Of course at the end Don discovers that he’s still “Don”! Who the hell else would he be? And of course he pulls another brilliant idea out of his ass with the Coke commercial. It’s what he did in the first episode with the “it’s toasted” bit for Lucky Strike when he walked into that meeting completely un-prepared. It’s the perfect book-end for the entire show. The stuff in the middle is just a process for him - fodder for the charmed life he lives. He’s not self-unaware. He just doesn’t give that deep of a fuck for very long: “You have to move on and it will get better.”
The Peggy and Stan revelation, “OMG, I love you! - I love you too!”, was irritatingly stupid and trite.
Joan’s never had any trouble finding men, so another relationship ending as the price of finding herself finally in control of her life was a good way to wrap that up.
Roger announcing he was giving half his money to his and Joan’s son was pointless. Clearly that kid wasn’t going to be left to fend for himself in life. His new wife will soak him for the rest. If he’s lucky, a heart attack will kill him before she makes him too miserable.
Pete and family flying off to Wichita to start their lives over was actually okay with me. He’s a little rat and will simply continue to be the rodent that he is, elsewhere.
The way I read Watershed Moment - when he finally let go of Dick Whitman, who was always there in the dark, in the dark fridge with nobody-man. Dick was always there deep inside, unloved, unlovable, unimportant and unwanted. That’s why he could never commit, never really accept love - he felt that he was trash, a fraud, and didn’t deserve it.
I always remember when he said Betty would leave him if she found out who he really was. Or wasn’t. I think losing his image was as devastating to her as his infidelity. She married a certain image. Twice.
Roger giving money to his and Joan’s son secured the kid’s future and enabled Joan to use her own money, to live on and use in her business. She could say goodbye to sugar daddy (and I’m glad he’s gone, I can see him paying his way into the high life for as long as he lives, and I hope he misses Joan)… Meredith will always land on her feet. As will Harry, who made me laugh out loud in his brief scene… And Roger and Marie will live happily ever after for as long as he lives, I think they’re amusing together. The only thing is they were drinking absinthe at that teeny table and he ordered two lobsters - I hope the lobsters arrived cut up ready to eat because there wasn’t much room there!
I wanted to punch that woman at the EST meeting making Stephanie feel bad about giving up her kid.
Again, it was definitely not est which was a very different experience than was portrayed. It was supposed to be Esalen or something like it. My Mom, who had actually been to Esalen just a couple of years after the events of the show told me that they nailed it.
Roger putting Joan’s son Kevin in his will might someday lead to speculation that he’s Kevin’s biological father. Everyone deserves to know of their true parentage.
I like that Roger ended up married to Marie Calvet. Very suited to each other. Loved how she laughed about his “and a bottle of champagne for my mother.”
Don’s happy smirk told me a lot …it was as good as a lightbulb in a thought bubble above his head. I don’t think Don would turn his back on his true calling as an ad man. It was his passion, he clicked on all cylinders when being creative. The girl in the hippie blouse and red ribbons in her braids says it all.
Some people like to think that Don and Peggy created the ad together.
FYI, the person who wrote the AV Club recap thinks that Don returned to write the Coke ad, based in part on the resemblance of the woman at the front desk of the retreat to the woman in the ad.
And BTW, when Sally came home, Bobby was burning something in the kitchen. Didn’t Henry have a housekeeper of some sort? Why were the children fending for themselves?
Also, the writer of the New York Times recap agrees that Don wrote the ad (or at least contributed to it, given that McCann Erickson worked by committee).
The funny thing is that when I saw the episode, I assumed that Don stayed in California to lead self-actualization meetings like that one.
What a disappointing episode. On the positive side, I was glad to see Joan starting her own business. I think she will be a smashing success. And I’m delighted that the relationship with what’s-his-name is over, he was clearly a dud. But I did sort of hold out hope that she and Roger would ultimately end up together. They understood each other better than any other couple on the show. Having said that, I enjoyed Roger’s last witty line (“a bottle of champagne for my mother”). I wonder how that marriage will fare.
I also liked the way the phone was used throughout the episode, all those phone conversations with people trying to make connections about some pretty weighty topics (Sally/Don, Betty/Don, Peggy/Don, Peggy/Stan). The final ad should have been “Reach out and touch someone.”
