As we say goodbye to Don Draper, Peggy Olsen, Sterling, Cooper and Pryce and the rest of the fictionalized 1960’s New York City world, we look back at our favorite parts of the show. The Mad Men series finale will be a doozy, and it deserves to be.

After saying goodbye to Parks and Recreation just a few short months ago, Alec and Kristina are back to reminisce about the best parts of Mad Men. It was the AMC drama that followed on the heels of Breaking Bad and found just as rabid fans. After seven seasons, the Mad Men series finale will air on Sunday, having changed the cultural lexicon for many years to come.

In the meantime, these are our favorite parts about the show.

Set design and immaculate details

(Photo by Thanassi Karageorgiou/ Museum of the Moving Image)

Before Mad Men premiered in 2007, there were few period shows, and even fewer that focused so intently on the details beyond the props handled within a scene. From the labels on the drinks on a table in the background to the televisions shows watched by the characters, Weiner and his team have been revered for the benign details that elevated the show and transported viewers into the 1960’s and 70’s.

The costumes revitalized the historical era

The costumes — and fashion designer/costumer for the show Janie Bryant — have single-handedly started a revolution (or rather, revived one from decades past). With a book about the fashion, a clothing line collaboration with Banana Republic and blogs focused specifically on recapping the outfits worn in an episode, these pieces help tell the story of the time just as much as the dialogue.

Sally and Peggy have notably changed the most, and with that their wardrobes are vastly different than seven years ago. Sally because she grew up from a young seven year old dressed like a human doll, to sultry teenager embracing the early onslaught of hippy trends, mixed with her prep-school education. Peggy, of course, went from “dowdy” secretary to what is still one of the most-coveted positions in an advertising agency. She wears a pant suit in one episode – and that’s considered groundbreaking.

The Advertising: It’s all true!

Perhaps one of the most magnificent feats Mad Men has accomplished was its realistic portrayal of the advertising world. The Kodak Carousel is one particularly memorable pitch Don gives in season 1. Was it sold to Kodak like that in reality? Probably not. But you do make story boards, and you do craft a story to sell to the client.

As a student of advertising, the pitch for clients like Kodak and Burger Chef were by-the-book perfect (Don’s Hershey’s pitch, less-so.) We’ve been watching SC&P get acquired/devoured by McCann Erikson – one of the top advertising agencies still standing today. While it’s a fictional acquisition, McCann did purchase many smaller shops during the Mad Men season 7 timeline. Bonus: the company has been live-tweeting the episodes and provides interesting insight into the way they’re being portrayed.

Topaz and Furs: A different kind of feminism

At first glance, the 1960’s setting featuring demure housewives doesn’t seem like a fertile ground for female empowerment. But Mad Men, like the great show it is (Game of Thrones is particularly good at this as well), finds room to create believable female characters. Joan, beautiful and voluptuous as she is, sees her body as both a gift and a curse. Throughout the series, she is able to use her raw sexuality to climb the corporate ladder and build a comfortable life for herself. Peggy, through sheer determination and will, is able to do the same. Each woman is in some ways jealous of the other. There are so few paths for women in their time period but the many women in Mad Men’s world are still able to use the tools available to them to slowly inch toward the lives they want to lead. As for Sally? Forget Hillary – Sally Draper will be the U.S’s first female President.

On Page 2: Next Week on ‘Mad Men,’ Pete Campbell, and more

Next week on ‘Mad Men’: Somebody does something!

Mad Men creator Matthew Weiner is famously wary of spoilers. On a recent episode of The Nerdist podcast, he described a transformative experience in which he entered a theater not knowing anything about the movie he was about to see: Poltergeist. Based on the first 30 minutes, he thought he had walked into a charming family comedy. So when the restless souls of the dead started tormenting that family it was a truly shocking and satisfying watch for him.

Weiner definitely has a point about watching a TV show with completely virgin eyes but he takes it to the extreme with absolutely incomprehensible promos for upcoming episodes. The promos at the end of each week’s episode are notoriously, hilariously vague. The announcer says “next week on Mad Men” and then a series of mundane snippets of next week’s episode play out over a ridiculously dramatic piano dirge. We’ll miss the 30-second flashes of unintentional comedy.

Pete Campbell: American Idiot

Every single character on Mad Men deserves his or her own entry to be recognized. But if we were narrow it down to one (and we are), Peter Campbell deserves a special shoutout. Don and Peggy are the heart of the show but Pete is its pinky toe: ultimately useless and likely to be abused. Pete is a fascinating character because he at first seemed to be set up to be the series’ villain. He came from a privileged background and threatened Don’s very existence by tattling about his real identity to Cooper.

Once that gambit failed, however, Pete seemed to accept Don as a inevitability and later a friend. That’s how real life works. People may seem to have villainous qualities at first but real life has very few true villains and very many normal, if complicated human beings. Pete is just a guy at work. He’s good at his job and he annoys you but you ultimately must accept that he’s not going away. All you can do is watch his hairline recede and his gut expand throughout the years. It also doesn’t hurt that Vincent Kartheiser has not one but two of the best line reads in the history of television.

And, more recently:

The end of an era

AMC’s marketing campaign for the final season of Mad Men is fond of the phrase “end of an era.” It’s a clever take on both the show and its depiction of the ’60s era ending but it’s also an accurate statement to make about a particular era of television. It seems hard to conceive of now but it wasn’t too long ago that television was considered film’s ugly and disposable cousin. This all changed with a golden age of TV cable dramas shepherded by networks like HBO, FX and AMC and shows like The Sopranos, Breaking Bad and The Wire.

Even with Mad Men ending, television will be in excellent shape. There are still plenty of great shows on a plethora of channels to behold. But Mad Men, which was created by a former Sopranos-writer, marks the natural end to this first era of TV’s golden age where complicated, at-times difficult showrunners wrote ambitious and unprecedented shows about mysterious anti-heroes. Quality television is here to stay and we have “first wave” great shows like Mad Men to thank.