Excellent post.

Whats with all the spoiler tags? If its aired, its fair game.

I'm with most here. It's either the most brilliant episode evah or a jump the shark episode.

Mmm.....Borderline NSFW

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2012/...30_634x902.jpg

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2012/...10_634x759.jpg

who is this?

Elizabeth Moss. She plays the character of Peggy. Why would anyone reading posts in the Mad Men thread not recognize her face?

I thought it was at first, but she looked TOO hot. I googled here and didn't see anything that showed her looking that good, so I thought for sure I was mistaken.

She did look really hot. If they had her looking like that on the show, maybe I wouldn't dislike her.

DAYUM GRRL

Wow. Excellent episode.

Apparently someone on twitter caught on to Don sketching a noose sometime earlier in the season... and then the connection with his brother doing the same thing.

Yeah... wow.

Couldn't agree more.

and boom goes the Lane-omite...

Lane tried to go All In in the Jag!

What does boilerplate mean?

I want to say it means like a canned response but I'm not sure.

That's essentially what it means.

It means it's a form document, or at least the basic industry standard; essentially a completely detached resignation.

It was Lane's final shot across Don's bow on the way out - here's your resignation, pal. Frankly, I wouldn't expect anything less from the troll.

The past two episodes have been outstanding.

Is the next episode the season finale?

Yup.

Excellent episode

Mad Men could be an entirely different show next season without those two Characters

From the same paper:

http://www.nypost.com/p/entertainmen...ref=obinsource

LOL

I ****ing hate the Post.

x2

is the post link to spoilers?


i may have to avoid this thread until sunday

Too bad these aren't for sale - dude could probably make some money. Pretty creative, (and hilarious accessories) IMO.

http://cdn.uproxx.com/wp-content/upl...Picture-43.png

Thank God it didn't include soiled underpants.

Yeah, otherwise you would have been out $20.

Freddies pissed pants

Shoeless Bert Cooper with Japanese erotica.

alexis bledel side boob!

Pete Campbell is the reason hospitals refuse to disclose who is in their care.

When Don walked out of the TV studio, he was Lord of Creation again.

He still has his fastball...

DON'T DO IT DON.

I don't think he will.

He's learned a great many lessons this season. Though in the end, it's possible that one of them was that death comes for us all...in which case he may just tell discretion to kiss his ass.

Ultimately I think what we saw from Don was growth. I think that's the dichotomy we'll see between young Don (with his aspiring model wife, Betty) and a wiser Don. I think Wiener wants his audience to see growth in Don. If Don bangs those girls, we're literally right back where we started in season 1, episode 1.

Thoughts:

That rated incredibly high on my meh scale - especially for a finale.

Anyone else hoping that there was evidence of a "casting call" situation on that reel?

Can we create a time machine and have Pete commit suicide and let Lane stick around?

Roger Sterling is one of my favorite characters on television right now.

I fully expect a .gif of those two dogs ****ing outside Peggy's hotel room to be posted within 24 hours.

It's a great cliffhanger for Don's arc this season. I'm very confident that he's going to turn that proposal down. But I actually like leaving that refusal off-camera because the morals and psychology underlying the situation have really been the primary theme of season 5.

Boooooooo.

I think he does it.

It all comes down to whether Don can handle Megan as actress. I mean, that's been a large part of season 5, but maybe this commercial makes Megan's career take off. He either accepts it, or he regresses as a character. Which isn't that interesting, IMO.

What might be interesting is if Megan leaves Don. One line in favor of Don being the old, cheating Don (or at least a Don without having to worry about staying faithful to Megan): when Don tells Peggy "that's what people do when you help them - they get better and move on." And Don did help Megan land that commercial.

Solid final episode. I prefer an episode like that then a cliffhanger season finale.

the dogs ****ing was so random and awesome.

roger sterling's ass on lsd, penis to the glass....lol

ROFL - agreed

Now I'm thinking hard about that scene where Don watched Megan's screentest. What say you, CP? Did Megan's screentest show great promise as an actress? Or did it confirm that she doesn't have the stuff to make it?

I'm debating between the two readings. On one hand, Don could realize that she's got the stuff to be successful, and decides to help her on her way towards success...knowing full well that her success will drive them apart.

On the other hand, Don might just see in her screentest the same expressions that she uses in their marriage, which would be upsetting. So he is casting her aside by helping her to "get better and move on."

Or he knows that, like her mom said, she's chasing a phantom...he knows she'll never be a real artist, so he helps her get into commercial acting...knowing that advertising is the death knell of her artistic dreams. She then becomes a diminished person in Don's eyes -- much closer to Betty (remember, she was a model!) than the Megan of earlier this season. Which makes it considerably easier for Don to cheat on her, then.

And even if Don is sincerely trying to help Megan, his help makes it psychologically easier for him to cheat on her. So, like Lane's wife tells Don earlier, Don's gesture of help is mostly done for selfish reasons.


Most of the signs point to Don reverting back to full-on adulterer mode. That isn't that interesting to me; it feels like the show stalling Don's character arc to milk out a couple more seasons that the show actually needs. BUT I very much appreciate the mystery behind exactly why Don's little cliffhanger moment happens.

For a season in which Mad Men laid its themes more bare than it ever has (to the point of being frequently on-the-nose, ESPECIALLY in the finale), the last 12 minutes or so with Don brought back the mystery that this show as always thrived on.

I'm also happy that Peggy has a character arc set up for next season. She's going to land that women's cigarette account and make it HUGE. I mean, her business trip was to Richmond, Virginia. Virginia Slims, anyone?

She's come a long way, baby.

