MAD MEN--"The Phantom"

"Where are the Dragons?" my partner responded after we screened the season finale of Mad Men--"The Phantom."  There were no albino zombies with piercing blue eyes and wrinkled visages either.  And Pete didn't die, although he did get punched in the face again, which is always a very satisfying thing.  The season finale did feel both semi-satisfying (in that it made me eager for the next season) and anti-climactic (no zombie dragons).  Still, the question that burned the most for me: "What is Don thinking while he watches Meghan channeling Anna Karina during her screen test.

I contend that it's actually Don's encounter with Peggy, along with Meghan's "this is all I'm good for" drunken remark that compels Don to take a giant leap into the future, and toward feminism, as this finale implies.  The episode plays a little fast and loose with what's actually happening versus Don's toothache hallucinations.  We've already found out from "Mystery Date" that Don's guilt manifests itself in all sorts of horrible ways, and also that he's really sucks at being ill.  So he keeps seeing his dead brother Adam (who committed suicide through hanging in season 1) popping up around the office, and who repeatedly intones wisdom such as "it's not your tooth that's rotten, Don."  Hello heavy-handed message!

Still, his hallucinations allow for a great visual moment that makes clear where next season is headed. The "boys" are struggling with the Topaz account, and others as well, because they haven't gotten the clue that women are the primary consumers, and SCDP is sadly missing that all important female POV they had with Peggy.  When Don arrives at the office after his heart-to-heart with Meghan (about an audition), he looks in on the bustling workplace, and every room is filled with hardworking MEN.  The camera sweeps through each room, and there's not a woman in sight (except for Dawn, his secretary).  Stan utters, "I'm so bored by this dynamic," and so are we.  Peggy challenged him, Stan respected her, and he was less of a jerk.  Hanging around all these DICKS is not good for him.  Things are going to CHANGE.

I also do not think the composition of the image above is accidental, as the flannel suit brigade flanks their new partner, Joan, who clearly, more than ever, runs the place.  Every scene she's in highlights her competency, and the devil's pact she made with Bert, Roger, and Pete (and Lane quite literally) appears to be paying off.  If one intuits the way Weiner thinks, he's touched on the youthquake, and civil rights, but next season it's the women's movement that will undoubtedly explode.  Weiner is priming us for it.

The most telling signal, though, is that Peggy's back, smoking some Virginia Slims and catching a Casino Royale matinee.  Yay!  Of course she bumps into Don, who comes to realize that it's better to help people and allow them to succeed and move on, than to hold tight to them and hinder their progress.  He's proud of Peggy and he misses her.  She's now yelling at people at her new firm, and going off to far off adventures, like to factories in Richmond.  Yet she's not long for this firm if what she witnesses in the final moments of the episode are any indication.

At the moment, I cannot get Depeche Mode's "Master and Servant" out of my head, especially these lyrics:

You treat me like a dog
Get me down on my knees

We call it master and servant
We call it master and servant

It's a lot like life
This play between the sheets
With you on top and me underneath
Forget all about equality

Let's play master and servant
Let's play master and servant

Sounds a little like Don and Meghan's sex life from earlier in the season.  Well, that sh** won't fly anymore. Don and SCDP are going to have to work to get Peggy back, and she's not going to just passively accept their treating her like crap.  She's destined for much better, and she's strong enough and smart enough to get it.  Go Peggy!  All the guys have been complaining all season about women and their power and wicked ways, yet at every turn, the show's female characters have struggled and fought for every baby step toward success.  If anything, these men, including Don, have stood in their way; but sometimes men learn from their mistakes.

Don learns a valuable lesson from his encounter with Peggy.  Earlier in the episode, he has stomped on Meghan asking him for help in landing a shoe commercial--one which his firm is casting.  He claims that he wants her to get a job because she "is someone's discovery," not "somebody's wife."  While he comes off as fairly reasonable, the real issue here is that he seems to want Meghan to fail, even though he says he doesn't.  To include her in the pool of actresses for the shoe commercial is a small leg up, a slight bit of assistance, and one he's capable of doing with relative ease.  Don just needs to be a little more selfless.

Marie happens to be visiting them, and she returns from a hair salon appointment to find Meghan still wallowing in bed at noon.  Does she offer her daughter comfort?  Nah.  Marie would rather see her daughter fail in order to manage her own crippling disappointments.  Yes, not everyone should be a parent.  Then, Marie takes off for a quickie with Roger at his hotel, leaving Meghan to get good and falling-down drunk, offering herself to Don when he arrives, only to be rejected and told to sleep it off.  When Marie returns, Don chides her for leaving her daughter like this, but she points out his own guilt in the matter.  Is Don going to support Meghan and her dreams, or participate in her failure?  Call me a mush-head, but I think he realizes that he wants to help Meghan, not lose her, or worse, destroy her (shades of Betty)?

The commercial looks utterly lame, but Don makes the right move, even though Weiner shows him in a bar moments later, being hit on by a couple of young hotties that ask him, rather stupidly, if "he's alone."  The implication is "will he or won't he" go back to his philandering ways, a la Roger Stirling, because Don has released the stranglehold he had on his young wife.  Please.  I don't think Don's going to go back to square one and negate all the things he's learned in this, and past seasons.

Even Roger's learned some lessons, and I'm delighted that he decides to embark on another LSD trip solo, rather than drag Marie along on such a journey.  I was really worried that those two would mess with some drugs and one of them would think that they could "fly," and that "falling man" imagery would finally come to fruition.  Whew.  Glad that didn't happen.

Then there are those characters that NEVER learn from their mistakes.  I'm looking at you, Pete Campbell.  My head's still reeling around the cockamamie narrative gyrations at work that got Beth and Pete back into bed again.  Does Beth really "spread her legs for the first chump she can find," because Pete is certainly the KING of chumps, and I cannot figure out what she might remotely see in him other than someone who conveniently showed up, twice.  When she leaves him at the hotel, it's pretty clear that she's not expecting him to show up at Bellevue claiming he's her brother.

