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

Waterloo seems to be overtaking The Suitcase as the canonical classic Best Episode
http://blogs.indiewire.com/thompsononhollywood/the-top-20-episodes-of-mad-men-20150513

"waterloo" is v good but if I'm picking a top 10 episode from season 7A it's gonna be "the strategy"

No "Guy Walks Into An Ad Agency" or "Signal 30" on that list?

how on earth do you guys remember episodes from that long ago?

that said, weirdly i can remember specific "cheers" episodes from my youth but i couldn't name/identify a single earlier "mad men" episode.

for me mad men is gonna be the show I blather to my kids about rather than the 90s buffoonery I technically grew up with

I've watched a few "Cosby Show" and "I Love Lucy" episodes hundreds of times but I couldn't tell you their names! That's why I laughed at "Friends" starting every episode title "The One Where..."

well back before the internet you often never knew the names of episodes. those were just for folks w/ copies of the script.

i remember the first time i discovered that TV show episodes actually had names! (aside from anthologies like "the twilight zone," that is...)

If you watch them on DVD, streaming, or download, the titles are how you identify the episodes because they are labelled that way.

Noted

Why I'll surely revisit the whole series a few years down the road: I was looking up the details of how "Early in the Morning" was used, and found out it was Father Gill who sang it, alone in his room (not sure if he was lip-synching to Peter, Paul & Mary or playing it himself). Anyway, I'd completely forgotten about Father Gill--he seemed important for a few episodes. Or that guy at the riding club who was the object of both Betty and her friend's attention--he seemed important for a while. There are undoubtedly other characters like who I've forgotten about. (And I watched the entire series over Christmas; it's not like I'm thinking back six or seven years.)

http://img.sharetv.com/shows/characters/large/mad_men.father_john_gill.jpg

I would generally watch it a month or so after it finished airing, in marathons on summer break from college the first few seasons. season 3 I missed all of until much later & still haven't watched all of its eps. 4 onward I've watched as it's aired, more or less. I definitely know the later seasons better because I've watched most of those episodes multiple times.

Another Father Gill-ish character -- Don's schoolteacher crush. And his Village bohemian gf. Lots of them.

Would be fun to have a bonus episode, fake-doc style, where all these subsidiary characters years down the road talk frankly about Don, Betty, etc.

i felt like zosia mamet's character was going to be important for a minute

she was important for a minute (as was Father Gill, and Jimmy the comedian etc.) but once they served their narrative purpose and passed out of the main characters' lives it seems perfectly reasonable to me that they not reappear

just like what's her face this season

Anyone else get the feeling that Don's denial of past and fresh start doctrine ("It'll be like this never happened") to Peggy was somewhat right in professional effect, but completely wrong when it comes to self image? Peggy has kind of posited herself as the woman who has no need for children, to comical extent when the neighbor kid obviously loves hanging out with her, and eventually breaks down and tells Stan about the baby she gave up.

And we sure know how well pretending he didn't come from nothing and steal his commanding officer's life has gone for Don's well-being

Actually, to everyone in the office and for most of his personal life for the first few seasons, Don Draper is the charismatic cipher who just does what successful men of his time supposedly do -- have affairs, drink at work, be the alpha male and very convincing to clients. The fact he's hanging out with bohemians or whoever else might mean something to him, but I don't think any of them ever saw him as anything other than "Don Draper, the man who drinks at work."

I think that's part of why he's hard to pin down as anything in particular for so much of the series. We see him react emotionally or distantly to things from his past (Anna, his brother) but 90% of the time he is just Successful Advertising Suit Man to his coworkers.

he's the secret astronaut man who drinks at work p much until he has his blurted confession in the hershey pitch (still one of my fav moments on the series despite its placement in a v uneven season).
after that, he is almost entirely thought of as the emotional mess until he sorta gets his shit together (as far as they're concerned and can see, at least) in season 7A. but like in "the strategy," peggy refers to him with justifiable dismissal when she says "i have authority, and don has emotion" to counter pete's expected notion of their roles

I really like how he just walked out of the first meeting on his first day of work and just drove around the country instead.

