Things TV Goodness Learned This Week: Mad Men, Shameless, H50, SPN 

Re: Mad Men @ The Envelope Screening Series

• Jon Hamm will be directing the first episode of Mad Men’s Season 5 — which doesn’t hit airwaves until March of 2012.

• Matthew Weiner doesn’t understand why people hate any character. With Betty, he feels like he’s holding a mirror up to humanity. We are seeing her in her most private moments. We’ve all done things we’re not proud of when no one’s looking. Betty is trapped and has no power.

• Jon Hamm doesn’t think Don Draper ever changes. He tries to paint and plaster over the cracks, but eventually they reappear.

• Matthew Weiner is constantly surprised when people ask him when/if Betty and Don will get back together, especially when he gives every indication that they won’t.

• When Matthew Weiner and the writers arced out Mrs. Blankenship, they knew she was going to die but the actress did not. Sometimes the writers don’t want to do what they’ve planned on doing (in this case killing a character), but it makes sense and they have to be truthful to the story.

Learn more about the event here…

Here’s a video of Jon Hamm dissecting Don Draper…what Christina Hendricks thinks about Joan‘s relationship with Roger Sterling…and Kiernan Shipka talks about channeling Betty when she plays Sally.

Re: Shameless @ The Envelope Screening Series

• William H. Macy will be writing a Season 2 episode of Shameless. He described the writing process and was jubilant over the fact that it was such a collaborative thing.

• Season 2 will start production just after July 4th. The new season will not take place in the winter like the first season; it will take place in the summer and run through Halloween.

• Shameless is filmed primarily on a soundstage in Los Angeles. The location shots in Chicago are at the back of The Yards neighborhood.

• Family isn’t just about genetics. There’s a lot of love in the Gallagher household. They deliberately cast a black child to play Liam so they could explore that.

• Based on the UK series, which has aired over 100 episodes, which is unusual for a UK series. James McAvoy (X-Men: First Class) played Steve and in real life married the woman who played Fiona. They left after Season 2. The US version is only similar to the UK version for the first six episodes.

Re: Hawaii Five-0 via The Hollywood Reporter’s article on the most watched TV shows among 18 – 49

• Hawaii Five-0 is the most DVR’d show of all time.

Re: Supernatural via Twitter

• Word on the Tweet: Jared Padalecki confirmed he has joined the ranks of the Twitter universe. His Twitter name is @jarpad and in a little over 24 hours, he’s amassed over 50,000 followers and his count is still rising. He managed to follow eight fellow tweeters including Misha Collins, Jim Beaver, Zachary Levi, Chad Michael Murray and Richard Speight, Jr. Jared was also a trending topic at one point on Saturday June 4. Best part? His profile pic is a shot of his co-star Jensen Ackles at this weekend’s Nashville convention with tons of Supernatural fans behind him.