 
That whole "electroshock" narrative turn also left me pretty flummoxed, although I was actually rather embarrassingly moved by Pete's story regarding his cheating "friend."  Then I thought, "Excellent.  He's going to check himself in, get himself some electroshock, and come out of it as a decent person, like that crappy Harrison Ford movie where he's shot in the head, and afterward becomes a nice guy, rather than a cheating jerk!"  Hey, Rory/Beth was pretty convincing about how electroshock could chase the gloom away, and save her from the "dark place."  Thankfully, it chased away all memories of Pete as well.  Heh.

When Pete gets into it with Beth's Hubby, Howard, on the commuter train, the conductor gives Pete an out, but instead of taking it, Pete provokes the guy into punching Pete in the face as well!  My favorite moment of the screening was when my partner intoned "He really is such a jerk.  I'm glad people keep hitting him."  Me too, honey, me too.  Trudy is a saint, wrongly assuming that Pete's constantly getting into auto accidents rather than provoking people into bashing him in the face.  She decides that it would be best for Pete to get an apartment in the city.  NOOOOOOO!  Poor Tammi won't be seeing her Daddy anymore, because Pete definitely thinks he deserves a different life than he has.  On second thought, lucky you, Tammi.  No more Pete.

We're left with Don looking so cool it hurts, and that's just not a high enough bar anymore.  Where be Dragons?  Or Zombies?  Have my expectations become impossibly high for this show, or any show for that matter.

Maybe I'm interested in watching something more like this:

MAD MEN--"Commissions and Fees"

Why does Jared Harris have to suffer so much?.  He gets shot by Lili Taylor in I Shot Andy Warhol (Mary Harron, 1996) and Harris is masterful at conveying Warhol's asexuality and stunted social skills.  A few weeks ago, Leonard Nemoy sacrificed him brutally during the Fringe finale, basically turning him into a pile of ash. Now on Mad Men's "Commissions and Fees," he's asked to resign by Don, pushing him over the edge into suicide land.  Poor Lane.  I wish it was Pete.

Mad Men's season finale airs tomorrow night, and I hope it ends with a bang, because the penultimate episode was pretty "Meh."  True, since Peggy's departure I am finding it hard to care about almost everyone else, but Lane's "embezzling" storyline came off as both inexplicable and contrived.  This guy dated a Black playboy bunny, appreciated Joan as a working woman central to SCDP, and punched Pete Campbell in the face!  His ignoble departure lacks dignity, pathos, and sense.

I was also not particularly blown away by Don's new cutthroat attitude toward acquiring new clients at the firm.  I read his aggressive meeting with Ed Baxter at Dow Chemical as a symptom of his insecure worry that Joan's night with Herb was what landed them Jaguar, rather than his brilliant creative pitch.  Sure, Don's no longer laying around on his office couch, mooning over his young wife, but he is still struggling to figure out his place at SCDP.  With Peggy gone and Ginsberg nipping at his heels, he has to prove that he's still "got it."  Then, after wiping the blood from his fangs following that meeting, he and Roger return to find Lane hanging from his office door.  Hello guilt. Will there be repercussions from these two events in the finale?  Who knows--they both seemed out-of-place to me.

Thankfully, the episode did have some poignant moments, and finally gave Betty her due, as the former Mrs. Draper is able to put aside her roiling bitterness toward Meghan and Don and share a moment of closeness with her troubled tween daughter, Sally.  "At the Codfish Ball" gave a sense of Sally's liminal state--not quite a young girl, not quite a teenager either.  Yet she's desperately wanting to grow up, even if every step is downright painful.

One of the things I like about Mad Men is that Sally and Meghan are genuinely fond of each other, and share some nice moments.  Betty may, at times, use Sally as a pawn or wedge between Meghan and Don, but Meghan refuses to play those kinds of games.  If the Gilmore Girls is our parenting model, Meghan's the fun Lorelei to Betty's cold and rigid Emily.  Yet Meghan's NOT a mother, and that difference can sometimes become all to clear.

Two weeks ago, Meghan was teaching Sally how to cry on cue (c'mon, admit it, didn't you try her technique out afterward)?  Now she's letting her order coffee at Balthazar, or some late 60s facsimile.  While Sally mimics sophistication, she still must pour most of the sugar dispenser into her coffee to make it possible to swallow.  If we're wielding heavy-handed metaphors, a woman's life can be bitter indeed.  Sally gets her first taste of that acute bitterness when she starts to menstruate while on a "date" at the Natural History Museum with her friend, Glenn (who puts the kibosh on any girlfriend possibilities by telling Sally that he thinks of her as a sister).  As I proclaimed loudly, while watching, to no one in particular, "Get used to it, honey.  Your going to be going through this kind of fun for another FORTY years." Yay.

Betty tells her much the same thing, but in a surprisingly gentle way, revealing that she actually does not have a heart made of stone. Betty's rampant envy of Meghan is smartly tempered by Sally's needing her at this crucial moment.  She's never going to be nominated for "mother of the year," but Betty does finally move beyond the simplistic evil-mother representation that has characterized her for so much of this season (as well as seasons passed).  I still have hope for her character's growth, and now that January Jones's pregnancy is history, I hope we will spend more "quality time" with Betty next season.

Not so much Pete.  Now that Mad Men has killed off a main character, I believe that there is absolutely NO CHANCE that they'll get rid of Pete as well.  Grrrr.  Come back Peggy!

MAD MEN--"The Other Woman"

Wow, wow, wow.  This week's episode of Mad Men entitled "The Other Woman" made me rant and cry in equal measure.  Crucial decisions were made by the characters I care about the most, with a little Don and Meghan on the side.  The above image pairing reminds me of a feminist short film by Chilean director Cecilia Barriga called A Meeting of Two Queens (1991), in which she edits footage from the works of two glorious queer Hollywood Icons--Greta Garbo and Marlene Dietrich--so that they appear to be carrying on the grandest and most tempestuous love affair.

The longing and connection that registers between Joan and Peggy in the above image isn't quite what happens at episode's end, but I like the fantasy.  This season, their relationship to each other has become deeper and stronger, and the show feels like it's finally getting to the "click" moments that became synonymous with some of the feminist values of that late sixties time period.  The valuable emotional screen time Peggy and Joan possessed this week was countered by sharp contrasts, repeatedly made, of showing a bunch of dicks in a room.  Also, if one had any lasting sympathies toward Pete Campbell, they were probably truly annihilated during this episode.  I take some hasty notes while I am watching, and I wrote "Pete is disgusting and coarse and a dickhead and I hate him."  I also called him a "scum-bucket."  Granted, I was a little intoxicated while watching, for my partner and I had a couple of Cersei's Ruins beforehand.