That's some wish fulfillment shiz.

ILE favorite Jason Reitman is putting together a live reading of "The Wheel" (season 1 finale) with non-Mad Men actors on Sunday night in LA.

xpost

well when you have a multi-million-dollar nest egg it's a bit easier.

http://41.media.tumblr.com/962ad756ad156bb5957b0d5d3fd93df3/tumblr_no7lyqdXOd1qdbluio1_1280.jpg

feel like "bury me inside the gucci store" is a p apt betty death wish

and delicious

no Sal

http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2015/05/mad-men-sal-not-in-finale

anyone who thought he would be is delusional

I don't like how they posed the question about how many other characters we'll never see again and then dot it with a gif of Stan. I miss Stan already. ;_;

rip sexy beard and neckerchief

Started watching one of the repeats last night, and--as I knew would happen--ended up watching most of the next five or six, with occasional breaks and drifting off now and again. It was a real good stretch of episodes from Season 3. Don was living in a hotel, I think fallout from Bobbie Barrett (I started watching where Don and Roger take Freddy out on his day, which is when Don sucker-punches Jimmy Barrett). Had forgotten all about Betty's brother. Creepiest moment ever: when Betty's father puts his hand on Betty and says, "Now that we've eaten, how about you and I go upstairs."

"on his last day"

yeah I was only intermittently able to catch some of s2 but found it immensely absorbing. feel like for a show where people complain nothing ever happens an awful lot fucking happened!

season 2 is my sentimental favorite. i can remember season 3 distinctly but 4-6 tend to run together for me.

This is from Clickhole, but I'm not gonna lie...I would like this very much.

http://i.imgur.com/16LRk0o.png

how long into the episode before we get: 'Five Years Later'?

VG- are you half watching this after getting bored or do you generally watch it that way? Because this show will definitely suffer from half watching.

There are drama shows I get way more excited about but in terms of overall quality, judgement and execution I don't think anything else I've seen comes very close. Not to say there's no room for complaints but I love watching this show because I feel like I'm in safe hands. It's rare to feel that way.
I'd assume a lot of the complaints and nit picking are partly because it's a great show?

I kept thinking Pete's deal is going to go to shit next episode and ruin his second chance with Trudy but maybe not.

Yes, he and we only have Duck's word re Lear Jet's matching McCann compensation. Oh well, lower cost of living in Witchita (as Duck already mentioned...). Good Public Radio station too, at least now.

yeah but pete's gonna be a big fish in a small pond, with breeding, family name, and credentials that will afford him more prestige than they ever did in manhattan. he might end up satisfied for once in his life.

he will never be satisfied

but I don't think too much is going to be done to undermine his more or less "happy ending" in the last episode

I gagged a little when Duck had that line about knocking class rings on tables

I'm down with the idea that Pete comes out on top, as that's long been one of the points of the show and that episode just proved it.

yup, things don't change - Don is still an unwanted mysterious con man, rich WASPs perenially secure, women relegated to secondary status etc.

Wonder if Ted is just going to be left reasonably happy?

I don't really want Peggy to stay there, it just seems so fucking horrible in that place but perhaps staying there is going to solidify her trailblazer status.

i'm glad weiner put the db cooper bullshit to sleep, i feel like some people think every tv show is breaking bad.

the headhunter peggy spoke to a couple episodes ago said that she'd probably quadruple her asking salary after working at mccann for a few years. i hope we'll see more about peggy at work in the final episode but it seems like a place she could thrive. she won't get the director position at mccann that she wanted at SCDP but she's got a very successful career ahead, i think.

you may have missed the part where the guy who runs the place told joan that peggy wouldn't likely be in her job very long

i don't recall that, no