Mad Men on AMC Worth Watching

We're all aware of how the advertising industry is portrayed, and sometimes shockingly misrepresented, on the tube. Even so, the new AMC original series Mad Men is refreshing. If you haven't seen it yet, don't worry. It's not another ThirtySomething" thank God. It's actually an interesting and stylized interpretation of a fictional ad agency during advertising's "golden age" at the height of the 1950's. It's 1960 and Nixon's gonna make a run for the White House. The PC and "desktop publishing" are still 20 years away, cars have fins, the most high-tech thing in the office is the newly introduced IBM Selectric typewriter, men's ties are skinny and everybody, and I mean everybody, smokes cigarettes. Female viewers may be a bit put-off by the way women are objectified in the male-dominated, boozy business culture of that time, but I can already see strong female characters emerging. One thing that is portrayed accurately and probably never will change - the AE's are universally despised. See the rerun episodes Wed. at 10, and the new ones Thurs at 10.