Monday, April 27, 2015

SEASON 7, EPISODE 11.

The key moment was when Jim Hobart from McCann told the SCP partners they'd "died and gone to advertising heaven" and they all sat there looking miserable. Actually I take that back -- they looked like they didn't know how they should look. In fact I think even the actors didn't  know how they should look -- because the feeling was too ambiguous. The moment was clearly meant to show that, though advertising is what they do all day, are good at, and claim to care about, Pete, Roger, Joan, Ted and Don (well, maybe not Ted) are only now acknowledging that it's not really that important to them.

But what is, then? Joan's got the clearest gripe about the move -- McCann's a sexist shithole and she'll have trouble there. Roger -- well, his name was on the door, and so was Don's for a while. But neither of them ever showed any thirst for permanence before -- shit, they're both practically estranged from their children. And Pete's reaction looks like nothing but pique. Really, Jim's right -- this is like minor leaguers complaining they got sent up to The Show. The only reason to complain is if you're sick of baseball.

So what do they want? I fear Joan and Rich Cracker are going to be spun off into an entrepreneural love nest. Pete may devote some of his spare time to becoming a better human being, and I have to admit his tip-off to Peggy (coming after a mommy-baby flash that was very well handled) and his chivalry with Trudy make that look like an interesting project. (Question: Pete told Peggy about the McCann move but Don didn't?) Sterling can have a sitcom with Mme. Calvet, something like Green Acres in Québécois.

But what about Don? I think showing up at the Waitress of Death's apartment red- faced drunk in the wee hours was about the most human thing I've seen Don do, and the most pathetic. If it means anything, it means Don's going to have to bottom out before he can get anywhere else. But that's a big if.

I liked Peggy's truth-telling scene with Stan, and all honor to the undersung Jay R. Ferguson, who has a certain preening, thoughtless sort of art-monkey down cold, and who showed here that even a doofus can get institutional sexism if you give him absolutely no chance to evade the point -- like, have someone he loves make it. (At this point his relationship with Peggy seems more realistic to me than Don's.) I guess the only problem with it was the truth-telling; to me, it's a sign the show is ending and people are going to start spelling out what they want. And I fear it's going to be things like respect in the workplace, a financially comfortable family life, and a bunch of other dull shit that's perfectly fine in and of itself but hardly worth all that artistic effort. Shit, maybe Draper will go back to Pennsylvania and make that old whorehouse into a Hilton.

P.S. There's been a Campbell at Greenwich Country Day for generations, but suddently family history is an issue? What'd I miss? P.P.S. With Trudy's eloquent complaint, it's official: Women in 1970 are sick of this shit. Was it Virginia Slims?

21 comments:

  1. dennisdoubleday12:25 PM

    They didn't say McDonald had been there for generations, did they? It could a change at the gatekeeper level.

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  2. sharculese12:38 PM

    That was my read, as well.

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  3. edroso12:58 PM

    Ah thanks. Though it seems weird that a headmaster could change a legacy policy like that.

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  4. FlipYrWhig1:00 PM

    A LOT going on in the episode about what will be left behind after SCDP and its principals, both personally and professionally. No more Sterlings, no nuclear families, everyone slightly broken and unfulfilled.

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  5. Obviously there was a hostile takeover of the school by the MacDonald clan.

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  6. sharculese1:12 PM

    (Question: Pete told Peggy about the McCann move but Don didn't?)


    Well, it was painted as kind of a spur of the moment thing. Pete saw Peggy and realized he needed to get her up to speed on things, whereas Don (shock of shocks) cares more about with this means for Don.


    But overall, I wouldn't be at all shocked to find out Pete and Peggy are closer than Peggy and Don, not by a longshot. Peggy jumping ship for CGC was kind of a nail in the coffin of their mentor-mentee relationship (and if her leaving wasn't, Don's awkward reaction was) they can show tenderness to each other, but they're more just employee-supervisor than anything else.


    Meanwhile, Pete and Peggy have always had an easy (if combative) camaraderie that comes from a shared sense of being misfits. Pete is probably a better fit for the atmosphere at McCann, where he'll just be an accounts man doing bigger accounts, but it doesn't seem at all implausible to me that he would stop and ask "oh, shit, how does Peggy fit in?" in a way that Don doesn't have time for.

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  7. prufrock2:25 PM

    I found the Pete/Headmaster clash particularly funny, given that the approximately 8 million McMullen's who live in Pinellas County are still bitching about the name of the causeway that connects Clearwater and Tampa.

    For those of you who don't know, it's Courtney-Campbell.

    The King ordered it, indeed!

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  8. mortimer20003:50 PM

    I thought the last office scene was an interesting bit, with all the Sterling-Cooper proles 'n drones basically ignoring their best and brightest leaders, almost shunning them as if they were no longer credible or even relevant to their own futures. It was probably the most unrealistic scene of the episode, too -- I can't imagine actual workers walking out on such a portentous announcement. Who knows, maybe it's a Vietnam war metaphor. But it was fun to see the big shots of the agency standing there like a chorus line of jerks.

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  9. sundaystyle4:02 PM

    I've always had a soft spot for Pete, despite his air of oily entitlement. Glad to see him step up this episode (with Peggy and Joan, as well as Trudy). This episode was directed by Jared Harris, who played Lane Pryce. Gave me an added laugh remembering that character's fight with Pete a few seasons back. Pete came out of the fracas with the headmaster in much better shape.

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  10. J Neo Marvin4:13 PM

    I really hope Don does something other than bottoming out for the third or fourth time. Mad Men has done that to death.

    I'd like to see him end the show by doing something completely unexpected. And I don't mean falling out of a damn window, either.

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  11. J Neo Marvin5:14 PM

    Burt Peterson will fire Roger in the final episode.

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  12. Wrangler6:43 PM

    I think each of the last 3 episodes have all ended with a shot of Don in the approximate center of some space, standing there silently as the camera pulls away, like he does not know what in the fuck to do.

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  13. M. Krebs7:33 PM

    Uh, I hope this isn't completely naïve, but is there really a character named Rich Cracker?

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  14. J Neo Marvin7:34 PM

    That's not his name but it should be.

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  15. Disboose8:03 PM

    It wasn't realistic, but I agree, it's interesting to see Don's ability to persuade die out with the agency.

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  16. Disboose8:05 PM

    Wonderful symmetry there.

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  17. Disboose8:07 PM

    I think they would both aid Peggy when the mood strikes them, but neither would consistently be there for her.

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  18. FlipYrWhig8:35 AM

    Set up from before with Mathis's remark that Don has never been particularly more than handsome.

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  19. Ellis_Weiner11:24 AM

    I literally thought that scene was a dream Pete would awaken from at any second. The weird blandness of the headmaster combined with his dialogue felt surreal. Imagine my surprise.

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  20. cleter7:02 PM

    It's really time-travelling Captain Pike from the alternate Star Trek timeline.

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