I've already pointed out that Mad Men was about as much of a male environment. All of these female characters from The Wire are at best supporting characters and with the exception of Snoop, who was a woman basically passing as a man, I never see them getting discussed as opposed to how "cool" all the gangstas were. The women in Mad Men are at the centre of the series and as much of its narrative motor as the men and it critically deals with how they function in a male dominated environment.
I think the dismissal of Mad Men is typical Internet misogyny. It has complicated, sometimes difficult female characters who aren't male fantasy action chicks and it is among other things about style and fashion, it deals with it as a theme and subject matter. It's never style over content, it's style is always a reflection of its society and characters and it's used with great intelligence. This is always suspect to heterosexual men who don't bother to look beyond the surface, because it's something they refuse to engage with as something which can be taken seriously. And while The Wire itself deals with this with huge intellgence and subtlety, much of its fan base comes from a white, male, heterosexual veneration for gangster culture, which is considered cool. The hero worship of some of its most despicable characters on the Internet has always disturbed me. Not a fault of the series itself, but I'm talking about how it gets discussed and why Mad Men gets dismissed.
