starmanof51 wrote:I know, and I don't disagree, but some of the behavior was so extreme I'm still not sure I actually believe these people would have done all these things that were written for them to do this week. I either love it or it's shark-jumpy, I think I'm hanging onto the love side.
Putting possible suspension of disbelief issues aside, the number of ways they were able to play with the varieties of "whoring out" ("turn around for us") was both impressive and a devastating catalog of misogyny. Pete with Trudy, Don with Megan, Ginsberg's probably lovestruck annoyance with Megan, Don with Peggy, probably on and on - the annoyance they all have at the very idea of women having agency in their own lives, all wrapped up in Ginsberg's Jag tagline intended to repudiate it completely - if only these things would just do what we want! So much to chew on.
I'm kind of relieved that I'm not alone in this perception of this oft-putting masterpiece of an episode. After the first 20 minutes I was wondering if Weiner's ego had gotten the best of him and he'd mistakenly convinced himself he could pull off anything he set his mind towards. I just kept thinking that
- other than Pete - the behaviour by these men (aside from Don) was too extreme,
even within the established parameters of the environment/atmosphere/attitude of the era they inhabited. Then it slowly dawned on me that Weiner & Co. had been slowly establishing their chess pieces to arrive at this precise dilemma for quite some time, whether it was
Pete's abrupt moral descent, or Lane's ongoing frustrations within the West, or Roger's gradual loss of virility and general confusion over his actual desires.
Yet, even after comprehending the purpose behind all of Weiner's character development, the situation still seems rather sour. However, just as I had resigned myself to the notion that this episode really might include the most distasteful events chronicled within
Mad Men's period, I was absolutely floored by the final few scenes, particularly between Don and the three modern women within his life. Indeed, the scene
between Don and Peggy that concludes the episode might have been the most heart-breaking stuff they've created since The Suitcase or The Wheel, and it's not surprising that it features another confrontation between the show's mentor and protégé. It was also a masterful way of having Don deal with every experience he's previously encountered with the women in his life - whether his biological mother, Betty, Bobbie, Sally, Midge, Anna, Faye, Megan, Joan, etc. - while going through every emotion and negotiating tactic with Peggy.
If ever there was an example of how to save an episode of TV that seemed to be headed off the rails, this was it.
starmanof51 wrote:Great stuff too for all Pete-haters like me, whose depravity and dissembling has no obvious limits. He may well kill someone before this is all over (the rifle is already out, gotta do something with it some time).
I've never been his biggest fan, but after some of the earlier episodes this season, I started to understand how some fans/critics feel he's a sympathetic character. I even went as far as defending him a bit when a friend basically stated how much she despised him. After this past episode, I doubt I'll ever look at him again without experiencing some form of mild nausea.
