Nov 042008
You’ve all been talking about it and linking to the opening sequence; here it is, courtesy of VideoGum.
Go to Hulu.com for the whole thing.
7 Responses to “The Simpsons do The Mad Men”
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Mad Men Season 5 Premiere: March 25, 2012
Get ready! Sunday, March 25, 9pm Eastern happens in 1 month and 14 days!
This made me kind of jump in my seat with utter glee and delight! I happen to take a lollipop than a cigarette (just kicked the habit after 10 years). I love how network television is embracing a truly one of a kind show that is Mad Men.
An utterly perfect tribute! Brilliant.
I can't find the full episode — any pointers? Or has it expired from Hulu?
Oh whoops, I just realized it's the Treehouse of Horror epi. Thanks.
This episode sucked. It had nothing to do with Mad Men except one of the "Sterotypical ad men" looked like Rogert Sterling. God, I hate The Simpsons.
Ironically, the period in which Mad Men takes place was a turning point in animation history. 1962 was the last year animation was good. Between 1961 and 1970 animation rapidly deteriorated and devolved and it was dead by 1970. It didn't begin to recover until 1987 with Might Mouse: The New Adventures.
Jorge, I think you're deeply mistaken to overlook the contribution that Yellow Submarine made to animation. It was a really important turning point in the possibilities of the medium.
Ahhh, of course, Yellow Submarine. That's a true classic, and an exception (along with Ralph Bakshi's 1970s films) to the rule. However, I don't think Yellow Submarine did anything UPA and Hulbey didn't do in the 1940s and 1950s, which itself got its style from magazine cartooning from the 1930s. Graphic wild shapes character designs in limited animation was pioneered as a minimalistic arty cool thing to do by Chuck Jones and then UPA, but what Yellow Submarine did different was take influence from hippy psychadelic art and design rather than modern art. Plus, I like the look of Hanna Barbera and Disney modern style designs more than Yellow Submarine's.
They had the foresight to do what was cool at the time (and it did fit the music of The Beatles like a glove) but I still consider the film's influence to be more harmful than helpful because it led to the 1970s independent animation movement, which sank animation into an anti-narrative trend that it has yet to recover from.