MAD MEN on AMC - Season 6

I think (hope) this was him truly hitting rock bottom. For me, as a viewer, it definitely was. Can only hope the writers feel the same though.

surely bottom was season 3s blackout boozing bachelor-dom?

the bit where he was watching Meghan talking and the sound gradually faded away was amazing

his rapid switch between reactions to her walking out I think really highlighted his whole awful emotional situation. He says "It's easy to walk out when you're satisfied" in his familiar fallback entitled male approach, and then moments later this utterly desperate-sounding "Please". Kinda devastating.

eh, i don't really have a lot of sympathy for don at this point.

I don't either but it is sort of pathetic/sad to see this guy trying so hard to keep the facade up

I loved the elevator scene at the beginning. "Door close! Door close!"

I feel like I was the last person on earth to have sympathy for Don, especially on this thread, and even I am losing it now! Which I interpret as some very good writing. They sent him off the rails good this episode. Something needs to happen now, seriously.

yeah exactly! it's interesting the show has pushed don to the point where he doesn't even evoke pity. he is so smug and just disdainful of the interests of other people that i have a hard time not wanting him to just lose everything.

let's face it the only loss that would really destroy Don is the loss of his identity as super-important advertising man (which seems pretty secure at this point). and maybe Sally.

hm. i predict he is going to lose his career somehow, by the end of the season. his decline seems to have been a consistent trend across seasons.

sorry not season... series

my prediction is that he is going to lose his advertising man identity and face himself, dick whitman/don draper, in all his naked humanity. this might be lame, i don't know if it will be the best thing to do, but it's what i predict is going to happen

Weiner's repeatedly talked about how the series is about Don getting overrun by the changing times but that doesn't seem to have happened a whole lot yet (record-skipping of TMM aside). he's blown a few client relationships but not because he wasn't "with it" or lost his mojo or whatever. but I would assume this is inevitable.

hm. yeah, i don't see his downfall coming from "the times" really, as much as just the fact that his lifestyle is stressful -- drinking, cheating, being an asshole -- and the mask is started to slip. i would have burned out already if i was him. also, maybe it's just me, but he doesn't seem to be as "into" his work these days as he once was... leaving work early to meet his mistress on the day the new ppl are moving in, idk, work doesn't seem to be a priority to him anymore.

he's engaged with work sporadically - Jaguar, napalm. you know, the important stuff. feel like that's been the pattern for the last couple seasons tho.

If he loses adman dominance it's because people like Ted are the future. Loved the Gilligans island bit.

I agree with Treeship. Don's downfall will be the one putting him out of business, I think. He is so far removed and detached from his work, he doesn't have a clue what is going on any more (cue the bewilderment seeing the merger happen in reality). In the first 3 seasons Don was already quite terrible but had this hero-esque "I will deal with this client" superiority. That is totally gone now. All he wants to do is wait for a phone call to have a shag.

Seeing how booze will not send him spiralling down, Megan not posing a big threat, I can only think that him losing his expertise of work will truly sink him. The way things are going, that won't be long from now.

the bit where he was watching Meghan talking and the sound gradually faded away was amazing

that was moment where he finally realizes "omg, look at those fucking chompers. she's going to swallow me whole"

I was trying to figure out if Don was really into the whole power-play thing or if he was trying to wear through this thing with Sylvia as quickly as possible while also feeling like he was in control of a part of his life. It kind of ended faster than he expected?

omg Pete's mom, "they're shooting everybody"

To me the whole power-play thing seemed like Don grasping at straws and reaching a new low

yeah, that too

that was moment where he finally realizes "omg, look at those fucking chompers. she's going to swallow me whole"

I know people on here love her but jesus she is just Freddie Mercury in drag people

psssh

"just"

I mean freddy mercury in drag is a pretty amazing look!

Thought Don was going to make Sylvia slap him, thought they were going to get a lot darker with that. The end gave me chills.

xpost meghan is gorgeous as was freddy mercury you people are insane

why do people keep insisting on adding an 'h' to the character's name

To make it more like "mh"

<3

The end gave me chills.

Yeah, I keep thinking about it. It captured the poignance of the end of a relationship, when someone decides to stop believing in the shared illusion. And it also obviously underscores how fragile Don's sense of himself really is. His fear that people will stop believing in him goes a lot deeper than his fake name. He himself thinks he's a phony.