But the negatives outweighed the positives for me. Don’s epiphany had nothing to do with enlightenment or a new understanding of himself and his place in the world. I wouldn’t have expected a grand moment of redemption for him, and I’m glad they avoided that. The emotional catharsis of hugging the Refrigerator Guy seemed forced and fell flat to me. But at the same time, to reduce Don’s breakdown and questioning his identity (again) to an inspiration for a TV commercial was a huge disappointment as well as being utterly predictable. To end with the actual commercial was such a cop-out.
Don is such a selfish bastard. That isn’t a criticism of the episode. In fact, I think it is entirely consistent with his character to end up meditating in Big Sur instead of catching the first plane to New York to be with his children. Good for Sally to realize what her brothers needed and to be there for them, but she really shouldn’t have to bear that burden alone. The last view of Betty at the table with Sally doing the dishes was heartbreaking.
Peggy deserves someone better than Stan. That phone conversation, though brilliantly acted on her part, was another moment I rolled my eyes about.
And evidently the future belongs to the Pete Campbells of the world. What a depressing thought. Though perhaps an accurate representation.
He said that he was trying to make dinner so perhaps she had gone for the day.
Has anyone ever had the type of dreams they have on TV and in the movies? I’ve never remotely had a dream with an obvious narrative like “I was in a refrigerator and people kept opening and smiling but not smiling AT me and then picking other things.” All of my dreams are “Ok, so I was in my old house but it wasn’t really my old house and that one actress from that show was there and I think she was my sister except that she wore this cat sweater and then we were cooking corn…”
Perhaps but she should have left something for their dinner. And he should have arranged for a private duty nurse for her. He certainly could afford it.
I voted “liked it” but I have some of the same concerns as others have mentioned.
The shot of Sally doing the dishes while Betty miserably smokes a cigarette made me very sad indeed. I get that there are implications of a happier future down the line for the boys and possibly Sally herself but I just wanted more for her.
Peggy and Stan have always been a great “couple” so I was glad they got together but I must say I wasn’t exactly expecting it. Can someone remind me what happened to Stan’s lady? When she showed up several eps ago I couldn’t remember how she came onto the show and now I don’t recall her exit. Anyway, I thought these last few eps showed Elisabeth Moss at her best. She was so freakin’ adorable, whether it be her goodbye to Pete (ditto the love for “. . . A thing like that”), her begging Don to “come home” or the sweet (though corny) scene between her and Stan.
At first the bedroom scene with Roger and Marie had me going(not in *that *way you pervs!) until he got out of bed and huffily wrapped the bedspread around himself and I knew everything would be okay for them.
I’m happy for Joan and so very very glad she’s rid of Leisure Suit. God, I hated that guy.
I definitely thought we are meant to understand that Don’s experience at the retreat was the inspiration for the Coke ad, though other’s interpretations are making me look at it differently. It’s funny, after months of speculation about the likelihood of Don writing it, while I was watching I didn’t give it a thought. I did, however roll my eyes and cringe a bit at his end scene with the whole “om” thing;it just felt so contrived. Then we see the ad and it all came together (for me. I could be totally wrong). Upon a second viewing I tied together the meditation bell sound coinciding with his moment of inspiration (which also sounds like the ding on a manual typewriter). I choose to picture him returning to McCann and pitching the idea and then retiring after the commercial has been finished and remaining a steady presence in his childrens’ lives.
Bottom line for me; it was all a little too neatly wrapped up, happy endingish, but after 8 years I have such affection for these characters that I’m glad to see positive endings for them, even if it sort of deviates from most of what we’ve been watching up to this point.
Sally seems to have used this experience to finally love and appreciate her family. It’s terrible that it had to happen that way but you know that, when her mother passes, she will grow closer to her brothers rather than more distant without even the excuse of their parents to bring them together. She seemed genuinely warm when she said she’d show Bobby how to make grilled cheese sandwiches which isn’t an emotion she displayed to anyone in her family often. I think people expected Big Things to come to Sally in the show but she’s still only… 16? with her life ahead of her. She’s not going to spend her life raising her brothers; she’ll go back to school and make something of herself. Especially if you’re on the “Don wrote the Coke ad” train, she’s not going to hurt for money (and thus opportunities and risks) and has plenty of time for Big Things. This chance to finally feel a connection with her family was more fleeting.
