Juvenile Cinephile

MAD MEN

#5.13 

“THE PHANTOM”

This was an episode that made time to wrap up things and also indicate that yes, there are still loose ends and there are future mysteries to ponder next season.  But let’s go over what got wrapped up first and start with the after effects from the suicide of Lane Pryce.  

A considerable amount time has past going from the early March, eternal winters in the Northeast (Easter came late in 1967) to the budding spring of late April (Casino Royale played in the movie theater Peggy and Don were in that clued me in on the date).  The effects to the agency see their most successful quarter thanks to Jaguar and perhaps some other, smaller, unnamed accounts brought in.  It is unclear if they got Dow Chemical and some current clients are restless (Topaz) and some have bleaker futures (Mohawk Airlines in June of that year has a plane crash), but the agency’s on the up and up, literally.  They are expanding to a new floor with the five partners gaining that new space, since the other floor is seemingly haunted by Lane Pryce and Ida Blankenship.  Hell, the agency even gets a profit with Lane with the life insurance.  In a bizarre way, Lane leaving puts them in a better position.  But that is not to say there is no guilt still felt.  

The void of Lane was spatial, an empty chair present in scenes but never named.  Joan and Don, the only two who could say had interactions with Lane beyond professional still have a limited mindset for the suicide.  Joan thought offering herself to him romantically could have fulfilled him when there are probably darker issues in Lane’s past that made his trajectory unavoidable.  With Don, following previous behavior in other episodes and other characters this season, tries to do the ‘nice thing’ and give Mrs. Rebecca Pryce money on the agency’s behalf.  She refuses, believing that the agency had poisoned her husband both morally and ethically painfully accepting her husband’s professional limitations were his downfall.  Money cannot buy away that kind of pain and personal agony about a love one and I think the Lane ending was very realistic and in-line with the stiff upper-lip that has clearly boxed in the Pryces.  

We find out that Peggy working at CGC as the creative head has pretty much fully transformed into the female Don Draper with a take no prisoners attitude toward her creative underlings and hanging out in movie theaters while on the job to figure out the questions of the day later.  Her superiors seem to accept this and let her take a personal business trip on behalf of what I believe we are being led to believe are Virginia Slim cigarettes.  Peggy as a creative head taking on a cigarettes account?  Oh my lord, she is Don!  It is not the classiest business trip (even without the dog-humping shot the hotel was a by-the-numbers kind of shabby set-up) but it is something and she is reveling in it where she is trusted to get the account instead of being patronized as ‘the little girl’ by Bert Cooper and under-appreciated by Don at SCDP.  We saw Peggy shine this season when she got to actually tap into her feminine side instead of professionally cross-dressing with the Heinz pitches to be Don-esque.  She was already a Don-type of ad person but the Chevalier Blanc pitch showed a certain promise that makes me think even if she does not get Virginia Slims, her feminist streak is really going to come out next season, picking up the scraps of women products from other agencies and turning them into gold.  It could just be that I am a Peggy fan and this is wish-fulfillment, but her and Don at the theater are equals and given that Don has to give angry, fire-breathing pitches to the big boys, I think Peggy may be in a better position than him come Season 6.  

The last shot of Don Draper seems to be contemplating proposition by a woman at a bar who gets her girlfriend to do it for him.  We never see his answer and it is a pretty blank canvass to project on if he will stray from Megan or cooly reject it like he did at the brothel in “Signal 30”.  But the motif of a Don’s animalistic, carnal, ‘beast’ yearnings when his ‘beauty’ is no longer in his life (Mad Men writers seem to get the original story more than the those blinded by the Disney film) seem to signal ‘DANJA ZONE!!!!’.  We know now that there is a definite possibility for stray Don Draper to happen.  

Megan’s self-worth this episode took a substantial dive in order for her to get what she wanted.  A rejected screen-test, a bitchy mother who is more in town to schtup Roger Sterling than hear about her problems, an acting friend trying to play a game of ‘I scratch your back if you scratch mine’ to appear in a commercial by SCDP, and ultimately deciding to get her major break by using her husband’s connections to appear on that commercial.  Don initially rejects it that it is bad for business but there is a part of him that decides to let her go.  Watching her screen-test, he realizes that for him, she was ‘his discovery’ romantically the way Peggy was his discovery professionally.  But as Peggy tells him, letting them go and watching them succeed has to be something he wants.  Don has kept Megan close in ways that verged on the abusive professionally.  She rejects working in advertising, a major sin since she revealed to be good at it, but wants to be very public face in the crowd and if that includes appearing on a national campaign, then so be it.  We have seen her give performances, from sex games to ‘Zou Bissou Bissou’, but Don has always been in the room and in a way he is in the commercial with his name on it, but she cannot just be his wife for her to be fulfilled and get traction.  He cannot be the only person watching and falling in love with her on camera, others will have to as well.  He has to walk away from the sound stage for her to get what she wants.  That is going to be hard on the marriage and whether or not it lasts (I think there will still be a marriage next season but its strength is another matter) is up in the air.  

In a way that Peggy was Don this season, Megan engineered her wooing of Don advertising a somewhat false avatar very much in the way Don has always advertised himself to others.  He thought she loved advertising and was thrilled at the thought she also wanted to be his work partner.  It is much more transparent now.   She is an actress.  Don knows Megan the way she knows all about him.  She accepts him but does he and can he?  Again more questions for next season.  

The weak point of this episode was the Misadventures of Pete Campbell in Cos Cob.  It was a bit too soapy for Pete to emotionally strip himself naked to a woman who no longer remembers him.  It was also much too quick and resolved that Trudy agree he gets an apartment in Manhattan because his excuses for looking beat up stem from car accidents.  I much more enjoyed professional Pete this season because he is such a ruthless manipulator and at-all-costs type of ad man.  Seeing him distracted by Howard and Beth Dawes, after so much time elapsed, at work just did not feel right when we saw him so power-hungry in the previous episodes. If the episode just cut to the chase and had Howard reveal he had Beth shocked which led to the very strange territory of the audience actually pulling for Pete Campbell in a fight, I would have found his sub-plot a bit more acceptable along with Trudy being more feisty and not so gullible.  Pete is one character I am most curious about going forward.  I would much prefer to see him more business-driven next season if just because I find Roger, Joan (though I loved her authority in the partner meetings), Bert, and Don to still be woefully old-school about business where I think Pete is going to have to find the new blood accounts and finally get the company featured as a hip ad agency.  He can also be despicable at the same time but I want office Pete to be the focus rather than retreading suburbia.  

Overall, this season has been divisive for a lot of people.  But for me a lot of the doom and gloom, the marginalizing of certain characters (Lane and to a certain extent, Peggy), the battling behaviors characters are fighting internally and externally, the yearning for control or maintaining control, the loss of control, and the changing times have made this season almost a prelude, an appetizer for the next two seasons.  The agency is growing but there are still a lot of flaws that could preclude them from reaching their potential.  Relationships seemed to have irrevocably changed on a professional and personal level.  Characters know what can and cannot change them, some are accepting of that and others just do not care or try not to care.  But the world and cultural landscape are going to make things even harder to turn away.  Things are going to be more transparent, more cynical, and a lot more colorful.  This is a show that knows it cannot be the same smoke-filled rooms of biting subtext.  This is where modernism and ends and post-modern begins and I cannot wait to see what the show does moving forward.  

Other Thoughts:

I will be ranking the episodes in the next coming days.  And I do not care what anybody says, “Mystery Date” will be near the top!

I saw the ghost of Adam Whitman coming and Don’s toothache added more opportunity for him to have macabre hallucinations.  It was okay but it spoke more to Don also dealing with his new life leaving an indirect body count that finally hit him after Lane.  Don knows he can never leave him but I am wondering why he wanted Adam to stay.

“You Only Live Twice” by Nancy Sinatra for the music montage and close-out song was a perfect choice considering this season has shown the lives of many characters fulfilling essentially these ‘other lives’ or ‘new lives’.

1968, much like the Kennedy assassination in Season 3, appears very unavoidable. Things start to go to hell immediately in January with Khe Sanh and the Tet Offensive but Vietnam is still background noise with only side characters involved at this point.  I think Dow Chemical would have to be under the agency for there to really make the war come out front and center.  

I think Civil Rights are happening next season as well.  Given that there is a lot of dissatisfaction and lack of bodies in creative, could there be a person of color hired?  Or will they actually listen to Topaz and hire a girl (before Peggy clearly steals Topaz from them)?  

I enjoyed the hell out of Julia Ormond as Mrs. Marie Calvet.  She killed her lines both in English and French with a lot of dry wit and tone that was both devastatingly true and really funny.  You get her affair with Roger Sterling as they are a bit of the same kinds of people.

Speaking of Roger, I think his LSD trips are going to be apart of his banality by season 6 and his phone-stalking for Mrs. Calvet was hysterical.  And I am sure that was not the brief nudity people expected on the episode warning last night.   

Shoot me, internet, but I enjoyed Jessica Pare as Megan (the character as well) and thought this episode in particular was a good one for her.  Drunk-driven episodes on Mad Men are always good for characters on this show.  

Excellent job by the people behind Inside Mad Men on misdirection.  We know Jessica Pare had the hair flip wearing an outfit she wore in a previous episode when talked about the episodes but of course her last scene was in the kitschy, sorta Disney’s Snow White outfit.  Christina Hendricks also was still in her costume from “Commissions & Fees” that made me think that episode was her last appearance (until I saw the preview, of course) but wore several different blue outfits this episode.   Same with Jared Harris being in a different suit than he wore in any of the episodes.  No stains and rope burns in sight.  Also served as a good clue Peggy would re-appear since she never wore that red number until the finale.  

Noted Loose-Ends Never Answered and Ones to Contemplate:

What are the partner percentages now after Lane.  Pete seems to be on equal footing along with Joan.  Was it too soon for a name change?  How much does the rest of the agency know about this?  Clearly nobody wants to touch Lane’s office.  

So is Abe like Peggy’s wife sitting in her apartment writing for radical weeklies?  We never returned to Peggy’s home life and now I am siding with her mother that Abe is test-driving her.  I personally always found her dynamics with Stan more interesting and his explicit declaration that he is sick of working with Ginsberg makes me think Peggy will take him with her a la Lady Godiva on a horse.  