This drink is a variation of a drink made at the Patterson House in Nashville TN.  I do not like my drink diluted, so instead of putting ice in the drink, I like to stick the highball glasses in the freezer before pouring so that they are nice and chilled.  Oh and the drink is called Cersei's Ruin because it's SO GOOD, it will make you sleep with your hot brother (thank you Game of Thrones).

Here's the recipe (makes one drink):

2 ounces high quality Bourbon
1/4 ounce fresh squeezed lemon juice
1/2 ounce St. Germain Elderflower Liqueur
13 drops lemon bitters
Absinthe Verte to coat the glass
garnish with lemon peel

Take your chilled glass and swish some Absinthe Verte around to coat it, then in a shaker, shake the other ingredients, strain into a glass, and garnish.  Yum, yum.  The flavors are sophisticated, well-balanced, and have a kick!

If having to face Pete doesn't cause one to drink already, this drink will certainly take the edge off--but also may contribute to a bit more passionate attachment to Mad Men than usual.  My partner was kind enough to talk me down a couple times.  I would not be opposed to saying goodbye to Pete for good in the season finale in two weeks (Sob. I'll miss you Mad Men. Not Pete, though).  Elevator Shaft fall?

The show opens with a bunch of dicks, dicking around, arguing over how best to get a bunch of dicks to buy a dick-substitute, which is then rationalized as a feminized fetish object--"At Last. Something Beautiful You Can Truly Own"--a Jaguar sports car.  For these men of the late 60s, this car is the proverbial "other woman," who will satisfy the fraught and precarious masculinity they so desperately need to maintain, especially in the face of the social changes underway.

Peggy is shut-out of this dickfest, where they are all swinging their wangs and eating lobster.  In fact, she saves the Chevalier Blanc campaign with some fast and fancy thinking (Lady Godiva saves the Beatles wanna-be), but she gets no credit for her work, as Don reminds her that it's MG's campaign.  When she protests, he tells her she can go to Paris, and literally throws money in her face.  WTF Don?  Even Ken Cosgrove's "pact" with Peggy just doesn't feel satisfying to her.  This confrontation with Don is the nail in her and Don's Samsonite Suitcase, for she starts taking meetings with other agencies, and is snagged by a competing firm that recognizes her worth and gives her more than her asking price.  I was simultaneously so proud of Peggy, and so sad, because I'm not sure that I can continue to watch this show if she actually leaves SCDP for good.  If she makes it to the top somewhere else, will she take Ken with her?  The pact implies equivalency, but in this episode, Peggy feels like it's all lip service, and she must be the one to make a change.

When Peggy gives notice, Don lashes out with "Let's not pretend that I'm not responsible for every good thing that ever happened to you," and asks her for her "number." Sure, he's hurt, but this kind of comment is exactly why she is leaving.  At this point, there is no number high enough to keep her putting up with Don's bullshit.  As she tells Don, he would do the same thing.  When he grabs her hand, Peggy can barely keep it together.  Hell, I totally lost it.

"Don't Be a Stranger."  Damn, how can these two people whose lives are so interconnected be saying goodbye for good?  Say it isn't so!  Will she be begged back for the finale??  I just don't know.

Meanwhile, last week's episode where Joan and Don test drove the Jag and tippled at the bar drove home the economic and romantic realities of Joan's situation.  Greg has filed for divorce, he's staying in Vietnam, and she's a single working mother with a new baby and no real financial security.  When that low-life scum-bucket Pete meets with the head of the dealer's association, Herb Rennit, about SCDP's stake in the Jaguar account, Herb lets on that he would be able to put a really good word in for them if they are able to set up a "date" with Joan.  Pete plays pimp, the hateful turd.

Then the sniveling weasel takes the proposition to Joan, who is understandably outraged and disgusted, and claims that they couldn't afford her.  The ignorant dolt then tells the partners that Joan is willing "for a price," which isn't how I read that scene, nor Joan I bet, but that bottom-feeding f**k wad perceives things this way.  Don thankfully walks out of the meeting, but the four other dicks--Bert, Roger, Pete, and Lane--think on it some more, and outvote Don, believing that $50,000 might be proper remuneration for sleeping with some disgusting pig.  Lane meets with Joan in private, tells her not to do it, but then says that if she's considering it, she should demand a 5% active partnership in the company (so that he isn't caught with his hand in the cookie jar).  Oh boy.  The stakes are so high here for Joan, and this kind of decision shouldn't BE a decision she has to make.  She brings the lecherous creeper/Pete into her office and informs him of her demands--no negotiations, buddy.  I like this exchange, although my heart was just breaking.

Joan:  "Which one is he?"
Lowlife scum-bucket:  "He's not bad."
Joan:  "He's doing this."

MG comes up with his spiffy catchphrase, and Don runs with it.  Pete comes in to tell Don that he's sure that creative will win the day, but that there are no other impediments keeping them from Jaguar.  He even implies that it was all Joan's idea, the loathsome toad. Don goes over to Joan's apartment to talk her out of this "date," and she appreciates his friendship and support, even if it's too little, too late.  What one does not realize, until after the following sequences unfold, is that Joan has already gone through with "it," making a devastating, but game-changing decision for herself.

The episode is constructed in such a way that the parallel editing sequence cutting back and forth between Joan's date with Herb and the pitch for Jaguar implies that they are occurring simultaneously--right up until the end when we see Herb's face in smug satisfaction.  I cried through this whole sequence, it hurt so much to watch Joan tolerate Herb's repulsive, lecherous desire.  When Herb states "let me at 'em" while groping for Joan's breasts, she turns her back, and her zipper to him, slowly pulling the dress down from her shoulders.  The wrenching look on Joan's face made my heart stop.

At the same time, Don is pitching the car as if it's a beautiful woman that a man can finally "own" to a room full of smug dicks, and when Mad Men stops for a commercial break, it's for a Stella Artois commercial whose ad line is "She is a thing of beauty."  I shit you not.  I couldn't find the exact ad, but here's a culture jammed version that will give you an idea of why it pushed me clear over the edge.

