AMC renews 'Mad Men' for 2 more seasons with Matt Weiner still in charge
No mandated cast reductions, but a shorter running time for many episodes
Don't worry, "Mad Men" fans: the cast will continue to include more than Don, Peggy and Joan going forward.
So remember when I said the other day that all this drama about the "Mad Men" renewal negotiations between AMC, Lionsgate and Matt Weiner would only worry me once a deal officially was or wasn't closed, and that everything else was just negotiating through the media? Well, the deal has been closed, and it sounds like there's not a ton to worry about in the short term, at the very least.
Weiner has signed a deal for two more seasons, which would be the show's fifth and sixth, and has extended his deal with the Lionsgate studio, so that if AMC decides they want a seventh season, Weiner will be the one running it.
As for the various contentious issues (which I discussed on Tuesday night), here's what I've been told from a source close to the show:
There is no specific mandate to eliminate castmembers. The budget will be unchanged for season 5, and "everyone's back for season 5," according to my source. There will, however, be "a one-time budget reduction for season 6, and how that's getting managed is up to Matt." So if he can find a way to keep all his actors and cut costs for season 6 (and the hypothetical season 7) another way, he could do that. (UPDATE: I'm now told that even the season 6 budget reduction was something talked about throughout negotiations, but that ultimately isn't happening. If there's attrition in the cast between seasons, it'll be because Weiner has a story reason for it, as he did with not bringing Michael Gladis and Bryan Batt back for season 4, but the budget won't be appreciably different for season 6.)
My source says there was never a request for more product integration, as that's been a part of the show from the start, going back to memorable examples like Kodak in season 1 and Heineken in season 2. The deal instead is about more transparency about the product integration - so that the sponsors can say, "Hey, we got our product featured on 'Mad Men.'" "Everything will continue to be organic to the storylines," my source insisted.
So that's that. "Mad Men" is coming back (sometime in early 2012, still). Matt Weiner will still be running things, etc. "Mad Men" is "Mad Men" with that man at the helm, and if he can live with the deal, then I can, too.
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All through his childhood, Alan Sepinwall's relatives told his parents, "All that boy does is watch television! How's he going to make a living doing that?" His career as a TV critic has been 15 years and counting of his attempt to answer their concerns. "What's Alan Watching" is a blog whose title is self-explanatory: Alan watches TV shows, then writes about what he watched. He can be reached at sepinwall@hitfix.com
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March 31, 2011 at 8:34PM EST Reply to Commentseason five seems like enough time to scale things down appropriately for season six. at the very least, that means it's put off until march 2013 (wow).
i'm glad the deal leaves all talk of a seventh season open but not definite. six tends to be pushing it for even the great dramas.
echos myron Actually, in a phone interview tonight with the people who run the BoK blog, Weiner stated that "[t]here are going to be three more seasons of the show and then it will be over." So he's going into the writing of season 5 with that gameplan in mind.
April 1, 2011 at 1:37AM ESTLoretta
March 31, 2011 at 8:34PM EST Reply to CommentI wasn't THAT worried, but still...
*sigh of relief*
AL Sighing with you! Although I was THAT worried! I've been having nightmares. But now I can just calm down and wait and wait and wait and. . . .
March 31, 2011 at 9:20PM ESTalynch
March 31, 2011 at 8:34PM EST Reply to CommentOoh, look at Alan getting all journalisty on us.
sepinwall I spent enough time at a newspaper that some of it had to rub off, if just by osmosis.
March 31, 2011 at 8:39PM ESTChris M. Ferguson
March 31, 2011 at 8:35PM EST Reply to CommentWoot!
chuchundra Woot woot!
March 31, 2011 at 8:47PM ESTOn the downside, though...another year to wait. I could be dead by then.
Zach
March 31, 2011 at 8:45PM EST Reply to CommentWrite a comment...
karn
March 31, 2011 at 8:47PM EST Reply to Commentawesome. wasnt really worried but nice to know they can get back to work and make really one of the better shows ever on tv.
just based on shows running out of ideas after i certain point can we really expect anything past a possible season 7? was is getting that contingent on? ratings? or is matt weiner not sure yet if he wants one?
also liking the march premiere slot. breaking bad takes care of the summer hole. fall = football. march seems like a good fit.
ZacharyTF
March 31, 2011 at 8:49PM EST Reply to CommentWith 2 or 3rd more seasons coming, I wonder if the show will go into the 70's.
