Hmm, let's see. How to make a riveting three-time Emmy-award-winning period drama even more awesome?
Allow Don Draper to narrate his diary entries as voiceovers that accompany scenes of him swimming laps in a pool; of course!
I absolutely loved this. I can't figure out if someone advised Don to start keeping a journal, or whether his office sleepover with Peggy made him realize he's gone a bit too far over the alcoholism edge, but I love self-reflective Don Draper. With anyone else, it would've been a downright cheesy follow-up to last week's cathartic episode that emphasized just how open the character is going to be from now on. But with Don, it wasn't. Mostly because every time I got close to thinking his musings were too cliched, he revealed something intensely personal and interesting ("I've never written more than 250 words in my life"; "I should've finished high school") or managed to poke fun at himself ("I sound like a little girl, writing about what happened today"). It was nice. Glasses of alcohol received furtive glances from Don instead of constant refills, and he finally goes out on a date with Dr. Fay Miller.
Betty is back in this episode, in a few interesting if not totally ambiguous scenes with her new husband, Henry Francis. She and the popular politician are called to a dinner with some fancy man at some fancy place, the same fancy place that Don happens to be dining with his (might as well be) 19-year-old dating buddy Bethany. I'm not sure what they actually are in terms of a relationship, and apparently neither is she. She gripes that Don won't allow her to get to know him. There seems to be an indication that she's just as surprised as I was to find they are still going on dates. Also, Bethany looks exactly like Betty in that scene. It was all a bit boring for me, but I liked it if only for its emphasis (once again) on the great generational divide of the '60s. And of course for how upset it makes Betty, who sees the pair and throws a fit that a 5-year-old would find too immature. She heads to the bathroom, to wail, and of course to smoke on the toilet. Ah, those were the days.
Does she have feelings for Don? Still; again? Is she just drawn to his bad boy image? Dapper Henry Francis seems to think so. He is increasingly agitated and territorial as the episode progresses. As territorial, I guess, as one can be when one is still living in his wife's ex-husband's home. By the end of the episode, Henry tells Don he's bought a boat just to get Don's boxes out of the garage, and Betty invites tells Don about Eugene's second birthday, obviously in hopes he would come. Sensitive new Diary Don actually does show up, and Betty rather childishly resorts to pacifying herself with the idea that she and Henry have everything and Don has nothing. Then she longingly glances at the father of her children, in a way I didn't understand. Don's interactions with his children were touching; Bobby's "Daddy!" cry, Sally's modest wave, toddler Eugene in his father's arms. It looks like the baby ("conceived in a moment of desperation and born into a mess") will know Don as his father after all.
In the SCDP office, things are touchy. It was not fun to watch Joan in this episode. It's hard to see her disrespected, as she consistently makes us forget what kind of position many women were in during that time (generally not respected in the office). Preppy little freelancer boy is very rude and sexist, and leads the Disrespect Women Parade. This includes: drawing a vulgar picture of Joan and Lane having sex and then sticking it to her window, mooning Joan's window, telling Joan she belongs in a whorehouse, and telling her she walks around the office like she wants to get raped. Which she has been, by her husband. So this was just absolutely terrible all around. I wanted to punch the little twerp in the face, and I was shocked the line about Joan wanting to be raped was written into the show. (Should I have been?) Peggy feels just as disgusted, and immediately sticks up for Joan to her colleagues. She ends up firing the Jerk, after some stern advice from Don, an act that Joan is not the least bit pleased with. Oh, but we saw this coming, didn't we? Joan has always commanded respect for the deliberate way she deals with situations. She is not the least bit flighty, or overly emotional. She channels the rage she has for her rapist husband going to Vietnam into her conversation with the mean boys, telling them she can't wait until they are all drafted in the war and suffering in Vietnamese jungles instead of acting out because their head secretary doesn't care for them. She thinks this is a sufficient ending to the matter, and that Peggy has screwed it up. By coming to her rescue, she's made Joan look weak and ineffective, and made herself look like "a bitch." It's pretty flawless logic that makes all the talk of her being just a secretary with too much power hard to stomach. I want for her husband to not come back from Vietnam, and for Roger's wife to leave him for a richer, older man.
Don is so well-behaved in this episode, and I am glad it is now that he and Dr. Fay Miller go out on their first date. They are incredibly adorable together. I like that she is smart and kind and has one hell of a New York accent. Also, I'm pretty sure at dinner she was hinting that her father is in the Mafia. "Candy store owner"? Come on, what is that? In keeping with his good boy theme, Don does not bring Fay back to his place, even after a couple of rather passionate kisses on the way home from dinner. I like the prospect of them getting into a relationship and Betty being jealous about it forever.
More next week, for "The Beautiful Girls." Can't believe we're already at episode nine!
My favorite voiceover moments:
"I bet she was thinking of that line all night." (In response to Bethany's "To be continued…" as she gets out of the car after their date.) I laughed out loud here.
"We're flawed because we want so much more."
"I should've finished high school, maybe then everything could've been different."
This article appears in Sep 9-15, 2010.