MAD MEN Partners' Meeting - "Dark Shadows"

Welcome to the Mad Men Partners' Meeting -- a roundtable discussion of this week's episode from your friendly neighborhood LowBrowMedia savants.
This is a spoiler-heavy zone. You have been warned.

"Dark Shadows"

Season 5, Episode 9

airdate: May 13th, 2012

Mark: Oh, Betty. Despite Ms. Francis doing the epically shitty thing of using her daughter as a pawn against her ex-husband, I think some of that season one sympathy that she instilled in me is creeping its way back in. Who, like Betty, wouldn’t be a little peeved to witness Don and Megan’s swinging Manhattan pad and genuine affection for each other when all they had to go back home to was a dark, empty house and a distant daddy-husband? You know you don’t mess with Sally if you want to stay in my good graces, but damned if I didn’t feel for Betty that her greatest source of pleasure in her life currently is a meticulously portioned glob of sweet potatoes. I’m definitely sensitive to weight issues, so maybe that has something to do with it. But I also know how deeply it hurts to be jilted, and although she does not process her feelings in anywhere near a healthy way, there is something to Betty’s anger and disappointment over Megan somehow having access to a sensitive, loving Don Draper that Betty herself never knew. Don’t get me wrong, Betty can be such a dope. After all, she is thankful because “I have everything I want, and no one has anything better”. It’s important to her that everyone else be on a lower rung. That line actually made me laugh out loud and exclaim “What a Betty thing to say!” Yes, I’m an obnoxious TV watcher sometimes. Well, anyway, chalk another one up for Sally’s dying innocence. Sorry, Sal, not even the grown-ups have it figured out. Good luck!

Now that Megan has flown the Sterling Coop to pursue guest spots on Dark Shadows (in theaters now!), Don has no choice but to reengage with his work. And he’s a little rusty. Not only does his cartoon devil pitch lack that Don Draper feeling, it looks downright quaint next to Ginsberg’s literally in-your-face Snoball campaign. It was painful to hear Don have to justify – TWICE – that his devil ad will work if you hear the scary devil voice in your head. When it comes down to it, Don predicates his idea entirely on the fact that kids like cartoon devils, which to paraphrase Roger Sterling, sounds like a client’s idea if I’ve ever heard one. Like Betty, Don feels jilted and passed up, in this case by the changing world of advertising. He has been checked out for a while (Ginsberg condescendingly congratulates Don on being able to write after not doing it for so long), and is jealous of the new kid on the block. Shades of Betty and Megan. And like Betty, Don takes the petty route and ditches Ginsberg’s mock-up in the cab ride to the presentation, and he sells the client on his cartoon devil after Ginsberg’s work was unanimously chosen as the stronger pitch by the SCDP partners. Maybe Don and Betty are more alike than we thought, and as genuinely supportive as Don is of Megan’s choice to pursue acting, maybe Don can only go so far. As Joan reminded us, Don was once this smitten with Betty back when she was a bright-eyed model plucked from a casting call. As Roger says (I’m quoting him a lot today), it’s every man for himself, and who’s to say Don won’t jump ship the minute he tires of his worldview being challenged? Megan, Ginsberg and the entire world aren’t going to stop moving forward, and it wouldn’t surprise me if Don just ripped the needle off the record in frustration and walked away from it all. Don vacillates between being with and behind the times, but ultimately I’m afraid he just can’t handle all those sitars and tape loops. By the way, I missed the last couple of weeks, but I can’t believe this show was able to license “Tomorrow Never Knows”. How expensive must that have been?

Gratuitous side-boob image brought to you by the good people of LowBrowMedia.

Continuing the theme of “Everybody’s Selfish!” is Mr. Pete Campbell and his dogged pursuit of Beth. This is more from last week’s episode, since I didn’t have a chance to weigh in, but gosh... It’s the same with Betty. Weiner and pals have a special talent of making their characters act like utter scumbags but having them still somehow be sympathetic. Pete’s motivations come from the most selfish and petty of places, all from his thwarted sense of superiority and unfulfilled need to be seen as important and to guide the narrative of his life, but damn his depression is palpable. He is the saddest little fuck I’ve ever seen, and his need to turn the tables on Beth in order to correct some misplaced idea that women shouldn’t have the ability to guide the course of action if a man believes things should go another way is just mindblowing. Wait a minute, Pete! That tiny speck of ground you have to stand on is crumbling! Watch out below!

I also appreciated that the fog of dread that has been hanging over this entire series became literal this week, in the form of the poisonous smog which apparently was a real thing and killed 169 people in 1966. I feel like that’s the kind of metaphor that causes Matthew Weiner to literally drool. After that and the incredibly ominous open elevator shaft from two weeks ago, I’m really starting to feel the cold hand of death hanging over this show. Or perhaps it’s the cold hand of Satan gripping his ice cold Snoball treat!