This Stella Artois campaign started in 2010, but it's proven so successful, that they're sticking with it.  This ad completely undercuts any progressive commentary on gender politics this show might be attempting, and gets at the heart of what's wrong with Mad Men.  This ironic kind of wink-wink retro-sexism seems to get a pass because it's cool, Sixties cool.  Here, this week, the writing and representations have made it glaringly obvious that women are faced with impossible choices, and that this kind of treatment is sexist, unjust, and deeply upsetting.  Then we get some retro commercial that sweeps all that painful, messy stuff away.  WTF!!  Oh, and tell me that this ad doesn't remind you of a certain Zou-Bisou-Bisou?

The show seems to ungracefully ride the line between critique and celebration of these outdated gender roles, suggesting moments of critique, but then ultimately recuperating all this bullshit into a palatable, retro-sexy package.  Is it wrong to want more from this show?  I don't think so.  Are we going to REALLY deal with racism and sexism next season?  How about Stonewall and homophobia?  Rise to it Matthew Weiner.

Speaking of Zou-bisou-bisou, Meghan comes into the office at SCDP for a little "quickie" boost of confidence on her way to her audition.  Don has made it clear earlier in the episode that he's not thrilled with the possibility that Meghan might be called away to Boston for rehearsals for a couple of months; they are still trying to negotiate the changes her decision has wrought on their relationship.  Still, Don's trying, and that's more than we can say for almost every other male character on the show.  I love when Stan tries to get Meghan back in the game, and she says, "Jaguar:  It's your problem, not mine."  Nice, Meghan.

Meghan's audition is extremely disheartening, and she begins to realize that for so many roles, it doesn't matter if she ever utters a word.  Three men sit on a couch and subsequently ask the "sweetheart" to step forward and spin around.  She is a "thing of beauty" to them, and it's not clear that Meghan will be valued beyond this idea.  All her excitement and enthusiasm is shattered by a couch full of dicks.

When Don returns home from the pitch, they have a discussion which is quite moving, and gives me high hopes for their future relationship.  Don tells her that he doesn't want her to fail, and she points out that if she's forced to choose (between acting and Don), she'll choose him, but she'll hate him for it.  Pretty honest words!  Don has figured out that he doesn't want another Betty, and they end this scene in closeness and respect.  Baby steps.  These two have come a long way from that Howard Johnson's parking lot!

The next day, when the partners receive the news that they've won the Jaguar account, Joan is right there with them, driving home to Don that he did not succeed in stopping her (and making him wonder, perhaps, how much her sacrifice affected the winning of the account).  Of course, that skeezy little pissant seems fine with the sea change that puts Joan in a position of power, however small.  He's still an unforgivable slug. 

After all this painful viewing, the one redeeming moment that stands out, and leaves me with more questions than answers, is the episode's final image.  Peggy walks out of her office with her giant coffee thermos, turning her back on the revelry, and as she steps onto the SCDP elevators for what may be the very last time, she smiles.  And The Kinks burst into song (the music choices made on this show really are f**king genius). What's going to happen to Peggy???  Is she going to get her own spin-off series?

**Just so you know, I re-watched the episode stone-cold sober and cried in all the same places.  This episode was really powerful, and has me wondering where the season finale will take us.  I hate waiting.

MAD MEN--"Dark Shadows" and "Christmas Waltz"

Meh.  Since I'm such a stalwart Peggy fan, watching two episodes in which she was barely a blip on the radar of the show didn't do much for me.  In fact, the last couple of episodes--"Dark Shadows" and "Christmas Waltz"--seemed  heavy on filler, and very light on "holy crap" moments.  Still, each episode had some memorable highlights, so I'll just say a little about those:
  
Ah Betty.  Mad Men continues to paint her as a villain, but I couldn't help but feel some pity for Don's ex in "Dark Shadows."  I could almost feel her seething jealousy as she took in Don and Meghan's cool city digs, and then gazed surreptitiously at the ever-lovely Meghan as she dressed.  Yet, even when Betty is at her most villainous (using Sally as a way to poison Don and Meghan's marriage) or her most pitiable (heading straight for the fridge to mainline whipped cream directly into her mouth), something about January Jones's portrayal always feels flat. Betty is the ultimate cold fish, but is that because January Jones is a bad actor?

A recent article by Willa Paskin for Salon.com claims that bad acting can keep careers like Jones's afloat for quite some time.  This prompted my partner and I to immediately talk about another "bad actor" on a television show we enjoy--David Guintoli, or Nick, on Grimm.  This guy is the STAR of the series, in almost every scene, and whenever he's on, we're just bored, bored, bored.  Really, the reason to watch the show at all is Silas Weir Mitchell who steals every scene, except for the ones that Sasha Roiz steals.  Even Reggie Lee, who's woefully under-utilized as Sergeant Wu is a hundred times more interesting to watch.  The fine cast of supporting actors seems to allow Grimm a modicum of success, despite its lead's flatness. Ensembles can save bad actors.

Mad Men's Betty is an extremely well-written character, and the situations in which she's thrust are visceral and discomfiting; yet, Mad Men is very light on close-ups of Jones, as if the situation is more important than the play of emotions that crosses her face.  As I've posted earlier, the show vacillates between sympathizing with women who struggle against the oppressive beauty culture of the Sixties, while simultaneously reveling in that culture with supernaturally beautiful characters such as Meghan and Joan (and Betty before this season).  The connection Mad Men draws between aging and the period's obsession with youth is crucial.  Betty's new dieting obsession fits into this context, yet I find it really hard to care about what happens to her.  Contrast these scenes with the one a couple weeks ago with Roger's ex, Mona (Talia Balsam), and one can see how a really talented actress can effortlessly steal a scene.  I haven't completely given up on Betty.  One really great temper-fueled explosion might solve this ambivalence I feel, but until it happens, I'm just not sure that Jones can carry that emotional scene off.

Mad Men's well-established characters--Betty, Roger, and Don--are desperately trying to remain relevant.  Betty is the cast aside beauty, replaced by a younger, more exciting version.  She tries to ruin things, with Sally as her emissary, but fails miserably, faced with a frugal Thanksgiving plate of food and a tummy full of bitterness.  Roger is still coasting off his LSD trip, and asks Jane for one last favor, then succeeds in ruining her new beginning (away from him) by tainting her new apartment.  Yet the single best gambit for relevancy is Don's, where he admires the blabbermouth MG's copy-writing creativity, but still wants to remind the twit of his place at SCDP.  Don purposefully leaves Ginsburg's campaign ideas in the cab, only bringing his own mock-ups to the pitch.  They win the campaign, but MG's pretty miffed.