Dow Chemical.  Again, will the agency suddenly become politicized beyond doing campaigns?   Will Ken successfully phase Pete out and will Ken’s standing at the agency be hurt or helped if they do get it?  Will his personal life be in any danger?  Will Don’s political apathy be challenged by the younger creatives given that I get a feeling Ginsberg hates war based on his personal history and Stan seems to be a firm believer in the military industrial complex.  Guess they are saving that nugget for next season.  Hopefully it means more Ray Wise.  

MAD MEN

“The Phantom”

#5.13

Oh, boy.  Last week’s episode still feels very heavy to viewers, so will the suicide of Lane Pryce still weigh heavily for people at the agency?  Reading two different previews, one brief description of the finale from Slate and another from UK’s Radio Times (that has since looked like it has been scrubbed), it feels like for the most part that everything is rosy for people except two characters, Pete and Don.  But nonetheless, Matthew Weiner describing the finale as ‘orgasmic’, makes me think this is a breather from the dour season of death anvils.  

So that begs the question: How much time has passed since the suicide?  Could a month really be enough time to move on from one of the named partners committing suicide?  Also, how much details of the suicide have been disclosed to people at the agency?  Has Don told anybody about the forgery?  Is the company letting Lane Pryce resign in his boilerplate resignation/suicide note or are they letting his wife and son get the proper life insurance compensation?  How has the agency picked up since then?  Did they get Dow Chemical after Don’s fire-breathing, desperate pitch?  Let’s go investigate the cryptogram of next week’s (only seen after the broadcast) preview:

“I’m sorry to drop by like this?”-Don Draper

So who is he trying to see?  Initially, I thought Peggy Olson (already in a fix to see her again) but realized the doors do not match.  The adjacent door to Peggy’s apartment is blue, not stained wood.  Other viewers have noted this seems to be the residence of Rebecca Pryce.  I can believe it.  Don has a really guilty conscience combined with the fact he has many questions to ask Rebecca about Lane both personally and professionally be it the forgery, their financial state, and perhaps why Lane could do such a thing.  I do wonder how long has passed in this episode given that Rebecca could still be in the United States given she is not employed and her husband who had the VISA when he was employed is now dead. Not sure what the immigration policies in 1967 were on that one.  But this definitely looks like Don at Rebecca’s door for reasons pertaining to Lane.  Given that the previews mention Don being ‘haunted by a face from his past’, it adds to the idea of how much he saw Adam Whitman’s suicide intersecting with this suicide and wondering what leads a man to kill himself.  Given how the Slate preview mentioned Lane’s past coming up as well, I am assuming the abusive household is sure to come up, I think Don gets a lot of answers from Rebecca.  Or, at least, the audiences does.

“I know who it is.”-Pete Campbell

The defeated, irked look on Pete’s face does not bode well for him.  Given that the previews for the show summary include him ‘facing the consequences of his actions’ and ‘meeting a stranger on the train’, one wonders if he is facing potential blackmail or is caught in a web.  The Radio Times episode summary has Alexis Bledel’s Beth in the listings and speculation can run wild on that one.  I am thinking this could be about her and Howard or how Pete’s affair with Beth gets unearthed.  Is the ‘stranger on the train’ relating to her failed marriage or has Trudy gotten a private investigator to look into her husband’s recent behavior that could lead to her finding out he has had affairs?  This seems like a personal phone call Pete is giving rather than business-driven call.  With business, he is a completely different person, even in a state of disillusionment and anger, than how he presents himself on the phone.  

“I got this, this morning”- Joan Holloway Harris

Joan hands something over to Don.  What would she want to show him in her mail. Is it about her divorce (since Don is the only person who knows and may be somebody Joan can relay to about such matters as a divorced man)?  Did Greg die in Vietnam?  Or is it Lane-related or agency-related?  This episode has consistently been mentioned of how it is ‘opportunities abound for everybody’ at the agency. This could also mean Joan.  Could Lane have given her his 12.5% share of the company?  Could she be harassed by the speculation that surrounds her getting a partnership (This episode is called ‘The Phantom’)?  Could it be about how, and this goes back to last season, many people thought her and Mr. Pryce were a thing? Given that Don and Joan were the closest to Lane having a friend in the agency, I believe this is Joan disclosing something Lane-related to Don.  Also, one of the lines that has gained the most traction between Lane-Joan is that he told her she could do his job.  Will it really happen now?   

“Damn it!”-Megan Draper

Megan also gets a letter and it definitely appears to be something unwanted.  Did she get a role?  Did she not get a role?  Something medical-related about her or Don?  Is it financial?  Don and Megan this episode has included two situations of one of her ‘friends’ (not sure if it is the red-head Julia or somebody else) asking to get a job in a commercial on behalf of SCDP and the fact Don is spending money ‘largesse’ for her.  What could this all mean?  Not sure if it relates to this scene, however.  Megan appears in black (going to acting class or a funeral?) and there is a woman in the scene but obscured, also in black.  Who is it?  

“Clearly states the exact opposite.”-Don Draper

So is this the new business?  It appears by the artwork that the agency has taken on a motorcycle account given we see a figure on a motorcycle.  So perhaps, unlike last week, we finally get to see the post-Peggy Olson creative.  Who is in charge of the copy-writers?  And what is the latest pitch?  Given motorcycles have always been about rebellion then, rather than mid-life crisis, it seems Don has to try and give a pitch that possibly involves ‘the youth-quake’.  Given his other pitches this season have been more for adults, Jaguar and ultimately Heinz, and the Sno-Ball pitch was for kids, this is Don trying to come off as in on it.  Is the pitch working or is he trying to volley concerns about the pitch that are clearly not from his mind but from the younger, hipper creatives?  

“So is it true or not?”- Harry Crane

Leave it to Harry to be the first possible candidate to ask Joan a personal question that also may involve the agency.  I doubt Ken would spill but is Harry speculating on Joan-Lane, Joan’s partnership, or the fact that she may very well fill Lane’s position and gain even more power?  Joan seems to want nothing of it, sighing in disinterest with no eye-contact to Harry.  You wonder if he just asks this question or if he keeps on prodding to the point Joan lashes out.  Joan has shown she can break this season, such as with her outburst against the receptionist so I would not put it past her.  

“Hello?  I can hear you!”-Megan Draper

Megan has a new acting friend.  Is this the friend vying for the commercial spot?  So did she get a nasty, heavy-breather phone call?  I am guessing that.  Oh boy, was it Glenn Bishop?  I mean, the kid knows the number!  Some have speculated that because the play she tried out for, ‘Little Murders’, had an obscene phone call that she is just acting it out but the look on the friend makes me think it is not acted out.  

Other Things Shown and Not Said:

Pete enters his house.  Better be some Trudy-Pete interactions!

Megan turning her head to a figure that I presume is Don as it looks like later in the day after she receives the obscene phone call.  

Don drinking something while in a shawl sweater on his bed.  Holy crap, Don looks like Mr. Rogers!  What is he drinking?  The Radio Times preview briefly mentions a health issue.  Is he drinking or is he taking something to remedy the health issue?  According to a summary on the UK Sky Atlantic, it is a toothache that hopefully does not produce dreams with homicidal tendencies.  He looks old and distant in this scene.  Is this really supposed to be a ‘happy episode’?  

How were My Predictions Last Week, You Ask?

Don did not have a health issue.  It was all about Lane who was indeed discovered as a result, killed himself.  Betty was annoyed by Sally preferring The Draper Love Nest but in the end she ‘wins’ as Sally rushed to have her mother to take care of her.

Joan’s new assertion of power has not pissed off people… yet.  Don is still annoyed about the situation and dissatisfied by where the agency rests.  

Ken did put two and two together it seems about Joan and does feel gross about it, but has not left… yet.  

Predictions:

The finale has been described as having a ‘cheeky James Bond themed montage’ that also includes ‘getting the old Don back’ and I can only imagine what that could be.  Does it involve Don or a cast of characters?  Will Don stray?  

Roger has a surprising reacquaintance supposedly.  I do not think it is Joan.  Mrs. Calvet, Jane, and even Mona would seem like more realistic guesses at this point in their relationship.  

Pete’s comeuppance has nothing to do with work but it could overlap.   

Somebody gets fired even as the agency takes on new business.  But somebody may also leave.

We do see Peggy albeit briefly at another agency or perhaps at her apartment with her radical boyfriend that she has seemingly avoided for months.  

We get a lot of Lane backstory that could reveal more about his personal history and money issues.  

Joan gets more power.  

They do get Dow Chemical and there is some drama with what Ken laid down because of not having Pete near the account.  

Some historical event will be a bit more pronounced than usual.  

MAD MEN

“COMMISSIONS & FEES”

#5.12

There was just far too many anvils and references to not see this coming.  Be it the talk of life insurance, car crashes, drawing of nooses on a notepad, the Richard Speck murders, an empty elevator shaft that is still undefined of whether it was a literal image or an illusion, and the falling man that though always apart of the show had changed this season with advertisements showing the falling man going straight down alone and not through a rabbit hole of retro advertising.   I and many viewers spent this season looking at the possible characters who would die.  It became clear it was going to be somebody at the agency.  It then thinned out to somebody high up in the agency.  Then it became clear that Lane Pryce was our fallen man (though perhaps not the falling man).

Many have written in previous episodes that this fall from grace felt shoe-horned and random, akin to Joan agreeing to the proposition (that I still defend was consistent with her character and people have had this false mythology about Joan even before the transpiring events of the previous episode).  But back to Lane.  The man since Season 3 had already shown a side where he had this inferiority complex and self-loathing that came from an upbringing by a cold, cruel father who re-appeared in Season 4 who caned him and subsequently stepped on his hand when he tried to retrieve his eye-glasses knocked down.  His class had put him at odds with the English toff employees in Season 3 and he never felt an equal to Don, Roger, Bert, or Pete even when he had his name on the door.  Nobody really knew his story with Joan and Don getting very small glimpses.  Lane kept a front of bottling it up, too proud and too stubborn to admit defeat over anything.  It was his fatal flaw that dug himself deeper and deeper to the point his wife had not had a clue. 

