'Mad Men': Your Season-by-Season Catch-Up Guide

Don Draper’s long strange journey through the ‘60s is finally coming to an end; Mad Men kicks off its final batch of seven episodes on April 5 on AMC. Since the show’s debut back in 2007, the Matthew Weiner-created period drama has spanned almost the entirety of that turbulent decade, from 1960 to 1969. With so many years — and so many characters — to keep track of, it’s easy to let key details about the show’s universe slip through your mind. That’s why we’re providing you with this handy season-by-season guide to the major storylines and characters in advance of the premiere. Now you won’t have any trouble remembering the names of Don’s three children or which wife he’s currently on.

Season 1: 1960 

* Don Draper (Jon Hamm) is the star ad man at the reputable advertising agency, Sterling Cooper. He takes the train in from his lovely home in Ossining every morning… except for those nights where he says in the city enjoying the company of various female liaisons.

* The Sterling Cooper offices are a hotbed of white male privilege, with women confined exclusively to secretarial positions, while guys like junior accounts manager Pete Campbell (Vincent Kartheiser) and head honchos Bert Cooper (Robert Morse) and Roger Sterling (John Slattery) have run of the place. However, stern office manager Joan Holloway (Christina Hendricks) knows how to make her presence felt, wielding her powers selectively, but effectively.

* Fresh out of secretarial school, lifelong Brooklyn resident Peggy Olson (Elisabeth Moss) secures a job as Don’s secretary and, influenced by the general office culture, makes the mistake of coming onto him. He demurs and she never tries anything like that again, but she does have a one night only fling with Pete — right before his wedding to Trudy (Alison Brie) — that results in an unplanned pregnancy and unwanted child.

* Meanwhile, on the homefront, Don is semi-happily married to retired model, Betty (January Jones), whose current job is mother to their two young kids, Sally (Kiernan Shipka) and Bobby (Maxwell Huckabee, the first in a long line of child actors to play this part). Betty is frustrated with her life, which doesn’t make the Drapers’ Ossining home a comfortable place for anyone to be.

* As the season progresses, it becomes clear that Don Draper isn’t actually “Don Draper,” but Dick Whitman — a young man of dubious heritage who served in the Korean War and returned having assumed the identity of a deceased superior officer. A mailroom mix-up leads Pete to discover this precious bit of intel, but he’s unable to leverage it in any helpful way. Meanwhile, Don returns to Ossining after a particularly successful campaign presentation to discover that Betty and the kids have seemingly left him.

Season 2: 1962

* The Draper home is full again, but Don hasn’t ceased his tomcatting. He strikes up an affair with the randy wife of a comedian who hawks Utz-brand potato chips. Eventually, her husband finds out and squawks on Don to Betty (who comes to learn she’s pregnant with their third child) and she understandably ejects him from their house. Don takes a detour to California, where he meets up with his “first wife” — the real Don’s widow, Anna Draper.

* Having recovered from her pregnancy and putting that whole incident in the rearview, Peggy rededicates herself to her new job as a junior copywriter at Sterling Cooper, her first rung on the professional ladder.

* Eager to avoid being labeled an old maid (like anyone would dare), Joan accepts doctor-in-training Greg Harris’s proposal of marriage. He turns out to be a boor who forces himself on her inside the Sterling Cooper offices. Joan puts on a brave face and stands by her man… for now, anyway.

* Sterling Cooper is put on the buyout block when accounts head “Duck” Phillips responds to not being made partner by wrangling the London firm Putnam, Powel & Lowe into making a play for the company. Sterling and Cooper both accept the deal, but Don balks at continuing on if Duck is president of the place and appears to quit, walking out mid-meeting.

Season 3: 1963

* Psych! Turns out Don’s still with the post-merger Sterling Cooper, while Duck is out on his rear. He quickly proves his value to the company by befriending hotel tycoon, Conrad Hilton, who challenges Don’s ad-making abilities in ways they’ve never been challenged before. Don’s current mistress is his daughter’s teacher, Suzanne.

* Betty isn’t letting Don have all the extramarital fun. She stokes a flirtation with ambitious politician Henry Francis (Christopher Stanley) and winds up changing her last name from “Draper” to “Francis.”

* Peggy makes the big move across the bridge from Brooklyn to Manhattan. She also starts seeing Duck on the side, yet another in a long line of questionable romantic decisions. Joan is preparing to quit her job for motherhood, but her good-for-nothing husband’s latest screw-up requires her to keep working.

