AMC sets 'Mad Men' & 'The Killing' premiere dates
Don Draper will return a week before the Seattle detectives
Don Draper (Jon Hamm) and the rest of the "Mad Men" gang will be back in March.
Credit: AMC
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What has been rumored for weeks is official today: "Mad Men" season 5 will begin on Sunday night, March 25 - and, as a bonus, the season premiere will be two hours long. (The premiere will air from 9-11 p.m., while the show's usual timeslot will be Sundays at 10.)
And this season, "Mad Men" will have a lead-in, as the following Sunday, April 1(*), will see the premiere of season 2 of "The Killing," which will also be two hours. (It'll air from 8-10 p.m., and the usual timeslot starting the following week will be at 9.)
(*) Which will put it directly opposite the "Game of Thrones" season premiere. Did Khal Drogo kill Rosie Larsen?
"Mad Men" last aired a new episode in October 2010. This season was delayed by contract negotiations with creator Matthew Weiner, and then by other shows AMC had in the queue. "The Walking Dead," for instance, will resume its second season on Feburary 12 at 9 p.m. (And AMC just ordered a 16-episode third season.)
Weiner and his actors will be appearing at press tour later this evening for a cocktail party. Based on past behavior, I imagine they will reveal absolutely nothing about the new season, including when it takes place.
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About This Blog
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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January 14, 2012 at 8:15PM EST Reply to CommentI'm confused as to how the Walking Dead fits with Mad Men and the Killing. Not thematically, I mean actual time slot wise. Will it be done by then?
sepinwall Yes. There are only 6 episodes to go this season, I believe.
January 14, 2012 at 8:18PM ESTrexmism Walking Dead has 6 more episodes this season, so the finale will air the week before Mad Men.
January 14, 2012 at 8:18PM ESTrexmism
January 14, 2012 at 8:16PM EST Reply to CommentI assume nothing was mentioned about when Breaking Bad might air and in one or two seasons?
sepinwall No. Though the assumption is it'll be back in summer, given how well it did there last time. Gilligan still has to meet with his writers, and then AMC, on how/when/if they could break the season in two, which I think everyone expects them to do. Just a matter of whether it's 8 and 8, 10 and 6, or something else.
January 14, 2012 at 8:19PM ESTNICOLE I really wish they would just air all 16 episodes at once. But I trust Gilligan will make sure that the two mini seasons will flow nicely.
January 14, 2012 at 8:56PM EST
January 15, 2012 at 9:18AM ESTJ I'm with you, Tim, about the indulgent time-wasting -- but instead of extra episodes, I wish they'd just stick to a normal-sized season and force Gilligan to do what he should do in the time he should do it in. This show should have ended by now. If Gilligan hadn't gotten so over-praised for sitting around with his junk in his hand all through Season Three, it wouldn't come down to dithering over half-seasons and extra eps.
January 15, 2012 at 5:05PM ESTNicole Well, I liked the "time wasting" episodes... But I don't need someone to be killed every episode for me to think it's good.
January 16, 2012 at 12:00AM ESTalynch
January 14, 2012 at 8:23PM EST Reply to CommentWill it a single two-hour episode, or will it be two episodes back to back?
Eric
January 14, 2012 at 8:27PM EST Reply to CommentHow many episodes will there be of Mad Men? Is the season premiere just extended to two hours or is the second hour essentially the second episode (thus making the season last only 12 weeks instead of 13)?
sepinwall Unclear. The press release makes it sound like the premiere is one episode (it only has Weiner credited for the script and Jennifer Getzinger for the direction), but that's something I will try to find out about later in the day.
January 14, 2012 at 8:28PM ESTalynch Wasn't there a bunch of reports that Jon Hamm was directing the premiere?
January 14, 2012 at 8:33PM ESTsepinwall He directed the April 1 episode, I believe.
January 14, 2012 at 8:43PM ESTalynch Interesting. I just did some quick googling, and the offseason reports were definitely that he was directing the premiere.
January 14, 2012 at 9:02PM ESThttp://www.tvline.com/2011/05/mad-men-exclusive-jon-hamm-set-to-direct-the-season-5-premiere/
There was even a behind the scenes photo released of Hamm directing when production resume:
http://insidetv.ew.com/2011/08/08/mad-men-season-5-photo/
So as far as I can tell there are two possibilities. The reports about his episode being the premiere were wrong, or they shot some episodes out of order (possibly to accommodate January Jones' pregnancy).
Truck Hamm said he directed the premiere on the Comedy Bang Bang podcast episode he was on a few weeks ago, and it was during the first few minutes before the show turns into a complete farce.
January 14, 2012 at 9:40PM ESTalynch Okay then, that leads me to conclude it's the second possibility. Hamm directed the first produced episode of season five, but the actual premiere was shot sometime later.