Jon: Ask and you shall receive! Last week I petitioned for some overdue Betty action and, man alive, did I get it this time. She's been busy trying to lose some of that excess weight we were introduced to earlier this season by engaging in some serious portion-controlled meals and attending some therapy sessions (also known as Weight Watchers). Things seem to be on the upswing for her, but the combination of getting glimpses of Don's swanky new apartment, his new wife's banging physique and their lovey-dovey correspondence prove to be too much, and she immediately regresses into the childlike behavior that drove her into this mess in the first place. But as awful as it was of her to spill some of Don's secret past to Sally, it was probably the most fun thing I've seen her do since she was gunning down birds with a ciggy hanging out of the side of her mouth. As much as her character drives me bonkers, "Dark Shadows" was a wonderful reminder how necessary Betty is to the show. She makes almost everything around her more interesting. A lot of trouble was caused this week, as she accelerated a lot of things into motion involving Don and Megan, as well as Don and Sally for the final episodes of season 5.

In addition to Betty's return, there were a couple of important shifts with other characters that occurred this week, namely the rest of the Drapers -- Megan, Sally and Don -- and young, enigmatic Michael Ginsberg.

Megan continues to buy into her father's disappointment in her life, with this week bringing us a peek at a similar sentiment from her acting friend we last saw at the "Zou Bisou Bisou" party. As her lovely ginger friend points out, Megan's pretty far away from the struggling actress reduced to reading for a cheesy gothic soap opera. At this point, I'm wondering if she'll leave Don to pursue her stage dreams just to struggle for the point of struggling, or if he'll become completely disenchanted with her before she has the chance.

But cute redheaded actresses aren't the only ones giving Megan a hard time this week, as Sally cuts deep at her with Betty's claws. The revelation of her father's dark secrets hurt Sally immensely, shattering her idealistic view she's allowed herself to build of him as an absentee parent, an image very unlike what Sally's cultivated for Betty. Soon enough, she'll be free of any simple vision of either one of her parents. But Sally's further ascent into adolescence does stop there. This week has shown us she is an absolute master at manipulating every adult in her proximity. She circles around each of Betty, Don and Megan with amazing tact, and one can only marvel at what she'll be able to pull off next season.

After having spent most of the season avoiding work at such an astonishing rate Roger has probably been the more productive SCDP employee this season, Don finally heads back into full workaholic mode. Bert's chastization from a few weeks back has finally become undeniable, so Don spends part of the weekend alone in the office brainstorming on the pitch for a new client. Really though, this is little more than a residual effect of Megan's decision to leave the advertising industry, as Don's physical and creative wanderings around the office seem a result of escaping his homelife now that it's no longer intertwined with his work.


And this new-found immersion in work brings him head to head with rising creative supernova Michael Ginsberg. A few weeks ago, Mark mentioned that we weren't talking enough about Ginsberg, and he was completely right. Season 5 has been peppering tidbits of information on the newest copywriter almost every week, but I never felt I had enough to really sink my teeth into with him until now. As great at their jobs as we've seen Peggy and Don be, Ginsberg has a wild, unpredictable streak that allows for his work to possibly reach another level of greatness. He's incredibly young and knows he's supremely talented, a difficult combination to harness. When he learns Don never brought his Snoball idea to the client -- one that was clearly superior to his boss's idea -- he goes berserk, partly because he knows Don did it intentionally and also because he has no filter. Ginsberg confronts Don in the elevator the following morning. As much as my hearts goes out to the kid for calling him out, Don so effectively swats him away that I'm immediately sent back into his corner. Ginsberg will receive his due accolades if he swallows a smidgen of pride. It just may not be within the offices of SCDP.

The only other major event that happened this week was Roger hooked up with Jane in her new apartment basically because he decided he wanted to. Not sure if anything significant will come of that, but it gobbled up enough of the episode that it's worth mentioning.

On a closing note (and also because it actually worked last time with Betty), I'm calling for the return of Lane. I miss that crazy British bastard! Did Pete mess up his face so much, he's gone into hiding? I need to know. And also please more sideboob. See you all again in a few days!

Previously:
Episodes 1&2 - "A Little Kiss"
Episode 3 - "Tea Leaves"
Episode 4 - "Mystery Date"
Episode 5 - "Signal 30"
Episode 6 - "Far Away Places"
Episode 7 - "At The Codfish Ball"
Episode 8 - "Lady Lazarus"

Peggy wasn't a big player this week, but we couldn't bring ourselves to leave this shot on the cutting room floor.

MAD MEN Partners' Meeting - "Far Away Places"

Welcome to the Mad Men Partners' Meeting -- a roundtable discussion of this week's episode from your friendly neighborhood LowBrowMedia savants.
This is a spoiler-heavy zone. You have been warned.