* Sterling Cooper’s new parent company plans to flip the firm to another agency, but before that can happen, Don, Roger, Bert, and British liaison Lane Pryce (Jared Harris) make plans to start their own firm. These plans involve a weekend raid on Sterling Cooper that’s up there with any Ocean’s Eleven operation.

Season 4: 1964-1965

* With Henry having taken up residence in the Draper Ossining homestead, Don is on his own in the city and especially loving it. He attempts to fill the void left by his family with booze and a bevy of gals, including a prostitute and, more seriously, level-headed Faye Miller. But the woman who ends up “winning” his hand is unassuming secretary, Megan (Jessica Paré), who becomes his fiancée to the surprise of everyone… including the audience.

* The new firm, Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, is up and running, but far from solvent. Securing and keeping clients is a constant battle, one that isn’t helped by Roger’s clumsy handling of the all-important account for Lucky Strike cigarettes. That, in part, leads Don to take a semi-principled stand against the agency ever representing another cigarette company.

* In other personnel developments, Peggy explores the Beat scene and fumes when Don accepts an award for an ad she dreamed up; Joan and Roger sleep together, resulting in a child that she demands to pass off as Greg’s; and future FoP (Friend of Peggy) Stan Rizzo (Jay R. Ferguson) starts working at SDCP.

Season 5: 1966-1967

* Don and Megan are officially married and living in a deluxe apartment in the sky, where she serenades him with “Zou Bisou Bisou” to the (irreverent) delight of everybody. In contrast to Betty, she knows all about his past as Dick Whitman and doesn’t seem to mind. Don, meanwhile, seems to be sticking to his “No cheating” rule this time around.

* Rising ad world star Michael Gisnberg (Ben Feldman) joins SDCP, bringing out the green eyed monster in both Don and Peggy. Fed up with being passed over for acclaim and attention by her male colleagues, Peggy jumps ship to another agency, with Don’s blessing.

* Pete and Joan are fed up with their respective marital partners: He’s unhappy in his suburb of Cos Cob and starts to stray from Trudy. Joan has been coping with Greg’s tour of duty in Vietnam with the Army Medical Corps, and finally seizes the opportunity to kick him out for good, to the cheers of everyone watching at home. Then, she firms up her own future at SDCP by sleeping with a potential client as a means to secure the account. In return for that unpleasant bit of business, she’s made a voting partner.

* Poor Lane is mired in debt with no obvious way out, so he quietly “borrows” money from SDCP… and is inevitably caught and summarily dismissed. Preferring death to dishonor, though, he hangs himself in his office… an ominous end to a seemingly good year.

Season 6: 1967-1968

* Don is back to his cheating ways, taking up with his neighbor, Sylvia (Linda Cardellini). Megan, who is busy with her nascent acting career, is unaware of the liaison, but Sally discovers her dad’s secret, sending him into a shame spiral that helps nudge him along towards a season-ending mid-meeting breakdown where he reveals the truth about his origins and gets put on a leave of absence for his long-overdue honesty.

* Tired of competing for the same accounts with the folks over at rival firm, CGC — whose ranks include Peggy — Don makes the bold decision to propose a merger with Ted Chaough (Kevin Rahm) to become Sterling Cooper & Partners. That brings Peggy back into the fold, and she’s not happy about it. Her dalliance with Ted helps make the transition easier, at least until he picks his wife and family over her.

* Don and Roger make the trip westward to explore the late ‘60s L.A. scene, and do a little business on the side. SC&P plans to set up a California office and Don pitches Megan on the thought of moving to sunny Cali, a plan that’s scuttled by his sudden onset emotional breakdown.

Season 7, Part 1: 1969

* Don is still on leave, but works his way back into SC&P, starting from practically the bottom rung in order to earn back everyone’s respect and trust. Megan has moved out to California without him, and they do the bi-coastal thing for a little while, until she breaks it off.

* Good ol’ Ginsberg loses his mind (and one of his nipples). While out on the West Coast, Pete throws himself into the swinging California lifestyle with a little too much gusto.

* Bert Cooper passes on, and Roger strikes a deal with McCann Erickson to sell them 51 percenet of SC&P, making sure to stipulate that they remain an independent subsidiary. Don is a full part of the company again, with a new five year contract.

See the number of punches thrown, cigarettes smoked, and more in this Mad Men by the Numbers video:

Mad Men premieres Sunday, April 5 at 10 p.m. on AMC.