With the final season of Mad Men returning at an undetermined date in April, I will re-watch the first four seasons and watch the following two-and-a-half seasons for the first time. After each season, I will share my thoughts on the show.
Season 1
Mad Men is one of the hardest shows for me to write about. The other hardest show is The Simpsons. In a way, it's hard to write about them for the same reason: it's pretty damn hard to write about a show specifically designed for episodic analysis. Episodic analysis has become somewhat popular in recent years. Any good show, regardless of the need, has a post from AV Club, HitFix, or any number of well-visited television-themed sites hours after the episode airs, analyzing and grading that specific episode. Most of the shows don't need it. I enjoy it if it's from a good writer, but really most of the time I'm just wanting to find the perspective of another person and compare it to my own.
Mad Men (and The Simpsons) benefits from post-episode analysis, assuming the writer is given a screener and allowed time to reflect on the episode. (This is why it's hard for me. I don't get screeners, thus I'll inevitably miss something. Plus if I actually take the time necessary to uncover all the depths of an episode, it'll need to be posted the day later, thus removing the timeliness aspect.) Mad Men is designed in such a way where each episode can stand alone with its own themes. That's not to say that you can watch any old episode out of order. But there's always this weird sense of finality when the episode is over that most serialized shows don't provide. (While The Sopranos dabbled in this, I don't think I can say the same about it.)
I guess this is my way of saying Mad Men is growing on me. I've made it clear in my previous post that I really enjoy Mad Men, but I can't elevate it to the best shows of all time. I'm not sure I'll change my opinion, but the second season was just as good as the first, and arguably more impressive an achievement. Since Mad Men is in essence a show about characters, the only way for me to look at this season is by revisiting all the characters and see their progression.
Don Draper doesn't exactly progress as a character. It's more like Matt Weiner and the writers reveal more of the character. Whatever happened in between the end of season one and the beginning of season two - probably Betty finding out Don has been calling her psychiatrist - the dynamics of the Draper marriage have changed significantly. Don Draper appears to be very sincere and very intent on staying committed to Betty. But of course that can't happen. The very things that make Don Draper who he is prevent him from ever staying committed. To his credit, it's not totally his fault. Take a verifiable philanderer and give him a woman who might as well show up naked to his bed, he's just not going to say no.
Interestingly enough, this is a different affair from the first season. He does not seem to enjoy it or even like Bobbie Barrett. He just can't resist. Don hasn't exactly grown this season, but he certainly makes a more concerted effort to remain faithful and be a good husband. Too bad the timing could not have been worse. Draper's actions in the second season would have gone unnoticed by Betty in the first season. Hell, she probably would have appreciated him more because of them. But Betty has changed.
Betty has infinitely more control than she ever had in season one. But she's still basically a child at the start of the season like she was in season one. She flirts with the idea of affairs, but does so in a way that a child would and immediately backs off whenever it seems to go anywhere. And in her cruelest moment of the series thus far, she facilitates an affair between her two stable friends because she's too chicken to do it herself AND then she gets to feel morally superior by shaming her friend. It's terrible.
Like I've stressed, I remember less about specific details in the third and fourth season and especially so for character progression, but I would guess Betty will be "grown up" in the third season. Actually participating in affair was emotionally cathartic and allows her to finally start eating. Couple that with her very mature talk with Sally about what her and Don are going through and I think she's becoming a responsible mother as well. (I'll forgive her for her antiquated punishments which are probably a sign of the times more than her abilities as a mother.) Thus, when she accepts Don back, it doesn't feel like a cheat like it could have.
Small note: I'm also looking for my opinion on January Jones, which upon first viewing was not positive. I was much more impressed with Jones in the first season than I expected. The second season? Eh. The cracks are starting to show. I continued to be genuinely surprised by her until the middle of the season. I want to say "A Night to Remember." The rest of the episodes were better, but I think that colored my opinion of her performance in a negative way to where I could never get back to that pleasant surprise. Ah well.
In the first season, Peggy and Pete were arguably the most important characters behind Don Draper. Peggy was making her transformation from meek secretary to devoted advertising copywriter. Pete didn't exactly have as drastic of a transformation, but Mad Men spent a lot of time uncovering the complexities of his character. This season, both characters' change between seasons, but not really throughout the season.
Peggy Olsen may as well have renamed herself Peggy Draper, because she takes the misguided advice of Don Draper and follows in his footsteps. Much like Don forgot his past life as Dick Whitman, Peggy forgets her pregnancy and subsequent adoption. She even takes the advice of a priest, albeit in a way he didn't intend, when she confesses to Pete that she had his baby. At the end of the season, her actions of emulating Don Draper have led to her own office and she shows no signs of changing that either.
Pete meanwhile finds out his father died in an airplane crash. Don Draper doesn't exactly care for Pete's feelings, but he at first gives him the counsel he needs to find out how humans react. But after Duck tries to get Pete to use his father's death to land American Airlines, Don is in a much different mood and shakes him off. Later on, when Draper disappears in California, Pete doesn't turn him in like he would have in the first season. And he readily accepts his father-in-law dropping the Clearasil account, because the only reason he even got the account was under the pretext that the Campbells would have a baby. When Don genuinely praises him for his work, he decides to side with Don over Duck, mostly because Don's praise means everything to Pete.