I do not think Matthew Weiner set this suicide up as some shocker but rather a dreading event that had been in play for some time.  Nobody knew more about Lane and his situation than the audience.  The discovery of the check by Bert Cooper reflects what would have probably have been the general response from people of the agency, that it was far more likely Don wrote a bad check than Lane forging it.  Don offered to Lane what he thought was mercy, and I am frankly surprised by the reaction toward Don when I thought he was pretty well-mannered given the stakes in the Don Draper avatar.  Don is a shedding snake.  He can adapt.  He can make ‘the elegant exit’.  Lane cannot.  Losing his job means returning to England as a failure which doubles the failure since I am certain him leaving the motherland to America was viewed as a failure for many in his inner circle.  His breakdown in front of Don is heartbreaking because to Don this is not the man he knows but here is a man more emotionally naked than ever before.  Credit to Jon Hamm and Jared Harris in that scene.

When Don finds out about Lane’s suicide, I think the suicide of Adam Whitman immediately crossed his mind.  He kept Adam at a distance and when Adam tried to re-enter his life, Don pushed him away.  Don was never as cruel with Lane but that this was another instance with somebody in the agency leaving his side, in such a violent fashion, certainly effected him.  That scene of Don letting Glenn Bishop drive his car on the State Thruway, though a bit jarring, showed a man trying to be kind, even to somebody practically a stranger to him.  I think Don hearing that Glenn is already in a pessimistic state of mind led him to do it.  He was projecting Adam onto Glenn.  Somebody deserved to be happy that night.

This has been a season of people getting what they want and feeling a bit empty if just perplexed by the fact it turned out to be different.  The other sub-plot of Sally trying to be the assertive, young adult inviting Glenn to spend the day with her, only to have it end with her taking a cab back to Rye in a panic after getting her first period, shows the teenage side of things where on one hand, wanting to be in the adult world but the other implications of that world are a bit frightening.  Sally went for the material things first with the mod clothing shopping with Megan and getting hair and makeup done to look older much to her father’s shock.  Then there came the mannerisms, such as eating the ‘adult food’ of codfish, drinking coffee, and suddenly conversing with Megan like she is one of the gals.  Then there came taking control of getting out of the ski trip, sneaking out of The Draper Love Nest, and having ‘date’ with Glenn.  There were obvious cracks in this development, mainly her bratty nature to Betty, her precocious Holden Caulfield salvos of labeling people as ‘phony’, her gossiping about ‘Bluto’ and the ‘dirty’ city, and the fact that she had a completely different mindset for what a boyfriend meant than Glenn did.  Thankfully it seems these two are just friends. 

Betty getting to have her satisfaction in that her daughter came to her, much to her shock, seemed to be a satisfying moment that she of course, rubbed in the face of Megan, aka Don’s ‘child-bride’ who seems to know not to cave to the passive aggressive smog monster that is Elizabeth Hofstadt Draper Francis.  Of course, her daughter suffering embarrassment caused her to have great new role to brag about.  Fat Betty, you are the best and I hope you stay the way you are- just in limited doses. 

Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce at this point may be in a false position of assurance that seems dashed when Lane’s body and letter of resignation is discovered.  Don feels betrayed by the people he works with and who have left him though his deal seems more with who surrounds him as of now be it the partners or even mild-mannered Ken Cosgrove who’s father-in-law could mean hot business for the agency.  Don’s pitch to Dow Chemical (and oh my ain’t napalm going to be the new cigarette?) is one of the most aggressive pitches I have ever seen him give.  I am not sure whether it was too aggressive or hit the right notes, but this is a man taking out his anger in his work but that tunnel-vision determination may have had him miss what has gone on with Lane.  Hell, this whole uneasiness about new business reflects learning about the possible ramifications of ‘The Letter’ and that the Jaguar speech to the office was more desperate than determined at the time.  Realizing that even a good campaign to win Jaguar required prostituting a co-worker turned that desperation into anger. It almost seems spiteful that Don is going for the big guns, to show that the agency is not only better than that but they can get companies that are worth their time and effort.  Damn, Jaguar must really be pissed about their involvement in this season’s dread. 

Whether Don is still angry with the fire and passion to really make SCDP a brand or this Lane incident has put him and the agency in a funk is going to be interesting to watch in the finale.  I have honestly no idea what can is going to go down.  Well, I do have my ideas, but I do not mind being surprised or reminded about what this show is about.  Great episode. 

Other Thoughts:

When Don made a reference to the partners making back-door deals when he leaves the room, the look of hurt on Joan’s face was so palpable.

I think just about everybody shed a tear when Joan cried realizing why Lane’s office was locked and barricaded. 

It would be a shame if their last conversation had Joan kicking Lane out of her office for making a lewd comment about her in a bikini. 

Come on, it crossed your mind that Glenn may have his new sights set on Sally’s stepmom.

I did not really take to Megan’s acting friend Julia in the beginning but I really enjoyed their TMI conversations with each other in front of Sally.

It seems the only person so far who may have put two and two together in terms of why Joan is a partner is Ken and that makes a lot of sense given he knew of the proposition, knew that Pete did not immediately say ‘no’ to the idea, and considered the Jaguar deal DOA.  Major kudos to him for making his negotiation with Roger include not having Pete at any meetings.  Man of integrity right there. 

I enjoyed the hell out of Betty making vague threats about strangling Sally when talking to Don on the phone.  She actually sounded like a mother.

Finding out from Jared Harris that the reaction by Hamm, Slattery, and Kartheiser was actually them seeing his corpse for the first time, is pretty interesting.  Roger’s reaction, when you account his reaction to the Ida Blankenship death, was especially interesting to see. 

Again, Jaguar was such anti-product placement.  From Lane puking at the sight of the E-type and his first botched suicide attempt stemming from the fact the Jaguar did not start. 

I am sort of have hoping the agency cannot land Dow Chemical.  So much shit will hit the fan with napalm and I can only imagine the conflicts within the agency getting super-politicized for representing/defending napalm even though Don is politically apathetic abd unaware of how jingoistic and out of touch it will be, even more than cigarettes. 

No Peggy this episode or even a mention of her.  It appears to be early to mid March so enough time has passed and there was no signs of creative for her presence to even be spoken about in passing.  I hope she is on the finale. 

Really good comparison shots of Don reacting to the Adam and Lane suicides that I found on Alan Sepinwall’s blog:

Now last week, I told you that I knew of a certain spoiler that I discovered reading details of a clip that circulated on the show’s carrier in the UK.  It was the scene where Pete gives the proposition to Joan.  Now I did not know she would accept it or how the partners would deal with the news or that Joan would ultimately fulfill my aspirations for her being the first female partner of the company.  But still, I think knowing that beforehand led to me not really having a severe, projecting, judgmental reaction to it like some viewers and critics (**cough** Linda Holmes **cough**) of the event.  This week there seems to be a more ominous and obvious turn coming from the previews for a few characters.  Let’s break down the promo for ‘Next Week on Mad Men’:

MAD MEN #5.12

“COMMISSION AND FEES”

Scarlett dictating a partners meeting that Joan is now apart of with a unanimous iraise of hands.  Scarlett has replaced Joan in her role given that Joan is now married to the company with 5% of the stake in SCDP.  You can bet she will not be silent or an easy push to get a vote.  

“You can’t tell anyone about this”- Don to Megan

-Is this work-related?  Or home-related?  Either way, that Don is imploring Megan to hide something is interesting given that they really do not cross-over into each other’s worlds at all anymore.  This pretty much stands by the idea that nothing leaves The Draper Love Nest without Don’s control.  But why would Don want Megan to keep a secret?  Is it regarding his identity get forged by Lane Pryce?  Is it that Don is so frustrated by the turn of events at the company that he tells her about the Joan incident?  Or is it something inter-personally about them?  The third option seems like the highest chance among the other categories since it is expected that whatever news is going on with them they both are in the position of power to tell whomever the want, except Don wants to control the message.  Megan looks a bit surprised and anxious about whatever he wants her to keep as a secret.  Is it their health?  

Will not say the p-word.  WILL NOT SAY THE P-WORD.   It could easily be Don’s health being an issue.  His smoking only seemed apparent in two episodes, “Far Away Places” (Megan hated his smoking in the car) and “The Other Woman” (stress with the Jaguar account turned him into a chimney for that period) whereas the man is drinking alcohol like a fish and it has come up more as a concern for Megan and Don before, even before they were even a thing.  

I do hope it is Don who finds out about the forgery and that maybe Megan, staying at home in The Draper Love Nest gets a call regarding the check.  Could that be the straw that broke the camel’s back?  Don may have no will to live in that agency any longer if they are letting it bleed in his name.  Sally is going to be in this episode but I do not see how it could involve her and why it would effect Megan or her having secrecy being asked of in that situation.  I think she knows well enough by this point that telling Betty anything that goes on at their place is a bad idea.  

“I’m sure there are others more deserving.”-Lane Pryce

-I am thinking Lane is out there about talking to some tax lawyer or banker with the interest of the company’s credit.  Could also be a client or it could be with his wife, Rebecca.  There is an air of unease to him as this could be a really be the character-defining episode for him and I am on pins and needles to see if he will go down like a coward or swinging.  Yep, I do not even think he can recover from the forgery. 

 “Were you celebrating with Don?”- Joan

There is a bit of sardonic side to her when she says that.  She could be talking to Pete, Roger, or Lane.   But I am thinking she and Roger are now on a strictly professional relationship, partner-to-partner with little cuteness.  Pete, oddly for a guy who put her into the position she was last episode he appeared to be most comfortable with her in the room at the partners meeting but I do not think they are suddenly talking to each other in that manner, Joan is a professional.  Since this appears to be a Lane episode I am thinking she is talking to Lane because I really hope that a Lane-Don drink talk has a lot of potential in fallout.  Don may not even know beforehand, it could just be Lane spilling and Don (understandably) freaking out.  

Also want to note that Joan’s outfit is what she is wearing in Inside Mad Men shorts on AMC’s website.  Usually, the characters are wearing what they wore for the finale/last episode.  I know Joan re-wears clothes but that red, white, and blue number is note for note what she wears in the shorts.  So, I do not think we will see any Joan for the finale.  With that said, I really hope she hope her screen-time regardless of length is significant this episode.  

