Mad Men 6.6: This Is Why Everyone Hates Don Draper
In last night's episode of Mad Men, Don let some people into his life -- and it doesn't end well for anyone in the room.
Mad Men is in full swing (wink, 1960s joke). Each week we’ll take a look at who’s shilling what to who; follow our recaps here. Obviously, spoilers.
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MAD MEN CLIENT MEETING
6.6: ‘For Immediate Release’
THE PRODUCT:
Chevrolet Motorcars. Vicks Chemical. Resurgence. Repetition.
THE PITCH:
“Today, nobody knows where they’re headed, but they’re not afraid about what’s ‘round the bend.”
This game is rigged. Big companies want cutting edge creative, and little firms like Don’s and Ted’s don’t get to play ball — but something new comes out of the mix. It’s a fun and snappy episode full of financial woe and high-stakes scrambling that turns everyone a little pulpy, as Don swings from vine to vine and leaps from skyscrapers, leaving the rest of his company in the lurch.
When Don plays cowboy, people get hurt. He shoots first and asks questions later. He gambles with other peoples’ life’s savings. Watching Teddy Chaough go gun to gun with Big Dick Draper is like watching the yappy youngster from the Magnificent Seven face up to Steve McQueen, yet both these guys are hungry, restless, and hopelessly stuck without options. Two ad agencies meet in a bar. One walks out, and then successfully storms Chevy for their new account. Meet the new firm in town Sterling, Cooper, Draper, Cutler, Gleeson, Chaff Chaough? It’s a mouthful, and not one we see Campbell, Holloway, Cosgrove, Crane, or anyone else swallowing too easily — even with a ‘spirits of elderflower’ chaser.
10% inspiration, 90% perspiration, also some choreographed strutting.
Watching circumstance play pile-up was like walking in on a hasty game of Mousetrap. Everything was going according to plan: Bert, Joan and Pete were stockpiling cheese in an effort to take the company public; meanwhile, Roger was turning the crank on leads he canoodled out of his new airline squeeze.
And then, whoops, the trap falls.
Don sets the whole thing in motion when he pulls back his boot and sends conniving butterball Herb and the Jag account careening, taking the lecherous lump to task for one piece of creative advice too many. Pete, caught at a brothel by his father-in-law, tumbles from his previously earnt high atop the diving board, and comes crashing down without his family — or the 9 million billing Vicks account — to cushion the fall.
SCDP’s in trouble, no one who knows anything can do anything, and they’re all left on the sidelines hoping Don will think of what’s right for their lives. Don-the-forward-moving-shark is a pleasure to watch, but you have to feel sorry for the churned up chums he leaves in his wake.
This mise-en-scène aptly reflects the current hierarchy of the company, with accounts on top, creative down below and Ginsberg represented by that plant in the corner. Missing: Joan Holloway, slowly sliding up the banister like a bombshell Mary Poppins.
The creator of Mad Men’s fixation on spoilers has always been humorously tempered by the fact that the show’s set in the past. When the entire audience knows how the big plays will fall (pssst, look out for Nixon! He’s behiiiiind you!), the little twists play all the heavier. People don’t show up to dinner when they should. People show up at brothels when they shouldn’t. People get cancer. People think good and hard about leaving their job because they’ve hit the roof, so they take a chance and find they can fly creatively, drop a down payment on a hastily-chosen dump, and get ready to land — only to find they’re right back at the beginning.
It’d be two more years before The Who hollered out “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss…” Looks like Peggy got the jump on that one.
TAGLINE:
“The future is something you haven’t even thought of yet.”
OLD BUSINESS:
This? Just a favourite drop of mine, Le Petit Mort de Fille.
Megan’s mother Marie comes to visit, her regular bag of delightfully scandalous advice and maternal disgust in tow. “Forget. My. Name.” No way, Marie.
Pete continues his downwards spiral. Or does he? It’s hard to know where Mr Campbell will end up, but right now he’s in the soup. Pete is always braying at his elders and pissing on his own shoes. Remember when he raped that au pair? Telling Trudy about her inter-racially whoring father might actually be a step up. Pete is so petulant that Webster’s is thinking of changing the word to Peteulant, but all this disaster — plus Roger’s latest success — might just drive him to pulling in the Coca-Cola account or something.
NEW BUSINESS:
“I know you were also fantasising about me wearing a captain’s hat, but I thought that was a little much.”
Whoops. Peggy steps over one too many human poos in her lobby and she starts dreaming of a life with this smoking jacketed schmuck.
And while we liked meeting the very James Stewart-like Gleeson, it was Cutler, CGC’s head accounts man, who was the most fun, acting as a bizarro Roger — another silver fox in the henhouse. Will the whole office be filled with doppelgangers now? Will Dawn and Phyllis be minority allies or enemies (or just two characters who happen to be the same gender and race). Do they have an even more arse-kissy version of Bob?
ON THE NEXT EPISODE OF MAD MEN:
Joan smiles. Burt sits down. Ted would like to “have a little rap session”. It’s almost too perfect a plan to get Vicks back on board. Go team!
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Matt Roden helps kids tell stories by day at the Sydney Story Factory, and by night assists adults in admitting to stupidity by co-running Confession Booth and TOD Talks. He also illustrates for Junkee; you can find more of his work here – and follow Mad Men with him here.