Mad Men, Season 6, Episode 6 Recap: For Immediate Release
We got rope-a-doped. For five, angst-filled episodes, we trudged along. Each Sunday night was filled with scenes more depressing than the next both for us and for our friends and enemies at SCDP. The blogosphere condemned the season as “lost” and “wandering.” They know what’s up. They’ve read books about script writing and watched videos about camera techniques on YouTube. They could write a more fast-paced, entertaining show if someone would just give them a chance.
Ye of little faith. Just when we were settled in for another hour of slow build, the MM world exploded with arguably the most plot driven episode in the history of the show and one of the most compacted eight minutes in the history of the medium.
(DDW) Donald Draper/Dick Whitman- From the surreptitious opening scene, I assumed Don’s path was about to become even darker. The last time Don was kept out of the loop on a decision, Joan ended up in bed with Jaguar. The Keeper of Secrets hates being left out almost as much as he hates people. The opening tease was rendered inconsequential due to our most striking Don episode in recent memory. If I could liquefy and bottle Don’s dinner with Herb, that would be the only thing I would drink for the next ten years. He went to dinner to play nice. DDW doesn’t smile and he sure as hell doesn’t “love puppies” so he had no intention of burning bridges, but even your aunt that doesn’t understand the plot of Inception no matter how many times you try to explain knew what was coming when Herb asked to have a flyer boy OK Don’s Copy. There are few things better on this planet than witnessing a Draper power move. Whether it was writing the kid’s name on the card nonchalantly, the reminder that his money was paying for this meal, or the unspoken contrast between the respective women the men would be going home with, I could watch that scene five hundred times. The merger is huge. The sex drive is huge. John Hamm is…well…, but none of that is nearly as important as the DDW swagger. He always has it when he’s about to knock on some woman’s door. You know he’s about to take off when he’s not sleeping around and he still sits like Don Corleone. Analysis: Put your life savings on black.
(TSF) The Silver Fox- Roger Sterling is one of my ten favorite characters in the history of television. The man almost makes me want to buy a Lincoln in real life. The general lack of respect he’s shown around the office has always rubbed me the wrong way. I get that he’s a juvenile, adulterous millionaire with a bottomless harem of twenty somethings and the notion of sympathy toward a character like that is bizarre. I don’t care. Roger is perhaps the only character on the entire show that is unapologetically authentic. You want to judge him for brining his adolescent airline mistress back to bed with tales of his dead mother? Knock yourself out. Daisy is predictably Roger and he’s perfectly fine with that. While you’re judging, he gets any easy way in to the inner circle of trapped business elite and, well…in. On a day that saw countless instances of a floundering Campbell, the Silver Fox brought one home almost entirely on his own. Analysis: Buy. He’s Roger, you always buy.
(WPC) Weasel Pete Campbell- Pete is the anti-Roger in nearly every sense. Neither can keep it in their respective pants, but at least Roger is able to acknowledge that fact. He doesn’t walk around with an absurd air of moral superiority. I honestly couldn’t say whether I root harder for Roger to succeed or Pete to fail., but fail he did. Has anyone had a harder 48 hour plummet on this show than Pete did last night. He went from the prospects of an eleven dollar per-share public offering (and the opportunity to have the material wealth he so desperately needs to fulfill his skewed, ignorant view of masculinity) to Vick’s-less, wife-less merged and falling down stairs. (I dare you to watch that less than 10 rotations) As long as we’re bottling things and serving them as drinks, can I place an order for the look on Pete’s face when his father-in-law walked out of a room with “the biggest, blackest prostitute you’ve ever seen?” Analysis: Sell like your shares are mangoes in Paris.
(POD) Peggy Olsen Draper- Rough, rough night. Having never suffered a shat-on porch, I can only assume it is not a morale booster. That was still the lasting high point of the night for Peggy. The fleeting high point was so beautifully Draper-esque, though. And also so typically Peggy. For a fleeting moment she shared the affection of a more relatable member of the opposite sex (its Peggy, of course the person was he superior) only to have the illusion of future peace and happiness shattered by the grim realities of the life she has chosen. The moments watching her powder her nose were excruciating. Her home life is figurative and literal shit, her friends are long gone and she doesn’t really know who she is anymore, but it doesn’t matter because the man in the other room makes her little baby-abandoning heart go pitter-patter. We know the news she’s about to get. Don actually being in the room to deliver the news is just icing on the cake. He had a Michael Corleone feel sitting in that chair. It was time for her Kay to come home and ask about his business. Analysis: You’ve got a better chance taking financial advise from Margaret Hoover’s Grandfather than listening to anyone who prognosticates on Peggy’s future. Hold.
(MAD) Mutually Assured Destruction- That’s just bad, bad luck. You can’t blame Pete for that. Of all the whorehouses and gin joints in the world, his father-in-law happened to walk into this one. What you can blame him for is going to Ken Cosgrove. Has Kenny ever had a good idea? What fool thinks that MAD applies to the father/daughter relationship. I’m one of the seven men on this planet who actually likes his mother-in-law, and even I know we’re not dealing with equal footing here. I could see my father-in-law have sex with three prostitutes while killing a sack full of puppies and selling state secrets to the Ruskies, and I’d know that I’m still in loads more trouble. If you’re married to a man’s daughter, you don’t even acknowledge you are aware of the word prostitution. Go write us a poem, Kenny. The big kids need to talk for a while. Analysis: Sell.
(BOB) Bob- Honest to God. Who in the hell is this clown? He started out the season getting lectured by Ken and now he’s going on field trips to Sodom and Gomorrah with Campbell. The guy is a mystery, wrapped up in an enigma, stuffed inside a…I don’t know… something? Analysis: Buy like crazy, even if it’s for the short-term. This creepy, creepy brown-noser is going somewhere in a hurry.