“I don’t like what we’re doing.”-Don

-Don seems completely broken creatively after his Jaguar pitch got tainted by Joan’s tryst.  He may also be stuck on an account with a room of free-lancers and Ginsberg that is going nowhere.  Note, those free-lancers last week in the end were useless since Ginzo came up with the idea for the campaign and Don nailing the message.  He is hitting the bottle and as another life-line in his office leaves, he seems more alone than before, probably not trusting the partners or Joan in the same way again.

“So you’re drinking with a purpose.”-Roger

Could be Roger just being observant and trying to give Don advice since the Jaguar account or it could be that Don is working on an alcohol-related account, hence ‘drinking with a purpose’.  Not much time has past since the ‘incident’; it is still winter with the snow coming down in the background window of Don’s office.   Roger has also lost his existential breakthrough LSD afterglow and things could be returning to normal, for Roger, but not Don who probably wants to get more clients to move on from the stink of the Jaguar account.  

Don is leaving the office late at night and it should be noted that all of these shots in the promo have him in the same suit and tie, including his talk with Megan.  It would make sense that she could get a call from a bank, an accountant, the doctor, or wherever about ‘the secret’ while he is at work or it could be early morning.   Don has a lot  on his plate that day.   

“You know you can’t keep being the good little boy while the adults run this business.”-Bert

Looks like this will be another talk with Don.  Invokes both the love-leave comment from ‘”Far Away Places” and Pete’s comment in “Signal 30” that Don suddenly acts like he has the moral high-ground.  That Bert is having another talk with Don makes me think this has become serious.   Don is still rankled by the ‘incident’ or the continued behavior of the firm has defeated Don with Pete rising and while he is getting marginalized.  

Other Stuff in the Original Promo:

Don is answering the phone but says something to the effect that he finds this conversation to not be at the right time.  Could be Sally, could be Betty, could be Megan; I just think anybody on the other end of that phone conversation is family-related as he is trying to be work-focused.  But since he is in the same suit and tie as the rest of the promos, the call could easily have gotten forwarded to his home on his insistance knowing that Megan is there who tells him later that night.  

Also a shot of Rebecca Pryce telling Lane that they should ‘celebrate’.  I am assuming this is work-related with the company that Rebecca wants to treat him but this could be on false pretenses with Lane holding the bolt in the company and probably is too guilty of a man that he has to be pushed into celebrating.  

How were My Predictions Last Week, You Ask?

-Nailed the Jaguar stuff with a little help from Sky Atlantic HD and very dedicated viewers.

-Nailed that Don and Megan were going to have kinky sex in his office.  Did not realize it would be as much of a break for her as it was for him.  

-Knew Peggy would triumph in something related to a pitch but not that Don would have his mind elsewhere, again, that finally pushes Peggy out of the agency.  

-Knew Lane would not be revealed but did not realize the depths he would go to cover his tracks.  

Predictions:

Lane finally does get discovered.

Don’s issues are health-related and something he prefers to be discreet about.

Don is going to have thoughts of where he is within the company that may make him seriously contemplate his mortality with the company.  To echo Roger’s unease in “The Beautiful Girls” episode from season 4, Don does “not want to die in this office”.

Sally’s presence at The Draper Love Nest is going to make Betty freak out in some way that is just going to annoy the Drapers.  She may not be the subject of the secret but Sally may just get in on the secret based on her curiosity and precociousness.  

Pete is clearly becoming a rainmaker.

Joan’s assertion of power is going to bowl over one of the male partners, if not already with Don.

Some junior employee is going to put two and two together with how Joan became a partner.  It may be a Pete Campbell revealing ‘Dick Whitman’ to Bert Cooper in a season 1 type of blackmail that falls on deaf ears or it could lead to somebody leaving because of the grossness of it.  

I feel like since the previews show many of the characters in the same outfits, most notably Don Draper, that either this episode is going the “Far Away Places” route where the episode is in a day or something big is being withheld.  The end of Lane?  The end of somebody’s time at SCDP?

MAD MEN

“THE OTHER WOMAN”

#5.11

Peggy Olson and Joan Holloway Harris.  We saw them in the beginning as secretaries with Joan navigating Peggy how to play the game.  But Joan’s passive aggressive queen-bee status and Peggy’s earnestness were just a mismatch.  They are not the same kind of woman in a variety of different ways, and the different eras of the workplace each one represents reappears time and time again.  Joan never thought of herself beyond being a secretary, even though it is proven and spoken how she could easily do the work of the male partners at SCDP.  Peggy went from secretary to copy-writer and is still willing to kick in the glass ceiling even though I would say she is pre-second-wave feminism at this point.  The moment after the news of winning the Jaguar account, Joan gives an exiting Peggy a look.  Joan might not know off the bat that she is gone for good from the agency, but there is a sense of Joan can never leave the agency.  She is the personified organ of the agency and ever the more indispensable after this episode. Peggy is moving on, she has outgrown the agency and the shadow cast by her boss and ‘older brother’ figure Don.  We saw in “Lady Lazarus” that the empty elevator shaft that Don sees after Megan leaves seems to point how he can never really leave.  Peggy leaving of course is horizontal at this point; same field, different agency.  Can she move up vertically?  Let’s hope Mad Men gives us the privilege to see that.  

Prior to Peggy leaving SCDP, we have seen in little bits each episode that she has plateaued in her work there.  From getting buried in an account that she got thrown off of, getting phased out of working on accounts because of her gender, and her work being under Michael Ginsberg’s name had to unnerve her as she was practically living in the office re-doing and re-viewing work for the day.  Don throwing money in her face, who has ignored a lot of her situation this season be it with his marriage or being anxious over the Jaguar account, was the breaking point. Peggy has never given a thought with a career outside of advertising but her wings at SCDP seemed clipped and her pact with Ken Cosgrove appeared to just be in name only.    But she realizes she can walk away, realizing money cannot solve her problem with her and the agency.  There is no price for her creativity.  

Joan also did not put a price on the asset that has gotten her most attention at the agency but that response was ambiguous enough for Pete Campbell to twist to the partners that she could do a proposition from an important Jaguar exec.  Money will not do, for many reasons, but Lane Pryce plants a seed in Joan’s head that a 5% stake and partnership in the company will do.  Now people think that Joan rejecting Roger offering to pay for Kevin seems like a much better option when weighing the two but for Joan, the Roger option still has her dependent on somebody else’s money.  That is just not Joan.  Yes, she is giving away her agency for the night but her reward is something in her control and not in a control of a man she knows far too well.  It is heartbreaking to see Joan willingly let go of that agency with the Jaguar exec and even more perverse that the glass ceiling has somewhat cracked at SCDP based on this with Joan as the first female partner but, even if Joan does not know the whole story from all of them, the male partners at the firm have all been involved in ethically questionable and heinous acts with clients.  Joan is not ashamed about it but even with her vertical rise through the agency, it is this agency and something she cannot walk away from.   

I think for both Joan and Peggy, their options are completely in character.  Peggy may have been raised through the agency but she is a woman who realizes she can walk away and not have to follow the path expected of woman at that time.   Joan does follow the path expected of her and if anything, the path has been very disappointing and destructive to her.  Joan relishes the power she has at the agency and there is something to note that with Greg out of the picture, but in the picture enough that he is seen as Kevin’s father, getting control back comes through the agency that not only helps her but the agency— as backwards as that is given what she has to do for both her and the SCDP.  

People seemed surprised that Don was against Joan doing it or rather, the only one against it.  I think in a way, he wants the Jaguar account for himself rather than Pete, Lane, Roger, and Bert openly pimping out Joan.  Last episode, Don made it his mission to get the Jaguar account and his pitch, via the ever perceptive Michael Ginsberg, seemed like the one pitch to officially get him back in the saddle.  However, we find out that his 11th hour trip to tell Joan not to go through with it was too late and that the account is tainted.  And by the end of that day, he loses the thrill of winning the account, his protege, and the woman he could never have but respected.  Work is no longer fun for Don already and a day like that may have done more long-term damage for him professionally at the agency. Don is removed from love-leave but also work, frightened that Megan was the one that would ‘run away’ when it stood true for Peggy.  He does not really understand it, Peggy wanting to leave, but it makes him uneasy with what he is left with.  Can he ever leave?  Or is his exit that empty elevator shaft, that he can never leave?  

Among the season 5 episodes, “The Other Woman” stands out in not just its all-around quality and balance but plot-wise it could be a real game-changer for the season and perhaps the series overall.  My only real complaint is the lack of Roger, and not just for zingers, but the fact that we saw no dilemma going through his head about Joan getting propositioned and that he trusted Pete Campbell’s word.  This season has been accused of being too “obvious” with its themes and the theme of women compartmentalized, objectified, and used as objects may scream out on paper as ‘try hard’ but it underscores that nothing has really changed.  There may be more ways and options for women to walk away but I think it says a lot that the briefest but most on-the-noise (in a good way) sub-plot was Megan’s audition because I am certain that for Matthew Weiner and the like in the industry, that is kicking the hornet’s nest.  

Other Thoughts:

Yes, I definitely was in tears at the end of this episode with the way Don, Joan, and Peggy gave each other heartbreaking looks.  This should easily be the Emmy submission episode for Christina Hendricks.  

A show of hands: Who recoiled in abject terror when they saw Pete turn his head and smirk after talking to Joan?

I do not think this is Elisabeth Moss’ last episode of the season, let alone the series, though her beaming exit into the elevator as The Kinks’ “You Really Got Me” was stupendous.  A much needed lift from all of the sadness.  

My only negative response to Peggy leaving is that it is to work for Ted Chaough.  I hate that guy!  Why did Freddy have to direct her to him?  

Don and Megan seem to need each other as escapes and breaks from their careers sexually.  I think it has dawned on Megan that returning to acting is not easy but their talk about the Jaguar pitch at home after work showed she is not giving into the temptation of critiquing the ‘mistress’ pitch, leaving the bedroom to look at a script.  But hell, even her late night visit to Don when she shoots down Stan and the free-lancers asking for any ideas had her give a dismissive statement that was still more interesting than what they were coming up with, with the exception to Ginsberg’s pitch- but he was on Mars anyway.

Now Ginsberg looking at Don’s office contemplating Don and Megan brings into question what he sees as who is getting ‘owned’, that most certainly inspired his pitch.  At first, I thought for sure Megan was ‘the Jaguar’ (certainly not ‘the Buick in the garage’) but rethinking his phrase that she ‘comes and goes as she pleases’ makes me think it speaks to how she has Don wrapped around her finger.  Given that he knew her as the boss’ wife, I think for him he easily sees that she is the one who won in this union and not the other way around and that is not necessarily her as the one ‘owned’.  