"Far Away Places"

Season 5, Episode 6

airdate: April 22nd, 2012

Jon: Mark, I completely agree with your assessment of "Signal 30" last week being the best installment of the season thus far. Because of that, I was expecting "Far Away Places" to feel a little flat in comparison. But that wasn't the case at all, as there were plenty of great moments once again. This was a week filled with high-level stress, experimentation and fear culminating in big changes for a trio of our principal characters as they went off to new, very different destinations.

Forgive me if I've forgotten a past episode that has done this before, but I'm fairly certain this is the first time Matthew Weiner and company have played with how time operates within the structure of an episode. Sure, they've given us flashbacks and dream sequences before, but I believe showing us the diversions of three characters took from a seemingly random suggestion of playing hookie between Roger and Don one morning and rewinding to that moment each time to that point to follow a different character's day was entirely new. And what makes "Far Away Places" all the more impressive is each are entirely different vignettes and yet are somehow complimentary when strung together.

First up was Peggy, who had a rough start to a trying day when the boyfriend fails to understand the pressure she's under at work. And that stress is only exacerbated by Don's removal of Megan before the team can review the latest beans pitch for Heinz. With Don headed to upstate New York, Peggy is left to take the lead of the meeting with the Heinz executives, and well... she simply lacks that Draper magic touch we've come to know in previous seasons in presentations like this. I don't remember Don criticizing the client after the Carousel speech, which this was pretty clearly modeled after. Following the disastrous pitch, Peggy takes off for an afternoon matinee (an idea she spurned the boyfriend on that morning) to blow off some steam. There, she smokes a joint with a stranger and, for good measure, dishes out a handy. She then returns to the office, sobers up and eventually calls up the boyfriend in an attempt to salvage whatever it is they have left together. Typical day for anyone, really.

Next comes Roger's day, where he was forced to attend a dinner party thrown by friends of his trophy wife, Jane, after Don swooped away with his plan to go on a business daytrip to a Howard Johnson hotel. Roger's unhappiness with his marriage has been hinted at all season and explicitly expressed by Don to Pete in the cab last week, and feelings between the two (or lack thereof) came to a head in "Far Away Places." Now, this turned out to be a far different dinner party than we saw at the Campbell's house last week. Jane's friends were a collection of snooty, outwardly drab intellectuals who "businessman" Roger who discusses Frank Lloyd Rice in order to fit in, much to their dismay. But no sooner was Mr. Sterling was ready to hit the road when a plate of sugarcubes laced with lysergic acid diethylamide, better known as LSD, was placed before him. (Btw, if you only associate acid with hippies, Badass Digest wrote a great piece this week on the drug before it was outlawed. In fact, B.A.D. has posted fantastic Mad Men-related articles each week based on the historical aspects of each episode's background plot threads this year.) Aided by some wonderfully fun camerawork, Roger's trip was fascinating and, at times, hilarious to watch. And because I adore Pet Sounds, I was so, so, so, so happy to be reminded of "I Just Wasn't Made For These Times" as soon as Timothy Leary's wife (or was Roger joking?) hit play on the reel-to-reel as it resonated marvelously with the episode. Ultimately, Jane and Roger get alone in the truth together, reveal their respective boredom and unfulfillment with their marriage to one another, and agree to separate. It was probably the most pleasant breakup in television history. And at that point, he no longer needed his note to get home because it was a beautiful day indeed for him.

While Roger ended "Far Away Places" on cloud nine after starting out miserable as ever, Don went on exactly the opposite trek. After hijacking Roger's hookie plan as an excuse for he and Megan to escape the office for the day. He's giddy as can be at the prospect of showing off HoJo's orange sherbet to her. However, she's still trying to earn her place at SCDP, so the idea of blowing off her share of the work for an important meeting with Heinz to eat dessert on the other side of the state is not a top priority of hers. She tries to express this to Don, but his insistence to recreate their California excursion from close of last season only elicits a childlike tantrum from Megan in order to get his attention. This reaction forces Don to engage in his own overreaction, leaving Megan standing alone watching his car pull away. I have no doubt the Don of past seasons really would have left her there, but a short while later on the highway, he realizes his mistake and returns to the hotel. But... dun-dun DUN! Megan's long gone, save for her discarded sunglasses in the parking lot with word from the HoJo staff that she hitched a ride with some random dudes. Guilt consumes Don, not just for his parts in that argument, but maybe you've noticed every episode has had talk of a serial killer this year? Yeah, he's fearing the worst while spending the night in the the hotel's restaurant desperately hoping for her return. (Man, how did people then do anything without cellphones?) Eventually Don drives back to their apartment, where he finds Megan. (Surprise! She wasn't murdered.) They reconcile, but I think it's safe to say the honeymoon is officially over.

