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Mad Men
Season Two
SERIES: AMC, Sunday 10:00p (60 minutes)


8.7

based on 20 reviews
read critic reviews
how did we calculate this?

based on 22 votes
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Get more information on this show at TV.com.

Official Show Site

Starring Jon Hamm, Elisabeth Moss, Vincent Kartheiser, January Jones, Christina Hendricks, John Slattery, Bryan Batt, Michael Gladis, Aaron Staton, and Rich Sommer

The second season of the multi-Emmy-nominated series picks up two years ahead in 1962 where the questions left hanging in season one are slowly answered.

GENRE(S):	Drama
CREATED BY:	Matthew Weiner
FIRST AIR DATE:	July 27, 2008

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100

San Francisco Chronicle Tim Goodman

The writing is a real thing of beauty - from the aforementioned nuance to searing workplace witticisms and pitch-perfect tone from a multitude of characters.

100

USA Today Robert Bianco

Terrifically acted and gorgeously produced, this is a show that's both funny and frightening, that can simultaneously make you miss the '60s and feel blessed that they're gone.

Entertainment Weekly Gillian Flynn

The premiere jumps the series from 1960 to 1962, but it plays coy with most of last season's cliff-hangers, including the whereabouts of Peggy's son with married exec Pete Campbell (played with oily brilliance by Vincent Kartheiser). It's quite a tease, but the debut proves Mad Men is as smart as ever

Hollywood Reporter Ray Richmond

Far from devolving into soapy Madison Avenue pablum, Mad Men is painstakingly building its way to genuine greatness.

Boston Globe Matthew Gilbert

Mad Men returns for season 2 in excellent form: There's a rich and active subtext in this series, you just have to discover it.

Newsday Verne Gay

Besides the fine acting, writing and an attention to period detail that borders on the obsessive, what makes this show so ambiguous and pleasantly iridescent is narrative tension

Salon Heather Havrilesky

There's a sense of gathering gloom as this exceptional drama gains steam in its second season, a feeling that the individual and his or her high-minded goals and values will be dragged under by the wheels of industry and the restrictive norms of the culture, all in the name of modernity and progress.

Variety Brian Lowry

As with any great series, Mad Men is becoming richer as these plot strands grow, establishing an engrossing serialized life beyond the hip, reverberating cultural references that demonstrate the smoking-drinking-closeted '60s aren't necessarily "good ol' days" to be mourned, despite the cheery Norman Rockwell image that cultural conservatives proffer.

Baltimore Sun David Zurawik

As hard as it might be to imagine after last year's dazzling debut, this period piece about life in a mid-sized Madison Avenue ad agency during the early 1960s returns tonight looking and feeling even stronger, smarter and more focused than it was.

The New York Times Alessandra Stanley

Mad Men beguiles like a Christmas catalog of all the forbidden vices, especially smoking, drinking and social inequity. Yet the series is more than a period piece. It’s a sleek, hard-boiled drama with a soft, satirical core.

Orlando Sentinel Hal Boedeker

The vintage look carries a potent, contemporary kick. Here's the rare series that lives up to the advertising hype.

Slant Magazine Amelia Sims

This season holds promise, not lacking in the detail that makes the series so enjoyable.

Chicago Sun-Times Misha Davenport

Based on the first episode of the second season, "Mad Men" is still one of the best series currently on television, if not the best.

New York Post Adam Buckman

While this Sunday's premiere gets the season started a bit slowly, Episode Two is the rarest kind of TV show there is - one that you hope will never end.

Los Angeles Times Robert Lloyd

There is little in the way of "action"--it is possibly the slowest, most deliberative show on television, which is one of the things that makes it so lovely and mysterious.

New York Daily News David Hinckley

It plays at its own pace, a little more deliberate than other TV dramas, and its strongest moments are often understated.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Rob Owen

Mad Men relies on its talented cast to communicate the unspoken, to get across the emotions and thoughts that roil just beneath the surface. I'll admit, there are times when I know I'm supposed to intuit something but I'm not completely sure what it is. And that's OK.

Time James Poniewozik

It's true that Mad Men is deliciously curated, from the omnipresent cigarettes to the rocket-cone brassieres (and casual sexism) to the cool modernist sets. But the subtle, deliberately paced drama has a wider sense of history.

TV Guide Matt Roush

If the season premiere is heavier on atmosphere than plot, by the second week, stories begin to kick into full gear, and you’re caught up again in the turbulent marriages, personal secrets and caustic office politics that make Mad Men so madly, marvelously mesmerizing.

Slate Troy Patterson

The tempo, thus far, is notably deliberate; the show's got mortality on its mind.

The average user rating for this tv show is 8.7 (out of 10) based on 22 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Michael B. gave it a9:
Brilliantly crafted down the the last detail. I was born in 1958 and the interaction between the children and the Draper parents has given me significant goose bumps more than once. This show is spot on.

Nick D gave it a10:
Awesome! I learned about the show late so I watched the entire first season in a week. I am already loving Season 2. The writing is excellent and heartbreaking. I can almost taste the smoke that fills the screen and I feel like coughing every time I see the actors light up. It's nostalgic without be corny. It's hard to believe that people used to smoke on elevators. I could go on for days. Excellent show!

e c gave it a9:
Easily the greatest show on TV right now. I have a great uncle that was in advertising in nyc in the 60's and he said this show is 90% accurate as far as dialogue/tone/design. Reviewer Chris C writes: "politically incorrect for political incorrectness' sake, and amoral for amorality's sake." were you in advertising in the 1960's? no? then how do you know this is for the sake of those things and not an accurate account of what this world was like? sure, it may be slightly exaggerated, but chauvinism/excessive smoking/drinking was prevalent during this time. PC wasn't even a term. also, hipsters are out at local (bad) noise-rock shows on Sunday nights. hoping to be seen with a PBR in hand. they're definitely not watching this show.

Matt A. gave it a10:
The show deserves a ten because it is the best drama on TV. You have to praise AMC for taking a chance on this show, and boy did it work out for their benefit. The writing is flawless and the acting is pretty close as well. And the way the second episode ended with Don in a Japanese restaurant with Sakamoto Ryu's classis "Sukiyaki" playing in the background was so good it gave me goosebumps. Great stuff that deserves a wider audience.

Paul Z. gave it a10:
Cast and writers are quite simply the most talented on TV. Mad Men is one of those shows you just don't want to end and which you anticipate with true pleasure each week. Makes the medium a true art form.

Anita D. gave it a5:
I don't get all the hype about this show. Does it look good? yes. Is it well acted? Yes. However, I don't think the writing is all that good; it's simply soap opera. I watched Season 1 in a Marathon; caught the first 2 episodes of Season 2. Won't be back for episode 3.

Chris C gave it a5:
Yet another HBO-mimicking overrated show that just tries to be cynical for cynicism's sake, politically incorrect for political incorrectness' sake, and amoral for amorality's sake. A formulaic cluster-f that gets called 'honest' and 'groundbreaking' because it's particular formula flatters the hipster worldview.

Mad Men Season Two SERIES: AMC, Sunday 10:00p (60 minutes)

Mad Men
Season Two
SERIES: AMC, Sunday 10:00p (60 minutes)