The bad news is that the finale is tonight; the good news is that Mad Men is coming back for a 7th & finale season (which will have 14 episodes).
Lesson for the Campbells: Avoid mass transit.
Something as an aside, but I find it hilarious how ad agencies take Mad Men as an opportunity to fellate themselves or otherwise draw attention to their professions during the commercial break. Nationwide’s commercial sticks out for me this episode, but generally speaking, there’s a lot of pomposity in the advertisements that support this show.
Bob was masterful in the way he took down Pete Campbell. And Bob was so sure that Manolo wouldn’t have killed Mrs Campbell. My guess is that he found out that she wasn’t even rich after he went to all that trouble, causing him to snap and throw her over the edge.
Too telenovela for my tastes. And who’s going to California? You goin’ to California? He/she/it goin’ to California?
And for once I was hoping a scene was a dream sequence. That scene being Don’s in-essence firing.
I thought Sterling walking into Bob serving Thanksgiving in an apron was hilarious. I really do think he’s “just friends” with Joan; there’s no way she could interact platonically with a man that long and not realize he’s gay.
Cripes. I suffered through endless Sylvia and drug hallucination episodes all season for this?
Overall a clumsy finale. The thing with Pete’s mom was just goofy.
The most genuinely touching moment was Don and Betty on the phone. When he called her Birdie, which I assume was an old pet name. There’s so much more chemistry between those two than between him and Megan.
Bob is still a mystery. And as someone else said, I can’t figure out who’s going to California.
I don’t really understand the partners forcing Don into a leave of absence. Did they find out about the night in jail? The Hershey’s incident was a little uncomfortable for everyone in the room—but actually proved Don’s incredible talent for finding a product’s emotional heart not once but twice. And (we know in hindsight) Hershey’s wasn’t even going to become a client.
And what actually happened in Detroit? Would the Chevy guys have actually come out and asked for a new account man, or just made it clear at dinner that they liked Bob more than Pete?
Also, I was disappointed there was no reference to Apollo 8. Wasn’t it around Thsnksgiving ‘68 that we found out that, a few weeks later, three humans would be taking a spin around the friggin’ moon?
I did like how two men (Ted and Don) were grappling with how to face squarely and/or attempt to run away from the problems their own libidos/egos had created.
I don’t know if they know about the night in jail or if Hershey’s was what pushed them over the edge. But Don has been clearly deteriorating all season. In this episode Cutler got Ted to come for a meeting, because Don was nowhere to be found, which made Ted say “again?”. I don’t know how often Don is missing when he’s needed, but obviously more than they’d like. Also in this episode, Don was pouring alcohol into a coffee mug. Drinking at Sterling Cooper and Partners hasn’t ever been frowned upon that we’ve seen, so if Don is having to hide his drinking, he’s clearly doing a hell of a lot of it.
I don’t really know how partnership stuff works, but I didn’t find it terribly surprising that Don’s being forced into taking a vacation.
Ted & Pete for sure, and also Megan apparently (but not with them). They’ll either take a few underlings with them, or just recruit locally.
The Detroit thing just seemed dumb to me. There was no where to drive a car TO in the building. Even if Pete hadn’t backed into the sign, where the hell was he supposed to drive to that would make a sports car worth driving? Fifteen or twenty feet forward and then stopping? And the GM guys were all “Oh, you have to do it” for that?
The Mrs. Campbell thing seemed terribly contrived although Pete and his brother collectively deciding “Eh, fuck it” was pretty funny.
I’d assume the partners can collectively decide to remove whoever they want, provided they majority votes and agrees with it. Don would still own his percentage. Anyway, I’d guess this is a “paid vacation” and Don would continue drawing a check while he gets his shit together.
Was it a suspension or a firing? With no return date and with Duck waiting in the hall to bring up (I’m assuming) Don’s replacement, I thought the “take a couple of months off” carried an implicit “and don’t come back.”
I assumed it was a suspension but I’ll admit that my primary reason for thinking so was the same reason I assumed Peggy would wind up back at SCDP – The show suffers for trying to split the cast too much and trying to follow Don’s non-SC&P life and the rest of the cast separately for an entire season would just be a mess.
So, it was Pete that hired Duck? And told Duck to arrive “early”? Pete must have found that to be delicious.
I don’t think that was Don’s replacement. They made it clear that *Peggy *will be taking over Creative (nominally under Ted’s supervision) while Don’s away.I actually groaned when Zod popped back onto the screen for the climatic battle. There was no dramatic need for it! Evil Kryptonians’ ship gets sucked back into the Phantom Zone, The End. it would have been a perfectly satisfying ending, and one with no need to portray Superman as a supposedly REAL tough guy because "Hey! He KILLS! I wonder if either Ted or Don will give her his proxy; it’d be fun to watch her in the in the partners’ meatings.
I think it was a suspension too. I was guessing that the no set return date was more because they don’t want to say he can come back March 1 and find out he’s still drinking heavily and going to be unreliable. They can check back with him in a few months, see how he is and if he seems like he’s going to be able to come back and get work done, and not be a mess like he’s been lately. Although I don’t know why Duck and the other guy were there.
“She really did like the sea.” 
When Ted an Peggy were in her apartment and she told him to leave, all I could think was “don’t get raped! Don’t get raped!” I was glad she was into it because I am sick of all the forcible sex on this show. Ugh.
Poor Peggy tho… I feel sorry she got jerked around. Also glad that the jerk is letting her get on with her life, thanks in part to King Don.
“Well aren’t you lucky, to have decisions.” Best line in the series.
BTW I just caught the “previously on Mad Men” segment again and the first clip is Sally saying to Don on the phone “I don’t know anything about you.” So ipso facto that final scene was very important.