I’ll get to the point first: The Handmaid’s Tale, as adapted by Hulu, is an excellent production and one well worth any TV lover’s time. Elisabeth Moss, an actress who spent nearly a decade understanding how female characters manage a life of oppression under male domination, uses her time on Mad Men to translate a fictional written diary into an uncompromising television reality.

With that out of the way, there’s a lot to unpack regarding the several episodes we took in before the show’s wide release on Wednesday, May 26. Hulu works in the best spirit of this current golden age of television. It presents an audience that’s hungry for thought-provoking content with a story that resonates with our current, unprecedented unique political climate.

Mad Men
Season 7 Episode 14 “Person To Person”
Directed by Matthew Weiner
Written and created by Matthew Weiner
Starring Jon Hamm, Elizabeth Moss, Christina Hendricks, January Jones, Vincent Kartheiser, John Slattery, Rich Sommer, Aaron Staton, Kiernan Shipka
AMC
Air Date: Sunday, May 17th, 2015, 10pm

The Mad Men series finale! The end of an era. There will be many spoilers as there has to be at the end of this journey. Do not read on if you have not watched the finale yet.

How did this series, which rooted itself in non-dramatic drama end? Please. Venture forward.

Mad Men
Season 7 Episode 13 “The Milk And Honey Route”
Directed by Matthew Weiner
Written by Matthew Weiner, Carly Ray
Created by Matthew Weiner
Starring Jon Hamm, Elizabeth Moss, Christina Hendricks, January Jones, Vincent Kartheiser, John Slattery, Rich Sommer, Aaron Staton, Kiernan Shipka, Kevin Rahm
AMC
Air Date: Sunday, May 10th, 2015, 10pm

Last week’s Mad Men found Joan (Christina Hendricks) quitting when the sexism became too much, and because Roger (John Slattery) told her to take the deal. That burned me up. Don (Jon Hamm) quits too (I think). I mean, he walked out right in the middle of a meeting and drove away. So if he didn’t quit, he’s fired. First stop? Diana’s husband’s house. There, despite the false story, he was made. And it was awkward. The driving made me feel like he was in danger. First, when he had a vision of Bert Cooper (Robert Morse) in his passenger seat, and I thought for sure he was going to run off the road. And second, when he picked up a scraggly hitchhiker. It made me Google David Berkowitz or Charles Manson to see if the fictional crossing of those paths could be a historically accurate possibility.

Mad Men
Season 7 Episode 12 “Lost Horizon”
Directed by Phil Abraham
Written by Semi Chellas
Created by Matthew Weiner
Starring Jon Hamm, Elizabeth Moss, Christina Hendricks, January Jones, Vincent Kartheiser, John Slattery, Rich Sommer, Aaron Staton, Kiernan Shipka, Kevin Rahm
AMC
Air Date: Sunday, May 3rd, 2015, 10pm

Last week on Mad Men, the gang found out that McCann Erickson “forgot” to pay the lease and everyone has to move to their offices. Don (John Hamm) tried a last ditch effort to separate themselves, by offering to go run the California branch. At least this way, the conflict clients won’t be affected. It’s shot down immediately, with assurances that this is better for them. When they finally tell the office at the end, it’s like they already ceased to exist.

Mad Men
Season 7 Episode 11 “Time & Life”
Directed by Jared Harris
Written and created by Matthew Weiner
Starring Jon Hamm, Elizabeth Moss, Christina Hendricks, January Jones, Vincent Kartheiser, John Slattery, Rich Sommer, Aaron Staton, Kiernan Shipka, Kevin Rahm
AMC
Air Date: Sunday, April 26th, 2015, 10pm

Mad Men 7.11 “Time & Life” review is coming right up. First, Let’s recap last week’s episode.

Don (Jon Hamm) has to sell his place, but it’s not like selling product in advertising. His realtor is frustrated because it’s so empty and sad. He had a bunch of small sad moments in this episode – Peggy (Elizabeth Moss) yells at him, he fires Mathis (Trevor Einhorn) because he blew it with a client and then insulted Don for it, and then the last shot in the hallway outside of his apartment – depressing.

Joan (Christina Hendricks) meets someone in California who is so not interested in dating someone with kids, having been there, done that. Not really a problem since they are across the country, so she lies about her son. He shows up in NY. She tells the truth and he doesn’t want it. But then he does.

Mad Men
Season 7 Episode 10 “The Forecast”
Directed by Jennifer Getzinger
Written by Jonathan Igla and Matthew Weiner
Created by Matthew Weiner
Starring Jon Hamm, Elizabeth Moss, Christina Hendricks, January Jones, Vincent Kartheiser, John Slattery, Rich Sommer, Aaron Staton, Kiernan Shipka, Kevin Rahm
AMC
Air Date: Sunday, April 19th, 2015, 10pm

It’s almost time to say goodbye to this exquisitely made period drama. There are only three episodes left til the finale of Mad Men. Before that happens though, let’s recap last week’s episode and review this week’s.

