If you were expecting Matthew Weiner and the cast of Mad Men to reveal the secrets of the final season at PaleyFest, you haven’t been paying attention. The final season will begin airing its first half on April 13th, but Weiner is keeping mum on where his characters will end up. From Deadline:
“I love the audience not knowing how the new season is going to start,” Weiner told Deadline, “We ended [Season 6] in the fall of 1968, and we’ll begin right after that.”
He’s a cruel master. Possibly the cruelest, but he learned from the best in David Chase and references his old boss with the possible ending for the folks at Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce:
“I don’t think David Chase was upsetting the audience,” said Weiner about his former boss’ creative choices, “That was the way that show had to end, and every year that passes we know that was the way the show should end. You can’t divorce The Sopranos’ ending from the audience’s emotion. I will end Mad Men the way it tells me to do it, the way I want to do it. The way that Mad Men is finally perceived by the audience versus what I want to do are two different things and I want it to be satisfying.” He summed up by saying, “I don’t want to destroy the entire life of the show.” (via)
Now given all the quiet talk about where the show is going for it’s final hurrah, it doesn’t mean we didn’t get any interesting information from PaleyFest regarding Mad Men. No one is happy to see the show end, none of the characters are the same as when we first met them (and might even be dead), and Jon Hamm is a formidable foe in a staring contest:
This is no surprise to fans of Jimmy Kimmel. The real shock comes from the fact that he lost to a Q&A moderator. Is Jon Hamm slipping? Is he as aimless as Don Draper? Will Pete Campbell finally meet his end at the hands of a starving grizzly bear? We will just have to wait and see.
(Via Deadline / Entertainment Weekly)