Pete never answered Joan’s hypothetical of how he would react if Trudy got propositioned.  I think we all know the answer to that question.  

Joan’s mother flirts with plumbers, is casually racist toward people of color, and now wants Greg to die in Vietnam.  I think we know what part of her personality she is fan-servicing as a character.  

I note that Peggy’s realization that there is nothing for her at SCDP is pre-second-wave feminism.  The fact that her biggest champions are Freddy Rumsen and Ken Cosgrove, not to mention Harry Crane speaking fondly of her to Don, shows that although the feminist streak in Mad Men in terms of plot and character arc is still in developing stages it is not going to be a random showcase of ‘The 60s!’.  

Will Jaguar ever want their product on the show ever again?  Now I just think all of their execs look like Antonin Scalia.  

This took place in mid-January but close enough to Valentines Day in 1967.  Did Super Bowl I already happen?  The game was not really taken seriously as an event so I can imagine it goes under the radar in the zeitgeist whereas the Ali-Liston fight in Season 4’s “The Suitcase” was must-see, must-hear, must-watch.  

This episode was co-written by Matthew Weiner and Semi Chellas who co-wrote this season’s “Far Away Places” and you got that feel of “Far Away Places” with the ‘return’ to Joan’s apartment to realize her tryst with the Jaguar exec already happened and Don’s quest to change her mind was too little, too late dramatic irony.  

Janie Bryant style callback.  Not just Joan wearing the black fur Roger gave her but a callback to her likeness to Rita Hayworth by going Gilda with the Black cocktail dress.  

That montage of Joan’s tryst and the pitch was gold and would make Eisenstein cry if he did not hate capitalism and consumerism so much.  Also helped the Jaguar models in Stan’s art work were hot red.  

People are wondering why Don would be concerned with Joan using her body but not Sal with Lee Garner Jr. in Season 3.  Beyond the homophobia and Joan being a woman, he admires Joan way more than Sal.  For Don, Joan is the indispensable, living incarnate of the agency.  Sal was a dispensable creative type who was a dime a dozen.  

MAD MEN 

#5.11

“THE OTHER WOMAN” 

Let’s begin by me saying I am partially withholding information as I have known from a couple of spoilers that have been readily available to UK viewers of Mad Men on the channel that carries it, Sky Atlantic HD, about what is going to happen with a couple of characters this episode.  Although I did not see a clip that is pretty integral to the plot, there was also a Radio Times preview summary of the episode there were many savvy UK viewers that each gave the in-depth description of said preview scene.  As you can imagine nothing shown in that preview scene was available for us viewers in the ‘Next Week on Mad Men’ clip at all.  Still with that information in the back of my mind, I am willing to decipher the clip without spoiling it.

Jaguar is still obviously in the game with Don giving a previous pep talk that this is essentially what SCDP is going to be working on for the remainder of the holidays through the New Year.   But what to say about the preview clip?

Don looking out the window of his office just smoking a cigarette.  Immediately it appears this in the same time frame as the next clip of Pete calling all of the senior and junior partners into a closed-door meeting in Pete’s office.  

Judging by Don’s facial reaction to being asked to close the door, this looks very impromptu and perhaps involves the sensitive nature in the tactics of how to win the Jaguar account, according to Pete Campbell.  

“You have to stop being afraid.”- Joan

Clearly she is serving as the office’s Lucy van Pelt and is giving Lane advice.  Given that Lane forged Don’s signature on a check and that Joan was phased out of the partner meetings regarding the Christmas bonuses, perhaps she knows what is up.  She has to know by the books that Lane’s push for bonuses even before the Mohawk Airlines account stalling was probably something that should not be on the table.  Or he could be opening up to her on a personal matter.  She does not seem mad at him but warm and encouraging so I think at first she does not know about the forgery or his very interesting math about the Christmas bonuses.  

“Let’s stop playing games.”-Trudy Campbell

Uh-oh.  Does Trudy know about Beth?  Does she know at least something is up with her husband’s behavior recently?  Is she tired of his persistence in looking for new clients which seems to border on stalker-ish by his own admission?  This seems like a different kind of Trudy than we have ever seen, especially this season.  Something is up and she is not taking Pete’s BS at all.  Go Trudy!

“We want to know why you want to pull the ad?”-Ken Cosgrove

It appears Ken is talking over an inter-com at the SCDP offices.  Is it a client or somebody within the company?  Is it Jaguar or some other account that they cannot afford to have problems with at that point?

Peggy is there and I am sure as a part of creative who needs to know what was wrong with it  to fix it and I guess it is good to see her on an account again after her work with both Mohawk under Ginsberg’s name got stalled and getting buried in Heinz beans.  So even in what seems to be a bit of a distressing situation, Peggy is there with Ken and not physically near a client to strangle him for not liking the ad a la “Far Away Places” Peggy.  

“He just came right out and said that?”- Bert Cooper

This seems to be the closed-door meeting in Pete’s office given that in the background of where Cooper is sitting, there appears to be a photo of Trudy.  

Something seems to be going on with Jaguar where Pete has the most direct-line of communication than anybody else in the company so I am guessing he is the one giving this news.  Bert sounds a bit surprised.  What could it be?  I do not think the account itself is in danger but there is something very specific that involves the account that was communicated to Pete about what the company needs to do to win the account.  

A woman’s hands cover Don’s face who appears to have falling asleep and gets awakened.

Now given that this episode is called “The Other Woman”, everybody was guessing/fearing/theorizing that somebody in the office is having an affair and given the direction of the Calvet-Draper union, could Don possibly cheat again remains an interesting question.  But this appears to be innocent.  

You notice that he is at the SCDP office and that this Don is working overnight with creative.  You can tell he is with creative because there are boxes of chinese food all over the table and we have already seen creative with Chinese and they are total night owls.  I think it is Peggy covering his eyes to wake him.  For her this has been her everyday life for months where work is her home.  You notice somebody in the background there and I believe it is Ken (Ginsburg would have to have a fashion makeover and Stan’s linebacker build does not fit the description either) since he and Peggy are buds so he is also working late to fix the pitch or brainstorm the Jaguar account.  

It could also be Megan surprising Don since the blouse does look a bit like the paisley number she had on for “Dark Shadows”.  She could be getting out of class and visiting knowing that her husband is working late and quite possibly be giving him a ‘break’ with a little relaxation.  **cue the train going into the tunnel and fade to black**

“A wife is like a Buick in the garage”- Megan Draper

Now people are speculating that could Megan already be so defeated by not getting any acting gigs that she could be giving him another pitch a la Heinz Beans.  

But I just sense that this pitch will annoy her.  In fact, I can probably finish the pitch she is reciting, “A wife is like a Buick in the garage.  The Jaguar is like ‘the other woman’ you take on the road”, or something of that nature.  That has to annoy her in my mind, giving that she knows the man she married.  Unless she is trying to help him and what would make her husband happier than her helping him out like the Heinz pitch?  Again, these two have the strangest aphrodisiacs.  Babies, cleaning, breaking things, fixing things, and successful business pitches.  Maybe these two can make it?  

But a part of me loves that they are calling back a Roger Sterling neologism when he hit on Betty in the Draper home and when is confronted by Don he says, “Sometimes you park the car in the wrong garage” and that John Slattery and Jon Hamm both do car ads.  So a callback and being meta.  Love it.  

But back to Megan saying this.  She looks like she is in nightwear talking to Don before they go to sleep.   Given their last advertising-related discussion went off like a led balloon, I think this could also lead to a bit of friction.  It might not even be Don’s pitch but something he green-lit but Megan could easily see this as Betty Draper Poisonous Smog Monster level of passive aggression.  

“What are you hoping I can do for you?”- Don Draper

The look on Don’s face makes me think, “This is a woman he is talking with!”.  He would never talk like that to a guy.  He has that stupid flirty smile on his face with that leading question.  I believe he is in his office and that this is during his ‘living in the office’ night given he has on the same neck tie as the previous clip after being awoken.  So I can easily see the woman who wakes him being Megan with him being surprised and they go into his office and then….. **cue train going into the tunnel and fade to black**

What Also in the Original Airing Promo:

Ken and Pete at a dinner together which can mean either Cynthia and Trudy are friends or they are at a client dinner.  Guessing by their exchange, I believe it is the latter.  Ken says, “Was that what I think it was?” to Pete’s “Yes it was!”.  Pete’s uncomfortable smile means it is business.  Lane also has a clip in the partners meeting where he gives a pep talk saying, “Go on!”  That this fell on deaf ears in all likelihood could point to his little meeting with Joan.  There is also Pete knocking on Joan’s door?  Have we ever really seen those two interact?  Hmm…

Prediction:

The Jaguar account will have conditions that I am not sure people will be comfortable with.  Peggy may have some rescuing to do on an account that finally lets her out of her creative abyss.  There is a photo of Don and Peggy with him appearing to look happy for her and she is not dressed like a Catholic school-girl so she appears to be dressed to impress so I am hoping Peggy is victorious in some fashion this episode.  

Lane will not be found out and exposed… yet.  

Pete will be in trouble with a lot of people.  

Megan and Don will have some alone time in his office but she will be looking at the ads and be colored unimpressed by the message of the Jaguar ad and challenge Don on it.  

Jaguar is never going to want to having their product on Mad Men ever again.   

How did I do last week, you ask?

It was not Christmas but around early December/Pearl Harbor Day.  

Megan did take Don to a play which insulted him and he made a jab at her for leaving the agency for being against advertising with him looking miserable and while their Christmas dinner was not ruined, we did have Megan’s sad spaghetti.  

Harry is not leaving but we saw Paul again and I guess to see Kinsey again we needed more Harry.  Whatever.  Nobody saw that Krishna turn coming, however.  

Very little Peggy this episode as the clip was her only scene discussing Paul’s fanfic… I mean spec script for Star Trek.  

Nailed Joan’s relationship with Greg coming to a conclusion and that she would open up about it.  It turned out to be Don.  

