About a week ago, I watched the first episode of Mad Men. After picking up on Battlestar Galactica when it was well into its third season and suffering terribly after following Jericho from episode 1 on to its cancellation after just one season, I've learnt that the only sensible way to watch TV is to let a 1-2 season buffer accumulate. You can watch the episodes at leisure, others have performed quality control and you are somewhat insulated against stupid networks cancelling fantastic shows (The Sarah Connor Chronicles being one example).

Thus, Mad Men has now become a prime TV dish for me - there are two seasons out there, it is critically acclaimed and they have more of the good stuff on the way. And having watched just one episode, I can say I was not disappointed.

This will read like a re-telling of the Wikipedia article and the praise the series has received from most quarters - sorry! - but hopefully some of you have watched more of the series and can provide genuniely insightful commentary in, you guessed it, the comment section.

The set designs - fabulous. Characters - quite interesting. The drama - nice. Time epoch capture grade: 10/10. It's almost like a cultural version of going with the "white buses" to the Nazi death camps - "genocide was happening here just sixty years ago!". Only Mad Men relates how much smoking was going on and how ridiculous the treatment of women (sorry, "girls") was in the US in the sixties instead.

In short, great entertainment, and well worth checking out. Though I suspect many of you have already. Yes?

I will be going back to episode 2 - but perhaps only after I watch some more Sarah Connor Chronicles, Dollhouse or Battlestar Galactica, or one of the movies lying around. I got on the back foot in terms of TV entertainment during my university years and will probably never fully catch up.

By the way, I am pondering a tribute showing of the final episode of TSCC (OK, maybe the two final episodes!) during Christmas. Anyone interested?