I’m going to play Devil’s Advocate. I don’t think Don wrote the Coke commercial.
The songs that close each each episode cover a range of emotions. Sometimes they expand on the theme of the show, just as often they comment on it ironically. This was one of the latter.
Mad Men always had a love/hate relationship with advertising. The creativity was celebrated, the cynical commercialism was not. Don often hated the products, especially when they hit too close to home as with tobacco. The most famous campaign he did was for the Kodak Carousel, a metaphor for connecting families through memories, the wish fulfillment dream Don always wanted for his own life.
Now, at the end, Don has been stripped down to his bare self. He wants connection, badly - he’s just been tossed out of all the families in his life. You can argue that’s the reason he returns to the one family that does welcome and respect him, his advertising family. But that family, like his real ones, has been broken up and moved off in a dozen ways. McCann is Peggy’s future, not Don’s. Besides, if he returns triumphantly to overshadow her, that whole happy ending is destroyed.
That says to me that the advertising vision of connectedness is meant to be ironic, a phony moment of fake reality to be contrasted with the true inner self that he’s just beginning to find. Don can’t go back to advertising. He has to find something new that will satisfy his true needs. For a moment I thought that might be cars, since he never seemed happier than with the connections he made to them. (Another callback to his early days, when he worked for Cadillac.) But all the cars were faulty, they let him down or were taken away from him repeatedly, so I don’t think that’s the answer. Being a pilot would be better. Don at Learjet has fun possibilities. His age and lack of experience kill that but the symbolism is good.
Whatever it is won’t be advertising. Stan’s right about it. Treat it as a job and don’t get so emotionally invested you’re lost in the hypocrisy. Don spent half his life lost. He’s not spending the next half the same way.
Another thought / question; Mr. Weiner has been quoted as saying that people are going to be angry or disappointed with the ending. Not sure if he simply meant it in a "damned if you do, damned if you don’t " way or if he was referring to a specific character’s plot line. What disappointed you or what do you think may have disappointed most people? My answer to both is Sally’s outcome. Apologies if this should be its own thread; it doesn’t seem significant to stand on its own but if the OP prefers I can start one.
Was I the only one who thought for most of that call between Stan and Peggy (and then again when the phone went silent) that Stan was putting her on as payback for the previous insults? And would that have been better than the rather formulaic 'shipping? A “OK, I kinda deserved that” response and renewed professional friendship? Or does Peggy deserve more than that?
I really don’t have a problem with Pete getting the happy ending. He is a weasel, and has done plenty of horrible things, but I think we saw quite a bit of growth from him. In particular I think the conversation with his brother in the previous episode (basically talking him out of infidelity) was an interesting change for Pete.
I also did not think (at least on first viewing) that Don went back and wrote the Coke ad. Maybe, just maybe, he called Peggy and gave her the idea, all the way down to the costuming. But I took Don’s enlightenment as genuine, and his “retirement” permanent.
I took Bobby’s “I heard it all before they stopped fighting” line to mean that Henry has somewhat checked out. He never was very good in a difficult situation - that’s why Betty wrote Sally the letter.
Although he doesn’t appear in the writing credits for the Sopranos finale, one has to assume that Matt Weiner was involved in the story line and quite familiar with the benefits of an ambiguous ending to a series.
I did have a few moments where I thought the very same thing. The way it played out was completely formulaic but it still made me happy.
[QUOTE=Jas09]
I really don’t have a problem with Pete getting the happy ending. He is a weasel, and has done plenty of horrible things, but I think we saw quite a bit of growth from him. In particular I think the conversation with his brother in the previous episode (basically talking him out of infidelity) was an interesting change for Pete.
[/QUOTE]
Agreed, though I don’t know how happy an ending a lifetime with Trudy, in Wichita no less, is going to be for one such as Pete. Then again, if he’s truly turned over a new leaf he may be all right.
