[QUOTE=AMC]
Don has trouble sleeping. Pete is blindsided by a difficult friend. Facing a new challenge, Henry arranges a family reunion.
[/QUOTE]
Last episode before the series finale next week.
So that was unexpected. I actually felt like crying when Sally was reading Betty’s note about her funeral plans. 
And Don’s completely in the dark.
Yeah, talk about Betty’s redemption. Who would have thought she’d have taken cancer with such class?
And Don giving that car to the kid at the end - brilliant.
Well, hell of a Mother’s Day episode, eh? I suppose after a decade of hard smoking and heavy drinking on the show, someone had to take the hit.
At any other point in the show, I’d be expecting Pete to get screwed but with one episode left perhaps he will have some sort of redemption.
I’m sure when the veterans came into his room, everyone was expecting it to be about his identity or his confession about his CO. I didn’t find the Don plot all that engaging but I suppose it’s setting us up for his eventual conclusion next week.
And I was (mainly) right last week when I joked that this week would be the all Sally & Pete episode based on the previews.
Still pulling surprises. Definitely a bit of a Betty redemption arc.
I was definitely a bit happy for Pete this episode. Maybe he’ll end up being a decent guy out in Wichita.
aww. wow. what a sad development. I feel like this is happening to someone I actually know. How sad, not just for Betty, but Henry, and the kids. A year or less.
I feel like we hated Betty and Pete early on and now they were the first to get redeemed. I mean I found myself rooting for them tonight.
Oh Birdy
I can’t believe that Pete comes to the end of this smelling like a rose. Maybe he will be the perfect family man out in Kansas. I guess that he’s done fucking around for good.
I loved Don at the VFW. For the first time ever he opened up to someone about his war experience and he got screwed over for his trouble. I hope that Don scared some sense into the kid.
So Don is back to NY but not at McCann. He’ll have to raise those boys on his own.
I can’t believe how sad I am about Betty. I’ve spent seven years wishing her character would die in a fire and now I’m just gobsmacked. Its almost as though Mr. Weiner knows how much everyone dislikes her and was saving this particular plot twist as a “you asked for it”, knowing that we would all be more bummed than we expected we could be.
I love watching Pete in action but I really do not give a flying Wallenda about Trudy so I could have lived without watching their
whole scene.
Forgive my ignorance but after watching it *three *times I still don’t quite get what happened with the kid at the motel and the VFW thing. It might help if I watch it again sober but in the mean time can someone recap it for me? Specifically, what did the kid do to piss Don off? Why did the VFW dudes come after him? I know it sounds unbelievable that I could miss a whole plot line three times but for some reason that part did not penetrate my drunken brain.
I wonder if Detective Wojo used the phonebook tactic on suspects in the interrogation room of Barney Miller’s precinct.
The kid knew that Don was rich (and he already hustled Don for the cost of the bottle of booze earlier). The kid knew that this fundraiser was going on and that there’d be cash there. Presumably, the kid went there and took advantage of everyone being drunk as hell to steal the coffee can of money, assuming that they’d blame the outsider and that Don could just hand out $500 to buy his way out of it. In his mind, it was probably no harm, no foul.
The veterans suspected Don because everyone else was a local and of course they’d never steal from a friend whose house caught fire. Also, Don was spending a bit of money so they saw him as the criminal type who can toss around cash because he’ll just steal something and get it all back (like mobster movies). I suspect they also assumed Don would just pay up under threat even if he was the wrong guy. The hotel owner wasn’t shy about pressing Don for more money – $40 of that $500 was Don’s out of a pretty packed room. Hell, at first I thought them demanding the money was its own grift; that they HAD the cash but figured Don could double it for them.
Don knew it was the kid just because of their prior conversations. The kid was a hustler and con artist, the kid knew about Don, etc.
Edit: I must be a terrible person because I didn’t feel especially moved by Betty’s illness. Feel bad for her kids but no new sympathy for her (with the realization that she’s a character, not a person).
I’m still not sure how I feel about that episode. The scene with the doctor talking to Henry about Betty’s condition was infuriating.
Thanks Jo. I can’t wait to watch this again, but with a clear head.
Yes, madmonk that scene with the doctor was a pisser.
Did I miss something? Why do we think Don is headed back to NY? All I thought we saw was Don sitting at a bus stop at the crossroads.
I HOPE Don goes back to New York. I want to see him talk to Peggy and Roger and whoever else before this show wraps up. I think my least favorite storyline was when Don spent several episodes in California with the bunch of bon vivants. Booooor-ring.
I think that he is if for no other reason is that he needs to raise his sons (although he doesn’t know about Birdy yet.) It seems like he gave away his car and now it’s time to go home.
I think that with most of the major plot lines tied up, we’ll be jumping ahead quite a bit in time for the finale.
Don’s story in Oklahoma mirrored his own experiences w/ the hobo from his youth, except with Don being the stranger looking for comfort. The title of the episode refers to a 1930’s hobo manual.
Betty’s final letter to Sally being 90% about how she should look at her funeral was SO Betty.
All I want in the world is a spin-off called “Sally Draper Grows Up and is a Well Adjusted and Happy Person.”
Unless Sally tells him on their next call, Don isn’t going to know about Betty’s cancer until she’s dead. And Henry will probably end up raising the boys, anyway.
Duck is off the wagon again, and when he’s drunk he’s always an incompetent buffoon. Pete is boned if he’s depending on drunk Duck to pull off this job.
I think it’s wanting Don to go back because we want to see some kind of final scene for him and Peggy at least…but it makes more sense for him to finish his drive (now bus)-about and go to California.
I have the feeling Pete is going to get screwed in this deal and lose both of his jobs…but he and Trudy will ride it out and make good.