Now Don and Joan did pose as a couple but nothing happened so I will not eat any hats but he did make that sardonic couple line to Pete.  Don was talking about the bonuses but he wanted them withheld until the party but nobody is sure who he was talking about.  Joan?  Peggy?  Megan?  

Lane is in deep shit, indeed. 

Mad Men 

“Christmas Waltz”

#5.10

Despite Mad Men’s Season 5 partly being about moving to the future there have been constant reminders of the past, from Megan and Peggy checking off names of side-characters from the earlier seasons for Don’s birthday party in “A Little Kiss” to even just ‘the past’ of characters literally and figuratively creeping up on them.  But then you have the actual physical characters from the show’s past showing up on your television that can only give you a ‘WTF?’ reaction.   Midge and Duck Phillips were last season’s instances of ‘Where are they now?’.  This past episode it was Paul Kinsey and boy, does he have a whole story to tell. 

The Harry helps Paul get the fuck out of Hare Krishna and dodge to California was one of the weaker sub-plots because of the ridiculousness beginning and ending with Hare Krishna (and just the visual of Paul Kinsey in Hare Krishna).  But the sub-plot made Harry seem caring if still very horndog-ish (getting caught in a web of weirdness and possible STD transmitting with a gal name Lakshmi), out of his element, unaware and naive as he has always been.  His kindheartedness probably still scratches the surface of Paul’s existential problems of needing to be in the in-crowd and throwing money at it a la Roger Sterling makes me wonder if Paul can be saved.  But the gesture for a character like Harry and the way he has been portrayed the last two seasons does make me think the act does come from a good place of where the character was in the first two seasons.  

We move on from characters out of the past coming back to characters who are growingly showing how of the past they look and feel.  Roger’s ridiculousness in relation to Pearl Harbor Day, and that it fell to mostly blank stares, shows he is still of a different generation and experience, particularly the trauma of his Navy days, and that he is beginning to use the LSD trip as a crutch to prove his sudden, better worldview.  For people like Don and Joan who have known him for years, and appearing to have heard many different iterations and pronouncements of this trip, it has gotten old.  Roger’s control in this episode post-trip seems to be gone and for Don and Joan they experience, or are still experiencing, the loss of their control.  

For Don it is the post-Megan SCDP where even she is not buying that ‘it is not the same without her’ when she knew he loved working in advertising before they even met much less saw each other in a romantic light.  She takes him to the play America Hurrah, a real play that makes advertising its punching bag, figuring he has said worse things about his own job but she still finds a wounded child mad that she left the advertising world and a void in their marriage.  He says the office misses Megan at the bar (and note Joan’s silence to that declaration) but really, he misses her.  I am guessing they work around a schedule that Roger planted the seed in him coming home quite early, another indicator was with Pete being ever the concern-troll telling Don he may have to work past 5:30, before she went to auditions or classes.  For Megan this seems like a ticking time-bomb, and her physically violent reaction to their dinner as he comes home drunk extremely late shows her heightened anxieties about that, as when they met she saw a brilliant but volatile man who had issues with control and alcoholism (remember, he told her as his secretary to count the glasses).  Given that he did this with Joan and that they played the game of husband and wife with Jaguar yet none of this was thrown back at Don by Megan, because he was being honest, and that it was about work makes me think the issues of fidelity are not the point of contention.  It is the fact that Megan also wants Don of the past back.  The guy who loved work, won the Clio, and earned his creative director reputation instead of getting eye-rolls and side-eyes from the copy-writers in creative because he sleeps in his office, has half-assed pitches, or leaves the office early.  

For Joan’s past it is something that points to her femininity and changing role as the dame of the office.  Last season her voluptuousness seemed to be forgotten with the sexist copy-writers and even the long-stays who once saluted her bending over.  The issues with Joan and control is that she often does not take the route we often associate with her reputation as a character.  Having Kevin pointed to what is still expected of her just as marrying Greg and she willingly gave into those choices.  Yet in both situations, she found herself itching to go back to the office because she had no such control.  No matter how terrible the workplace was for women, especially for her, she earned a reputation as a no-nonsense gal who got respect and fear from both sexes.  But when Greg turns the tables and becomes the first to file for divorce, it crashes down on Joan that those choices she made were terrible and even before that news, she refuses to cave into Roger’s idea of supporting Kevin because she has no control over that either.  

So when my television nearly exploded with the amount of chemistry between Don and Joan at the bar, I found myself believing this was not even fan-service or turning into something more than just this moment.  It was two kindred spirits trying to find their standing in the present while reflecting on their pasts.  And they definitely looked like people from the past.  Don’s fedora definitely aged him.

Don is a bit of a romantic, especially drunk, quoting the infamous Bobbie Barrett, putting on a fedora, and reminding Joan of her beauty of a certain time period by mentioning Aly Khan, the husband of the great redhead sexpot of the 40s and 50s, Rita Hayworth, because of all of the flowers she received from admirers.  The last bit was the most heartfelt and kind, topped off with Don finally giving Joan his admiration with flowers, but Don also mentioned his respect and fear of her at work because of how she carried herself.  Joan needed that talk after nearly murdering the clueless receptionist but she maintains a realistic outlook when Don is trying to help find her ‘a date’.  She knows it is very unrealistic for a woman her age, with a kid no less, to start looking for that special someone.  

And no, I do not think Don and Joan are going there because I am pretty sure cities and households will explode because that chemistry is TOO MUCH.  Moments like the ones they shared are not too far off the Peggy-Don moments.  I like when the show is not too incestuous with their ensemble and I think Don knows not to touch either Joan or Peggy, especially if he ever realizes that both Roger and Pete marked that territory.  He almost is too brother to both of them for me to feel comfortable with that.  

The end of the episode marked that old Don has risen again with a pep talk to get Jaguar.  Was it more Joan or Megan who pushed this new Don back into the spotlight?  Was it both?  I think somewhat.  With the Mohawk account stalled, getting Jaguar becomes all the more imperative for SCDP.  But can this Don last or is this a New Years Resolution Don?  

Overall, this episode was an old-school, inviting breather of the past even though now for one of our characters, Lane Pryce, we now have a possible incendiary situation that could catch more fire over time that possibly takes more than one person down.  But that is just speculation on my part.  It is good to see relationships and work-place stunts be apart of the program again.

Other Thoughts:

I wonder on what grounds did Greg file for divorce.  Did the math finally add up to Kevin not being his child?  

Scarlett, the secretary.  I don’t think she is going to be that significant even though speculation ran wild why they were suddenly showing her because new secretaries always seem to be involved in everything.  Seriously, if there were a secretary that deserves major stories it is Dawn.  

It is not that Hare Krishna itself is ridiculous (except it kinda is).  Paul in a priest collar is a ridiculous enough thought.  Paul being devout in any religion much less a cult is a joke that just writes itself.  

Between Joan’s outbreak and Megan’s spaghetti splatter, no prop was safe this episode.

So Megan and Don having role-playing angry sex is a thing.  Their neighbors must love that.  Now if Don, although he was very sauced, got confused by her smashing food possibly meaning this was foreplay then I am very curious about how dark, dirty, and deep their games got.  Still convinced Don leaving work early meant going home to a lot of that.  Megan needs to hone her acting in some way, I guess.  

Peggy had maybe one little appearance with Harry but what we have now learned is that she is surrounded by current and former co-workers heavily invested in Sci-Fi.  

Speaking of Sci-Fi, Paul’s Star Trek script in retrospect is terrible and insensitive (much prefer Ben Hargove) but for the time period even the people who supported diversity as Gene Rodenberry and other sci-fi writers had….. interesting takes on racism allegories about space.  

The next episode being called “The Other Woman” alone is giving me shivers.  More than “Lady Lazarus”.

In many ways Don’s pep talk further enflames Pete’s Don envy.  He seems to be the only guy going after clients and yet he can never have that much control or believability in that room.  

Lane forging checks through Don’s name.  An excellent twist on the Don Draper avatar but now I am doubly concern for both Lane and Don being found out.  Hell, Don finding Lane out may possibly bring out the “Mystery Date” side of him.  Lane better hope this only reaches Joan.  

Come on, the moment you realized it was Paul you realized that a certain part of the Mad Men viewing population is demanding the return of Sal Romano next.  

That’s Chekhov’s Jaguar XKE cum red herring that I thought for sure Don would wreck in a drunk driving accident.  But then he returned it and it was just him acting even more pathetic in The Draper Love Nest.  The man is of many contradictions and him saying a car doesn’t do it for him is a stone-cold lie.  

Obligatory Joan as Hulk Smash gif:

MAD MEN

“CHRISTMAS WALTZ”

#5.10

You can bet Sally and Bobby #4 were watching this and Gene was off in the distance playing alone with his toys.  

“Someone’s not going to be happy and I would rather not stare at it for a month?”-Don Draper

-Is somebody getting fired?  Was two weeks notice (and I am guessing Christmas vacation could play a role in this) a whole lot longer back then?  Is is a really bad pitch idea before going to Christmas break?  Or is somebody just choosing a terrible Christmas/Holiday decoration?  This looks like Sardonic Don Draper talking to either the partners or even creative.  His body language suggests let’s just put this situation under the rug.  Since Don really seems out of his element in work, talking to either Roger or Bert or Lane or the creative team are equally plausible.  

“Your promise was to EXTRICATE me from this situation altogether!”- Lane Pryce

-Why, hello again, Lane!  What the hell have you done since we last saw you?  Is this calling back to his stolen photo of Dolores in “A Little Kiss” that led to him meeting a shady as hell boyfriend?  The phone conversation is at night in his darkened apartment so it is either a really big secret that Lane is keeping from Rebecca or it may involve him back in his home country since the other line on the phone may very well be calling him in the morning from London.  

Either way it is good to see Lane back on camera again since his last appearance in “Signal 30” was one of the best episodes of the season and his story seems to hold a lot of the focus and most mystery.  Like Don last week, we see him in the office in the very odd, possible late hours, as well as look bitter, and not just from the cold, as he leaves the offices of SCDP.  I am not even going to bother to guess on this one, I want to be surprised.  

