I Don't Like Mad Men

I don't like the AMC series Mad Men and I have no idea why so many people do. I sat through it and itched, scratched, waited for something to happen. I'm fine with slow. Loved 2001. But all Mad Men seems to be is a constant slow burn of men being chauvinistic and smoking a lot and women being catty back stabbers who do what they need to do by their men. The shadowy background of our main man Don Draper is tantalising at first. I remember leaning forward in my seat and exclaiming, "finally, something to latch on to," but the unfolding results are fairly mediocre, predictable plot turns. And I don't really care about him. He cheats, is harsh to his wife, they all have tenuous grips on morality, and in a world where everyone's nasty, no-one is.
Baffled, I turned to the plethora of positive reviews. The consistent point of similarity between all of them is an abundance of exhalation over the faithful and painstaking recreation of the 1960s. They all say it's the shows strongest point...not its story, not its character arcs (which don't really arc so much as say a constant plateau of rather soulless), none of the things that keep me interested. They all jism over the art direction. Big bloody whoop. Art direction's important, but in a TV series, I forget about it after the first two episodes. The world is established, I'm appropriately immersed and now I want to get down to the business of story. Great art direction doesn't make a good show. And, umm, since when was it difficult or groundbreaking to reproduce the 1960s? They've been doing it for decades, and it wasn't even that long ago to begin with.

My other, more subjective irk, is that going in to the show, I thought I'd be seeing a more thorough look into the actual mentality, process and science behind advertising. Instead, it's more a pop-psych, anecdotal handling of the business. I can't blame them for that though. That's just my own uninformed expectations.

It's just not a very strong show. Maybe it gets better in season 2. I've heard as much, but I was so underwhelmed by season 1, I just feel like I have better things to do with my time.