[Televisionary]

Don’t be fooled: Matthew Weiner’s period drama has always been about the future. Warning: contains spoilers for “Waterloo.” At BuzzFeed, you can read my latest feature, "The Midseason Finale Of Mad Men Is One Giant Leap Forward," in which I review the midseason finale of AMC's Mad Men ("Waterloo"), which represents a giant leap forward for the characters and for the show itself. For a show about the past, Mad Men has always been about the desperate pressing of the future against the figurative glass. In looking back to the 1960s, the show has held up a tarnished mirror to our own society, our own failings, our own future. A moon landing is full of promise; an old man lives just long enough to see the impossible made possible. Old ways — and the literal old guard — slip away. Companies perish and new ones are formed. Alliances, once fractured, are renewed. This dance is eternal, the combustive pressure between the past and the future, between cynicism a...

I've been candid over the years about my love for Chuck , supporting it and nurturing it and standing up for it whenever renewal seemed like a distant proposition rather than a sure thing. But I've also been upfront about my thoughts about this creatively uneven season, which seemed to veer from strong episodes to really weak ones on a weekly basis. Last night's episode ("Chuck Versus the Push Mix"), written by Rafe Judkins and Lauren LeFranc and directed by Peter Lauer, was originally intended to be the season finale for Season Four of Chuck , back when the season had only gotten a thirteen-episode commitment, but as with last season, an eleventh hour order of additional episodes meant that the semi-season finale wrapped up several storylines but wouldn't be the end to the season. Which brings us to the here and now, as I have to take an unpopular stand and say that I didn't enjoy this episode as much as others seemed to. In fact, I'll admit that I...