I agree. I think it sets up some Peggy vs Don competing for future accounts.

During the scene where they are in the theater I just kept waiting for Peggy to reach over and give Don a handy. Kinda of a "Thanks for everything Don, allow me to jerk you off while we watch this movie together"

There's no better account-as-character-metaphor.

Did anyone else think Megan's earring during her screentest look like a little hanged man?

this site pandagon does a video recap/analysis each week that is pretty good (from an explicitly feminist perspective, fwiw)

http://pandagon.net/index.php/site/c...en-the-phantom

<iframe src="http://player.vimeo.com/video/43821946" width="400" height="300" frameborder="0" webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen></iframe>

their take on the screentest is that a) Don see's that she is not a natural talent and b) he sees her expressions in the abstract and realizes that what he fell for originally was in part an act...

i also agree that Don isn't just going to return to his swinging ways, but their relationship has fundamentally changed and is going to fall apart, imo...no clue where Don goes from there

Yeah, the more I think on it (after my third full re-watch) the more I get convinced that Don is gonna' sleep with that woman at the bar. I think that analysis from The Orange Couch is correct when it asserts that Don is accepting the bad parts of himself. Too bad the show had to use that dentist scene to get him there; I think that might just be the worst scene in Mad Men history. Talk about overdoing it.

Yeah, that was pretty apparent. Virginia Slims was a Phillip Morris brand that rolled out in 1968; this season took place in 1966.

Could we simply skip forward 18 months or so to Peggy slamming the Phillip Morris account? Surely they won't be so pedantic as to have her come back to SCDP as a partner with Phillip Morris in tow (as discussed earlier, I just don't like the arc).

I'd have to re-watch the screen test to see how I feel about Don's take. My first blush was that he saw that A) She doesn't have the chops to pull this off but that B) She does still have the beauty and grace that he saw in her in the first place.

I'm decidedly pro-Don and am always trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. My hope is that he's seen the writing on the walls with Meghan's acting career but has had a moment of clarity with their relationship so he's doing the 'good husband' thing in getting her the gig.

But I can't lie - him walking away from the set with his shoulders set back and the strut clear for the world to see was just awesome. He was right back where he was when he was just busting skulls at Sterling Cooper; in his element and in command.

Virginia is for lovers.

http://cdn.uproxx.com/wp-content/upl...n5-doghump.jpg

and the worst line: "i'll hang around.."

groan

I don't think there is any question that the Don and Megan relationship is pretty much done. The scene with him walking away from the set is just to powerful of a metaphor to think anything else. This whole season, Don has never figured out the "right" thing to do with any of the women in his life. It seems he is going to fully embrace Don Draper, the good and more important, the bad and see where that takes him.

The orange couch talked about the parallel scene to the Megan reel from the first season. I had forgotten how powerful it was.

http://youtu.be/suRDUFpsHus

embeding disabled

Yeah, virgina slims was the first thing I said to my wife.

just not too sure where they are going with Peggy. Like I've said before, she's a big part of the show for me.

Maybe I missed something, but what was the significance of Don seeing / interacting with Adam?

in that clip he says "in greek nostalgia means the pain from an old wound" (sufix -algia = pain)

which connects to Pete last night talking about the wound that never heals...to a woman whose memories are continually erased and for whom there is no material be nostalgic about...

crazy how true this show is to its own motifs

Rewatched this afternoon, and HOLY SHIT:

Megan's friend who she back-stabbed for the part ("I'd ask you who I have to sleep with, but I don't think you'd like it) and the blonde who approached Don in the bar at the end...

Same person?

Searching for screencaps...

I wondered that too.

http://www.backstage.com/bso/photos/...12_amc_med.jpg

http://i46.tinypic.com/k99zps.png

no

I'm not going to go nearly this in depth with why I think he's going to cheat. Only a couple reasons.

1. When things have been seemingly perfect for Don, that's not a good thing for him. He always needs to fix something.

2. Don hasn't cheated since he got rid of all of his Dick Whitman baggage. That seems to be back with both Sally asking and him seeing his brother. However, it could just be said that he hasn't cheated since then because he's been with Megan since then, so I guess that could go either way.

I don't know, as with any person who is addicted to something, sometimes they get sober for a long period of time before relapse. I don't think it would make the show worse if he has another extra-marital affair. Maybe if he does, Megan will handle it differently than Betty did, and that could be interesting to watch.

Either way, I'm upset that we have to wait many months to watch the best show on TV again.

I think you guys analyze this show way too much.

God knows I analyze things to death. Because I enjoy it. So this might be a little hollow coming from someone who loves to dissect art and entertainment, but... surely there's never been a more appropriate or necessary show to analyze than Mad Men. It's built for it.

My mind doesn't understand this criticism. It's built to analyze things. For me, if something isn't worth analyzing and discussing then it isn't worth doing.

I never said it wasn't worth analyzing or discussing. It might not be worth analyzing/discussing to this level, however.

Don't you feel cheated when it doesn't take the turn you believe it should take? How about disappointed, when it does take the turn you expect it to take?

HE'S GONNA GET BALLS DEEP IN DAT ASSSSSSSSSSSS

I feel neither of those things, unless the turns taken are poor ones.

Thing is, I don't see what I or anyone else in this thread have been doing as excessive analysis. it seems like the appropriate amount.

I really have an inability to passively watch things, admittedly.

Peggy dies on the plane ride back, Cooper dies of old age, Sterling disappears never to be found, Campbell flips out/goes on a gun rampage/gets life in prison, Joan passes away from STD complications, Don jumps from the top of the building.. mimicking the opening credits, Zombie Lane comes back and takes control of company.