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Mad Men: season 3, episode 13
"Shut The Door. Have A Seat"
November 9, 2009 - 12:11a.m.
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 ...
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Mad Men: season 3, episode 12
"The Grown-Ups"
November 1, 2009 - 11:11p.m.
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 ...
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Mad Men: season 3, episode 11
"The Gypsy And The Hobo"
October 25, 2009 - 11:10p.m.
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 ...
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Mad Men: season 3, episode 10
“The Color Blue”
October 18, 2009 - 11:10p.m.
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 ...
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Mad Men: season 3, episode 9
"Wee Small Hours"
October 11, 2009 - 10:10p.m.
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Mad Men: season 3, episode 8
"Souvenir"
October 4, 2009 - 11:10p.m.
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 ...
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Mad Men: season 3, episode 7
"Seven Twenty Three"
September 27, 2009 - 11:09p.m.
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 ...
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Mad Men: season 3, episode 6
“Guy Walks Into An Advertising Agency”
September 20, 2009 - 11:09p.m.
If last week’s Mad Men was all about the inertia of jobs and families, and how difficult it can be for people to seize opportunities and reorder their lives, then this week’s is all about the inciting incident ...
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Mad Men: season 3, episode 5
"The Fog"
September 14, 2009 - 12:09a.m.
I didn’t catch the title of this episode before watching it then, as a thought experiment, I decided to wait until the episode’s end before looking it up. Mad Men’s episode titles tend focus on one aspect ...
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Mad Men: season 3, episode 4
"The Arrangements"
September 6, 2009 - 11:09p.m.
For an episode that involved the death of a minor, but important, character and a scene in which Peggy’s mom informed her she’ll inevitably be raped in Manhattan, this felt genuinely breezy by Mad Men standards. Despite the ...
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Mad Men: season 3, episode 3
"My Old Kentucky Home"
August 31, 2009 - 12:08a.m.
So, let’s review what we learned tonight:
• Proper etiquette for a dinner party, by way of Emily Post
• Some reasons Rome fell
• How to make an Old Fashioned. Properly. And with confidence, without a wrong move or a moment ...
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Mad Men: season 3, episode 2
"Love Among The Ruins"
August 24, 2009 - 12:08a.m.
“Lust of glory pricked their hearts up, dread of shame
Struck them tame;
And that glory and that shame alike, the gold
Bought and sold.”
—Robert Browning, “Love Among The Ruins”
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“Let’s also say that change is neither good ...
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Mad Men: season 3, episode 1
"Out Of Town"
August 16, 2009 - 11:08p.m.
Good evening and welcome to spring of 1963. The Cuban Missile Crisis is behind us now and we still have a glamorous young president in the White House, one whose influence has even prompted some men to stop treating hats ...
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Mad Men: season 2, episode 13
"Meditations In An Emergency"
October 26, 2008 - 11:10p.m.
At various points during this second season of Mad Men, I've wondered to myself whether creator Matthew Weiner has been making this series largely for himself. A lot of Mad Men's quieter moments–like Sally mixing drinks for ... -
Mad Men: season 2, episode 12
"The Mountain King"
October 19, 2008 - 10:10p.m.
I don't know why it bothers me so much in movies and TV shows when characters open up and say what's on their minds. I mean, in my own life, I'm pretty much an open book; if ... -
Mad Men: season 2, episode 11
"The Jet Set"
October 12, 2008 - 11:10p.m.
For about the first 20 minutes of this week's Mad Men, throughout Don Draper's adventures on the left coast, I was a little confused about where "The Jet Set" was headed. We had Pete and Don wandering awkwardly ... -
Mad Men: season 2, episode 10
"The Inheritance"
October 5, 2008 - 11:10p.m.
I know I said back at the start of this season that Pete had become my favorite Mad Men character, but after Roger's speech to Don last week about marriage and desire, I've started to think of him ... -
Mad Men: season 2, episode 9
"Six Month Leave"
September 28, 2008 - 11:09p.m.
Good news, Mad Men fans! Not only is our favorite show back tonight with a new episode–and a very good episode–after what feels like forever, and not only is it the newly anointed Emmy-winner for Best Dramatic Series ... -
Mad Men: season 2, episode 8
"A Night To Remember"
September 14, 2008 - 11:09p.m.
Many thanks to my pal and boss Keith Phipps for covering this beat so well last week while I was up in Canada immersing myself in the sublime tedium of world cinema. (Keith's analysis of how Bert Cooper's ... -
Mad Men: season 2, episode 7
"The Gold Violin"
September 7, 2008 - 11:09p.m.
Hi. I'm not Noel Murray. Noel is off at the Toronto International Film Festival, arguing with other critics about whether the new Jonathan Demme movie is a masterpiece or merely an instant classic. Meanwhile, some of us film-loving types ... -
Mad Men: season 2, episode 6
"Maidenform"
August 31, 2008 - 10:08p.m.
I can't imagine a more surprising start to a Mad Men episode than the pounding sound of The Decemberists' "The Infanta," even though the images accompanying the song–our three primary heroines suiting up for their day–is typical ... -
Mad Men: season 2, episode 5
"The New Girl"
August 24, 2008 - 10:08p.m.
So here's a question that's been driving me nuts since "The Benefactor:" Does Don like Bobbie Barrett or not? I mean, I know he likes the ocean, and bridges, and movies (including the foreign ones, like La Notte ... -
Mad Men: season 2, episode 4
"Three Sundays"
August 17, 2008 - 11:08p.m.
One of my favorite Season One Mad Men episodes was "Marriage Of Figaro," the bulk of which took place in and around a Saturday afternoon birthday party at the Draper home, as Don got bombed on beer to deal with ... -
Mad Men: season 2, episode 3
"The Benefactor"
August 10, 2008 - 10:08p.m.
As despairing as Mad Men can seem at times, it can also be one of the slyest and funniest shows on TV. Witness the fine bit of silent comedy early on this week, as Harry receives Ken's paycheck along ... -
Mad Men: season 2, episode 2
"Flight 1"
August 3, 2008 - 10:08p.m.
I think I have a new favorite character on Mad Men.
No it's not Paul The New Bohemian, with his poseur beard, antique booze glass, black girlfriend and fashionably run-down apartment in Montclair, New Jersey. And it's certainly ... -
Mad Men: season 2, episode 1
"For Those Who Think Young"
July 27, 2008 - 04:07p.m.
The first season of Mad Men began airing before our little TV Club convened, though after the final episode, I dashed off a few thoughts on the series as a whole in a blog post titled "Notes On Mad Men ...