Don and MG's conversation in the elevator takes MG down a much needed peg.  This guy is just too cocky and full of himself for his own good.  I know that excessively proclaiming one's accomplishments can be a sign of deep-seated insecurity, but MG just pushes his cockiness too far.  When MG, in all his puffed chest youthful glory lands his "I feel bad for you" pity zinger, Don merely deadpans, "I don't even think about you."  Even though we know that Don thinks about MG quite a bit, his nonchalant dismissal felt pretty satisfying as Don leaves MG alone in the elevator, slack-jawed and properly dissed.  Many of the best scenes of this season seem to being playing out in the elevator.  Coincidence?  I think not.  That chasm between the older and younger generations yawns ever wider.

Oh, special shout-out to the scene where Meghan is teaching Sally how to fake cry, highlighting a her newly learned acting techniques.  You just know that teaching Sally that trick will come back to bite them all!

"Christmas Waltz" spends way too much time with Lane Pryce and his financial problems, without really properly explaining what he's done and the repercussions (he hasn't paid his taxes in the UK, tsk tsk).  Also, after the revelation that Paul Kinsey has fallen in with the Hare Krishnas, that whole plot-line fell kind of flat.  Really, is Weiner trying to kill his viewers with boredom by focusing on Lane and Harry this week?  WTF?  Even Roger's belligerent drunkenness produced yawns, even though I'm a fan of his There's Something about Mary hairdo.

He's definitely on a crash course toward wearing socks with sandals.  One more LSD trip will definitely send him over the edge.

That twerp Greg serves Joan with divorce papers, and Joan throws a delightful and uncharacteristic fit in reception, taking it out on the receptionist by hurling the Mohawk Airlines plane model.  Joan is usually so carefully controlled, so her emotional scenes this season have really elevated her character and added a necessary degree of depth to her fiery beauty.  Don witnesses the meltdown and whisks Joan away to test drive a new Jaguar automobile.  Here the two most ridiculously beautiful characters get to have a proper sit-sown and chat at a bar--truly one of the standout scenes of the season.

Yes, their easy camaraderie is a little booze-soaked, but their history allows them to be open with each other. Don admits that he misses Meghan at work, even though he couches the feeling as "the firm" missing her.  He suggests that Joan "start over," not really thinking through how challenging it is for women of a certain age, and divorced women especially, to find someone meaningful--especially with a small baby at home.  Loved Joan's "no one brings me flowers anymore" lament, which Don alleviates with a bouquet of roses from "Ali Khan" later in the episode. Sweet and thoughtful.  Still, Don's fierce and somewhat demented expression as he drunkenly drives the Jaguar suggests that he's still troubled by the split developing between his personal and professional lives.  All is not quite well at home, as both Don and Meghan negotiate her choice to leave advertising and SCDP.

I cannot help but sympathize with Don when he and Meghan attend this self-conscious, high concept theater piece that mocks consumerism. ZZZZZZZ.  When Don shows up late for dinner after carousing with Joan in a Jag, Meghan's fury is understandable, and one senses her conflicted feelings.  Don is pretty drunk, indicated by his inability to hang his coat anywhere.  Meghan demands to know where he's been and throws a plate of (plain) spaghetti against the wall--she still hasn't graduated to sauce.  He tells her the truth, and points out that she likes to be angry, and he's not far off; they often rage at each other in order to have hot "make-up" sex later.  Yet things have changed between them.  Whereas not long ago Meghan would have accompanied Don, rather than Joan, to the car dealership, now Don's extra-curricular work-related activities no longer include her.  One can sense the emotional gulf growing between the couple.  Don's impassioned speech to his SCDP co-workers at the end of "Christmas Waltz" does not bode well for his marriage either, as he makes clear that family and the holidays will fall by the wayside in pursuit of the coveted Jaguar contract.  I'm fairly certain they'll get the client, but I'm skeptical as to how Don and Meghan will weather the storm.  Here's hoping they get through it.

I also hope that we'll see some more inner workings of the advertising "game" on Mad Men, instead of fast forwarding through the creative process and just showing SCDP's success or failure with Jaguar.  The scenes that focused on advertising this season were pretty damn fascinating.  How are they going to pitch these stylish automotive "lemons?"  Will the agency be "established" once they land their first car campaign?

Alas, I've been trying to jettison as much television as possible in order to focus on more film analysis, but I'm a little hooked on The Pitch right now.  I loathe the reality show format, and fast forward through all the "personal" scenes--as I do with every reality series I've watched--but I love watching the ideas happen.  Almost every week I tend to pick the losing team and their campaign, but I still find the process fun.

MAD MEN--"Lady Lazarus"

Even after all the love of retro and vintage on the Gilmore Girls, Rory Gilmore grows up to be a confused, shaky depressive married to a dick-ish insurance salesman, who tragically sleeps with that pathetic villain Pete Campbell--a jerk on his own one-way trip to suicide town.  The moment she erases that heart by opening and shutting her window, I pictured Pete stepping into that amazing elevator shaft back at SCDP.  Bu-bye.  Appropriate considering the title of this week's Mad Men--"Lady Lazarus"--taken from a Sylvia Plath poem detailing her attempted suicides.  Everyone has their desperate moments on the series this season, but Pete seems the most ready to do himself in.  Perhaps on the ski slopes with his nifty new skis??

I realized also that I'm really all about identifying with Peggy.  To the point that I was really pissed off at Meghan during and after the episode, even though part of me admires her willingness to follow her dreams.  After last week's intimation by Emile that Meghan has given up on her dreams and surrendered to a life of ease with Don, I wondered, "Is Marxist Dad upset that Meghan's not an actress?"  The crux is that she's landed success (w/Don, at SCDP) without much struggle.  Well, turns out that Meghan was underwhelmed by her success at advertising, and Emile's words hit the mark.  Even though, as Don admiringly told her last week "you're good at all of it."

