STUDIO: Liongate
RELEASE DATE: July 1, 2008
STARRING: Jon Hamm, Elizabeth Moss, Vincent Kartheiser, John Slattery, Christine Hendricks, and January Jones
CREATED BY: Matthew Weiner
FEATURES: Provocative featurettes establishing the world of Mad Men and the 1960's creative revolution in media
interviews with the show's creative designers
photo gallery
Mad Men music
commentaries on all episodes

"You're painting a masterpiece. Make sure to hide the brushstrokes."
-Betty Draper, Mad Men

The show of 2008 is finally available on DVD, just in time for the second season to debut on AMC. I'll admit that I barely knew where AMC was on my cable dial. With FX, Showtime, HBO, and the nets keeping me more than busy enough dramatically, why bother with AMC? I'll now bother as long as Mad Men is on the air. Now that I've caught up with the critically lauded show on DVD, I can confirm that any concerns that you may have that this drama is overhyped or praised a bit too much are unfounded. If anything, the true genius of Mad Men has been understated. This is a nearly-perfect season of television, as good as any that aired in 2007 and up there with some of the best of the last decade. The show won the Golden Globe for Best Drama and Best Actor (Jon Hamm) and will, hopefully, clean up when Emmy nominations are announced on the 17th. Honestly, the hype surrounding the show feels like the buzz that followed the first season of The Sopranos, when it was still a word-of-mouth hit and not yet a cultural phenomenon. Just because no one gets whacked, Mad Men will probably never find the same cultural cache as that HBO masterpiece, but the writing and the acting is nearly as good. Let's hope it's around at least as long.

Recapping Mad Men is difficult. Yes, it's about an advertising agency in 1960 - the people in the business called themselves "mad men" because they worked on Madison Avenue and, of course, it was a play on the more traditional "ad man" title - but that's like saying that The Sopranos is "about mobsters". There's a lot more than advertising campaigns going on in Mad Men, although even that stuff is handled brilliantly. Mad Men is, in many ways, cut from an old dramatic mold - that there's a lot more going on behind those white picket fences than you can ever imagine and that our current obsession with image is older than you might think. The show is set in 1960 New York at the advertising firm Sterling Cooper. The star of the company is Don Draper (Jon Hamm), one of the smoothest talkers in the golden age of the industry. Don is married to Betty (January Jones) and both hide pretty significant secrets below their perfect images. We also meet the young man who looks at Don's office and thinks about where he would put his stuff, Pete Campbell (Vincent Kartheiser), Don's new secretary, Peggy Olson (Elisabeth Moss), the "Queen bee" of the steno pool, Joan Holloway (Christina Hendricks), and a number of other employees of Sterling Cooper (including the great John Slattery as the first half of that powerhouse duo).

Much was made of the attention to detail in the first reviews of Mad Men and it truly is overwhelming. On the DVD for season one, you'll learn that during a crucial grocery store scene, apples actually had to be replaced because they were deemed too big for the era. That's how detailed the show is in its faithful recreation. On a design level, Mad Men is one of the best series ever produced. Most movies don't look this authentic. But television is still about characters and that's where Matthew Weiner's (one of the best writers from The Sopranos) creation truly thrives. It's as deep and fascinating an ensemble as any on television. Like The Sopranos, it has its lead and he deserves all the acclaim he's gotten and more, but it also allows others to step forward and shine nearly as brightly. The recent news that January Jones and Vincent Kartheiser didn't make the supporting actress and actor short lists for the Emmy just serves as further proof of how ridiculous that awards show has become (or, actually, has always been). Jones should win. And if it wasn't for Michael Emerson's stunning season on Lost, I might say the same about Kartheiser, but he definitely deserved a nomination. All the actors who were shortlisted - Jon Hamm, Elisabeth Moss, Christina Hendricks, and John Slattery - will be names I truly hope to hear on the 17th when they're announced (although Moss being in lead when she really belongs in supporting is a bit of a puzzler).

Knowing that they have one of (if not THE) the best shows on television, Lionsgate gives it a stellar treatment on Blu-Ray. It's the best television presentation I've yet seen on the format. The picture and audio are flawless through all thirteen episodes and the special features are nearly overwhelming. Every single episode comes with a commentary track and the behind-the-scenes material, including galleries about the design and a discussion with the composer (yes, even the score is amazing) illustrate the incredible attention to detail in every corner of every frame of Mad Men. One final comparison to The Sopranos - like that show, which a lot of people first pigeonholed as another mob show, it's truly difficult to express how good it is if you haven't seen it. The brilliant design, the stellar writing, the best ensemble on television - what are you waiting for? If you're like me, you probably think rave reviews like this one are exaggerating. How could a show about 1960 advertising execs be THAT good? Watch it. You'll believe.