Heather Havrilesky notices that, whether intentionally or by accident, TV anti-heroes since Tony Soprano are becoming less and less sympathetic:
The trick that David Chase pulled off with The Sopranos was that he made us feel protective, affectionate love for a bad, bad guy, a guy who wanted to grow but couldn’t, a guy who, at the end of the day, just wanted to daydream about the good old days and stuff his face with onion rings. When Tony had a panic attack or missed the ducks in his pool or got beat up or embarrassed, it made us feel terribly sorry for him in spite of ourselves.
That’s not how we feel about Walter White.
But that’s not how we’re supposed to feel about him. Just as Walt wasn’t designed to occupy the same place in our hearts as Tony Soprano, neither was Don Draper of Mad Men. But because Matthew Weiner and the show’s other writers take pains to show us why Don does what he does, it’s more of a problem when we come way from these character sketches feeling unmoved.
In the show’s sixth season, Don didn’t necessarily make bigger mistakes than he ever had, but his hungry ego and his weaknesses were on full display like never before. Aside from being called a monster by Peggy and assuming the fetal position toward the end of the season, Don didn’t register guilt or awareness of his own terrible behavior that often. Even though it may be Weiner’s intention to demonstrate the limitations of Don’s consciousness, even though Mad Men is arguably guided by ideas more than emotions, and Don’s shortcomings are meant to embody the shortcomings of not just an entire generation but also late capitalist American society itself, the exercise can grow tiresome when Don is less likable than the writers seem to believe.
The Dish