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The Golden Age of space exploration could get a lot sexier if the minds behind Mad Men have anything to say about it. Reports surfaced this week that writers from the acclaimed AMC drama are scouting locations along Florida's Space Coast for a show centered around NASA during the 1960s, the glory days of the Apollo program.

I don't know what would possess a person to remake the intro for Breaking Bad as a high concept dramedy from the 1990s. I'm just glad that the spirit took them, because this video is absolutely tops. Who knew that Walt, Jesse and the rest of the gang would have been so at home on the WB right after Buffy? Now, we all do -- or at least, you will once you check out the video below.

Look, not every single person running in your nerd circle -- as close as your relationships may be -- is going to see eye-to-eye with your beliefs or opinions, such is a little thing called life. Even if you're prone to getting a little hot under the collar as the result of such petty disagreements, there's nerd rage, and then there's callously shooting your girlfriend in the back. 26-year-old The Walking Dead enthusiast Jared Gurman, after having argued with his girlfriend over the possibility of a zombie apocalypse, believed that a bullet to her back would help her see clarity. Obviously, what ultimately happened was far from what he intended.

Unfortunately for everyone caught in the crossfire, Dish Network and AMC have been duking it out over what the former referred to as a distribution problem and the latter said was a legal dispute with Voom HD. See, Dish Network dropped the Voom HD channels back in 2008, which led to them disappearing altogether, and litigation has been ongoing since. AMC Networks, which operates the aptly-named AMC, once operated those Voom HD channels. After much deliberation, and a payout to the tune of $700 million, Dish customers will once more be able to watch The Walking Dead.

Every Sunday night at 9:00 PM I turn on AMC. From 9:01 PM to 9:03 PM, I watch the opening scene of The Walking Dead. It's usually fantastic. The producers know they have a tight window in which to film a scene and start the opening credits. The producers also know that they have to hook you at this point, so they give you what you came for: Zombies. Brains. People in cars stabbing zombies in the eye with screwdrivers because zombies want their brains.

Lionsgate Films has signed a multi-year deal with Netflix to bring the hit '60s ad industry drama Mad Men to the streaming service. Beginning on June 27, the first four seasons of the hit show will be available on the service with new seasons to be added after their run on AMC. Though Mad Men has been available on Netflix in Canada under a separate deal, this is the first time the program will be available on the U.S. version of the service. Netflix has been keen to add new television programming, and last February announced a similar deal with CBS that made Cheers, Frasier, and Medium available for streaming. The addition of hit television programming is certainly part of Netflix's efforts to expand its streaming library, but also likely to help offset the loss of films the service has recently suffered and competition on the horizon from studio-backed streaming services. Netflix may be trying to outmaneuver these attacks by increasing demand for their service with hot media commodities like Mad Men. Regardless of the motivation, having the delighfully inebriated trials and tribulations of constantly smoking, ultra sexy ad executives from a bygone age at my finger tips is enough to have my butt parked firmly on my couch. Provided someone can refresh my Old Fashioned. (via Mashable)

Despite strong ratings and its recent renewal by AMC, The Walking Dead is reportedly firing the entirety of its writing staff. Moreover, the zombie series could dispatch with an in-house writing staff entirely for Season Two, relying instead on freelancers assigned on a script-by-script basis. Series writer, EP, and director Frank Darabont would stay on, however, and comic creator Robert Kirkman, who wrote an episode this season, could continue on in a contributing role. Deadline has the scoop:

I hear The Walking Dead writer/ executive producer/ director Frank Darabont has let go of the writers on the hot freshman AMC series, which has already renewed for a second season. That includes Darabont's No. 2, writing executive producer Charles “Chic” Eglee. Writer turnover on series between seasons is commonplace but wholesale overhauls are unusual. What's more, I hear Darabont is looking to forgo having a writing staff for the second season of Walking Dead altogether and assign scripts to freelancers.

This seems very odd. The fifth episode of this first, six-episode season had even higher ratings than the already-strong series premiere, so tanking ratings aren't an excuse, and the show has been widely critically acclaimed even as it has daringly moved further away from the original source material. One possible explanation is that Darabont has been doing a lot of the work to begin with -- he wrote episodes one and two himself and was thoroughly involved with the writing of the other four. But thirteen episodes is a lot more than six, especially if the comics become less reliable as source material to fall back on, and firing the writers seems a potentially strong jolt to the series' momentum. (Deadline via io9)

THE WALKING DEAD "Opening Titles" from Daniel Kanemoto on Vimeo. Fans everywhere are fairly excited for AMC's upcoming The Waking Dead series, a television adaptation of a well-respected zombie apocalypse comic written by Robert Kirkman, premiering October 31st of this year. One fan in particular, Daniel Kanemoto, was excited enough to make extremely moody opening credits to the show that will most likely rival AMC's version of the opening credits. (Daniel Kanemoto via Kuriositas via Boing Boing)

In June, AMC began production on a television version of The Walking Dead, an esteemed comic book created by Robert Kirkman and published by Image Comics. The comic (and now television series) follows police officer Rick Grimes as he attempts to survive a zombie apocalypse.