So, we have Peggy and Megan lashing out, Roger finally free of his languid marriage, and the veneer of the Draper marriage cracking a bit more. Brian Wilson might as well have been talking about these characters when he composed that Beach Boys' song the Sterlings tripped to. Not too shabby of a week, eh? I didn't even bring up Ginsberg's Martian story or how frickin' awesome Bert is. Will he swoop in again soon with yet another an amazing one-liner, or was this week his "she was an astronaut" of season 5? Tell me what you thought, brothers!

Mark: Damn, Jon. I think saying the honeymoon is over is the understatement of the century. After that extremely disturbing display of Don chasing Megan through the apartment and knocking her to the ground like a serial killer, it's clear that those fucked up power dynamics we were talking about back in the season premiere are growing more wildly out of control. Sure, they seem to have reconciled for now, but that reconciliation was like putting a band aid on a severed limb. I hate to say it, Jon, but I think the "Don's a changed man" theory is officially kaput. I think he's been keeping things pretty well in line, but if his tranquility is shaken so easily by one fight, causing him to instantly revert to Don Draper Classic and leave Megan in the lurch at the HoJos, then I think things don't bode well for these two. You can only have creepy-sexy underwear fights for so long. Eventually the new car smell wears off and you're left to sort out the fact that you have two profoundly different worldviews. Then it's just a hop, skip and a jump to chasing your significant other around like Jason Voorhees.

It is interesting that serial killers have been mentioned so often this season. Perhaps it's a metaphor for the creeping dread these characters feel as they become increasingly confused and disoriented with where the world is headed. Don is stuck in the past and disconnected from how his business and society at large are changing, and he's trying to force Megan into the role of the subservient wife who shouldn't have any use for work when he wants to rush off to Howard Johnsons to recreate their Disneyland trip. At work, Don has been a mentor to Peggy, and he certainly trusts her ability, but I don't think he left her alone to run the Heinz pitch because he believes in her. The Heinz rep was a dickhead, but still Peggy isn't ready to do this on her own. She needs more experience and guidance before she'll be able to pull off her own Carousel pitch, but Don just doesn't care anymore. The fact that he had to be called on this by shoeless Bert Cooper was just a nice surprise. Don's dazed moment in the boardroom as he watched the young faces of SCDP literally pass him by was a great closer. This season's (nay, series) recurring theme of time passing people by was made literal in many ways in this episode. Time was all over the place in "Far Away Places", mostly because everyone seemed to be getting high (What, no shrooms for Don and Megan? That would have tied the episode together, and I hear they go great with orange sherbet and clams). Between Don and Peggy's blackout naps and Roger's disappearing cigarette, the loose sense of time gave the whole affair a druggy vibe. Drug experiences are hard to capture on screen, though, and honestly I didn't care for a lot of the Roger moments, except for his two-tone hair which was a nice visual metaphor for the duality of Mr. Sterling.

With Joan and Greg calling it quits and now Jane and Roger having the most existential break-up imaginable (I thought you were supposed to impulsively get married when you're under the influence?), could it be that Weiner and co. are setting the table for the big Draper divorce? Eh, I don't want to get ahead of myself, but Don and Megan have a lot of tests coming their way and I think they're both too immature to handle them.

I love Peggy. She's so earnest, and Elisabeth Moss' line reading of "It was the beans that brought them together on that cool summer night" delighted me to no end. I hope she and her Trotskyite fella can work it out. To be honest, I liked the non-linear structure of the episode. It played into the definition of Mad Men as being a televisual short story collection, and it continued this season's streak of interesting technical exercises. But I have to be real, I was slightly disappointed that Peggy's story was cut short a third of the way into the show. Part of me didn't want it to end after that superb scene between Peggy and Ginsberg in the darkened office. Beautifully shot, beautifully acted. After his reaction to the Richard Speck pictures a couple of episodes ago, I knew something was up with Michael, and my mind went to the obvious: he was in some way effected by the holocaust. Then I thought maybe the timeline didn't match up. But the fact that he was born and orphaned in a concentration camp just blew my mind, and the way he presented that information to Peggy through his story of being a Martian was the perfect blend of disorienting and deeply sad. Come on, Jon and Mike, you guys have been strangely silent on Ginsberg. I love this guy. Am I alone?

Overall, I liked this episode a lot. It took some chances, provided some great period detail and in its own weird way kicked the story of this season into gear. Mike will be back next week, so we'll see the rest of you then!

Previously:
Episodes 1&2 - "A Little Kiss"
Episode 3 - "Tea Leaves"
Episode 4 - "Mystery Date"
Episode 5 - "Signal 30"