Mad Men – It’s Getting Grim

 

*Warning – Spoilers ahead from the recent episode of Mad Men.*

There’s only one more new episode left in the fifth season of Mad Men and damn, has it gotten grim. A bright, upstart suffered one too many insults and attacks from her mentor last week and headed out the door of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce. The savvy office manager was pimped out by the partners in order to land the Jaguar account.

And now one of the named partners -- who embezzled money from the firm and forged the signature of a man who stole his identity from someone else and fears being caught by the feds -- hanged himself in his office. Oh, and Sally is now sneaking around New York City with that creepy Glen kid with his cheesy adolescent lip fuzz.

Remember how the elevator door opened in a mid-season episode and Don peered down the empty elevator shaft, seemingly thankful he didn’t absent-mindedly just step forward once the doors opened? Remember how some of the promos for this season featured the stark image of a falling man, similar to the ones we see in the opening credits? Was this all meant to form a meta-analogy of Don watching things fall apart around him? Again? Everything from the team he created to his reputation among the big companies (who are still angry about his Lucky Strike letter)?

Don -- whose own brother Adam also hanged himself after Don gave him money and his walking papers -- experienced an eerie echo of that scenario in this episode, entitled, “Commissions and Fees,” when Lane was told by Don to keep the money he’d embezzled – Don would cover it – as Don told Lane to just walk away from the firm, resign, leave, skedaddle because Don couldn’t trust him (like Don didn’t trust his brother not to wreck the life he’d created for himself with a stolen identity).

Don has now come face-to-face with death (the last time he did so he was in Korea). Because he told Lane he had to go. (It was only by chance that Don’s new prestige client – the landing of which was sullied by Joan prostituting herself – wasn’t sabotaged by Lane committing suicide inside a Jaguar simply because, ironically, it wouldn’t start.)

What will this all mean to Don, who seems to want to focus on his work and lost boys (seeing a young Dick Whitman in Glen I’m betting), and has returned to form, treating his wife Megan as though she’s no longer a marital equal, that she no longer merits notification that she’s going to be saddled with the care of his daughter and that no longer needs to be consulted on stuff? He's already ditched her at HoJos, and now he's acting like she's a brunette Betty 2.0.

Even the so-called enlightenment that Roger experienced on LSD, which he found so beautiful and significant, has disappeared into thin air, worn off, Roger told Don. Does that mean the newness and freshness of Don's new start with Megan has worn off? That the bubble of the enlightenment that Don found in his new marriage has burst?

At the same time, there was some attempt at an analogy meant to be forged with Sally “becoming a woman,” her girlhood passing her by as she’s hanging out with Megan and her friend and gabbing about the color of pubic hair, drinking sugar and coffee, donning white go-go boots and making clandestine plans with Glen to meet together.

Given the way this season has unfolded, there’s no telling what will happen in next week’s season finale, called, “The Phantom.” Any predictions?

Image credit: Ron Jaffe/AMC.

Notes on Pop Culture: Mad at 'Mad Men,' Don Draper & Co. in Cartoons, 'The Big C' Finally Comes Clean

Mad at Mad Men

After allowing myself to stew about the Mad Men season four finale for a few days, I wrote this piece over on Mommy Tracked. The more I thought about the fourth season in its entirety, the more I became annoyed with how Betty Draper Frances was depicted as a distinctly unlikeable, unsympathetic character, as well as with Don’s choice of a substitute mate.

Other critics, including New York Magazine’s Emily Nussbaum, likewise weren't overjoyed with what has become of Betty ("While the ladies around her bloom, Betty hardens. Her character . . . gets even icier, vainer, more alien – nearly camp at times") and the New York Times’ Ginia Bellafante observed, in light of Don’s proposal to Megan, that the show exacted “vengeance on Faye for her lack of maternal instinct” and that Betty was portrayed negatively because of “her horrific one.”

The most interesting thing I discovered while researching my column: In season one, Don told Betty that she was a better mother than “anyone else in the world,” adding, “I would’ve given anything to have had a mother like you, beautiful and kind and filled with love, like an angel.”

Don Draper & Co., Cartoon Style

I’m still trying to figure out if this is some kind of a joke . . . but the internet is buzzing about these picture books that the UK's The Poke has created based on chain-smoking, expletive-spewing Mad Men characters.

