MAD MEN on AMC - Seasons 7(a) & & 7(b)

I think Don has finally become a drifter. His last act will be to carve a "Tell a Sad Story" hobo code sign onto the entrance to McCann

guilty lol

An insightful bit from the Tom & Lorenzo recap:

Betty’s had a lot of scenes over the years where her petulance and childlike nature made her hard to take, but in our minds, one of the worst scenes was when her own father tried to talk to her about his funeral plans, knowing his death was imminent. She wouldn’t hear a word of it. “Can’t you keep this to yourself?” she asked him coldly. “I’m your little girl.” Here she is, eight years later, as emotionally mature a woman as anyone could ask for, accepting her own death and forcing her own little girl to handle the plans for her upcoming funeral. And yet, despite all the ways Betty has grown and changed over the years, her final words to her daughter were mostly concerned with how she wanted her hair, what gown she wanted to wear and what lipstick she wanted applied to her. Betty was able to change to the effect that she was able to celebrate her daughter’s uniqueness and tell her she loved her – but she had to do it in a letter concerned largely with appearances and coldly listing a series of demands. That’s pure Betty Hofstadt. She couldn’t perch on Sally’s bed and give her a hug and talk about love and looking down from heaven. That’s not who she is and that’s not what that scene was for, in Betty’s mind. It was Betty’s last declaration of self. “I’ve fought for plenty in my life,” she tells Sally, Now do as I tell you. And make sure I look pretty. She’s grown, but she’s still the Betty we’ve always known.

Seriously, how many times is Don going to get propositioned by dudes this season?

I'm wondering at this point if Don is just going to abandon his Don Draper personality and live out the rest of his life as Dick Whitman somewhere in the mid-west

he really does have all the hallmarks of a semi-closeted dude of the era

https://snapcracklewatch.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/tumblr_n4dvcbfzhy1s5e5bko4_400.gif

:(

I did really like the Betty/Sally stuff in this ep, and that moment when Sally takes her little brother onto her lap was a rare and quietly tender moment for this emotionally chilly household.

Maybe he's gonna change his name to Dick Whipman and whip people with his man dick

he really does have all the hallmarks of a semi-closeted dude of the era

Always bringing people coffee.

Seriously, how many times is Don going to get propositioned by dudes this season?

― Norse Jung (Eric H.)

that scene with the gay couple in the apartment was a sop tbh

Don's never coded gay; he seems like a typical guy from any era who's seen and done terrible shit, doesn't care to judge, but don't dare put your hand on his thigh.

Next episode will see Don being chased by a crop duster plane.

In something I read, they compared the North by Northwest imagery of the last episode to the Hitchcock/Bass-like opening credits. I also thought of "if I could get Betty in the ground" the other night--added some extra poignancy to Sally's reaction.

Especially resonant since the occasion for the "Betty in the ground" comment was her roommate's mother dying.

My other immediate thought was "Don is going to have to stop running now".

^^^this. it is kind of odd how the last episode was all about how unnecessary Don was to everybody in his life, so he abandons them, and then the next episode sets up a situation where his kids definitely need him. Said it upthread but I really can't picture Don realistically leaving his kids behind to be raised by fucking Henry Francis, who he has always hated.

North by Northwest opened the Weiner-curated movie series in Queens.

My sister remembers our grandma whispering "cancer" about friends in the '70s; she had grown up in the era of silence, of course.

I know how this ends now, don is going to move to oxnard and become my dad

has anyone's kids become full-blown radicals, or even touristy ones?

(I will probably be watching season2 in about a month)

yes

several seasons down the road there's a kid in Paris in '67

another goes full hippie commune, and there's a couple others that probably qualify to varying degrees

There are a very small number of grown up kids in this show, but I would say that most of the one's that are grown or near grown have been very influenced by the counter culture.

There's a trailer for the last episode:

http://bcove.me/u7npykmu

Vox's headline promises "This exclusive trailer for the Mad Men finale will make you tear up." No.

Didn't recognize the song at all--Paul Anka, "Times of Your Life," 1975. Fits perfectly in some ways: "Kodak created an advertising campaign in 1975 that featured Anka singing a jingle entitled 'Times of Your Life.' While the tune was being heard across the United States in a commercial, Anka decided to record and release it as a single in late 1975."

