When did Henry find out about Dick Whitman; Betty knows, but I don’t remember her telling Henry.
I don’t think they ever mentioned it before, but it was pretty obvious she died of cancer judging by the way Betty was talking about watching her mother die.
She did. She definitely said that Don was using a false name and I also seem to recall her telling him not to reveal it for the sake of the kids.
High and dry and fired since without Don to be secretary to McCann won’t keep her.
I’m sure they’ll just cycle her into the secretarial pool. Big operations like that can absorb one secretary. She’s experienced, secretaries often move around and turn over, and Don’s going to be replaced, it looks like.
Well, Duck was probably lying about why he was at McCann. Pete asked if he was getting a replacement for Don and Duck said it was none of his business. Then he hit Pete up for the LearJet meeting. Most likely, Duck was there solely to recruit Pete but wouldn’t want Pete to know that.
Don never even had a chance to organize his pencil drawer so who knows if McCann is in any rush to “replace” him. Which doesn’t mean that they can’t find a spot for Meredith, of course.
Which episode was that? I don’t think it ever happened.
I predict that Don returns to NYC and continues on as Don (not Dick) as some new and improved version. Perhaps still as an ad man who redeems himself by pulling a rabbit out his ass with the Coke account.
I also predict that Ted goes out the window.
I’d be okay with that finale.
January Jones has been given a lot of shit for her acting since this series began. Some say that she’s a wooden actor while others say that she’s just playing a wooden character and doing a fine job. For those in the second camp, are there any good examples of her in other roles where she demonstrates her range?
I’ve only seen her in X-Men: First Class and she essentially played Betty Draper with diamond skin.
I think her acting as Betty Draper has been first class.
Would you walk a mile for Camel? Would you rather fight than switch? 
No, but show me a filter cigarette that really delivers taste and I’ll eat my hat! 
She is currently on the show Last Man On Earth. I don’t think she is bowling anyone over with her acting. I think she has Resting Bitch Voice.
I predict no one goes out a window.
The opening credits have never seemed like a suicide to me- not with the character landing comfortable and relaxed on a couch at the end. I’ve always seen it as imagery of fall through life with his work surrounding him and eventually landing content and comfortable.
Presumably someone at McCann would have phoned the home of Don’s first ex-wife. Even if Don hadn’t yet filled out a “contact” form at McCann, Roger (or Meredith) would have Betty’s home number and would suggest checking there.
It is kind of illuminating of how isolated Don is. He can just disappear and, but for one or two missed meetings, no one really notices or cares.
Yes, good point.
I suppose everyone has an opinion on what this show “is about,” but for me, it IS about Don’s isolation. He’s given a more-obvious reason than most could claim, for being emotionally detached from his own wife (wives), children, and co-workers: that horrible childhood. And of course the ‘living a lie’ brought about when he took the real DD’s dogtags.
But his story is the Everyman story of the guy who has worldly success, but no one to be truly intimate with. He’s alone.
Is that all there is? could be Don’s theme song.
I endorse this interpretation. I go a step further though; and this may be controversial - or just stupid. I think it’s about his isolation due to the fact that he is not who he is supposed to be, and that isolates him from himself and others - kind of like that saying “What is the use of gaining the whole world if a man loses his soul”. All of the money and success was pleasurable for a time for him, but also was not fulfilling.
But I think that these past few episodes he is moving in the right direction - he is seeking out his people in a sense - the type of people he would have avoided or abandoned when the series started several years ago. The waitress, for example, she is unattractive, and not likable - yet she is his people. The con man in the last episode, he is one of Don’s kind also.
Don is an outcast, a conman, emotionally conflicted, lost and unable to really find any meaning in the world of more well adjusted people. He did not come from the right background or go to the right schools - the advertising world will never really be his world no matter how talented he is.
Whether he is accepted into that world or not is irrelevant - he cannot be one of them, it’s kind of like the Velveteen Rabbit. I think that the corporate world belongs to others. Pete Campbell will always be of that world, so will Sterlling - they are to the manner born. It seems as if one thing ends up consistently happening in the series - people do not fare well outside of the pond they were raised in.
Manor.
I warned you early on about the possibility that what I was going to write could be stupid . . .