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Mad Men: Season Five (1 Viewer)

Patrick Sun

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Dheiner said:
At some point I expect Don to tell Peggy. "You've come a long way, Peggy."
Only if she offered Don a theater bonus (like she did to another guy in a previous episode). :D
 

TravisR

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^ It's tough to guess because Lion's Gate (who distributes the DVDs and Blu-rays) seems to put out the sets whenever they choose and doesn't seem to care about cross promoting it with the airing of a new season. I'd say that it might come out in time for holiday shopping but that's nothing more than a guess.
 

Charles Smith

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I was wondering, too, because now that the AMC presentation is so !#@$& low rent with regard to the commercial interruptions, etc., this will actually be the first season I watch straight through on BLU. I have the rest on BLU, but man, I need to see this one, properly, as soon as possible, to get that lousy AMC taste out of my mouth.
 

Charles Smith

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Seriously, I was hyper-aware of being distracted throughout the season by the execrable presentation.

(Hmmmm. I thought I had a point to make here. What was it?)
 

TravisR

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^ What was objectionable about this season from the other years? There's always been commercials, there's always been the AMC logo, there's always been editing of the word 'fuck', etc. Not that I like any of those things but they're par for the course when it comes to TV.
 

Jason_V

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Originally Posted by TravisR /t/317541/mad-men-season-five/300#post_3939655
^ What was objectionable about this season from the other years? There's always been commercials, there's always been the AMC logo, there's always been editing of the word 'fuck', etc. Not that I like any of those things but they're par for the course when it comes to TV.

Ditto. If it comes down to commercials and a logo versus waiting 6 months to see the season, I'll deal with the commercials and logo.
 

Charles Smith

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I'm not waiting to see it. I watched "live", faithfully, every Sunday night. All I'm saying is that there has been a marked, noticeable deterioration in AMC's respect for quality in presentation, from the first to the fifth season.
 

John DeAngelis

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I'm fine with watching Mad Men on AMC, but when the DVDs come out I enjoy re-watching and listening to all the commentaries that they include.
 

Aaron Silverman

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I remember hearing that earlier seasons featured old-fashioned commercials. Is that true? I watched seasons 1-4 on disc and didn't notice anything like that on season 5.
 

Charles Smith

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Feel free to correct whatever I'm remembering inaccurately here:

Season One had only 2 (or was it 3?) commercial interruptions, and they were very tasteful -- (it was almost like PBS!). I believe the only sponsor then was BMW, and the ads seemed tailored to the show. There were also some little "bumpers" that referenced old-fashioned commercials to the show in some way. I wonder if that's what you're thinking of.

AMC only broadcast the first season in standard def, but those of us who had an HD On Demand channel could watch it in HD the next night, an added bonus being that those OD episodes played straight through with no commercial interruptions.

The commercials that deliberately and wittily simulated Mad Men situations came along in the next season or two, but I don't remember who that sponsor was (!).

Starting with either Season Two or Three, the On Demand viewers stopped getting a break and the commercials were included.

Can't say when every little change happened, but the increase in commercials was really noticeable by Four, and the whole presentation was totally F'ing ridiculous in Five -- not only with commercial interruptions that forced me to use my MUTE button, or be driven insane, but in the implementation of tiny fast-scrolling end credits with the little "preview" of the next episode playing in one quadrant.
 

Aaron Silverman

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You said it! In fact, I believe the On Demand broadcasts of the current week's episode this past season were expanded to 64 minutes in order to squeeze in TONS of commercials. Really annoying.
 

TravisR

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Chas in CT said:
Season One had only 2 (or was it 3?) commercial interruptions, and they were very tasteful -- (it was almost like PBS!).
I've got no way to back it up but I don't remember the show ever running under an hour (which would have happened if there was only 2 commercial breaks).
Aaron Silverman said:
You said it! In fact, I believe the On Demand broadcasts of the current week's episode this past season were expanded to 64 minutes in order to squeeze in TONS of commercials. Really annoying.
The show runs 64 minutes when it's on AMC (as a way to earn more ad revenue so they could pay Weiner and maintain the show's budget) so On Demand mirrors that.
 

Adam Lenhardt

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The amount of commercials was one of the hang-ups with Matthew Weiner's contract renewal. AMC wanted to cut the running time of each episode to pack in more commercials, and Weiner didn't. Until last September, the plan for season five was to air 45 minute versions of the episodes and have 47 minute versions for steaming. So maximizing revenue is definitely a top priority for AMC now.
 

Aaron Silverman

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TravisR said:
The show runs 64 minutes when it's on AMC (as a way to earn more ad revenue so they could pay Weiner and maintain the show's budget) so On Demand mirrors that.
Ah, interesting. The current week's episode was always listed as 64 minutes, but previous week's episodes were shorter. I forget the exact length, but it was somewhere in the mid 50s.
 

TravisR

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Aaron Silverman said:
Ah, interesting. The current week's episode was always listed as 64 minutes, but previous week's episodes were shorter. I forget the exact length, but it was somewhere in the mid 50s.
I think the first week of On Demand, they keep the same amount of commercials as the original airing but after that first week, they drop the number of commercials. I didn't watch any episodes On Demand this year but since the show sans commercials runs about 47 minutes, I'd guess that the '50 minute episodes' probably just have one commercial during each break.
 

NeilO

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TravisR said:
I think the first week of On Demand, they keep the same amount of commercials as the original airing but after that first week, they drop the number of commercials.
That is the way with some shows these days On Demand. I think a few USA Network shows follow the same pattern - Psych I know for certain and I may have noticed a few others. I think with Psych they are not only the same amount of commercials, but they might even be the same commercials (at least the national ones).
 

Stan

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NeilO said:
That is the way with some shows these days On Demand. I think a few USA Network shows follow the same pattern - Psych I know for certain and I may have noticed a few others. I think with Psych they are not only the same amount of commercials, but they might even be the same commercials (at least the national ones).
This why I hope DVD/BR stay around for a long time.
1, I like owning the disc so I can play it anywhere, anytime, any machine without some special setup or tweaking the hardware.
2, I don't want my entire Movie/TV collection sitting on my hard drive, regardless of backup strategies, I want a physical disc I own.
3, So far, other than a few companies with obnoxious previews you can't forward through, DVD/BR is a clean, uncut, no-logo, no commercial format in OAR.
If they start cramming the advertising, logo, edited versions down our throats, I will sadly, but simply stop buying.
 

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