No, it was a jumper with his arms outstretched like a plane and a smoke bomb embedded between his legs. He was above the building because many jumpers like to jump high into the air before arching down for a wider splatter pattern on the ground.
Kidding, maybe Draper was looking at a plane. But, still, ending the series by reenacting the title sequence would have been cool and conclusive.
It occurs to me that we did see the opening title sequence completely played out in the last few episodes. Don is in the office, calm cool and collected. Don falls for a little while. Then Don lands back in his proper place, calm cool and collected.
The wife and I just watched the second half of the season recently. Loved the ending. We both agree Don Draper returned to New York and developed the Coke ad, which apparently is Jon Hamm’s interpretation too. I wonder if he gets his secretary back. She was a keeper.
I never watched this show during its run on air, as I wasn’t too interested in it or period pieces in general. But I’ve been Netflix binging it the last few weeks, as I’ve found it to be at least mildly entertaining comfort TV (even though at no point did it strike me as particularly great drama worthy of all the awards/acclaim it received).
But anyway, I just watched the finale and some thoughts while it’s fresh in my mind even though I’m very late to the party:
First of all, this is the most garbage series finale I’ve ever seen of any serial drama. It didn’t feel like a finale at all; it felt like another ho-hum boring episode. If I hadn’t noticed it was the last episode beforehand I wouldn’t have even realized it was supposed to be a finale until it was over, and ended up thinking “That’s it? WTF?” Very little in the way of meaningful resolutions to any of the characters or plot arcs.
The very unclear resolution of Don: there shouldn’t have been any debate about whether or not he did the famous Coke ad. I get that TV producers like to be intentionally vague because they think it’s cute and artistic, but it doesn’t add anything to the show to leave it that way. It detracts.
Fuck Pete Campbell. How does he get such a favorable ending? Him: “Hey Trudy, I decided we should get back together and be a family again”. Her: “OK!” How often does it really work out that way in reality? To the extent that we acknowledge that yeah, it’s fiction where anything can happen, nobody in the show is less deserving of a fairytale Hollywood ending than him. If you’re gonna break suspension of disbelief by making something like that happen, at least do it for a character that deserves it.
I don’t think the question was whether he did the ad or not; the question was whether he internalized the lessons and came out a better person or just stayed the same broken person and came out with a classic commercial.
It was pretty well established that neither Pete nor Trudy had really moved on from one another. Trudy never gets into a serious relationship after the divorce and Pete scuttles his thing with the California real estate agent when he thinks Trudy might be seeing someone. Whether the viewer wants to believe in some sort of redemption for Pete or watch him suffer in misery forever is up to them but Pete & Trudy reconciling wasn’t really out of nowhere.
It’s a period piece. However unlikely, it seems more probable then.
I can see how the finale didn’t seem like a big deal if you weren’t really that invested in the show to begin with. Not to argue or try to change Rigamarole’s mind; a person likes it or they don’t, no big whoop, but I strongly felt Don’s redemption and I really enjoyed the tie in with the very famous Coke commercial. I didn’t really feel any ambiguity as to whether he made the commercial.
As for Pete, I really didn’t care how he ended up. Don’t get me wrong, I loved watching him because he was hilarious but I wasn’t emotionally invested in him or Trudy or them as a couple. I kind of looked at it as Pete has always been his own worst enemy and he’ll never have a totally “happy ending” because he’ll bring some other woe unto his weaselly self. Trudy is pretty unpleasant in her own right so they deserve each other, but I don’t know as that will be a life of bliss.
Pete’s character arc is really some of the best parts of the show.
He’s a shit quite a lot of the time… but also has this weird capacity for thoughtfulness and loyalty (like Burt says after Pete’s blackmail gambit fails). He doesn’t necessarily NOT deserve a happy ending.
I do wish the show had done more with the character triangle of Pete-Don-Peggy. The episode during the Burger Chef storyline that ends with the three of them eating a “family dinner” together seemed almost like a mission statement for the rest of the show… but they didn’t do anything with it.
