'Our Hams Are Worth Fighting For': Mad Men Recapped
At least there's the dating front, right? No woman can possibly withstand his bachelor wiles -- not least of all the 25-year-old ex-gymnast with whom Roger fixes him up... right? "It's not like I've been a monk," Don explains to him, though the drab, dark recesses of his apartment suggest the last real vestige of monasticism in Greenwich Village. Don's housecleaner Celia occupies the one pocket of light in the whole place, and all he can do is chastise her for not leaving his shoeshine kit in the middle of the floor. In return, she nags him to eat something. Yes, Don, you are living large.
Not long afterward, at Jimmy's La Grange, his nubile dinner Bethany partner cops to deigning to a blind date with a divorced man; in the cab in front of her building, she indulges his kiss while freezing his libido until New Year's. It takes a whore on Thanksgiving to give him -- a regular customer, it appears -- what he wants, which amounts to some serious face-slapping during sex. Interesting. Better still: She has to hurry off to Thanksgiving dinner while Don idles alone at home, handing out bail money to Peggy for one of the ladies charged the PR stunt-turned-criminal assault case.
Which brings us to Betty. Betty, Betty, Betty. I think it might be over for Betty, who makes her first appearance at the Francis family's turkey day celebration and yam-spitting battle of wills with Sally. I'm not sure exactly what purpose Don's ex serves here beyond living in his house with his kids and her new husband, rent-free for almost a year. She seems to relish her newlywed lust and resent the albatross that her kids have become, which sounds about par for the course for her. Yet whereas Betty's quirks, flaws and contradictions once exercised leverage against Don's own, with his secrets out and their new lives begun, all that's left are the first little fascinations of this revised coexistence. Like seeing Betty and Henry in bed together? Weird! Seeing Betty and Henry and Don in the same tense shot as the latter picks up the kids? Really weird! And a kitchen showdown over their untenable living arrangements? Beyond weird!
Also: Boring. If ever a TV character were a victim of her own success, it would probably be Betty Draper. The extraordinary pitch of last season's climactic episodes established a pretty formidable presence -- a moral and philosophical force that vanquished its primary opposition. Yet after all that, now she's a lusty, freeloading, irresponsible, crappy mother whose philandering ex-husband has reclaimed the high ground and whose in-laws wonder how Henry "can stand living in that man's dirt"? Like, I get it, Weiner -- so things still aren't working out for Betty the way she intended. But she was much more sympathetic (screw sympathetic; she was much more interesting) when we witnessed her repressing her dreams of modeling or world travel, or humiliated by Don's conspicuous flings. Now she's just a garden-variety bitch with no roots to her rage. It's facile. We were faithful, and yet it's like walked out on all of us.
Don, on the other hand, is fighting for his very future. Jantzen drops by for their presentation, a "suggestive" shot riffing on the exposure of their swimsuits. "You can either be comfortable and dead," Don protests, "Or risky... and possibly rich." Not good enough, the fellows argue. "Did we mention we're a family company?" The exchange is just the catalyst Don needs to cycle back to the beginning of the episode -- his false-modest Ad Age interview, his initial kid-gloving of Jantzen, his frustration with Peggy's experiments -- and finally own that "scrappy upstart" quality he sniffed at before. He boots Jantzen from the building like he's performing an exorcism, soon afterward barking to his secretary: "Get me Bert Cooper's man at the Wall Street Journal."
She does, and this next interview -- with its candid recounting of what led to his new firm in the first place -- should be exactly the kind of stirring stick this potboiler requires. And thank God. It's Mad Men, after all, not Inert, Milquetoast, Hooker-Patronizing Men. Let's get mad.
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Comments
Betty's new characterization is so disappointing. She was my favorite character and now she's turned into the flat childish bitch everyone kept saying she was for the past 3 years. I understand that this is how she'd go after being free of Don but still it's really terrible to watch. I would rather her be written off the show then watch Weiner knock her down like this.
I also don't like Peggy's new brassy and sassy attitude. But again, I get it.
What happened to the mad men rankings?
Rogers line was "They're so cheap they couldn't send a whole reporter"
Of course, that's what I meant. Sorry, and thanks.
Those were Mark Lisanti's domain, and he has since relocated. Apologies! I miss them, too!
I don't want to live in a world without a Fingerbang Threat Index Level.
ST- still love me Movieline but my day is a little grayer.
I was really hoping they would've gotten rid of Betty as a regular character. This is a show about the lives of a staff of an Ad Agency not the the lives of the spouses of the staff on an Ad Agency. I don't think Weiner thought it well out when he had them get a divorce. He could've at least had her have an affair this season and leave the divorce for next season which is the last season.
Regardless of why the client didn't want it, that Jantzen campaign did suck.
And I'm happy to see the Sally Draper Matricide Level at bright orange level! Go Sally Go!
My biggest concern was when Henry got in the car with Betty. Are you going to open the garage with the not yet invented automatic garage door opener? Thankfully, Betty mentioned opening the door, and a crisis was avoided See, Betty still has a reason to be on the show.
Weeeee!
Sorry! Nothing we can do about it. I sincerely hope they return as well.
Betty Draper is the whining albatross around the neck of this otherwise superb show. I applaud her shortened screen time and the fact that the mother-in-law character (a total bitch in her own right) may at last, make her twist in the wind a bit.
Sally Draper For The Win.
YES.
I think the point is that Betty is never satisfied, and yeah she may be everyone's least favorite part of the show, but for now she can't just be written out or written in a way that isn't true to the story and character arcs.
I vote for Carla killing her during a race riot. We can do this!
I found the new location for Mark Lisanti's Mad Men power rankings, and yes, the first recap includes a fingerbang threat level: http://marklisanti.tumblr.com/tagged/mad_men .
I just pictured Carla bashing her over the head with a blunt object. Love it. Honestly as much as I want Betty to go away, I wish there was a way to make Carla stay as a regular on the show!
S.T., great writeup! Big shoes to fill obviously, and you filled them quite well, thank you.
I'm glad he's still doing them.
Sally's a brat.
Correction. She's a matricidal genius.
And for the record, Betty was a "lusty...crappy mother" for the entire run of this show. Brittle, angry and dismissive. That's not changed (and it means Sally will be a "mean girl" once she gets into Rosemary Hall).
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