"Mad TV"

(The cast of AMC's 'Mad Men')

It’s a cigarette lighter. A quick, subtle glance from an admirer or a wanted paramour. These are the kind of devices used to tell the web of personal stories in “Mad Men,” the brilliant AMC show about the world of 1960s advertising executives. The show, now about halfway through its second season, is a complete contrast to the loud world of the “CSIs” and “Law and Orders,” where the M.O. of storytelling is either showing blood and guts, recycling the same old storylines and/or revealing some surprise twist at the end (trust me, the old creepy landlord at the beginning of the episode is always the murderer/rapist/kidnapper).

In “Mad Men,” there are no gimmicks. There’s no whodunit or puzzle to solve. Just as “American Beauty” cut a slice of Americana, “Mad Men” gives a fly-on-the-way glimpse of households, relationships, love, lust and sometimes unexpected comedy.

I started watching the show after AMC ran a marathon of the first season. I kept hearing the title along with words like Emmy, Golden Globes, critically acclaimed. It was August, which is deadman’s land for new TV shows, so I aching for something new besides “The Daily Show” and “The Soup.”

It has quickly become a favorite show of mine, even rivaling its premium channel counterparts like Showtime’s “Dexter” and the stable of HBO greats like “Six Feet Under” and “The Wire.”

The show also is unconventional in that there is no clear protagonist, bad guy, villain or even hero.
Take the show’s central character, Don Draper, who is the creative director at the ad agency Sterling Cooper. Draper, captured perfectly by Jon Hamm. Draper is successful at his job, successful at home, with a picture-perfect wife, played by the gorgeous January Jones, and two little kids. But Draper, like most of the characters on the show, keeps a dark side. When he is not closing account deals or taking building his kids a playhouse, he is sleeping with the wife of one of his clients or sometimes with the female clients themselves. You watch as these real characters makes choices with real consequences. There is no soap opera twist, just sober realities.

As loud as shows like “CSI” and “Cold Case” are with blood and guts, “Mad Men” resonates the same volume but only with its brilliant subtleties and well of characters.