Ideally, the final scene of the series would cut between the characters watching the ball drop on New Year's Eve and cut to black just before it reaches 0. Just my two cents.
March 31, 2011 at 9:00PM EST Reply to CommentPhew! Not sure what I would have done without my favorite ginger.
March 31, 2011 at 9:01PM EST Reply to CommentAlan, do you know if AMC has any plans to rerun Mad Men late at night the way it did (and is about to do again) with Breaking Bad? I missed the original runs of Breaking Bad, and found the two-a-week pace to be an excellent way to get into the show. If they do it with Don Draper & Co., will you give us a heads-up?
Thanks!
March 31, 2011 at 10:40PM EST
April 1, 2011 at 12:36AM ESTechos myron Dude, just skip breakfast for a week and buy the set, which is only 28 bucks or so on Amazon.
April 1, 2011 at 1:42AM EST
April 1, 2011 at 2:13PM ESTRachel
March 31, 2011 at 9:03PM EST Reply to CommentAlan, does it make sense to you that there would be a shorter version airing on AMC, and a longer version available on VOD? It seems like it might dissuade fans from watching it live with commercials and prioritize iTunes or another airing method.
alynch I'm thinking most fans are obsessed enough that they'll gladly watch it live rather than wait an extra week for a two-minute longer cut. The ratings will remain roughly the same, I bet. If anything, it'll increase their VOD & download numbers.
March 31, 2011 at 9:10PM ESTRachel ALynch - Would you really watch an inferior version if the iTunes version is cheaper than cable/VOD and available the next day? Would you watch both?
March 31, 2011 at 9:50PM ESTEither I'll get it on iTunes or VOD (whichever is cheaper), or I'll find some other way of watching it -- but now there's absolutely no reason to watch it on AMC as it's airing with commercials. And the two-minute cut is there specifically to get enough time for more commercials. So, at least in my case, this move has dissuaded me from watching it live.
sepinwall Rachel, as updated above, it sounds like AMC is going to sit on the 47-minute versions for 8 days. So unless you want to stay out of the discussion for that long - and with "Mad Men," the digital water cooler factor tends to be pretty high - you're probably going to have to watch the 45-minute versions first.
March 31, 2011 at 10:20PM EST
April 1, 2011 at 12:36AM ESTbelinda Would there be additional reviewings (maybe an additional ETA to review the extra 2 minutes) for the full versions when they become available? Assuming that the kibosh on DVDs sent to critics are still in effect.
April 1, 2011 at 12:40AM ESTOr would they be considered spoiler material and won't/can't be discussed in the comments?
echos myron The episodes of Mad Men which air in Canada on Bravo are basically 42-minute versions of 47-minute episodes. It means much faster cuts. They tend not to show any scenes that don't involve dialogue (i.e. Don staring at the fly trapped in the ceiling light was completely cut out).
April 1, 2011 at 1:40AM ESTRachel Huh, that is frustrating, but makes more sense for AMC. I've always bought the episode on iTunes so I could watch them multiple times in high quality. Since I'm already paying for episodes when I download them, I don't like the idea of having to pay for shorter episodes. I hope there's an option for being able to automatically download the longer version as well when it hits iTunes without having to pay twice (the same way we got "bonus episodes" with commentary included in the subscription in the fourth season). I guess we'll wait and see -- with a year to wait, there's no use agonizing over it right now.
April 1, 2011 at 11:14AM ESTwdc If they're going to strip 2 mins from the TV airing, then it will be 2 mins that isn't that integral to the plot. So why bother showing it at all? It's not like I'm going to watch the extra 2 mins 8 days later and have a different experience. It's like deleted scenes from movies, which are pretty pointless. I just don't get it. It all seems really petty to me.
April 1, 2011 at 11:33AM ESTOaktown Girl
March 31, 2011 at 9:54PM EST Reply to CommentGlad it's coming back, I've been on board since the beginning. But damn, that's a long time to wait for the next season. Aren't we going to get a full new season of Walking Dead before Mad Men finally rolls around again?
Echos Myron New seasons of The Killing, Breaking Bad, The Walking Dead, and Hell on Wheels.
April 1, 2011 at 1:48AM ESTAMC also has four new shows in development: The Man with the Golden Ears (also an adaptation of a European drama), The Voyage (sci-fi drama by The X-Files/Breaking Bad writer John Shiban), The Wreck (a drama about the football industry) and The 4th Estate (about an investigative Journalist).
