I avoided watching Mad Men for years because I routinely saw posts about the show on a variety of websites and gathered from them that the show was a glorification of boring and outdated sexism.
Then a reader whose opinion I trust more than those websites insistently recommended the show, so I watched it. And discovered that my readers are smart and those website are stupid.
I’m almost done with season 5 of the show and there are no more on Netflix, so if there are any other recommendations, I’m very interested.
Clarissa's Blog 
I haven’t watched this, but “Battlestar Galactica” was a famous sci-fi TV series. Since you try new things, may be …
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This post really made me want to watch “Borgia: Faith and Fear”, but I couldn’t find it on Internet.
http://www.exurbe.com/?p=2176
This post also talks about the series, and in general about American vs Europian TV, which I found interesting:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/03/31/1079424/-A-Tale-of-Two-Borgia-TV-Shows-As-Usual-Americans-Get-the-Inferior#
“But I can’t, and don’t, buy that it’s a coincidence that every time similar content is approached in two different ways for Americans and for international audiences, the people designing it for US consumption choose to dumb everything down, rob sex of its sexuality, and turn violence into a cheap visual gag reel”
Do you think she is right?
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The Wire.
This is probably the dozenth time I’ve recommended this show to you on this blog. And I won’t stop until you give it a shot.
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This is just to second SB. I saw the first season of The Wire and it wasn’t quite to my taste and so wasn’t motivated to watch a second season (a bit too slow and unrelentingly bleak from my perspective.) But many people that I know and respect think it’s one of the finest show ever to be on American TV. So it’s worth a try. It was defintely well written and well acted. 🙂
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I really loved _Big Love_. I didn’t think it was going to be for me but once I started watching it, I was instantly hooked. I also loved the first two seasons of _Homeland._ Season 3 is not out on Netflix yet but I am looking forward to watching it.
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Lillyhammer (sic) on Netflix. I have only watched the first season, but it’s about a NY mobster moving to Norway for witness protection – cultural misunderstandings abound! I thought it was pretty funny.
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Maybe give the Sopranos another try? The place to start is series one episode one and give it a few episodes (The pilot is all over the place with a lot of stuff that’s very out of character in light of later episodes but it picks up by the third or fourth episode).
For nothing else, the first two seasons have one of the most iconic portrayals of a toxic parent ever seen on TV (that might not be a recommendation….).
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“For nothing else, the first two seasons have one of the most iconic portrayals of a toxic parent ever seen on T”
– You REALLY know how to get my attention. 🙂
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Also, have you seen Profugos, the HBO Chilean narcotraficante road series? It’s brutal (in more ways than one) but very good.
I expect it to be remade in NAmerica with more photogenic actors and more aesthetically pleasing violence and a lot less grey.
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You might like Damages. It’s an excellent character study of a narcissist, played by Glenn Close.
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I quite like Suits – it’s interestingly amoral. Haven’t watched series 3 yet, so take that as a caveat. It’s all about leverage, in essence.
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