A couple of weeks ago I was a guest on Talking TV With Ryan And Ryan, a fine podcast from Maureen Ryan and Ryan McGee. We talked about Mad Men and kept coming back to the futility of trying to ...

Did anyone fall for the Robert Kennedy fake-out? I did. And I should have known better. For one thing, if Mad Men were to cast someone as RFK, they would have cast someone who could do a better impression. For ...

This was an episode of somber gatherings and closed-door intimacies, sexual and otherwise, and the way such moments force characters to divide their loyalties. The title—“Chinese Wall,” a reference to Dr. Faye’s description of the compartmentalization her job ...

Lately when I’ve been talking to others about his season of Mad Men, I’ve mentioned how I think this is one of the best, if not the best, season the show has produced in spite of the fact ...

Last week I mentioned that I usually found Don’s romantic relationships with women not named Betty among the less interesting aspects of the show and a couple of commenters took me to task for that opinion, one of them ...

We’ve spent three-and-a-half seasons with the man known to most of the world as Don Draper at this point, watching him as he goes about both his public and private life. Mad Men has kept virtually no facet of ...

(Keith is out again this week, and he was shocked to discover his destination does not have access to AMC. So you have to put up with me again for a week. - TV)

Mad Men is unique among televised drama ...

I’m not sure who first came up with the slogan—or, to use the word of choice from this week’s episode, idiom—“The cure for the common ___.” It seems to be one of those bad-but-infectious advertising clich ...

Outside of the season premiere, it often seems like every episode of Mad Men this year has been greeted by deeply divided critical reactions. Don's sojourn to California was poignant and moving. No, it was the first bad episode ...

In our “AV Talk” about Mad Men’s season premiere, I mentioned that I have one lingering concern about the show, and that’s my worry that Matthew Weiner’s stubborn insistence on keeping Don a lost soul could lead ...

“Nobody knows what’s wrong with themselves. Everyone else can see it right away.” —Stephanie

First off, hello. Your regular Mad Men reviewer Keith Phipps will be off for the next three weeks, and I’m taking over Week One ...

Let’s start at the end this week. Mad Men doesn’t use songs accidentally and it especially doesn’t end episodes with carelessly chosen songs. It’s always puzzled me that “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” became a ...

The end of 1964 has the geometrical forms of a Mondrian painting, the gleaming white surfaces of a department store kitchen display, and a hum of optimism in the air. It’s a busy place, where young, smiling people push ...

I wasn’t sure what to expect from the third-season finale of Mad Men. I know I didn’t expect the equivalent of the second season Alias episode “Phase One,” which in a tight, exciting hour essentially wrapped up all ...

And so, after a season spent speculating when, and if, Mad Men would deal with the Kennedy assassination, we got there. And, perhaps unavoidably, the show didn’t merely deal with it in passing. After opening with some perfectly ordinary ...

Sorry, I would have posted this sooner if I hadn’t gotten distracted reading about horse meat, which is a more interesting subject than you might guess. Taboo here—we don’t even slaughter horses for export anymore—it’s ...

I re-watched “Wee Small Hours” last night, partly in preparation for writing up tonight’s Mad Men and partly because my wife hadn’t seen it yet. I was deeply struck by “Wee Small Hours” last week: the cleverness of ...

Keith: We’re going to break with the usual TV Club format this week. I have Mad Men blogger emeritus Noel Murray in town for the big Inventory book signing this week so we’re going to talk about this ...

For two weeks Mad Men turned out episodes that dispensed major plot developments at a breakneck pace. (Well, breakneck for this show anyway.) This week brings a summer idyll focusing almost entirely on the private lives of two couples: Don ...

This week’s episode opens with three teasing images of what’s to come: Peggy, looking spent in bed with an unidentified man, Betty on a couch we’ve never seen practically glowing, and Don passed out and beaten up ...