As the final season of “Mad Men” resumed April 4, the staff of Sterling Cooper & Partners said goodbye to the turbulent ‘60s and were introduced to the new challenges that the ‘70s will soon hold for them. AMC advertised the remaining episodes of the series as “The End of an Era,” which perfectly describes the impending finale in more ways than one.
When the series debuted in 2007, it brought an enormous amount of success to a cable network that was mainly known for showing classic movies and “The Three Stooges” around the clock. Audiences immediately fell in love with (or at least were entertained by) the show’s portrayal of the inner workings of an advertising agency in New York.
However, if we’re going to be completely honest, the show was never really about advertising; it just happened to be the profession of the main characters. The true focus of “Mad Men” revolves around what a terrible person Don Draper (Jon Hamm) is and how his past actions are eventually going to come back and bite him on his well-toned butt.
I’ll spare you the sordid details in case you’re in the process of binge-watching the show on Netflix, but let’s just say Don’s personal life involved an egregious amount of sex, alcohol, lying, cheating, manipulating and more sex. Yet, despite his philandering and borderline alcoholism, he always managed to be one of the best at his job and a loving father at home.
The thing is, Don’s the kind of guy that we shouldn’t root for or want to succeed in any way, shape or form, but we still found ourselves cheering whenever he won over the big client with his pitch or had a nice heart-to-heart moment with his kids or even when he successfully slept with another woman without his wife’s knowledge. It’s all so wrong, but it just feels so right.
Maybe that’s the appeal of “Mad Men”: watching someone who has everything he could ever want in life struggle with the fact that he really has nothing at all, or at least nothing of true worth. It’s sad to think of, but it’s also a realization that many others make about themselves in our society, and that realism is what draws viewers in week after week.
Don knows that he can’t continue down the path he’s on, as it has cost him a lot up to this point. The question is, will he be willing to change his ways and start fresh? And if he is willing to change, can he truly go through with it? Nobody really knows at this point, but with the end in sight, the answer will reveal itself in due time.