The problem is it's terrible, completely negating everything else about the trailer.

the last episodes a clip show

trailer was fine imo

btw, how obvious was it in the flashback way back when that dick whitman was responsible for don draper's death? coz i had totally forgotten that element of it, i just recalled it as the two of them getting shelled

Don recounted it as if it was intentional, which I def don't remember

looks like an accident to me (at about 29:00 here):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXDcpOh_0kE

I didn't take it as Don saying that he did it on purpose. They were talking guilt, he still feels guilty, though it was an accident.

yeah I just couldn't remember and it wasn't entirely clear

tbf I didn't entirely understand the other guy's anecdote either

That clip clarifies something I was confused about the other night too (when Don told the Legion guys he killed his C.O., for a second I wondered if that meant he intentionally killed Draper precisely so he could steal his identity--had I forgotten that?). Totally an accident. But interesting, in retrospect, that it's again predicated upon cigarettes.

Pete was such a little weasel ratting him out. Surprised Don ever forgave him.

lotta water under that bridge

will never forget cracking up at bert's reaction when pete came to him w/that

it was one of bert's most ayn randish moments

"a man is the room he is in" is so perfect

Check out the kiss Sal plants on Joan earlier in the episode (2:00).

Wow. Don, Peggy, and Pete's voices have changed since 2007.

I'm looking forward to re-watching this entire series tbh

Starting tomorrow night at 6, AMC is running the entire series from the beginning.

(of course, it's already on Netflix, so...)

tbf I didn't entirely understand the other guy's anecdote either

― Οὖτις, Tuesday, May 12, 2015 5:00 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i think it was written to be more than a bit elliptical and open to interpretation. that said, if you ate a bunch of german dudes, would you really tell anyone about it, even your VFW buddies after a few whiskeys? i suspect it's more that they just shot the krauts rather than take them prisoner. which is bad enough.

the scene in the last episode that got to me (emotionally) was when henry told sally it was OK to cry, and then proceeded to break down in tears. poor guy.

btw i have a terrible memory and it's been so long between season. can someone remind me of the circumstances by which McCann bought out SCDP? obviously a major plot point many seasons ago was the main characters breaking away to avoid being swallowed up by McCann, so their eventually absorption by the larger company is supposed to have a huge ironic resonance. but since, like I said, i tend to forget these long-term plot developments, I think some of that has been lost on me...

Bert dies and rather than let Harry Hamlin force Don out, Roger engineers a deal to sell SCDP to McCann making the partners mostly rich.

so basically he appeals to Harry Hamlin character's greed over his vanity?

whatever happened to that character, then?

Fairly recent, so I think I remember it well enough. It was basically Roger going to McCann so he could save Don's job via a buyout--Jim Cutler wanted Don out, and figured he could make that happen because of Don violating his contract. It's more involved than that, but I think that's the basic outline. (Still no explanation of what happened to Cutler, who in the end did vote in favour of the buyout. Great line: "It's a lot of money!")

btw who was the other Korean War vet in that last episode--I mean who was the actor? he looks/sounds crazy familiar.

hankies out gang

http://www.vox.com/2015/5/12/8593701/mad-men-finale-trailer

it's interesting how for a long-running show like this there are such intense expectations built up for the ending.

whereas for a 120-minute movie, we're perfectly content with a "good" ending, whether that be a conventional ending that's well-prepared-for, or a unconventional ending that seems apt somehow. but because we see it all in one go, we don't have quite the same intense set of expectations.

weiner has so many choices. he can do a kind of in-medias-res thing (a la sopranos), or he can try to have things "settled" in a contingent way, or he can have a balls-to-the-wall conflagration a la breaking bad (which i doubt, given the kind of show it is). in fact, the recent history of long-running "quality" cable TV endings itself weighs heavily on expectations for the show.

anyway i'm not saying anything interesting sorry.

Hamlin got bought out but mccann didnt want him - mccann wanted (primarily) draper and chough

by the way for anyone still confused over the business dealings side, this is an amazing rundown of all the buyouts, mergers, partnerships hoo ha since the beginning of the show. and it's more fun than it sounds.
http://www.vulture.com/2015/05/history-of-mad-mens-sterling-cooper.html?mid=twitter_vulture