Mad for Mad Men

Mad Men Season 4 poster: Don Draper stripped down to the core.

Mad Men Season 4 is just a couple of weeks away and there’s no shortage of buzz about Don Draper’s new start: a new advertising agency in the making and a sinking new reality at home.

The fourth season’s poster nicely illustrates what’s happened and what’s to come: Don Draper stands alone in an empty office, we catch his profile looking into the cityscape, cigarette smoldering. The image asks, “Where do we go from here?” and the telephone answers- we start over and make some calls.

It’s a stark contrast to Season 3′s poster where our leading interest sits in his office, here filled to the desk with water (pictured below). The poster nicely illustrates the third season’s theme of loss of control and a lifestyle that can only sink.

Mad Men Season 3 poster: Don Draper in an office of water.

Season four’s clean slate brings us the excitement and promise of new beginnings for the cast. But people don’t really change who they are, do they? Can they be blamed for being human?

And besides, we enjoy watching our charming Manhattan ad men make the wrong choices, dip into illicit relations and flirt with the bottle.

Among our guilty pleasures is the famous wardrobe that our characters sport as the 1960s roll into trend after trend. From the set decorations to the hair and makeup and down to pocket squares and trouser cuffs, Mad Men does an exceptional recreation of this exciting decade. So much so that men’s suiting and pocket square folds have become new again and the talk of several fashion blogs and magazine How-To columns.

And so to feed the Mad Men appetite that can hardly wait for the July 25 premiere, we offer this video featuring costume designer Janie Bryant discussing the wardrobe for the new Season 4:

Images courtesy of Amctv.