My Fair Adman

"It's hard to tell if Mad Men's celebration of smoking, drinking and culinary excess is moralistic or nostalgic for these bad old days, or both. Then again, the prominent product placement for cigarette brands suggests that this may not be the right question to ask. It's very clear that the show is going for a 'cracks in the facade' depiction of suburban life. Baby boomer childhood, it tells us, was not a nonstop parade of deadly allergenic peanut butter sandwiches and helmetless bike-riding. There was polio to worry about, not to mention adults. A sense of casual violence percolates through the suburban complacency. In one scene, interestingly downplayed, one of Don's neighbors disciplines another man's rambunctious little boy with a slap in the face. Small touches like this inject a sense of fear, hatred and spite into the history of middle-class WASP life that the show seems keen to convey."

Anna McCarthy in The Nation praises AMC-TV's Mad Men.