The Poke has posted images of "Mr. Draper," "Little Miss Joan," "Mr. Campbell," "Little Miss Betty" and "Little Miss Peggy," and has posted the complete 17-page version of a book called “Mr. Sterling Gets Angry” in which there’s a debate over who drinks more whiskey, smokes more cigarettes and has more “inappropriate sex,” Roger Sterling or Don “I’m a goddamn sex machine in a suit” Draper.

I’d love to get these in print.

The Big C Finally Comes Clean

It finally happened, 10 episodes into The Big C’s freshman season on Showtime. Laura Linney’s Cathy Jamison character, who has spent most of the season not telling her husband and son that she has a serious, fatal case of melanoma -- and instead of getting treatment she had an affair, got her first bikini wax, bought a red sports car, took Ecstasy and punished her husband to the point where he finally asked for a divorce – finally told her husband, in the closing seconds of the episode, that she has cancer. NOW, things are going to get interesting. I reviewed this episode, “Divine Intervention” on CliqueClack TV.

Image credits: The Poke.

Creative Take on 'Mad Men' Theme, Matt Weiner on Finale

As we draw closer to Sunday night's final episode of Mad Men's exquisite fourth season -- Matthew Weiner & Co. created, by and large, an outstanding set of episodes this year -- I thought you'd find interesting this video of NBC Nightly News anchorman Brian Williams' daughter Allison who combined the Mad Men theme with the lyrics from the Nat King Cole song Nature Boy and got this:



About that Sunday night finale, entitled "Tomorrowland," Weiner has remained pretty tight-lipped about it, though he told a TV Squad blogger in an interview:

". . . [W]hat I really hope for for the finale is that people will see the finale and understand the journey that they went on for the season. They've been looking at it week by week, and they've sort of been on board with it, and I think they've enjoyed learning so much about Don and seeing him pushed to the end, and seeing him either rise to the occasion or, as you're saying, not rise to the occasion. But hopefully they will see at the end what the journey that he's been on."

Earlier in the interview, Weiner said of Don's experiences this season:

"He got to a place this season, certainly in the middle of it, where he was very close to being a different person and sort of accepting who he was and saying, I'm tired of . . . and then the shit hit the fan. Now we're seeing this person is come out. Is it the same person we met at the beginning of the show? I don't know."

I don't know about you, but I'm in complete denial that, after Sunday night, I'll have until next summer for new Mad Men episodes.

Notes on Pop Culture: 'Mad Men's' Roger Sterling, 'Grey's Anatomy' & 'The Event'

Image credit: AMC

John Slattery on Roger Sterling: ‘I don’t think he has any interest in killing himself'

Mad Men’s Roger Sterling has had a bad time of things this season. His marriage to his super-young former secretary, which upended his entire life, hasn’t quite turned out the way he hoped as his eye has wandered back to the woman with whom he shares an intense emotional connection, the married Joan Holloway Harris. When Roger and Joan were out on the town, they were mugged. Joan lost her wedding ring and the duo had sex in a dingy alley . . . which led to an unplanned pregnancy followed quickly by an illegal abortion, after Roger plainly told Joan that if she went through with the pregnancy he'd disavow paternity.

On top of all that, Roger’s one big client, American Tobacco -- which represented a huge hunk of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce’s revenues -- left Roger high and dry after decades of working together, putting the entire future of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce in jeopardy. Then Roger lied about losing the account, pathetically faking a phone call and a trip.

Some have speculated online as to whether Roger, played by John Slattery, is suicidal. (He was darkly joking about suicide after Ida Blankenship died, saying he, a man who survived two heart attacks, didn't want to die at his desk.) Slattery chatted with New York Magazine about this issue, as well as Roger’s very bad season.

Grey’s Off to Good Start

Grey’s Anatomy’s writers have certainly not taken the easy road as the drama’s seventh season has begun and, as a result, the show's off to a fine start. There've been no neat and tidy resolutions following the mass shooting in the season six finale. Seattle Grace staffers who survived intimate contact and threats from the homocidal shooter has left them with emotional damage, some more so than others. The characters' reactions have been varied, though I must say that Lexie Grey is getting on my nerves.

I was particularly fond of the interplay between McDreamy and Cristina in last week's episode, particularly the scene in which Derek said they would’ve never chosen each other as friends but now they’re family and he was worried about her withdrawal from her work. And because she saved his life, operating as the barrel of a loaded gun was next to her head, he feels as though he owes her. I reviewed the latest episode here.

Any Grey’s fans think the season has been going well so far?

The Event: Is It Worth Sticking with It?