“He’s sorta been threatening to stop by.”- Unknown Secretary

Harry Crane still being at SCDP has been a real surprise.  He seemed to be in a Hollywood haze for all of Season 4 and there are many indications to suggest he wants to get out.  His only real job has been to get Don with The Rolling Stones and that failed.  He has mostly sat in Pete’s old office after taking $1,100 bribe from Roger and hanging out around the office, like talk to Pete when they are not even on the same wave-length.  Very little of Harry this season but that appears to change since he has been placed in the vague plot summary as, ‘Harry helps out of a friend’.  So is this “friend” the one who is threatening to stop by?  I say yes but since I not too involved in the Harry Crane universe, I have no idea who this person could be.  Maybe from Hollywood?  Last episode, very subtly, Harry openly expressed his discontent for his work as head of the Media Department being nothing but a “bunch of empty promises” which got a response out of Peggy in addition to Ken Cosgrove informing him that at least his office is in the same building.  I think Harry could be a candidate to leave the agency and hey, if that in some bizarre way in the Mad Men universe saves Ken or Peggy or even Pete from leaving as in also possibly leaving the show, I am okay with that.  

“You may have to stay until 5:30!”- Pete Campbell

-Is there a bigger concern troll in the offices of SCDP than Pete Campbell?  He is, of course, telling this to Don who may still actually need this push.  I am guessing Don followed Roger’s advise on him and Mona’s relationship that things need to be on a schedule now that Megan is out of his work-life.  Is Don taking off early before Megan leaves for acting classes for some afternoon delight?  I am going to imagine that this comes as surprise to Don given the holiday season happening but Pete’s tough love may be reflecting the different economic state of SCDP from Season 4 with that elaborate Christmas party to now post-Lucky Strike where it is all about business.

“I couldn’t care less!”- Joan Holloway Harris

I am not really paying attention to what Joan said but her outfit caught my eye.  She has worn this before and the rose-patterns are very much apart of her character’s relationship with Greg.  As Tom and Lorenzo have pointed out in their Mad Styles review of the “Lady Lazarus” episode, the dress may be seasonally appropriate but it looks like a bunch of dead roses on her dress that reflect her relationship with Greg.  Remember, in that episode she confided to Peggy that the marriage with Greg was essentially over in that outfit.  Joan’s body language in the scene comes off with a certain ease and casualness versus the front she usually puts on in the office.  I feel like only two people in the office are allowed to see Joan act this way and those two are Peggy and Lane.  I am guessing Peggy is at the other end of this conversation.  But the conversation also shows a bit of deflection, that she should care about something.  But what?  

She also wore that outfit when Don told her that Megan was quitting and spitting out venom to Peggy that she believes Megan, like Jane, follows the ‘second-wife playbook’.  Is there something with Roger or even Don that she could be talking about?  I think it may have something to do with the fact that her husband is not home for Christmas or more specifically, for Kevin’s first Christmas.  Joan not being too upset makes sense in her dress as she believes the relationship is dead and perhaps she has come to terms with the fact that she is not even going to bother to deny that Kevin’s father is not Greg.  But perhaps to somebody like Peggy who like the rest of the office only sees the surface of her relationship, the idea that Joan’s husband is not home for Christmas or to see his son’s first Christmas is very unusual.  I hope Joan can confide more about her personal life to somebody not named Roger in this episode.  More Joan in general is always good and it looks like she is spending the holiday at a bar, notably with a flower pendant that further minimizes the Greg relationship.  

“Maybe you and I should go as a couple.”- Don Draper

This again could be Sardonic Don and this clips wreaks of audience misdirection.  If this is Joan or even Peggy at the other end of this and that it will go anywhere, I will eat my hat!  He could very well be telling this to Roger Sterling or Pete Campbell.  He sounds a bit exhausted but not desperate, very casual, so I am thinking this is being dryly sarcastic and that Don is not being serious.  He could be answering advice to somebody like Lane or Roger about going to dinner without their spouse since one’s marriage is destroyed and the other’s marriage does not appear to be in good shape either.  Don and Lane last season bonded over their singles status so I could believe Lane would ask such a thing to Don.  But if this is Joan, oh boy, may it just be for posing…. which hopefully leads to absolutely no misunderstandings.  

“That’s a twist.”-Peggy Olson

Again pushing the misdirection by having Peggy follow the Don clip.  Who is she talking to.  Judging by the blazer that seems to try to be festive but looks out of date seasonally, I will eliminate Pete, Roger, and Bert from the blazer candidates.   The blazer in fact looks like the blazers Ken, Pete, and Don wore for “Signal 30” but looking again and the print patterns do not match.  But looking back at “Dark Shadows” it appears to be Harry Crane’s winter coat and that Peggy sounds happy for him.  Please, oh please, may this be him leaving SCDP!  

Other scenes and stuff only shown after the airing of “Dark Shadows”: There is a dialogue-free scene of Megan in a formal gown soaking in what I am going to guess is Don acting like a child about going out.  I am assuming she dragged him to see it because he seems very dressed down compared to Megan, just from work and does not look like he wants to be there as Megan’s looks for his reaction and it does not match hers.  I am assuming they are at a play for either one of her friends or a work by somebody that she is hoping will get her a gig with in future instances.  

Then there’s Harry saying, “They’re derived from reality but there are hopes and dreams.”  With him sitting down at an office of a higher-up.  Not sure if that is him a new agency or talking to the friend.  

Predictions:

Joan is going to open up to more people about the downfall of her relationship with Greg and perhaps the details as far as the paternity of her child, though stopping at Kevin not being Greg’s.  This seems like it could be Joan’s “The Suitcase” with opening up to somebody on a professional level about her personal life right down to the bar.  

Lane is in trouble and this will last more than a single episode whether he likes it or not. Why?  I want more Lane Pryce.    

Don is up to his neck at work to the point he and Megan can not have a holiday exhale which leads to a misunderstanding where Megan’s ‘orange sherbet’ is not well-received by Don and we have a reversal of ‘Far Away Places’, except no chasing around each other in the apartment but just a bitter Christmas.  

Harry has a lifeline to leave SCDP but that leads to the question of who now will be the head of Media.  The politicking begins.  

How did I do last week, you ask?

I nailed Betty getting jealous but I had no idea she would be the ‘Anna card’ on Sally.  I did get the chain of events wrong.  Her revelation to Don that Sally knows about Anna came after Sally and her were alone after Don took Gene and Bobby out to someplace we will never know about.  

I knew Megan was reading from a script but it was not for her but her theater-kid earnest friend Julia as Megan dismisses the script.

The smog did play into things on a literal, on-the-nose, 

Peggy was responding to Harry’s very woe is me ‘empty promises’ quip but that weirdly went nowhere that episode but could go further this coming episode.  

Peggy was really ignored this episode to the point her pitch got phased out like her dress on the couch when it became Ginzo vs. Don.  

Don does consider Ginsberg a creative lifeline but not somebody to put under his wing as Ginsberg does not operate in such a way and neither did Don by looking through his stream of consciousness ideas and pulling together an ad and dropping Ginzo’s ad.  

Pete was fantasizing about Beth but his sensitive, ‘you can’t be here’ was also in his fantasy.  That creep…..

Howard nor Beth died but Pete really wanted gave a truth-telling tongue-lashing to Howard that was so ridiculous out of context that there was no way Howard could believe Pete would dare sleep with his wife.  

Don was indeed working up a storm and he is very much off his game.  

Roger did invite Jane out for dinner and this deal required Roger to pull out Jane’s J-card that in Season 1 seemed like a suicidal task.  

The smog happened but the kids were not at Don’s for Thanksgiving so they were not in harm’s way from the smog although I will still refer to Betty as the Smog Monster.  

MAD MEN

#5.05 

“Signal 30”

Pete Campbell wanted to become a Don Draper.  He wanted to be the hot shot ad executive, he wanted to be a king among men.  Even knowing Draper’s true identity of Dick Whitman, he has continued this path.  This may have been his greatest mistake.  

For one thing, Pete and Don were on two completely different ends of socio-economic class and life experience from the beginning.  There is also the fact that Don as the suburban husband who womanizes while his wife is largely unsuspecting as he remained a doting father to his children is that the wife and kids suited a role, a vision.  Don’s powerful presentation of “The Carousel” at its most cynical is Don seeing his family as a vision of the American Dream that is accessible for his clients.  Sure, there was love in those photos but it is clear the marriage to Betty was becoming nothing more than Don overpowering her with his influence and vision of what a wife should be.  That changed with Megan.  

Don Draper this season is way more controlled and many fans of the show have some ambivalence about this Don.  His fever dream shows his fears and anxieties but is he capable of violence?  People are waiting for the other shoe to drop, for his honeymoon with Megan to end.  But, as Chuck Klosterman wrote after the Season 5 premiere, this Don could easily be the ‘real’ Don who is finally coming out rather than the Don who lied his way into his first gig at Sterling Cooper and built up a facade that made him so enviable to characters like Pete, and even some viewers who should know better.

Pete cannot be Don for many reasons but him trying and failing seems like a set-up for this character going into an abyss.  The suicide pool on this show seems to have two prime candidates: Pete Campbell vs. Roger Sterling.  Both have revealed suicidal thoughts in past seasons and both seem to be on edge this season looking for appreciation.   Roger has largely stayed the same in the ‘poor little rich boy’ lifestyle and searching for further satisfaction but Pete’s changes as mentioned before have been trying to emulate the ideals of bringing up a family in the suburbs while getting his cake-eating at the workplace.   Roger’s masculinity cannot be questioned given his war experience that still haunts him but this episode was a series of Pete getting emasculated.  He has not a clue about how to fix the appliances in his home while the no-collar farm boy Don probably knows it like the back of his hand.  Pete does not know hot to fight being raised under Nannies and boarding schools while Lane came from a stiff upper-lip family and boxing lessons served as an imperative for survival.  Pete from previous seasons tried to shone his writing skills after Ken Cosgrove got published in The Atlantic Monthly out of jealousy— and all he got was Boy’s Life to publish his story for $40.  

Pete’s ambitions are firmly in the company but then he has his other fantasies that have been apparent since early seasons, such as his drive to be dominant and masculine by hunting, something he can never have in the city.  Pete wants to be the king of his castle but it is clear who dominated the domesticated space during the dinner and that was Trudy.   Kind of like how Megan dominated the house party in the series premiere, but she made it up to Don by re-instituting the balance of power with their dirty carpet sex kink.  Trudy lost her looks in Pete’s eyes (for shame, Peter Campbell!) and so he settles with a prostitute who gives him a long line of spiel before settling on him as a ‘king’. The lowest blow may have come from Pete making googly-eyes at a high school student in his driver’s ed. class only for her to immediately turn her attention to much more brawny, age-appropriate guy with the nickname, ‘Handsome’.  

