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Mad Men, Season 5. General Discussion Thread (spoilers welcome)

If Don and Megan fail, I hope it is not about Don cheating. At this point, because we saw so much of it in the ofirst few seasons, it would be too clique and boring.

Besides, I'm enjoying it more watching him screw up with a woman he obviously cares about much more than he did Betty, by being self centered, insecure, and macho -- much more interesting than other women.

I also agree with Lord Gaith, I think it would be more interesting to watch them go through "dem changes" but stay together.
 
Lord Garth said:
I'm interested in seeing Present Day but too many of the characters would be dead by now.
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Yeah, sometimes I have to take a second and remember that Peggy and Megan, the two youngest adults on the show, are actually about the same age as my parents, meaning they'd both be about 70 now.

Hell, the kids would be almost senior citizens at this point: Sally would be close to sixty and the two boys would be in their forties and/or fifties.
 
My mother is the same age as Peggy as well. Peggy was born in 1940 on the show if she was 22 in 1962 (2nd season) as she replied when asked. My mother was born in '39. She and I discuss the show often. It's like baseball with men, something we can discuss even if we're not talking about anything too deep or painful in our lives.

Hell, the kids would be almost senior citizens at this point: Sally would be close to sixty and the two boys would be in their forties and/or fifties.
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HEY!! Eugene was born in 1963. That's only 2 years before me. Cool it with the "almost senior citizen" talk. :lol: :alienblush:
 
It's only one year before me and 50 is when they send you the AARP card. And so i feel his and your pain.

My mom has never seen Mad Men but I keep telling her she needs to watch it. She just might get a season 1 DVD this Mothers Day
 
You are both making me feel young, I was born in 1978. ;)

Interesting personal story on men like Don who marry women much younger than them. In 1966, the year the show is currently in, my father was 28 years old and my mother was 12....

Though they did not met each yet! But... In her late teens she was the babysitter for my half brothers. Her family lived on the block behind his house.

They are still married but I don't know why. All they seem to do is bicker. The age difference seems to be amplified now that my brother,sister, and I are on our own.

I would be curious to see how Don's lifestyle affects his kids in the future. I have never married and I know a big reason for that...
 
Don't get married. It isn't worth it unless you are so compatible you can complete each others' sentences or children are vitally important to you. Yes, there are a lucky few. If you find *that* person, go for it.

It's usually the same story when the man is a decade or more older than the woman and they get married before she's 30. She adores him and defers to him at first. Then after a few years she gets some life experience and doesn't want to be the adoring debutante who's led by her "father figure" anymore. He still wants her to be his ideal, like Don wants Megan to behave. His beautiful doll whom he can whisk away on vacations at a moment's notice. What do you mean you want to work? She wants more autonomy and makes more demands. Don and Megan are a classic case, though not as extreme as some people in real life. That 41 year old teacher who left his wife and kids for his 18 year old student comes to mind. Sure, they broke up, but he kept calling and calling after she went home to her mother and now she's back with him because "he's wonderful." Give that 10 years and she's going to wonder what in the hell she was thinking. Quit telling me what to do, you old geezer.
 
Despite all the life experience that so, so many people have had over the ensuing decades people keep making the same mistakes. :lol: Not only individually but also collectively.

The time period for these stories is particularly interesting because the '60s is the decade when women really started to step out. Of course there have always been exceptions prior to that, but women as a social class were beginning to stretch their wings and flex their muscles.

Peggy channeling Don as we saw would have been seen as right out of left field back then. Today no one would bat an eye. While today there still are some women looking for sugar daddies a guy really has to be thick to expect a contemporary women to dote on him and be there at his beck and call.
 
the G-man said:
Yeah, sometimes I have to take a second and remember that Peggy and Megan, the two youngest adults on the show, are actually about the same age as my parents, meaning they'd both be about 70 now.
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Joan would be over 80 (she was over 30 in the second season).
 
But is it realistic that a serial philanderer like Don, who has women available, would never cheat again? There's a saying "once a cheater, always a cheater" that isn't necessarily true. However, it depends on the kind of a cheater as to whether it's true or not. There's a difference between a man who has a one night stand and a man who carries on mulitple affairs. Those kind of men tend to have serious issues and will cheat even if--and I read a fascinating article by a Harvard psychologist about it--they're quite happy with their wives and their sex lives. She claimed that her research showed that men will often cheat even if they're happy at home....especially given easy opportunity. Some men are just womanizers by nature. They have issues with women and selfishness and other insecurities. They have to be totally committed to change with lots of work and intense therapy and even then, many in her experience simply won't change. They don't have the desire at the end of the day, or they have the desire but a high stress event in their lives triggers their philandering impulses and they start right up again. Sounds like a certain New York ad executive to me.
 
Dorian Thompson said:
But is it realistic that a serial philanderer like Don, who has women available, would never cheat again? There's a saying "once a cheater, always a cheater" that isn't necessarily true. However, it depends on the kind of a cheater as to whether it's true or not. There's a difference between a man who has a one night stand and a man who carries on mulitple affairs. Those kind of men tend to have serious issues and will cheat even if--and I read a fascinating article by a Harvard psychologist about it--they're quite happy with their wives and their sex lives. She claimed that her research showed that men will often cheat even if they're happy at home....especially given easy opportunity. Some men are just womanizers by nature. They have issues with women and selfishness and other insecurities. They have to be totally committed to change with lots of work and intense therapy and even then, many in her experience simply won't change. They don't have the desire at the end of the day, or they have the desire but a high stress event in their lives triggers their philandering impulses and they start right up again. Sounds like a certain New York ad executive to me.
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Sounds like a justification to the "genetically programmed to cheat" line.
 
She wasn't saying that they were genetically programmed to cheat, per se. She acknowledged that her study sample couldn't definitively be extrapolated to men as a whole; there were only 30 men participating in the study (out of 50) who self identified as men who had multiple affairs.

What her study showed was that the men who were serial philaderers (as opposed to the those who'd had a single affair during a marriage or a one night stand) all shared extremely similar personality traits. They were all extremely competitive, had high sex drives (duh), acknowledged that they were extremely selfish on a personal level, all were assertive, and they all trended towards professions where they received a great deal of attention and in which they felt greater personal power than your average Joe. Sounds like politicians and professional athletes to me. A high powered ad executive might also fit, no? Most of them had issues with their mothers.

The other "non serial philanderers" had personalities all over the place. They weren't nearly as similar to one another.
 
Dorian Thompson said:
But is it realistic that a serial philanderer like Don, who has women available, would never cheat again? There's a saying "once a cheater, always a cheater" that isn't necessarily true.
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That is just a saying that doesn't always apply to every man since all men aren't the same - so yes, it (Don stopping his cheating) would be realistic as long as one can accept that all men aren't the same. Many men (and women) become better husbands (and wives) in their second marriages. It's not unrealistic to think that Don now realizes how damaging his cheating on Betty was and is trying not make that mistake again while obviously being oblivious to other (more interesting) mistakes he is making.
 
T-minus 40 minutes. I have the strangest feeling that Joan and Lane are going to hook up.
 
Loved when the big lady tripped on the phone cord and just yanked the phone right away from Sally. :lol:

Yeah, Sally got an unexpected eyeful later.
 
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