The Duck-Don rivalry was the crux of the second season. Duck is envious of the amount of control Don seems to have over Sterling Cooper while Don is defensive of Duck's search for power. They also seem to have ideological differences about how to approach advertising. All of this leads to the desperate, yet nearly successful attempt by Duck to have Sterling Cooper sold to an overseas corporation. In somewhat of an anticlimatic moment that nonetheless is as satisfying as anything on this show, Don simply says "I have no contract" to shut down Duck's plans.
Duck Phillips was a great addition to the cast. He's a recovering alcoholic who is frustrated that his talent does not match his position. Due to his alcoholism, he's not exactly a great foil to Don Draper (as it's pretty clear which one will win the impending battle), but he stands out as a character in his own right. Plus, he's contrasted with Freddy Rumsen, a person whose alcoholism eventually gets him fired. Actually, he's contrasted with just about everyone in the office, who by modern-day standards surely qualify as an alcoholic. I'm guessing Duck just doesn't quite handle the alcohol as well as the others.
Lastly, in terms of characters who I'll spend a paragraph talking about, Joan Holloway unfortunately seems to develop in much the way that is expected, in hindsight at least (that's not a complaint. It's unfortunate because it sucks). In the first season, there's a hint that she wants more out of the office judging by her jealousy of Peggy's quick rise. She's given a chance her and is excellent at it, but nobody even thinks she wants it. What's sad is that if she spoke up, she might be able to get that job, but that's not the type of thing she would do.
Worse, she now has a fiancee who is completely uninterested in Joan being anything other than a housewife. That was a forgivable sin, because at least you could blame the time period. But then he rapes Joan in Don's office in one of the most harrowing scenes in television. And then... she remains with her fiance. I honestly don't remember anything about Joan past this season so I'm really hoping for more positive storylines for her.
Now, because Mad Men seems to spend time on each character, I'll have to bullet point the rest of the characters.
- Salvatore Romano gets married to a person he seems to truly love, although is completely uninterested in sexually due to his homosexuality. He and his wife host dinner with Ken Cosgrove, which is the closest he can get to intimacy with a man. (Masters of Sex also has a sexually repressed gay man married to a woman and a sexually repressed housewife. In my opinion, MoS does both better, in one case due to better acting (housewife) and the other due to more time spent on it.)
- Ken Cosgrove seems like much less of a creep than when first presented. Once again, he writes a short story, and while Sal's maybe not the most objective person, it seems genuinely good.
- Paul Kinsey is Mad Men's gateway to civil rights and... well his interests seem less about actual interest and more about showing off how progressive he is. Joan calls him out for exactly why he's dating a black woman, which is somewhat painful to watch because her speech is pretty racist, but she is completely correct.
- Harry Crane becomes head of television, apparently has resolved his issues with his wife, and is set to become a father. His disapproval with the civil rights march and his opinion on homosexuality plummet his character down from the seemingly good guy in season one.
- Roger meanwhile leaves his wife for Don's secretary. His looming divorce leads him to be eager to sell Sterling Cooper. It's pretty clear Jane Siegel is simply a replacement Joan Holloway since he can't have Joan. John Slattery continues to steal scenes even when he doesn't have anything significant to do.
- The young talent Duck brings in doesn't make a huge impression, but their arrival is completely worth it solely for the scene when everybody finds out Kurt is gay. That's one of the funniest scenes the show has ever done.
Looking back at the second season, it's actually kind of impressive how Draper-focused it was. The three main recurring storylines throughout were the Draper marriage, the Duck-Don rivalry, and Don Draper's past. Peggy's ascension was more background than at the forefront and Pete was majorly featured in just two or three episodes. But basically, the second season is all Don Draper.
The past life into Dick Whitman not only provides a chance for Jon Hamm to flex his acting talent, but it's also interesting just because here's a person he's totally comfortable being Dick Whitman around. Dick Whitman seems a hell of a lot more healthy about who he is - I'm not sure he could rise to where he is in the advertising world, but I do feel like he'd be happier. Either way, I think the show makes it pretty clear that Don's path to success - forget the past - hurts him. That doesn't seem like good news for Peggy at this point.
Playlist
1. "Let's Twist Again" - Chubby Checker
2. "Temptation is Hard to Fight" - George McGregor & The Bronzettes
3. "Lollipops and Roses" - Jack Jones
4. "Blue Room" - Perry Como
5. "Theme from a Summer Place" - Percy Faith
6. "Infanta" - The Decemberists
7. "Break it to Me Gently" - Brenda Lee
8. "I'm in Love" - The Pentagons
9. "Early in the Morning" - Peter, Paul, & Mary
10. "Telstar" - The Tornados
11. "Misirlou" - Martin Denny
12. "Cup of Loneliness" - George Jones
13. "Stranger on the Shore" - Acker Bilk
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