Pete is cutthroat but him building alliances and impressing people have burned and blown up in his face.  Don casually remarking to Trudy on the phone that she knows how ‘to close’ better than her husband may have been an exaggeration but Pete throwing Lane, Roger, Peggy, and to a lesser extent, Ken Cosgrove under the bus on some level this season shows a guy who is reminding everybody why people hated the bastard in the first place.  The glee of everybody’s reactions to Pete getting the crapped beaten out of him by Lane and him crying foul tearfully in the elevator, “I thought we were friends!”  Not really, Peter.  

“Signal 30” being the episode after “Mystery Date” could possibly be the a connection with how weirdly masculinity and violence are so intertwined.  Charles Whitman, the University of Texas at Austin killer, is mentioned with Pete’s rifle coming up in the dinner conversation.  Have we come to a head where we have a literal Chekhov’s gun on the show that could have a body count?  Perhaps, yes, and perhaps, no.  But I think how the episode shows masculinity that succeeds an episode about what leads to violent urges does serve to underline a common theme of the period, note how close these events all are in the two episodes, a mere two weeks.  This was no accident and instead of going straight on to the bloodiest periods of the late ’60s that undermined the ‘summer of love’, Mad Men shows the dark clouds already present among the characters and the historical backdrop.  

Other Things:

Despite this episode being Pete stripped, this was Lane Pryce’s reclamation.  He has struggled with his English identity and enjoyment of things considered English in America given his outsider status in the agency that bares his name.  Sure, he lost the client to no fault but a very incredible place to stick your gum before sexual intercourse, but he beat the crap out of Pete for shaming him in front of the his fellow partners and he got to kiss Joan who totally forgave it.  

Why Joan is the best: She opens the door after the kiss, acts like it never happened, and then slyly says everybody wanted to do what he just did… to Pete.  Thank goodness she is back at the office.  

This was the best John Slattery-directed episodes by far.  Beautiful, fluid transitions, incredible humor found throughout, and scenes that were just total treats for fans.

One of those treats are Peggy and Joan reacting to the sounds of the fight, both who were sadly not featured much in this episode.  

I am glad Ken Cosgrove is still writing but not sure about the new pseudonym, Don Algonquin.  Given that Star Trek premieres about 5 weeks for when this episode ends, I kinda believe that Ken could soon be out of the office and on to better things writing science fiction.  

It is not entirely clear if Pete gave Ken up.  I can easily see Peggy casually mentioning to Roger that Ken has written great science fiction and accidentally outs him, despite their agreement.

I think the unanswered question about Roger having so much cash on him was answered when he treated the Jaguar exec and the others with prostitutes.  And I do not know what to think about the fact he took a busty redhead in that scene.

So Sterling’s Gold seemed to have flopped hard on Roger.  And now only Peggy and Don know about Miss Blankenship’s origins as a hellcat of sexual perversions.  May she rest in peace.  

Don saying if he met Megan first he never would be on his second marriage.  Again, this may test the believability of viewership but Don seems truly devoted.  Not batting an eye to anybody at a brothel?  Discipline!

I know he seems boring now but how cool is Don?  Telling the Madam he grew up in brothels (I am assuming his father didn’t stop despite his wife discovering a little accident named Dick Whitman from his earlier carnal extracurriculars) and that her place was nicer than he can imagine managed to get him a free drink despite not doing business.

Is Megan on the pill?  Drunk Don got so happy seeing Trudy and Pete’s kid that he wanted one in the car.  Was that the booze talking (he acted no such way despite being prodded by Joan showing him little Kevin Holloway about more kids) or is he serious?  I think it is the former but given they had two of these situations twice already, I wonder.  

Megan told Don to handle Trudy on the phone.  Bravo to Megan!  

I only have two samples, but I much preferred Ken’s narration to Don’s narration and that is because Ken writes beautiful prose underscored by Beethoven’s 9th while Don admits he has a 9th grade education and likely lower reading level.  Love how their narrative voices reflect their writing skills.  

Obligatory Pete got punched GIF:

5.01 “A Little Kiss”

What is the Time: Memorial Day weekend into early June, 1966

What has happened since the last episode since Columbus Day, 1965 (historically and fictionally):

Fictionally: Don and Megan have gotten married.  She knows about the Dick Whitman deal and accepts it.  Their relationship is pretty carnal.  There seems to be a certain kinkiness that Don only previously tapped into getting slapped by a prostitute in Season 4.  That said, I think he kind of ruined the Mary Poppins/Maria von Trapp facade of Megan to his kids because that woman is a sexpot. 

New York Worlds Fair closes to major loses. 

Henry and Betty moved the kids into the home of Gomez and Morticia Addams.  Don and Megan’s apartment, though a little too modern for Sally, at least feels 1960s.

John Lindsay is elected the Mayor of New York.

Joan had a boy named Kevin who did not come out of the womb with white hair.  Joan keeps on saying she is not at ‘fighting weight’ but with those curves?  Please.  Husband is still alive in Vietnam.  Boo!

The soap opera Days of Our Lives premieres on NBC.

Joan wants to get back in the work force while her “babysitting” mother thinks she needs to stay at home.  Joan misses SDCP and fears her role can soon be filled.  Lane assures her that is not the case.

A Charlie Brown Christmas debuts.

Peggy and Abe are going strong while Peggy now has to work with Megan as a copywriter.  Rizzo is still employed but they have more of a brother-sister bond.  Peggy is highly concerned that Don has lost his mean streak and persuasiveness in the boardroom.  But has Don become ‘too nice’ or has Peggy become ‘too cynical’?

Indira Gandhi is elected Prime Minister of India.

Pete still hates Roger and Roger especially loves to troll Pete and really anybody in the office for more boozing with clients.  Pete wants Roger’s office, not just any office.  But he ends up being completely fine with taking Harry’s office in the end.

The 1966 Uniform Time Act is signed to “promote the adoption and observance of uniform time within the standard time zones”.

Harry Crane has officially been corrupted by Hollywood.  He makes lewd comments about Megan that she hears.  Harry has fear she will tell Don or Roger but little has changed in dealing with harassment in the workplace.  He is safe, for now.

Legendary albums Blonde On Blonde and Pet Sounds debut. 

SCDP’s competitor has a PR disaster when their copywriters throw water balloons on black protesters.  SCDP put out an ad that says they are an ‘Equal Opportunity Employer’ as a way to point the middle finger at their competitor who gave them unexpected extra business.  Little did they know how many applicants would fill the waiting room. 

Comments:

Megan’s party ended up being Mad Men All-Stars with a cross-section of characters (central, auxiliary, and first appearances) representing the 1960s.  Megan getting tips from Peggy on who to invite made for good Easter Eggs for longtime viewers. 

Pete is at his vainest at the office but seems incredibly human in his Greenwich home. Roger is in a more inverse situation.  He also seems to keep a front up at work but enjoys it as he is completely miserable with Jane.

The scene where everybody gets a look at little Kevin had a lot of subtext.  Peggy in general looks the least uncomfortable but then you throw in the fact Pete enters the frame and the looks they give each other make for great TV.  Megan, while good with children, does not seem interested in having one.  And of course Kevin has gas when Lane holds him. But then there is Roger holding the baby with a cigarette at the end of his mouth.  Adorable and irreverent. 

I am completely surprised and unsurprised Weiner had the Whitman reveal off-screen for Megan.  I am not surprised she was understanding of his life story and  that takes a lot of regurgitation of a plot-point done before for the show to explore.  Well done, Matthew Weiner. 

Lane’s only normal relationship seems to be with Joan at this point.  His relationship with Rebecca is up and down.  She is great company for him at parties but the phone calls and talks revolving around their son going to prep school do not interest him so he gets a little escape from having day dreams about a wallet he finds in a cab that contains a picture of a pretty girl.  He calls the number and has a flirtatious pillow talk session that only has the own of that wallet and photo (that Lane keeps) to come in and even give Lane a reward made for a ‘gentleman’.  Given that Lane wants to have an escape and he has had a past with ‘jungle fever’, I am starting to think a female black secretary could be a future plot-line involving Lane.  Actually Lane trying to pull off that ‘toodle-loo’ with any secretary can make for some uncomfortable but funny television. 

I thought Peggy’s Heinz ad was kind of brilliant and the Heinz guy while does seem to be on track with demographic probably does need to trust the younger copy-writers about ‘getting’ younger people.  Peggy has Abe and Joyce (unless Zosia Mamet has left the show for good to do Girls on HBO), Megan has a lot of friends, and I am going to assume Stan also has a lot of friends in the age group Heinz is targeting. 

No Betty in this episode but it looks to be different next episode.  This episode really did not need her.  It was Megan-heavy to properly introduce a character and her dynamics to the main character as well as being as Joan-heavy in a long while. 

Don and Megan still do not ‘understand’ each other yet but their sexual chemistry is off the charts to the point it will not surprise me that their work hours suddenly ending is not unusual.  Megan was described more than once as ‘impulsive’ and Don indulges.  It is too perfect to have Roger and Jane ruin Megan’s surprise party.  Could that become that?  Then again, Jane and Roger each seemed pretty envious.

I read beforehand that the Civil Rights protests were too pronounced.  I disagree.  It was the beginning and end to an episode that was the reality at the time to serve as a reminder that this is a life struggle than a public relations power play.  It also shows how unromantic Weiner gets by taking off the Baby Boomer rose-colored glasses of the era by showing how civil rights was not taking seriously and how hard it was for people to be taken seriously for even showing up in the waiting room of a Madison Avenue office that was not ‘the help’. 

Alan Sepinwall is right, Megan performing that “Zou Bisou Bisou” song was the unequivocal “This is the Sixties” moment of the show.  Hot, hot, hot.

Overall, this was a fun two-hour (really 90 minute episode) full of humor, irony, sex, and interesting women issues all in one episode.  Definitely worth the time off and the show gave enough of a reminder for why people love the show even though a lot of people have changed since the first episode aired.  Cannot wait for 5.02 and I will definitely do more of these reaction posts.