By 2013, they should have more dramatic series on the air than HBO, Showtime, and FX.
cjones yes but how many of those shows are actually going to air? two?
April 1, 2011 at 8:06AM ESTLJA
March 31, 2011 at 10:03PM EST Reply to CommentBest news all week!
March 31, 2011 at 10:23PM EST Reply to CommentWouldn't it be reported that they would only cut characters for creative reasons even if the deal went the other way? Avoid fan furor, Weiner saves face and the studio saves money.
Unless the contracts are actually public I'll be interested to see if the cast does end up shrinking after this season anyway.
bearcouch
March 31, 2011 at 10:41PM EST Reply to CommentI would watch both episodes, but it's going to be a bitch to keep track of. Hopefully they announce which episodes will have longer or shorter run times.
bearcouch I mean aside from that fact that the first and last episode will already be 47 minutes. Would be weird if Weiner decides to have episodes 5, 6 and 7 to be long while others are not.
March 31, 2011 at 10:43PM ESTcitizenmilton
March 31, 2011 at 11:09PM EST Reply to CommentThe Basket of Kisses blog reports Matt Weiner told them there will be 3 more seasons, and that will be the end of it.
Glad this whole negotiation drama is behind us. After the two best surprise shows of the past year (Terriers, Lights Out) getting axed, I've been really down on the business side of the medium lately. Good to see quality vindicated financially at least once in a while.
jukeofurl
March 31, 2011 at 11:51PM EST Reply to CommentGood. The bad news is in Season 7, it will just be Don & Joan on a bench in Central Park, waiting for Roger. . ..
Josh
March 31, 2011 at 11:55PM EST Reply to CommentAlan, do you think the time lapse will be good for the overall storyline involving Sally Draper? Between the time jumps, and the overall evolution of the character, I think the extra year would allow the show to continue to expand Sally Draper's role (especially w/the "real 60s" coming) without replacing Kiernan Shipka, who has been amazing the last two seasons on the show.
FoundNemo A lot of people think yes to this question. It has been discussed here in earlier posts.
April 1, 2011 at 12:52AM ESTechos myron
April 1, 2011 at 1:35AM EST Reply to CommentSeven seasons is a bit weird for me to fathom, if only because I had already split Mad Men into two halves, with seasons 1-3 being set at SC, and 4-6 presumably at SCDP. However, I do like that Weiner is aware well in advance of how long the show will go on, and can plan way ahead so as not to end up with something as wheel-spinning and bloated as part 1 of season 6 of The Sopranos.
I'm amazed that this show will likely end up having 91 episodes. There hasn't been an outright dud yet. I hope they can keep the streak alive.
outoforder30
April 1, 2011 at 1:40AM EST Reply to CommentWould the 47 minute version cost viewers money? Or would it be available for download or streaming online?
echos myron Obviously. Unless you download it on a torrent site or something.
April 1, 2011 at 1:51AM ESTLinda It's not necessarily going to be anything you have to pay for out-of-pocket if you already have On Demand on your cable, IF it turns out that the VOD version is the 47-minute version. You'd just watch it On Demand as you always do, eight days late, and you'd get the extra two minutes.
April 1, 2011 at 7:53AM ESTI'm more interested in the fact that you will now have fans arguing back and forth in situations where some have seen things that others haven't. I don't actually think it will matter, but anyone who watches the 45-minute will instantly be blown off with the "Well, you wouldn't know, because you don't watch the full versions" argument. I think for fan discussions, it's going to be an absolute nightmare.
cjones I could see them making it available on amc.com, so it's hardly obvious
April 1, 2011 at 8:01AM ESTJanieJones
April 1, 2011 at 8:18AM EST Reply to CommentI'm happy that "they" were able to come to an agreement. I'm sorry that it will take some time for the show to return but it will be worth the wait.
Good news!
gail
April 1, 2011 at 9:22AM EST Reply to CommentWhat does this do to Jon Hamm's chance of an Emmy vs. Bryan Cranston (?) of Breaking Bad -- as Alan had previously talked about?
Such a long wait.
Horst
April 1, 2011 at 6:12PM EST Reply to CommentSo the Snoozefest continues for another 2 Seasons...
April 2, 2011 at 5:27PM EST Reply to CommentI am so relieved to know that MM will return. I am not happy that I have to wait until 2012.
The cast is wonderful, so I am glad to know there will be no cuts.
MM, BB, and TB are the bests series shows on TV, without question.