Still feeling burned by Lost’s series finale and unhappy with the way FlashForward ended while leaving a million loose ends dangling (thanks ABC), I’m leery about latching onto another show that's a dense serial drama where answers won’t immediately arrive, that is, if they ever do.

Which brings me to The Event. It’s got all these layers and conspiracies. Scenes flash around from time period to time period. People are dead and then they’re not. A jet liner disappears just before crashing into the president. Amidst all that, you know what was flashing in front in my eyes? Red flags. Giant ones.

Is this all going to make sense? Is it irrational, in light of Lost's final "hey they're all dead" season, to expect that answers will be forthcoming? That the network will encourage viewers to get all involved and then pull the rug out from under them, a la FlashForward? I’m very skeptical. You?

Image credit: Michael Yarish/AMC.

'Mad Men' -- Blowing Smoke

Image credit: AMC

*Warning – Spoilers ahead from the recent episode of Mad Men.*

Addiction. Addiction to tobacco. Addiction to heroin. Addiction to lies, to false facades, to impulsive actions, to getting involved with the wrong people. Mad Men was awash in bad-for-you addiction in its second-to-last season four episode and not just Don “I’m falling off the wagon” Draper.

First of all, seeing Midge return was a surprise and kind of refreshing, until of course we saw the sorry state into which her life has fallen, courtesy of her addiction to heroin as she and her husband offered to prostitute herself for the sake of more money for the next score.

While he himself had hired prostitutes in the last year to feed his addiction to his self-loathing, Don surveyed the wreckage that is Midge’s life and was stunned. It was impossible not to think of his life. During the last episode he slept with his secretary, jeopardizing his budding, healthy relationship with Faye. He’s started drinking again and his company’s on the brink.

But Don attempted to redeem himself for some of his bad behavior, paid Pete’s portion of the mandated partner contributions in order to keep the company afloat, a nod to Pete’s discretion when it came to the Dick Whitman matter.

Don also sought to cleanse himself of his company’s “addiction” to Lucky Strike -- the loss of which could wind up destroying Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce -- by unilaterally composing and then purchasing a full-page ad in the New York Times telling the world, “Why I’m Quitting Tobacco” and vowed that the agency wouldn’t accept tobacco companies as clients any longer. (Don was shown swimming as you heard his voice-over reading his open letter. Water and cleansing . . . which led to a scene where Don come face to face with Megan.)

Don experienced a Jerry Maguire moment of sorts, although Don’s open letter wasn’t a heartfelt opus, ‘twas but a mere marketing ploy to save his sinking agency. (Loved Peggy’s wry smile when she called Don out on the fact that this was a stunt as much as Peggy’s staged mall over the ham in the market was.)



Bert’s response to Don’s stunningly narcissist act – “We’ve created a monster” – was an equally stunning one, quitting. Certainly Bert isn’t really gone, he can’t be, can he?

Maybe he really can be, given what Robert Morse, who plays Bert Cooper, told AMC’s Mad Men blogger that:

"You never know with Matt [Weiner] what is going to happen, and you never know what the future will bring, whether I'll be going to the unemployment line looking for another job or whether I'll be coming back or anything. So all I do is pick up my shoes and say good-bye to everybody and I'm out of the office. What happens next year I don't know. I hope I get a phone call. I think it's the best show in the world. . . Maybe we'll have to get a thing going: bring Robert Morse back.”

Meanwhile, back in the awkward, uncomfortable and emotionally withholding Francis home, Sally had been sneaking around and hanging out with creepy Glen – the one who ransacked the house for Sally earlier in the season -- though it should be noted that Sally took a pass on his offer of cigarettes, unlike in season two when Sally stole Betty’s cigarettes and, when Betty found her smoking, shoved her in a closet. Sally’s truly the product of the duplicitous Betty and Don, telling her therapist that Betty doesn’t really care how Sally feels because Betty just wants compliance.

About Betty . . . the fact that once she realized Sally was hanging out with Glen – a haunted kind of boy who’d previously show an interest in Betty in season two, when Betty dressed him in one of Don's T-shirts and watched cartoons with him – was what prompted Betty to announce that they’d be moving out of the house, when her own husband’s pleas fell on deaf ears, is disturbing. On so many levels.

All of this, plus laying off Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce employees, made me wonder: How will this play in the season finale next week, called, “Tomorrowland?” The AMC Mad Men web site only says this of the season finale: “Opportunity arises for Don and Peggy.”

If you had the ear of the Mad Men writers, what would you hope to see in the season four finale?

Image credit: Michael Yarish/AMC.