January 14, 2012 at 9:50PM ESTsepinwall Spoke to Hamm at AMC's cocktail party tonight. It's as alynch guessed: Hamm's episode was the first produced, but the Getzinger episode will air first. Because of the logistics of pre-production and the amount of on-camera work HAmm has to do in each episode, the only realistic way for him to do prep is, like Cranston when he's directed Breaking Bad, to do the first one out of the gate.
January 14, 2012 at 11:54PM ESTsepinwall Also, Joel Stillerman from AMC clarified: the 2-hour premiere counts as two episodes, production-wise, so it'll be a 12-week season, with the 2-hour premiere, followed by 11 1-hour episodes.
January 14, 2012 at 11:55PM ESTLJA Thanks for clarifying, Alan.
January 15, 2012 at 12:02AM EST
January 15, 2012 at 9:21AM ESTWilliam
January 14, 2012 at 8:37PM EST Reply to CommentOK AMC, I'll take the easy joke bait (as will countless others) -- premiering The Killing on April Fool's Day is a nice touch.
lztouchthedream
January 14, 2012 at 9:34PM EST Reply to CommentGame of Thrones at 9 and Mad Men at 10 is going to make for one hell of a Sunday night.
sepinwall And one hell of a blogging workload. I'm simultaneously excited and panicked.
January 14, 2012 at 9:35PM ESTlztouchthedream I definitely don't envy that task! Hopefully Matt Weiner is a little more generous with screeners this season.
January 14, 2012 at 9:47PM ESTRoy You're not going to blog about The Killing? Aren't we all looking forward to finding out THE KILLER in the summer? Seriously, though, it's a pity that American audiences never saw the Danish original, which (although not without its flaws) is so much more entertaining than this hackery. You should really give it a shot somewhere where you have the time, Alan, just to show you what could have been.
January 14, 2012 at 9:49PM ESTMoreTears @Roy -- The US Killing is not in any way a step down from the Danish version (okay, I make a small exception for the role of the mayor, who is a normal person in the Danish show and a cartoon villain in the remake), and I have preferred the first half of the story in the American show to the first half (10 episodes) in the Danish show. Since Alan made it clear he hated the US Killing because of all the red herrings, the fact that the US show actually REDUCED the number of red herring from what the Danish show offered makes it quite clear he wouldn't have liked the Danish show either.
January 14, 2012 at 11:24PM ESTDezbot
January 14, 2012 at 9:52PM EST Reply to CommentDo you watch "The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret"? Jon Hamm popped up in the Season 2 premiere and killed it.
Richard Crow
January 14, 2012 at 11:24PM EST Reply to CommentAlan who cares about that hack Matthew Weiner and his show Mad Men? That show is just formulaic garbage. Why not blog about a really groundbreaking show that doesn't follow the formula like The Killing? Why not follow the show by legendary writer and showrunner Veena Sud?
ZacharyTF Not sure if serious.... ;-)
January 14, 2012 at 11:42PM ESTVaughn
January 15, 2012 at 3:29AM EST Reply to CommentAMC’s SVP original programming Joel Stillerman assured critics that won’t happen again in Season 2. “I can stand here and confirm that we heard everyone, and the killer will be revealed in the Season 2 finale of The Killing,” he said. “We explored veering away from the original Danish model (following the controversy). At the end of the day, after significant discussion, we decided that resolving the murder at the end of Season 2 was the best plan.” ------ Does he mean the new Season 2 mystery will be resolved by the finale, or the Rosie one? If it's the latter, then that really isn't the best plan.
Nick Oh he meant Rosie which is just mind boggling. They're completely clueless. Any chance there was of me returning is now gone.
January 15, 2012 at 11:49AM ESTJonny
January 15, 2012 at 4:17AM EST Reply to CommentI do hope Alan covers the Killing this season if not to give me a laugh. When Ryan McGee covering the terrible Terra Nova got bored he just did a play by play and no critical evaluation.
Alan ripping into the killing finale and the season itself on his podcast was literally the funniest thing I have ever heard. I know people say Cuse and Lindleoff should be a comedy act but Alan was on fire! It was brilliant...and the way he said that Nina Sud was insulting Breaking Bad and Mad Men by comparing her series to that was not only accurate but brilliantly said...hehehe.
So yeah please Alan review the show, talk about the show in your podcast because you are so awesomely funny and I mean this all sincerely.
tim_isola
January 15, 2012 at 9:22AM EST Reply to CommentAlan swore he was done writing about the killing so he cant go back on that, gotta be a man of his word, sorry folks.
Sareeta
January 15, 2012 at 12:42PM EST Reply to CommentHm... Game of Thrones or The Killing, which to watch? :P
Actually, I might watch The Killing later in the week if it ends up getting good reviews. Lots of series struggle in their first season.