I guess I really wanted Peggy to have another female teammate and supporter, someone to bounce ideas with and become a pal to.  In some ways, Joan serves that function, but she's not another creative like Stan and MG, and Peggy's worried enough about "acting like a man."  Last week felt like that mentoring relationship was really starting to blossom; but then everything has to unravel on Mad Men.  First, Meghan lies to Peggy, saying she's going to meet Don for dinner after she's told Don that she couldn't join him and has to stay and work.  This scene occurs after a mysterious phone call straight out of a Hitchcock film, with Meghan looking very mysterious.

Don, of course, calls multiple times looking for Meghan, putting Peggy in a really uncomfortable position.  When he keeps demanding to know where Meghan is, Peggy snaps, "I don't know.  Do you know where Abe is?"  He's treating her a bit too much like his secretary, and she's understandably frustrated.  My favorite moment is Peggy hesitantly picking up the phone, Don asking "Hello?  Hello?  Peggy?" and her crying "PIZZA HOUSE!" and hanging up on him.  Hilarious.  When the phone rings again, she wisely decides to split.

The next morning, Peggy drags Meghan into the bathroom to find out the scoop, and Meghan divulges that she hates working at SCDP, and that she's thought about trying to get fired.  She wants to pursue acting.

After recovering from shock, Peggy is furious, and I'm surprised that she doesn't shake Meghan like a rag doll and mess up her perfect hair.  Instead, she yells "You know that people are killing for this job?!  You're taking up a spot, and you don't even want to be here!"  Yep.  Peggy clawed her way up the ladder, was treated like crap, just to get to where she is.  Meghan lands in a coveted spot, without struggle, and she's dismissive of what Peggy has fought so hard to achieve. Urgh. Arrgh.  How do you spell privilege, Meghan?  Still, Peggy does give Meghan the advice to tell Don the truth ASAP--partially because Peggy is a crappy liar and doesn't want to carry that secret around.

To add fuel to the fire, shortly after their bathroom talk, Peggy and her fellow creatives are discussing the Cool Whip campaign with Don.  He asks where Meghan is, and Peggy (still pissed) states that she's not coming.  Then Meghan sashays in, giving Peggy a satisfied little smirk.  That was the moment when I started loathing Meghan again.  A woman who had almost completely won me over the last couple weeks, was back in the Zou-bisou-bisou slot.  Boo.  See catty smirk below.  Oh, Mad Men, why did you have to go there??

Sure, there was a distinct chance of Meghan outshining Peggy rather than working alongside her, and that situation becomes reality when Meghan and Don do their little schtick about Cool Whip.  Megan is really good--AT EVERYTHING.  And she doesn't even want the success that Peggy craves or struggles to achieve.  Meghan wants to explore her dreams, and being married to Don gives her the ability to pursue them.  Her dreams do not need to be about making money and surviving financially--she will always land on her feet.  See.  Over-identifying with Peggy here.

To her credit, Meghan wakes Don that night to tell him that she wants to quit her job and go back to acting, admitting that "she'd rather fail at acting, than succeed with Heinz."  Don's disappointed, but he gets points for not giving her a hard time and being supportive.  He thought they made a great team, and now Meghan wants to venture out on her own. At least he recognizes what a woman who feels trapped and resentful might become (Hi Betty).  Don also acknowledges that he put Meghan in an extremely awkward position by marrying her and then continuing to work with her at the firm.  But Meghan flat out says, "I don't want to do it, Don." Ouch.

The next day, Meghan seems genuinely sad when she says goodbye to Peggy, Stan and MG.  Peggy immediately sheds her bitchiness and shifts to concern, asking Meghan if she's okay.  (Damn if I didn't soften too at her tears).  Ginsberg hilariously jumps to the conclusion that Meghan's been fired and responds with outrage; maybe this guy really is from Mars, since, as Meghan pointed out, she would never be fired.  Stan, incredulously asks if she's kidding (about quitting to pursue acting), but Peggy smacks him down, so they both graciously shake her hand and say they'll miss her.  Peggy's reaction is the crucial one.  She asks firmly if Meghan's sure, and Meghan replies, "Peggy, I've always appreciated what you've done for me.  Not just yesterday."  Awwwww.  Okay, more softening from my surrogate, Peggy.

Peggy and Joan's pow-wow over Meghan's departure is also very telling.  Joan was always suspicious of Meghan's role at the firm, and states that she was frankly surprised that Meghan didn't spectacularly fail.  Peggy admits (oh, Peggy) that she might have been too hard on her, and scared Meghan away.  When Joan suggests that these events might be all part of Meghan's cunning plan, Peggy defends her:  "No, I think she's just good at everything.  She's just one of those girls."  Joan responds, "Then you had every right to be hard on her."  Peggy realizes, this episode and last week's, that she's never going to be "one of those girls," and will have to fight for every single success, professionally and romantically, that she achieves.

Joan has really transformed over the seasons, and her comment reflects her new-found insight.  As a woman who has capitalized on her exceptional beauty for quite some time, Joan now sees how advantages can be limitations.  One senses a mixture of envy and maturity in the way in which Joan regards Meghan.  Joan's portentous thoughts on "second wives" and Don's penchant for actress/models suggest that Meghan's choice will have significant consequences for the future.

Peggy and Don's confrontation at the Cool Whip text kitchen is one of those consequences, and a long time coming.  Everyone at the Cool Whip HQ is expecting the witty Don and Meghan banter, and Meghan's absence, and replacement by Peggy, is palpable.  Don and Peggy "screw up" the schtick, because they're both still reeling from Meghan's departure, and Peggy's no "Meghan."--both Don and Peggy know it.  These tensions produce the following exchange:

Peggy: "Meghan is not the problem."
Don:  "You didn't want her there.  You were threatened by everything about her."
Peggy:  "I spent more time training her than you did, and eight months defending her!"
Don:  "Defending her?  She was great at it!
Peggy:  She thinks advertising is stupid.
Don:  "No, she thinks that the people she works with are cynical and petty."
Peggy:  "I did everything right, and I'm still getting it from you.  You know, you are not made at me, so shut up!"

