mad men - season one

Rating:
Date: 2008-07-05
Plop Plop Fizz Fizz
AMC once again proves itself a worthy adversary to HBO and Showtime for producing a quality and highly literate television experience. Time spent viewing "Mad Men" is not a passive couch potato exercise calculated to generate a momentary knot of personal nostalgia. The experience is much more than that. Like "The Apartment," a major motion picture released in 1960 and mentioned in this series captures the very essence of big city urban 1960 culture and is utterly convincingly in ways both broad and subtle. The look and feel of the time is spot on. Some of what is defined in "Mad Men" may shock current PC culture sensibilities as relates to race and gender relations. At its core, "Mad Men" provides the viewer with a blistering and not too flattering look at ourselves and our entrenched culture of consumerism as strong today as it was nearly a half century ago. Jon Hamm leads an inspired cast of little known actors portraying reticent and mysterious Donald Draper, a highly sought after ad man and selling genius. Elisabeth Moss gets second billing as Peggy Olsen, Draper's wide-eyed new secretary. Moss's acting resume includes a stint as young Zoey Bartlett, daughter of the President in "West Wing." As for Hamm, he would make a convincing James Bond and depending upon the camera angle, ever present obscuring cigarette smoke and dim lighting proffered in any given scene, his tall, dark and handsome masculinity contains uncanny elements that are at times mildly suggestive of a young Timothy Dalton, Robert Di Niro, even Kevin Kline. Madison Avenue is reknowned for cynically packaging products or political personalities for retail sale but the consumer's ultimate acceptance is an exercise in free will that is heavily influenced by the cunning efforts of men like Draper. Whether Draper is signed on to promote cigarettes, aerosol deodorant, an upscale department store, presidential candidate or even promoting the state of Israel, he brings a cold and calculating hard edged view of the world to the table. It may be true that the incessant cigarette smoking and hard drinking during regular business hours by almost all of the brilliantly defined characters in "Mad Men" is no longer de rigueur, the compulsion towards self-destruction has not changed one whit. No one defines that trait better than gifted actor John Slattery who plays Draper's boss, Roger Sterling. As a partner in the adveristing agency, Sterling is at once a likeable fellow and yet morally repugnant. Slattery pulls off the character effortlessly. The secondary male characters in "Mad Men" are well acquainted with feelings of ennui. Many in Drapers's staff for the most part married yet openly pursue self-gratifying liaisons with willing female co-workers with feminine agendas of their own. Some things have not changed one whit in all these years, even as the unadjusted price for a gallon of gas was around 30 cents in 1960 and tops $4.00 a gallon today. The prices for virtually all commodities may have changed over the years but rest assured, people and their inate capacity to be gulled has not. You'd think we'd know better by now. That is the essential genius and overarching message contained within "Mad Men." The successful ad man accepts as an article of faith that the pitch and ultimate message should always contain or vaguely suggest a measure of happiness or bliss associated with the product whether that product be packaged in pill form, a breakfast cereal, an enhancement to health or desirabilty, the only goal is to convince the consumer to open up the pocketbook and buy into the come hither promise of "new and different." Simply put, "Mad Men" is brilliantly crafted TV that unabashedly drives that message home.

Rating:
Date: 2008-07-05
The show's brilliant, the packaging? Not so much.
The show itself is fabulous. And I'm pretty sure most of the people hitting this page would agree. Otherwise, why else would you be here? You've seen the show, you love it, and you just want to know whether or not to buy the DVD.

Yes, you totally should. Because the show's brilliant, and therefore you should support it.

The packaging is horrendous. It looks awesome. Zippo lighter shooting out flames. The flames are the problem though. You have to be really careful taking the discs out (set up stadium style) as you're going to get your fingerprints all over them. And you have to be super careful closing the box, as the way it's set up, you end up scratching the discs.

Rating:
Date: 2008-07-05
Fun if Fuzzy Flashback
I had heard a something about this show in some magazine (Wired?), and then I saw it at the store in a cool enlarged Zippo shaped case. The only reason I purchased it though was because I recognized one of the actresses from Firefly. Once I started watching I really enjoyed the 60's they created. Not sterile but controlled, chauvinistic but poking fun... Lots of lovely ladies, drinking, smoking, and some clever writing. Since it is only the first season, I suppose its only going to get better. I've not listened to the commentaries or watched the special features yet but it's cool that they are there. I will most likely purchase the next season.

One note, as an Ad and Lucky Strike junky, I was very irritated from pilot where they tried to introduce the "It's Toasted" slogan by Don Draper in the 60's. It actually came out in 1917, and was more than likely closely linked to the real granddaddy of advertising Edward Bernays. They might have considered turning his life into a show, but once I started to watch the other episodes the minor deviations from facts for the sake of entertainment didn't seem so frustrating.

Rating:
Date: 2008-07-04
Mad Men DVD - Special Features
Series was great, 5 stars!
3 stars for the DVD only.
Disapointed with most of the DVD Commentaries. Most are 2 or 3 cast or staff commentaries pieced together into one commentary which makes some of them VERY boring. VERY borng! There are a few good ones when two people are actullay doing the commentary together at the same time.
Not too many other special features other than the commentaries.

Rating:
Date: 2008-07-04
Mad Men Rules
It doesn't get much better than this. Sometimes hype for TV shows is way overblown, but this is not so with Mad Men, which is arguably the best show on the tele since The Sopranos or Deadwood. The acting is superb, the writing divine, and the sets are magnificently realistic. If you're looking for something good to watch, look no further. This is it. See it now...before your friends tell you all about it.

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