Mad Men countdown

[Lord Garth]

Great episode.

The Betty plot was hard to watch toward the end. My mother didn't smoke but she did die from cancer and today was Mother's Day.

I'm so glad last week was the first and last time, we'd ever hear the words, "I'm Don Draper from McCann Erickson".

So Don's out. Joan's out. Pete's out. Ted doesn't count as he started off with CGC not SP. So that leaves Roger, Peggy, and Stan.

At first, I thought the beginning was a flash-forward and not a dream. I kept on expecting that to be the case right up until Don gave his car away to that kid.

I wonder if Don will find Di. And if Don will die.

I agree that we'll probably see Roger next week. If the story focuses on him, we'll probably see Marie and -- by extension -- Megan.

I thought Pete of all people would stay at McCann for sure. I'm hoping Peggy finds her way out of there. And sooner than three years from "now". Pima might be her (and Stan's) way out.

 

[Warped9]

Don will die eventually (like everyone does), but the question is whether he'll meet an untimely end. I've never believed (and still don't) that he will suicide. Some wondered if something might happen when he picked up the hitch-hiker in the previous episode. I wondered if something bad might happen with the cop when Don got pulled over, but it was all a dream. I wondered if he might get offed by the three drunken war vets, but they weren't homicidal. I recently rewatched Season 1's "The Hobo Code" and it really tied in to Don sitting at the bus stop in the middle of nowhere yet with a smile of peace on his face.

Don is obviously shedding the skin he's worn since Korea. He can't go back either to his roots or to McCann and advertising, but he can become a new person that would be basically an amalgam of Don Draper and Dick Whitman. Theoretically he could become Dick Whitman again (because more than one person can have the same name) without being the same DW that existed before Korea.

I've never really liked Betty much, but her ending with advanced terminal cancer was still a blow even if realistic. She was never a wholly bad person, but when we first met her she seemed so screwed up. She does illustrate that people are usually not wholly good or wholly bad, but rather complex. Her letter to Sally was revealing in underlining the differences in generations. In many ways so many of us can get caught up in doing what we're expected to do and following someone else's rules. Those who go their own way can be resented for not falling into line like everyone else has had to, and yet secretly we can admire those who break from convention.

Unless something unexpected happens in the finale Pete Campbell looks like he's getting the happy ending he's wanted. I don't know if he deserves it because I never liked Campbell. Despite his growth there's still a good measure of "little shit" in him that we saw in full bloom when the series started. The return of Duck Phillips was like seeing a leprechaun promising Pete a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Is it really there or all an illusion?

I really hated the way Joan had to leave. Jim Hobart and McCann treated her abominably, but that wasn't unusual back in the day. Hell, it isn't unusual today. All the way back in Season 1 we saw what a prick Hobart could be. But Joan still has a good whack of cash and a new guy who seems to appreciate and respect her so it's nice to think she'll do allright.

So now we await to see how things wrap up finally for Don, Roger, Peggy and maybe Sally as well. Don has maintained contact with Sally so I'm hoping he fully reconnects with his kids once they're motherless. Sally will soon become the family matriarch once her mother is gone.

I gave up long ago trying to predict where this series will go--and that's one of the things I like about it. It's cool in its unpredictablility even as what happens makes perfect sense.

 

[Warped9]

I understood the finale is two hours. Anyone know if that's true?

 

[gblews]

Don is obviously shedding the skin he's worn since Korea. He can't go back either to his roots or to McCann and advertising, but he can become a new person that would be basically an amalgam of Don Draper and Dick Whitman. Theoretically he could become Dick Whitman again (because more than one person can have the same name) without being the same DW that existed before Korea.

What is going on with Don is SO interesting. Earlier in this thread I posted that I thought Don was no longer that character who didn't know what he wanted. Now I think it more accurate to say that he is that character who may or may not know what he wants but knows for certain what he ]I]doesn't[/I want, which can be just as powerful. I have no idea of where his journey ends (except that it won't be in suicide).

I've never really liked Betty much, but her ending with advanced terminal cancer was still a blow even if realistic. She was never a wholly bad person, but when we first met her she seemed so screwed up. She does illustrate that people are usually not wholly good or wholly bad, but rather complex. Her letter to Sally was revealing in underlining the differences in generations. In many ways so many of us can get caught up in doing what we're expected to do and following someone else's rules. Those who go their own way can be resented for not falling into line like everyone else has had to, and yet secretly we can admire those who break from convention.

Betty was never one of my favorites either, but boy did she show strength and confidence in her most trying moment.

Unless something unexpected happens in the finale Pete Campbell looks like he's getting the happy ending he's wanted. I don't know if he deserves it because I never liked Campbell.

Pete sure thinks he deserves it, as usual. Still, good to see at least one happy ending, or so it seems.

I gave up long ago trying to predict where this series will go--and that's one of the things I like about it. It's cool in its unpredictablility even as what happens makes perfect sense.

Co-sign.

I understood the finale is two hours. Anyone know if that's true?