Yeah!  You know how sometimes when you love someone, you get mad at them when you're really mad at something else entirely?  Like, you get mad about "A," but you're really upset about "Q" and you aren't even aware that you are angry about "Q?"  Well, Peggy comes to that realization (and verbalizes it), a moment earlier than Don, but they both are going through the same mix of emotions (albeit for different reasons).  And they can argue with each other in this way because of their connection and understanding of each other.  Still, I'm glad that Peggy's willing to stand up to Don's petulance and give him a little wake-up call.  Yay, Peggy.  Don is just starting to process what Meghan's loss means to him and SCDP, which that earlier encounter with the elevator shaft made painfully clear.  Hello encroaching sense of foreboding!

Mad Men really makes apparent, week after week, the growing chasm between young and old, and the older generation's discomfort with change.  I admired the way in which Meghan tried to play down Don's "out-of-touch" worries early in the episode, when she said that it's impossible to keep up because the world (and popular music) is constantly changing.  The exchange Don and Roger have later on emphasizes this growing divide.  While Roger says, "I was never able to choose my dreams," Don reminds him that he grew up in the Thirties and dreamed of "indoor plumbing."  Again, that curmudgeonly fist-shaking coming from two characters desperately trying to stay in touch with the upcoming youthquake, whether from taking LSD or marrying young and hip.

All these tensions come together in a lovely concluding montage scene.  Don arrives home from work just as Meghan's leaving for acting class, and she hands him The Beatles Revolver album, telling him to play "Tomorrow Never Knows" before she skips out the door in her perky Audrey Hepburn beatnik get-up.  Don pops the vinyl onto his gorgeous hi-fi console, and sinks back into his recliner and lets the lyrics wash over him:

Turn off your mind relax and float down stream
It is not dying, it is not dying

Lay down all thoughts, surrender to the void,
It is shining, it is shining.

Yet you may see the meaning of within
It is being, it is being

Love is all and love is everyone
It is knowing, it is knowing.

The camera reveals our characters from "Lady Lazarus" at their various pursuits.  Meghan lies on the floor in her acting class, immersed in some visualization exercise.  Pete watches in misery as Beth/Rory draws a heart on her car window, and then erases it, stomping on his heart as well.  Peggy and Stan share a joint while working on a campaign at SCDP, which softens their "reality" of Heinz Baked Beans.

And Don?  Don cannot even sit through the whole song, but gets up and shuts off the stereo, drink in hand, and leaves the room.  He just doesn't get it.  Watch out for that elevator, Don.

MAD MEN--"At the Codfish Ball"

Poor Sally.  She "saw something nasty in the woodshed," to quote one of my favorite films, Cold Comfort Farm (John Schlesinger, 1995).  Even though this episode ends on a down note for just about every character featured during this show, the focus on Mad Men's women in "At the Codfish Ball" really made this episode stand out.  Two moments in particular made me outright cheer, and I'll explore them in more depth.  Also, the show is clearly trying to rehabilitate Don Draper after his "dream murder" and the horrifying fight he had with Meghan last week.

This season, Mad Men has been exploring in some form the growing youth movement and generational tensions synonymous with the Sixties, and nowhere does that storyline carry more power than in the struggles and  preoccupations of Sally Draper.  This episode is bracketed by Sally's phone calls to her friend, Glen, who's been a fascinating character from the earliest days of the series.  His crush on Betty was so creepy and weird early on, but his steadfast friendship with Sally has really come to define him.  That he's played by Matthew Weiner's son, Marten, always blows my mind a little.

It seems that Sally and Bobby are often left at the mercy of Grandma Pauline, and Sally is continuing to complain about this woman (justifiably) to anyone who will listen.  (Betty, Henry, and baby Gene seem to be out of town all the time).  Sally gets much more mileage from conversations with Glen than with Don, and in a burst of comic slapstick, Pauline trips over the phone cord spread across the hall, and breaks her ankle, sending the kids over to Don's by default.  Sally's delighted, because she's undoubtedly Daddy's girl.

Unfortunately for Don, Sally and Bobby aren't his only house-guests; he and Meghan are entertaining her parents as well.  Emile and Marie are French Quebecois, and very, very unhappy.  From the moment that Emile walks through their door and tells his wife, in French, to drink so that she'll "become nice," you get the sense that this visit will not be a pleasure.  Emile is some kind of lefty professor who is turned off by their stylish apartment and displays of wealth.  Conversely, I'm delighted by that cool lamp next to the bar, and Meghan's fab dress even matches.  Nice.

Sally and Bobby briefly interrupt the tensions at dinner when they arrive, and Don frames Sally's calling 911, icing Pauline's ankle, and "keeping her calm" as downright heroic.  Sally's relationship with Meghan is also warm and friendly, and it's always nice to see a stepmother not portrayed as creating a rift between father and daughter; those petty jealousies are absent.  Still, with a mom like Betty, Meghan's bound to seem kind and supportive by comparison.  It's unlikely that Meghan will ever tell the kids that they are "boring" or that they should go "bang their heads against the wall."

In fact, knowing that Sally doesn't like fish, Meghan makes spaghetti for the kids (weirdly without any sauce), and Marie fondly tells Sally that she used to make Meghan spaghetti when she was child.  This nostalgic moment becomes the inspiration for Meghan's saving the Heinz beans campaign, conjuring an idealized scene of mother and child, through the ages, cooking beans--from caveman days to futuristic moon colonies.  When Meghan presents her ideas to Don at work the next day, coming up with "Heinz Beans--some things never change," Don looks at his wife with new respect.  Whenever he tries to box her into the "wife" category through sexual innuendo, she insists that "this is about work" and "I don't want to change the subject."  She wants to prove herself.  Still, Meghan is hesitant and conflicted; she fears reprisals from Stan and Michael Ginsberg, and initially wants Don to take credit for the idea.  Thankfully, Don refuses, saying "You don't really want me to do that," to which she replies "no."

The guys do grumble to Peggy about the changes, questioning whether the new campaign was actually Meghan's idea.  Yet they good-naturedly recognize that this campaign is better than what they had. Building on last week's camaraderie, both Stan and MG respect Peggy, and they playfully tease her over take-out Chinese, stating to Abe, who joins them, that if she keeps eating Chinese food, she'll go up a cup size (referring to the Playtex bra account).  When Abe takes off for home, Stan says "he's too good looking for you!"  This comment will come back to haunt Peggy when Abe calls to meet for dinner the very next night, and hangs up before she can say no.  Their fighting last episode still weighs on Peggy, and she believes that Abe's about to end things between them.  She goes to Joan for a cigarette and some womanly advice.