Second pretty good episode in a row, though unless they pull something astounding out of the bag this is shaping up to be the least good season.

Big exception is Campbell, that's one character who gets better with every episode.

Acting is an amazing profession. I don't know if I could live myself even pretending to be Pete Campbell for a half an hour let alone however long Vincent Kartheiser has to in order to create 72 hours of television.

can't really see Joan finding sycophancy all that attractive in the long run tbh, no way is she going to fall for someone less powerful than her

Hmmm let me think, what recent events in Joan's life might render power unattractive?

Really couldn't give less of a shit about Don's boring affair by this point. Everything else was great, especially Roger firing Burt, and the whole bunfight in the boardroom.

finally caught up on this ep

- the more Pete unravels, the happier I get. He's so awesome when he's panicked and flailing. MY MOTHER CAN GO TO HELL...AND TED CAN FLY HER THERE.

- Don's scenes with Lindsay Weir made me genuinely uncomfortable. And I started thinking about how conflicted his 'I grew up in a brothel' backstory has made him as an adult. At least, that's where my mind went. All of his swagger at sweeping women off their feet, the 'art of seduction' he has down pat, and all of his white-knighting women whose wrongs needs righting ie Joan makes him seem from a distance like he's the perfect man, and he thinks that's what makes him a perfect man...and yet there's this gaping chasm of disconnect because of what that 'growing up in a brothel' experience did to his perception of sexual love, when you crack that shell open he's barely a formed adult.

Either that or Don's just a prize-winning douchebag. Mostly that.

oh one other great thing about this episode no one's mentioned yet - Pete's brother. their relationship cracks me up

Pete's mom not realizing her husband is dead, and then her getting the situation with Pete/Trudy completely right followed by an accusation his dad was also using the apartment as a love nest really got me.

To me the whole power-play thing seemed like Don grasping at straws and reaching a new low

there were also supposed to be some obvious parallels between Don's actions w/ Lindsay Weir and his power games at the office vs. Ted

shouldn't Peggy have been going to have a talk with Ted and not Don? that was a bad look.

for those tracking Don's literacy he was reading The Last Picture Show

there were also supposed to be some obvious parallels between Don's actions w/ Lindsay Weir and his power games at the office vs. Ted

yeah I guess if you look at it that way there are lots of power dynamics in that episode. joan possibly being poised to become the more powerful one in a relationship, peggy back under don's control, roger getting a kick out of firing somebody, and pete taking control over his controlling mother.

joan possibly being poised to become the more powerful one in a relationship

also the most powerful woman in the office (she's even Peggy's boss) and yet still trying to not get treated like a secretary

speaking of secretary what was up with Dawn going missing ... ?

the scene with Bert and Roger was great, I also liked the dialogue between Ted and the guy with cancer

it does seem like Ted is real close to being able to call bullshit on the creative genius of Don Draper. Don's butter ad was so hacky. Ted only thought it was good because he was drunk.

speaking of secretary what was up with Dawn going missing ... ?

yeah, assumed this was some kind of weird foreshadowing

yeah I really liked that exchnage with Ted in the hospital room. hopefully Ted will steel himself to play the long game with Don and come out on top. don's macho shit annoys me.

That hospital conversation was really interesting. Before that you just see Ted eager and serious about working with Don, but that conversation shows that the competition is still there. But I think it's not as simple as "winning", which the sick art director alluded to, I think Ted generally wants success and just wants to figure Don out. Maybe there will be some power play with Don submitting to Ted, or maybe Don will learn some lessons about not being alpha as the agency changes around him.

What surprised me was the beginning of Peggy's talk to Don, "you never tried to get me back" or something, like that was still an issue. Don's response was funny, "right, we merged these two companies so I could have you in my office complaining again."

I got the impression it was more that she was pissed that Don never acted like she existed when she was outside of his office as a human being, let alone as another person in the same business, and now she's supposed to be all hunky-dory and have the same in-office dynamic that she left

She's really grown as a person! She was in charge of shit! She bought a home, damn it!

I can sympathize, it's really irritating when you are away from someone for the express intent of growing as a person and they act like nothing's changed when you see them after a stretch.

maybe Don will learn some lessons about not being alpha as the agency changes around him.

"I hoped he would rub off on you, not the other way around"