After 2.5 seasons of Don Draper, superman lover/ad exec, it was a shocker to see him brought down to the ranks of the mortals. Probably ultimately good for the show but still startling.
I’m slightly surprised in retrospect that the “Previously on Mad Men” vignette didn’t include any S1 snippets of Cooper learning about Don’s previous life.
I’m glad it didn’t. The surprise was much better.
Ya know what? I’m starting to wonder if Bert knew all along, even before Pete spilled the beans. If I remember right, Bert didn’t seem very surprised. He might not have known the details, but is it possible he always knew that Don wasn’t who he said he was?
Even tho it’s not quite evident what sort of guy Bert is now (like, what he brings to the company) … I suspect he’s extremely intelligent and/or savvy, possibly even moreso than Don. His fascination with the East gives me the impression not that he’s kooky but he’s quite wise. He also may be someone that Don may have confided in at one point.
I think there’s more to Bert than meets the eye. And, so far, he’s the only character I don’t have any disdain for.
I doubt he knew and I doubt he cared once he did find out. But it was still something worth shelving away in case he might need it later.
It’s so great to see Morse deliver the goods in these little vignettes. Part of me wishes he was more front-&-center sometimes, but they seem to perfectly calibrate his exposure for maximum effect.
Only 4 months away from JFK & Dallas…
No offense intended, alphaboi867, but AMC’s not-quite-misleading description and your quite reasonable speculation about what it means is a good example of how this show surprises us every week. No fallout from the tractor accident, no Joan, nothing with baby Gene or Sally. Instead we have Peggy in the sack with Duck and Don getting ripped off by a couple of hitchhikers. 
I never put much stock in the “Next week…” clips but last week’s was especially misleading with the lady asking Betty “Are you considering suicide?” (dum-Dum DUMM!!!) which was actually the head of the Lady’s Auxiliary saying “You redecorated AND had a baby! Are you considering suicide? Tee-hee!”
:rolleyes:
Betty got her girlish figure back awfully quickly. While on the subject, one of the “interludes” in the middle of the show involved Betty reclining on the god-awful ugly fainting couch she was laying on at the end. In the interlude she sort of ran her hands down her legs and appeared to start to clutch her dress, as if she was going to pull it up.
Was she, um, laying there thinking about the political advisor she had met that day and preparing to… rub one out?
A lady like Betty Draper doesn’t “rub one out”. She twirls her pearl.
A lady like Betty Draper does neither.
But she certainly ought to. If she did, maybe she wouldn’t be such an uptight jerk.
This episode creeped me out.
I feel so bad for Peggy. I hope she surprises me and tells Duck, “Thanks for the sex. And I’m still not going to leave Sterling Cooper.”
His seduction seemed to obviously contrived. I can see where an inexperienced woman might fall for it, but geez “I used to walk by you all the time and not notice you???”
I loved the interior decorator!
My favorite line was when Peggy says “I hope yours is a different color” to Pete about the scarf she got from Duck. For some reason, and it had to do with her usual dry delivery, that just cracked me up.
Who says Peggy needs much seduction? She’s been shown to treat sex suprisingly casually given the time period, her “uptightness”, and her experiance with unwanted pregnancy. BTW is it just me or is Peggy the closet thing Pete has to a friend? Even after everything that happened between them he still appears closer to her than anyone else in the office (even Don) and vice versa.
Why the hell is everyone being little Miss Priss when it comes to Peggy and Duck? He may not be a strategic boardroom mastermind, but he’s turned away from alcoholism, landed a plum job in a larger, more dynamic agency than Sterling Cooper, and is looking for new talent. He’s had his ups and downs, and been humiliated by being replaced as his children’s father figure but still he manages to dust himself off, and land on his feet.
These were two lonely people hungry for connection tearing at each other like animals in rut. One can only imagine how white hot and nasty their urgent coupling was, surging on the wave of their aching mutual need. She didn’t ask Duck if he had a condom, she wanted to impale her unshaven 60’s maidenhood on his rigid, unsheathed tumescence. Duck, whatever his faults, clearly has the lovemaking skills too satisfy Peggy as she eagerly and hungrily came back for more of the Duck love instead of bolting as she did with her prior pickup. He ravished her and she revelled in it.
He had plum jobs at Putnam & Sterling Cooper as well before he fucked those up. Give him another six months.
In the behind the scenes interviews for this week’s episode, Elizabeth Moss said that Duck appealed to Peggy because he showed some respect for her professional abilities.
His comment about liking the smell of liquor on her breath was kinda scary though. An ad man who doesn’t drink is almost as handicapped as one who’s missing a foot. He can’t stay sober for long. I hope it was just a one night stand but it’s probably not.
I feel dirty. :eek:
*Also, I vote “ducklove” should heretofore be used to reference any sex used purely as ego balm.
I dunno, just the fact that he’s a grown man who goes around being “Duck” all the time would be enough to put me off.
Aaaaaaaaand, ewwwwwwwwwww.
Seriously though, “ewwww” was my reaction to that scene. I won’t take the trouble to justify or intellectualize it, because it was visceral. Eeewwww.
I rather enjoyed watching Don get repeatedly screwed in the less-pleasant sort of way. It’s funny (and this I probably will attempt to justify and intellectualize when I’ve absorbed a bit) that Betty acting like a spoiled child makes me hate her, but Don acting like a spoiled child just makes me amused, although it certainly doesn’t make me like him any better.
I read in an interview that Matt Weiner isn’t going to address JFK’s assassination in the show, declaring that is has already been done to death. (No pun intended)
It might be a bit odd to avoid completely. He likely meant that it’s not going to be On A Very Special Episode of Mad Men.
Thanks for the quote, astro. I forgot how much I like TWoP.
Lots to think about in this thread. Agree that Don’s not suddenly a dick, he’s just not so great at hiding it. He did some great things for Peggy and has been honest and stoic when it counted, but he’s only human.
What I can’t figure out – is the teacher nutso or just a hippie who’s been hit on by a lot of dads?