Don (Jon Hamm) had a rough time of it last week. Megan (Jessica Pare) flew in to negotiate divorce terms, and left with a million dollars (which he gave her), and all his furniture (which he didn’t). Well… that part was her angry mother. He found and lost his waitress. SHE rejected him because she must be bananas. Don stared with longing at the family picture Betty (January Jones), Henry (Christopher Stanley), and the kids made. A new photographer, Pima (guest star Mimi Rogers) scores with Stan (Jay R. Ferguson) but not with Peggy (Elizabeth Moss). Harry (Rich Sommer) is a sleazeball, expecting sex from Megan for help with her career, then bad mouths her to Don (who does not care) later. I wanted to kill Harry. The end of that episode with Don standing in the middle of his empty apartment was jarring.

Mad Men
Season 7 Episode 9 “New Business”
Directed by Michael Uppendahl
Written by Tom Smuts and Matthew Weiner
Created by Matthew Weiner
Starring Jon Hamm, Elizabeth Moss, Christina Hendricks, January Jones, Vincent Kartheiser, John Slattery, Rich Sommer, Aaron Staton, Kiernan Shipka, Kevin Rahm
amc
Air Date: Sunday, April 12th, 2015, 10pm

Before we get to this week’s Mad Men 7.9 “New Business,” review, let’s take a look at what happened last week on 7.8 “Severance.”

Well the severance in question was Ken’s (Aaron Staton), whom Roger (John Slattery) fired at the behest of Ferguson Donnelly. Ken may have only one eye but he had the last laugh as he succeeded his father-in-law as head of Dow Chemicals and now is a client Roger has to please. Sweet karma!

Don (Jon Hamm) is back at the top of his advertising game, but the womanizing is leaving him hollow. He wants to reconnect with Rachel Mencken (Maggie Siff) after dreaming of her, which was a haunting foreshadowing, because she had passed away the week before.

Joan (Christina Hendricks) gets severely sexually harassed by clients, then gets in a snit with Peggy (Elizabeth Moss) when Peggy kinda alludes to it being her fault. Peggy goes on a unexpectedly wonderful blind date, then thinks again during next harsh light of the morning.

Mad Men
Season 7 Episode 8 “Severance”
Directed by Scott Hornbacher
Created and written by Matthew Weiner
Starring Jon Hamm, Elizabeth Moss, Christina Hendricks, Vincent Kartheiser, John Slattery, Rich Sommer, Aaron Staton, and Kevin Rahm
amc
Air Date: Sunday, April 5th, 2015, 10pm

First a recap, then a review. Beware of spoilers!

The first of the final seven episodes of acclaimed AMC series Mad Men aired last night nearly a year after the 7th season began, and I miss it already. The first half of the season ended with a major death, that of quirky, wear-only-your-socks-in-his-office Bert Cooper (Robert Morse). Although Roger (John Slattery) got the news that he passed while Bert was offscreen, Don (John Hamm) was treated to a song and dance of Bert (either a ghost or the insanity in Don’s head) doing “The Best Things In Life Are Free,” with secretary back-up dancers. Don also lost his wife and almost completely lost his job in Episode 7.7 “Waterloo,” against the backdrop of the Apollo Moon Landing. It was the losing of the job that spurred the realization of divorce, for when he called Megan (Jessica Pare) and the possibility that he was now free to move to California to be with her came up, there was a knowing silence. It turns out McCann saves Don as they want a partnership with the company that makes them all rich, but they won’t do it without Ted (Kevin Rahm) or Don. And just like that, he’s back.

Mad Men: Season Two
Special Collector’s Edition
Created by Matthew Weiner
Starring Jon Hamm, Elizabeth Moss, January Jones, Christina Hendricks, John Slattery and Vincent Kartheiser
Lionsgate Home Entertainment
Release Date: July 14, 2009

It was F. Scott Fitzgerald who once posited that the things that people are ashamed of are the things that make the best stories. Fitzgerald, had he come later and not, y’know, drank himself to death, would have been proud to have come up with Mad Men. It was last year’s Emmy winner for Best TV Drama, and if my estimation of last season’s complete and utter swill that called itself television is correct (a year that spawned a disappointing third season of Dexter, a godawful season of Weeds, and the advent of the neon storm of ass that calls itself “True Blood“), it will win again this year. They should just rename the Emmys “Let’s Throw Gold Shit at Matthew Weiner and Tina Fey for Three Hours.” ‘Cause if I’m a fan of anything, it’s honesty.

For those of you who have yet to fall head-first into Mad Men like the unbearable hipster jackass at the record store told you you should have by now, allow me to set the scene:

In the early 1960’s, Don Draper (Jon Hamm) is an advertising executive at the New York agency Sterling-Cooper. He has a lovely wife named Betty (January Jones) and two darling children and a big expensive house. Naturally, someone who has all these things should have deep problems and Don most certainly does. He’s a serial philanderer, has barely any love for his wife at all and bears a huge secret that haunts him at every turn. From season to season, Draper attempts to build up his success while his baser natures do everything they can to tear it all down.

Mad Men has gained a reputation, somewhat, as “That Show Where Everybody Smokes.” And it’s true that, in order to reflect the tenor of the middle of the twentieth century, everyone has a cigarette in his or her hand. As a smoker, no show has ever sent me into crazier nicotine fits. I go through smokes watching this show like fat children go through Tootsie Rolls.