamond in the rough.

  17. 17.

    jeffreyw

    August 15, 2010 at 10:39 pm

    DVR is catchin all the mad men and rubicons for me, we watchin crazy heart or anyway Mrd J is. I’m sippin coffee with vanilla and likin it. be still my tappin foot, dammit, I don’t like country.

  18. 18.

    schrodinger's cat

    August 15, 2010 at 10:39 pm

    @mr. whipple: How is Mr Whipple, the kitteh? Haven’t seen any new pictures of him in a while.

  19. 19.

    arguingwithsignposts

    August 15, 2010 at 10:41 pm

    @General Stuck:
    i liked it. didn’t understand the critic hate.

  20. 20.

    Dee Loralei

    August 15, 2010 at 10:42 pm

    What no Leverage love on this blog? Sheesh they did the whole Massey Energy, WVa., buying aJudge/ Atty general thang tonight. And I watched closely and no Tunchie, Lily, Rosie sightings. Damn that John Rogers!

    I like The Glades too. And I have Rubicon on the DVR and am only 2 behind. And yea, the acting isn’t great. But I still have hopes for it being another Fringe.

  21. 21.

    mr. whipple

    August 15, 2010 at 10:45 pm

    @schrodinger’s cat:

    He is well but isn’t losing weight. I captured an incredible ‘view from my couch’ of him and sent the picture to JC, but I think it got deleted with 3,000 other emails.

  22. 22.

    apocalipstick

    August 15, 2010 at 10:49 pm

    @arguingwithsignposts:
    Really? There was no hatred; the critics slurped it pretty hard. It did get nominated for Best Picture as well.

  23. 23.

    arguingwithsignposts

    August 15, 2010 at 10:53 pm

    @apocalipstick:
    hmmm, my recollection differed. i seemed to get a “meh” vibe from the critics.

  24. 24.

    JGabriel

    August 15, 2010 at 11:20 pm

    @arguingwithsignposts:

    i seemed to get a “meh” vibe [re: Inglourious Basterds] from the critics.

    Initially, there was meh vibe. Once the critics realized it was just as much about movies as it was a war film, they loved it.

    Alternately, the initial reaction might have been a Cannes too cool for school vibe that died out as it went into general release.

    .

  25. 25.

    JGabriel

    August 15, 2010 at 11:22 pm

    @General Stuck: I enjoyed it. Melanie Laurent and Diane Kruger are both awesome.

    .

  26. 26.

    Linda Featheringill

    August 15, 2010 at 11:27 pm

    About Mad Men:

    The actors do a good job. Unfortunately, the writers do a good job, too, and they remind me of the 50s. Who would want to relive that? Jeez!!

    I suspect that the folks who like Mad Man are too young to remember that era.

    Maybe it’s like MASH, which was a rollicking comedy about life on the front line during the Korean War. Yeah. Right.

    [Another damn war that reduced the size of my family and I still don’t know what we were fighting about.]

  27. 27.

    adolphus

    August 15, 2010 at 11:54 pm

    I’ve watched a little bit of Rubicon and liked it, but it looks like a TV show you have to stick with, and I am not optimistic about my time this next few months. Maybe I’ll catch it on the intertubes when I have more time.

    But one thing caught my eye when I tuned in to see Mad Men. I only saw the pilot, but these people are supposed to work at a super secrete, maybe CIA maybe not, intelligence agency, right?

    So why are they having their daily briefing on the ground floor on the streetside of a downtown office building with huge windows that weren’t even remotely tinted or meshed? My gym has better security than that.

  28. 28.

    DickSpudCouchPotatoDetective

    August 16, 2010 at 12:33 am

    How could Rubicon be to anyone’s “liking?”

    How many fucking episodes of this sleep inducing shit are they going to broadcast before they actually start telling a story? If they tried any harder to not tell whatever story they have, they’d have to run the thing backwards.

    Jesus. Watching the cat sleep is more fun than this.

    Edit — the most action on this “show” is the traffic whizzing by the windows in the shithole where these people work.

  29. 29.

    DickSpudCouchPotatoDetective

    August 16, 2010 at 12:36 am

    @Seanly:

    If Cole likes it at least fifty people here will swear they love it.

  30. 30.

    DickSpudCouchPotatoDetective

    August 16, 2010 at 12:45 am

    Can you pause the Rubicon playback? The cat just twitched.

    I don’t want to you , you know, miss anything.

  31. 31.

    Wordsmith

    August 16, 2010 at 2:53 am

    Not a fan of Man Men or Mad Men. Just saw Jon Hamm in ‘Stolen.’ He’s such a 5 oclock shadow kind of guy. Rubicon looks interesting from the ads…just forget to watch.

  32. 32.

    BigSwami

    August 16, 2010 at 8:51 am

    Lining up on the Mad Men side of the playground. I’d follow Don Draper into Hades.

  33. 33.

    Bulworth

    August 16, 2010 at 9:38 am

    I’m hanging in there with Rubicon although like some of the posters here, I’m ready for a bit more intrigue. I think the brief case the boss dude gave Chase–I mean Will–is bugged.

    I have yet to watch MM, which if I did it would only be to see more of Ms. Hendricks and then I would inevitably gripe that she wasn’t in the show enough.

  34. 34.

    flyerhawk

    August 16, 2010 at 11:15 am

    Last night’s episode showed the most promise for Rubicon, which has been lackluster so far.

    This kind of show is right up my alley normally. But it’s been too disjointed so far. But last night’s episode at least had some coherence.

    I think it has possibilities but it really needs to settled into a storyline.

  35. 35.

    August

    August 16, 2010 at 4:11 pm

    I was 21 in 1961. I had no interest in the philandering of advertising whizzes then, nor can I drum up any today.

    I don’t watch that much television, but during the course of a week usually catch Rubicon two or three times (via Tivo). It gets better every time I look at it. I especially like the wild streak in the character called Miles, and find myself identifying surprisingly strongly with Will. Anyone who’s ever worked in a large organization that slightly resembles that spy outfit is likely to recognize the way the older man Spangler misunderstands and yet has a crush on his promising young employee down in Washington. I also like the acting of those playing Grant, Tanya, Maggie (Whipple’s “Redhead,” I believe), Ingram (I think it is) the mid-level boss, and Ed, the code breaker Will keeps visiting for help. I don’t know what to make of the woman who’s trying to figure out why her husband committed suicide, but I love the music and especially the cello whenever she starts snooping around.

  36. 36.

    Gus

    August 17, 2010 at 10:16 am

    @BigSwami: I love Mad Men, but Don Draper is a bastard. Which is part of the reason I love it. And the redhead.

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