Sally and Joan's friendship continues to evolve this season, and as two working women with history at SCDP, they are well matched.  (Yes, I'm a secret fan of their getting together, just as I dream of Alicia and Kalinda together on The Good Wife.  Not going to happen).  Joan wisely tells Peggy that "men don't take the time to end things," and instead just ignore you until all that's left is hate.  She thinks that instead, Peggy may be looking at a marriage proposal.  Peggy never imagined this possibility, and is equal parts stunned and delighted by the idea.  Joan warns her to prepare a careful answer, especially if that answer is going to be "no."

Peggy shows up to the Minetta Tavern in a new dress, beaming at Abe.  They both seem a bit awkward, and Abe looks extremely nervous.  The "proposal" isn't quite what Peggy expects either.  Abe asks her "to move in together," and her smile is still on her face, but their is something just a little flat in her eyes.  She was expecting more.

Still, she grabs his hand and says "yes."  Her reaction to his proposal helps define the line she continues to push in regards to female hetero respectability.  Last week, she gave a stranger a hand job.  This week, Stan suggests that Abe's too good looking for her.  Does Peggy say yes because she's worried about losing Abe, and ending up alone, or is it because she's tasting the so-called sexual revolution, and liking the flavor?  I think her ambivalence in this scene, and when she tells Joan her news, speak to her conflicted feelings--and her daring.

Peggy is the focal point for both cheer-worthy scenes this week.  When she arrives to SCDP the next day, she is met by Joan delivering the news that there's champagne in the conference room because Meghan landed Heinz at dinner the night before (yes, Don gives Meghan credit here too, and she deserves it).  Then Joan notices Peggy's ring finger is bare, and says that champagne may not be right for the moment.  Peggy haltingly tells Joan that Abe proposed they move in together, worrying that Joan will be disappointed for her, but defensively stating that they don't need a piece of paper to prove anything.  Joan snaps that the piece of paper Greg has with the Army is more important than any paper she shares with him (nailing that coffin down tight).  Joan congratulates Peggy, believing the proposal romantic and Peggy brave before giving her a big hug.  Yay!  I'm grinning just remembering this beautiful scene between these two incredible women.

And yet things get even better!  Meghan steps out of the celebration and runs into Peggy, who immediately cries, "Meghan, congratulations!" and embraces her.  When Meghan sheepishly tries to undercut her accomplishment, Peggy exclaims, "I know what you did, and it's a big deal!"  What I love about Peggy, is unlike any other character on this show, she is utterly devoid of guile.  She blurts out how she feels, even when it's sometimes inappropriate.  She tells Meghan "I tried to crack that nut.  If anything, I should be jealous, but I look at you, and...I don't know...I'm getting to experience my first time again....This is as good as the job gets, savor it."  One can see Meghan's complicated reaction here.  She's used to experiencing jealousy, pettiness, and blanket dismissal.  Instead, a fellow woman colleague she respects is cheering her on.  She decides to "savor it" giving Peggy a quick squeeze in solidarity.  This moment is a triumph for Peggy, Meghan, and Mad Men!  Yay!  I'm smiling as wide as Meghan!

Ah, but Mad Men is always eager to bring viewers back down after they are up.  Back at chez Draper, the griping and sniping turns into full on screaming matches with the two in-laws.  After a little shopping interlude, Meghan, Marie and Sally return home.  Sally politely asks "papa" if she can attend his awards dinner that evening; Don's being lauded by the American Cancer Society for his letter denouncing tobacco (last season).  Marie points out that daughters need to witness their father's successes, and then Emile explodes, screaming in French that Marie won't be happy until he's dead.  He storms off to his room, and she joins him.  Screaming ensues.  When Don asks what the hell happened, Meghan explains that at one point, after an unsuccessful meeting with a potential publisher, Emile called his grad student girlfriend, sobbing.  Marie walked in and overheard his conversation, and was understandably furious.  Meghan's reaction says so much about why she's willing to put up with Don's volatile moods; this kind of behavior is standard operating procedure for her.  As she tells Don, "They do this all the time.  They'll recover.  They always do." Wow.

Roger pops by before they depart, and there's noticeable sexual tension between he and Marie; she openly flirts with him while she ties his bow tie for him.  Before Emile has time to protest, Sally emerges in her dress for the "ball," looking young, hip, and older than her twelve years.

Don's shocked reaction is priceless, but Emile warns him, "No matter what you do, some day your little girl will spread her legs and fly away."  Hilarious implied butchering of English coming off as disturbingly Freudian!  Don tells Sally to get rid of the boots and make-up or she has to stay at home.  Meghan replies, "wings, Daddy," but everyone gets the drift.  Sally's not a little girl anymore, and she is about to witness some very adult behavior!"

Disappointments come fast and furious throughout the rest of the episode.  Peggy and Abe invite her mother to dinner to tell her their "news," and she ends up taking back the cake she brought them, declaring that she will not help them celebrate their "living in sin."  Mom basically tells Peggy that cliched "he won't buy the cow if he gets the milk for free" story, and the evening turns pretty damn sour.

At the ball, Sally asks where the "staircase" is, disappointed that she cannot make a grand entrance.  Then she's served codfish (with the head on) for dinner, inspiring this episode's title.  Marie and Roger massively flirt with each other, and then leave together.  Emile accuses Meghan of surrendering her dreams for Don's love.  Don is told by Ken Cosgrove's father-in-law (played by Ray Wise) that everyone admires his work, but corporate businessmen don't like and will never work with Don because he "bit the hand" with his anti-tobacco letter.  Finally, poor Sally, taking a wrong turn from the bathroom, opens a door to find Marie giving Roger a blow job; she gets an eyeful before she runs back, no longer interested in her sweet "Shirley Temple.''

The episode's final image is a striking contrast to the idealized version that Meghan uses to sell the Heinz campaign.  Instead of generational equanimity, these generational relationships are riddled with strife.  The realities that this group are forced to face, about themselves, and each other, continue the tensions that underscore this entire season.  Sally's encounter with the sordid side of the "city" has undoubtedly only just begun.

MAD MEN--"Far Away Places"

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