Sure I'll buy my theory is wrong. I guess it just doesn't strike my fancy. I also can't understand the appeal of marvel movies, and half the planet loves those things.

And yeah of course that kind of thing happens. My problem is chiefly that it is super heavy handed. Like the story doesn't really paint a picture of reasonable people who are struggling in their relationship, but rather this caricature of a larger-than-life husband who does whatever he wants and an incredibly demure wife who just puts up with it. Again, that exists, but it is absolutely not the norm - and the show seems to suggest that this is just how life was in those days. I just don't buy that at all. Maybe it was more acceptable, maybe it was easier to hide your shittyness, but shitty people are shitty people are shitty people. It's not like in the 60s everyone was like 'hell yeah bro you cheated on your wife and the mother of your children. High five that's sick bro"

Its like if you made a period piece about the building of the railroads in the late 1800s and every white character just said things like "boy I sure do hate those chinese" instead of actually creating realistic characters that demonstrate their hatred instead of just being a caricature of a racist.

Well it’s a feminist show or at least change in womens role in society is a large theme (hence the name). I think it might come across preachy if one expects a more nuanced show.

If you look it against films from the era like The Apartment (which is like styleguide to mad men) or All that heaven allows, similar themes and characters were displayed already then as sign of the times.

I agree with your comment on "heavy handedness". I think this is common in modern cinema in all forms. They fail to capture subtlety and come across as cartoonish. For example, based on conversations I remember with the older generations from my early childhood, usually racism was not expressed as some sort of outright hatred. Far more common was just casual ideologies that were part of the thinking of the times and rooted in tribalism in general, but had an overarching affect on society. One of the old ladies at my church when I was a child told me, "birds of a feather flock together" regarding people of different races. They thought races should be kept separate and that problems came up when you mixed races together. To them, it was "just so" and just as casual as the thought "that businesses should not be open on Sunday" or whatever. It was a set of axioms that were ingrained in their thinking. But if you asked her if she hated black people, she would say "no, they're God's children", etc.

Sorry, you know the norms for social relationships in the 1960s?

>Its like if you made a period piece about the building of the railroads in the late 1800s and every white character just said things like "boy I sure do hate those chinese" instead of actually creating realistic characters that demonstrate their hatred instead of just being a caricature of a racist.

Have you watched mad men at all? it's nothing like this level of storytelling.