Oh, and though it’s not specific to the finale, I was really surprised going back and reading some of the threads on other episodes to realize a lot of people apparently hated Megan. She was so incredibly sexy, and the “Zou Bisou Bisou” scene was by far my favorite scene in the entire show. I can’t say I was ever disappointed to see her on screen.
(A close 2nd was a Don line around I think S3-S4 or so, where he gets in an elevator with Pete, who is pissed at him for something or other, and says, “You know, I really feel sorry for you.” And Don comes back nonchalantly with, “I don’t think about you at all.”)
When were they expressing their hatred?
Early on, Megan was much more sweet and humble than after she’d married Don - her own mother called her a “little bitch”.
After Megan was making her own money as a successful TV actress, she became less satisfied with that arrangement. Understandably. If Don hadn’t been such a big, philandering, son of a bitch, they might’ve worked things out.
Agree that I was never disappointed seeing her onscreen.
I don’t think I hated Megan but I never really warmed to her. I think she was always presented as peripheral to Don and only really existed to advance his story. I don’t think she even really had any one episode B-plots that didn’t involve Don, unlike Betty (even when Don & Betty were married). So unless you liked her straight off, she never got a chance to do much to change your mind.
That said, she was in the top half of Don’s women in that at least she wasn’t actively annoying like Sylvia.
I think they should have explored more the ramifications of his identity switch. Kept waiting for that to catch up with him, but it seemed to have been forgotten.
We watched the last 2 seasons in a binge this past weekend. What can I say? It’s been a very busy 18 months or so, what with election season and all.
Anyway.
Yes, Don’s smile indicates one of those very gratifying creative moments. I see this as his character co-opting Bill Backer’s creative contribution to the jingle and commercial. Which I wholeheartedly approve of. This is a fictitious world HEAVILY drawing upon real-life names and situations. It’s a central conceit to the entire series, so now- at the very end- people are outraged? ( Or were 20 months ago when this was news. ) Please.
I very much enjoyed the finale and Loved It in the poll. I expected a rocky road for Betty & Company. Dealing with death face to face is a bitch. I thought it was handled very very well in the last few episodes and that final shot of Sally doing the dishes was superb.They were 8 feet away and a million miles separated- and soon to be an eternity as well. Nicely wrought.
As for the other tidy finishes, meh. I’m not pissed at any of them. They all work in the construct of this show. What did people want?
Trudy and Pete and the baby die when the Learjet slams into a cornfield in Shanksville, PA on the way to their new life?
Peggy winds up set into a framework that will insure she becomes Pimi. Alone. Brilliant. Incapable of any more than manipulative power-based seductions?
Joan marries the Sugar Daddy, loses her spine mysteriously and completely abandons her dreams, core values and personal strengths?
Roger has a heart attack as he’s fucking his new wife?
Don takes acid at the retreat, stumbles off of the cliff and falls to a bloody broken filthy wretched death on the salty boulders below, as the Beach Boys’ " Wouldn’t It Be Nice? " fades in over the final credits?
It’s a t.v. series. Tidy finishes are expected, and I’ve always thought that that’s exactly why The Sopranos ended as it did. With a randomly untidy final set of moments.
To be rather meta about it, I cannot imagine Weiner doing it any other way. This show started in the Eisenhower Era. The 1950’s, with the recent shadow of Korea and the ONLY slightly longer shadow of WWII cast over the players. As disillusioned as many people were in 1971-era, these are characters who grew up in a VERY specific era with a specific set of values and life-views. Hardened NY’ers or simpler country folk, there was a life-view that was radically different than the one I grew up with. I was born in 1962.
This wasn’t their finest hour, it was their finale. Their finest hours? Hundreds of little moments that gave nuance and flair and depth to many of the characters. And the broadly-brushed ( now grotesque ) characters such as the executive at McCann Erickson who made it clear to Joan that she could do no more than fuck her way into job security? Those people didn’t need nuance because they still exist. It’s just that people call them on their shit faster. Sometimes.
I’ll miss these characters and story lines. Great series, great arcs.