Most of the shows revolve around ad concepts so famous that they are remembered fondly 40 years after the fact, and a good client conference or two. Perhaps you are correct that these concepts were more the product of sweat than inspiration, but showing someone think about it for a few hours wouldn’t exactly be good for ratings, would it? I am surprised that one would have to explain this to a creative director, who is supposed to be open to, well, creativity.

BTW, I am a person that likes Mad Men for it’s faithfulness to the era and open mockery of the current lefty conception of how repressed Americans were before 1968. The entire first season was a hit list of all the things that are now taboo by Americans who are indisputably more politically correct, neurotic and repressed than this supposedly buttoned down era. MadMen depicts a time when you could slap somebody else’s child for misbehaving and expect to be backed up by that parent, punch a colleague in the nose because he smarted off about your wife and not get fired or even hauled off to jail, bring a firearm to work without raising eyebrows, drive your kids around while they bounced between the front and back seats, shoot a neighbor’s pigeons out of the sky just because you can, smoke & drink while pregnant, and reprimand a child for playing ghost with a plastic dry cleaning bag because you suspect they dumped its contents on the floor. We are sissies and prudes compared to what is depicted in every episode of this thoroughly entertaining show.

Or, more accurately, Mr. Clueless.

I was a creative director at J.Walter Thompson and acd at Leo Burnett. 28 years in the business. I bet you tell your friends lots of stories about subliminal advertising, too; another sad myth about the business.

Frankly, I don’t think this show has long to last. Heck, sex + manufactured “controversy” = low ratings. Since you can see all the controversy and icky things you want on the internet, on your terms. The amount of people in a recession who want “edgy/hip” stimulation, instead of comfort and reassurance, is pretty damn small. As are advertisers willing to pay big bucks to hit a few upscale consumers.

End of the “Grant Tinker Strategy” … after the NBC exec who ran Hill Street Blues, St. Elsewhere, Miami Vice, Seinfeld etc. in their first few years when few watched but those who did were rich, upscale consumers marketers paid a premium for.

When Wal-Mart is the leading TV advertiser, you wont’ find too much appetite for niche programming. Heck “Gossip Girl” got renewed at only 2 million viewers, and the whole CW Network is likely to go dark next Winter.

I caught a bit of the show. It was as self-consciously “edgy” as one of those interminable Indie movies.

I wonder if the unenthusiastic take shown in 4 of the 5 previous comments here is typical of the MM reception, or if PJ Media just tends to attract a rather dour audience. I suspect it’s a bit of both.

I suspect their scripts are written by people whose sense of truth and correctness is about equal to a broken clock that’s right twice a day. You know,if real ad writers did the quality of work the script writers do, they’d be out on their ears walking the streets faster than you can say, “Bill Bernbach.

On the other hand, if you want totally fabricated stories about men and women in heat in the 60’s who work in advertising, well, licking lollipops Batman, this show is for you.

But if you want an accurate look at what it was really like in a 60’s agency, you won’t find it with MadMen.

It about as useful a depiction of ad life in he 60’s as, say, a Britney Spears book about child care would be useful to new parents, even with a forward from her sister.

Ogilvy, Doyle Dane, BBDO, Mary Wells, Grey, Della Femina. They were run by single minded people who’s every ounce of energy was spent on coming up with better ideas than the next agency;one probably positioned to pounce, and, given the opportunity, to steal their biggest account.

The touchstones of these agencies were great, original, award winning concepts; the kind that comes not from inspiration, but sticky, nasty, sweat. If sex ever caused sweat in a real ad man or woman, chances are they were at home in the evening after a couple of cc’s, imbibing spirits in the hopes they’d relax a bit and stop fixating on their chance of being laid off if an account was lost; instead morphing into a decidely more Romantic mood.

Believe me, the numbers of folders in their briefcase were a pretty good indicator that the evenings weren’t spent scheming how the next day could be spent nailing a pert little secretary on the table inside the locked creative director’s door.

In my humble opinion, MadMen’ has low ratings because deep down people are smart enough to be able to separate fact from fiction.

Frankly, if you believe the pap the writers of “MadMen” continue to gladly feed you, well, how politely can I say it; you deserve a job in the mail room.

Bottom line: I will watch the episode tonight.