Television

SPOILER ALERT: No reading this post until you’ve done an honest day’s work for it, you bum.

So who knew that Mad Men would also turn out to be Carnivale? I’m impressed that, within this already detailed period piece, there turns out to be another period piece (Don/Dick’s childhood in the Depression) that’s just as engrossing and …

SPOILER ALERT: Before you read this, swipe a bottle of booze and watch Mad Men.

So I’ll admit it: I lost faith just for a second. I briefly thought Mad Men was going to start sucking. That moment when Don asks his long-lost brother whether any of their relatives are left surviving, finds out they’re gone, then reaches into his bag? …

SPOILER ALERT: Before you read this, put some slipcovers on your couch and watch Mad Men.

So: Pete–not a total unsympathetic worm? Who knew? Four episodes in, Mad Men is showing an intriguing ability to change itself up from week to week. The first two episodes handled the plot in the usual serial style, bouncing among the various …

SPOILER ALERT: Watch last night’s Mad Men before you read this. And don’t forget the cake.

This week’s was the first episode of Mad Men I didn’t receive an advance screener of, and so watched on TV like a civilian. So it was the first time I saw the interview segments after the show with Matthew Weiner and the cast, talking about the …

If you didn’t already know that Mad Men was created by a producer of The Sopranos, you might be able to guess it by now. Like The Sopranos, it has a gift for making its world seem utterly hellish and utterly seductive at the same time. The casual sexism and racism and the highly cultivated cynicism. The smartly dressed men and women …

I’ve decided to add AMC’s advertising drama Mad Men to the Watch rotation this summer, although, truth be told, it’s been so long since I watched the pilot that this first one is going to be a bit more of a Mad Men Did-You-Watch post.

When I first saw the pilot, I was worried it was a case of pilot-itis, the too-good-to-be-true first …