Don't know but I sure hope so.

 

[Snaploud]

^My DVR says it's going to run from 10:00pm EST to 11:15pm EST.

 

[Dick Whitman]

Maybe with limited commercials too? That is just guess but AMC has done it with the show before. WHat better opportunity than the last episode?

 

[the G-man]

A Buddy Holly song?
Yeah, Weiners definitely trolling us now.

 

[Karzak]

Really excellent, final promo for the show:

http://bcove.me/u7npykmu

 

[Green Shirt]

Really excellent, final promo for the show:

http://bcove.me/u7npykmu

If they had used still photos to go with the song, it really would have made a good Kodak ad.

 

[shapeshifter]

I understood the finale is two hours. Anyone know if that's true?

^My DVR says it's going to run from 10:00pm EST to 11:15pm EST.

Mine says 1:17 but yeah, confirmed. I'm adding an extra couple minutes to the scheduled recording just to be sure. I wouldn't want to miss the splat!

 

[Lord Garth]

These were my predictions on May 29, 2013 while the sixth season was airing, for how I thought the series would end. Let's see how much of this I got right. link

Winter 1970

Partial credit. Right year but the wrong time of year. Even if the finale does another time-jump, at least I got it right that Mad Men would move out of the ‘60s.

Chevy is lost

Technically correct, though it happened in the first half of the season.

Don dies around the time it becomes publicly known he's Dick

The jury is still out.

whatever SCDPCGC is called ends up bought out by McCann

I called it.

Burt Peterson fires Roger.

The jury is still out.

Peggy replaces Don.

Essentially correct. In a way, this happened during the Burger Chef pitch. In a way, it also happened in the sense that Don left McCann and Peggy is still there. It also seems like someday Peggy will have her own agency. Maybe we’ll see that happen if the finale flashes forward but it still remains to be seen.

Pete has the power and prestige he always wanted but it doesn't mean anything because no one likes him.

Wrong. Trudy and Pete are back together. Who knows what happens after the series ends but it looks like the way things will be ending, unless a flash-forward says otherwise.

I wonder how much of that, or any of it, will be right.

3 right, 1 partially right, 1 wrong, and 2 still unknown.

 

[Beagleman]

I kinda doubt we'll get flash-forwards, personally I would like it, but it seems too gimmicky and not reall MM's style...

 

[Dick Whitman]

I think at this point his secret past is not an issue to anyone but himself. Everyone who matters knows on one level or another. His breakdown in the office exposed him emotionally. I doubt the government has any idea or reason to be looking for him.

 

[Lord Garth]

I don't think it would look out of line if, just for the finale, it went into the 1971-1974 range. Anything after that, yeah, I agree.

[shamless_plug] If I want to see the '80s, I just have to wait two more weeks for Halt and Catch Fire. Which is what I'll be doing anyway. [/shameless_plug]

 

[Beagleman]

And your plug worked, besides the title I hadn't heard much about Halt and Catch Fire but I've looked it up and it sounds interesting, gotta give season 1 watch.

 

[Push The Button]

10 minutes to go, I'm getting a little nervous..

 

[Warped9]

I don't know exactly what I expected, but that really wasn't it.

But I was reasonably certain Don wouldn't suicide. And he sure as hell didn't become D.B. Cooper.

 

[Push The Button]

I don't know exactly what I expected, but that really wasn't it.

But I was reasonably certain Don wouldn't suicide. And he sure as hell didn't become D.B. Cooper.

Don Draper is dead, and Dick Whitman is reborn.

And now I'll forever believe that Peggy wrote that Coke commercial.

 

[Corran Horn]

I don't know exactly what I expected, but that really wasn't it.

But I was reasonably certain Don wouldn't suicide. And he sure as hell didn't become D.B. Cooper.

Don Draper is dead, and Dick Whitman is reborn.

And now I'll forever believe that Peggy wrote that Coke commercial.

I figured Don wrote it after getting back to NY after all the "Kumbaya".

 

[Warped9]

The opening credits image of the falling man is Draper having made it to the top and then falling back to Earth. His success as Don Draper was all an illusion exactly like the business he excelled in. But the illusions fell away when he couldn't sustain them and he tortutously found his way back to reality and accepted himself as Dick Whitman.

I think the final scene of Dick is a beginning of him putting his soul and himself back together.

The famous Coke ad at the end can be interpreted in different ways. Did Don return to New York and create it? No, I think that part of his life was now firmly closed. Did he phone the idea in to Peggy? Maybe, but I doubt it. Did Peggy (and Stan) think up the Coke ad? That works, but it also doesn't matter because that ad also signifies a closing of that era.

Everyone seemed to have some measure of closure or finally attained something they truly wanted. Except for Betty and her kids. That, too, will be closure of a chapter but a rather painful one. Henry was absent here almost as if saying he was basically non-existent anyway.

Don's closure is finally closing the door on Don Draper and walking through the door to being himself. Assuming he finally regains himself then who knows what he will be.