Prepare to think that smoking is cool again because Mad Men will be returning to our screens next month – at 9pm on Tuesday 27th March to be precise. We make that 52 days away.. Hurrah!
The date was confirmed as show-runner Matthew Weiner spoke of what fans could expect from the long-delayed fifth season, which will debut with a two-hour episode ‘A Little Kiss’.
âThe year doesnât really mean anything,â? Weiner said. âIt doesnât. Iâm not doing a history lesson. The thing that Iâm excited about is I wanted to give people a big helping. I wanted a two-hour premiere. Itâs a Mad Men movie — I donât think anyoneâs going to think itâs two episodes spliced together. There is a story that starts in the middle of it [but otherwise] itâs one story. The beginning and the ending are related to each other.â?
“There’s a time jump,” he said. “There are some new people. Changes have happened off screen, and the audience will have to catch up with that. Even though Don (Hamm) ended up making this overture to Megan (Jessica Paré), and the audience felt sort of peculiar about it, so did the people in the office. That’s something that we play on.”
“There’s this sensation, which I think people have right now… there is just so much change going on,” the showrunner explained. “I don’t know if anybody else identifies with that, but that’s a big part of the season. Just trying to hold on.”
Weiner has also been talking to The Hollywood Reporter about some themes of the new series: âWe talked about ‘life isnât fair’ before on the show, but the realisation of, like, you really have to deal with your own problems by yourself and other people are not interested – that self-interest can be a surprise, especially if youâre trying to be good.â?
But does he think the big gap between the last season will have any affect on the show? “I have to tell you, I more than anyone know that a lot of pleasure in the show is the accumulation of details and we talked about that, but I do think that last seasonâs finale was kind of the most cliff-hanger-y weâve done because it was such an abrupt shift and it was really like weâve just got to Don and all of the sudden weâre on the outside again.
“Some people felt betrayed in a way I thinkâ¦They thought the story was honest but they thought âOh, he almost made it.â? But considering all the drama of not being on the air for the past year, Iâm glad that it was that kind of episode and we left them there.
*THE INTERNET’S FINEST MAD MEN SEND-UPS*