Mad Men on AMC

Watched the 1st episode of the AMC series Mad Men last night (via Tivo of course). If you haven't heard, Mad Men is a an AMC original series about Advertising Execs in the 1950's. I actually thought it was pretty good. I'll be back for Episode #2.

For those in the business, we've all heard stories about the "old days" of advertising. This certainly qualifies. The whole plot centered around the Account Executive main character having to develop an ad campaign for a cigarette company. Which is very ironic since I just blogged last week about ethics in advertising in general and cigarette advertising in particular. So it's been on my mind.

My main take-away is: holy sexism! The women are all secretaries and are there for their bosses every need. Yes, EVERY need. There are some interesting portrails of client meetings. For those in the agency business, it's surreal. Picture a producer taking your life and recreating what it would have been like 50 years ago.

The funny part about it that I watched it via Tivo. Let's see, since I watched it 2 days after its' original airing, I guess I'd count in the Live +3 ratings currency that seems to be acceptable these days. Of course, I fast-forwarded thru all the ads. But AMC did something interesting. Between every commercial, the put in a 3-5 second interstitial on a blank white screen with red lettering containing a fact about advertising. Very clever. It took me a couple of commercial breaks worth of watching fast forwarded ads fly by before realizing that something was going on. Good job of knowing your audience AMC. You made me stop and actually watch an entire pod. Once. Then I went back to fast-forwarding. But good job none-the-less.