With the Cuban Missile crisis as its backdrop, the outstanding and measured Mad Men concluded its second season with its most satisfying episode yet. It brought Don Draper (swoon) home, and back to Sterling Cooper where he belongs, and made some surprising (and not so surprising) revelations to both the audience and to some blindsided characters.
As the panic of nuclear threat left each character fearful and distracted in their own way, the business of ad agency Sterling Cooper continued, just as the messy personal lives of its employees remained hidden beneath that polished and neat Madison Avenue veneer—a veneer almost as attractive as the characters themselves. But just like the society around them, the unrest is bubbling closer and closer to the surface, and has been just barely restrained in its final episodes leading up to the finale.
As the panic of nuclear threat left each character fearful and distracted in their own way, the business of ad agency Sterling Cooper continued, just as the messy personal lives of its employees remained hidden beneath that polished and neat Madison Avenue veneer—a veneer almost as attractive as the characters themselves. But just like the society around them, the unrest is bubbling closer and closer to the surface, and has been just barely restrained in its final episodes leading up to the finale.
The two things I love most about this show is how so much of their dissatisfaction is a result of the world around them. Some (cough, Betty Draper, cough) are practically on the verge of madness and you want to just reach through the looking glass (or television screen) to shake them and shout, “It’s not you! It’s the world around you! Betty, pop a Xanax!” So many of their personal problems could be resolved with just a little more perspective, like when Don (Jon Hamm), dealing with the possible dissolution of his marriage, explains his problems and expresses his fears and doubts to a confidante. When she suggests calling his wife to tell her, he responds simply and without a trace of doubt, “No, that would just complicate things.” Dude, you are about to lose the super hot January Jones (the actress who portrays Betty). Just tell her you love her, damn it! They are so clearly trapped in their time and only vaguely aware of their prison, it sometimes hurts to watch. You want to hand them the key so badly. Never is this phenomenon more painful than it is with Joan, the curvy, mother-hen secretary of the office, whose wits match her stunning good looks. For her, the glass ceiling is more like a glass box. At work, she’s thwarted at every turn toward professional success by less talented men. At home, she’s resigned herself to an engagement with a handsome, successful doctor that looks great from the outside, but in reality is devoid of all love and respect. The dude is insecure, bossy, and so jealous of her sexual past and life at work that he forces himself on her after hours in her boss’s office. And worst of all, there probably isn’t a happy ending for Joan, and wasn’t for most women like her at that time.
The other thing I love about this show is that the characters are so finely drawn, and so complex, that it took me a good 4 to 5 episodes to realize that most of them are, quite frankly, despicable. In the span of an average 4 to 5 episodes, nearly everyone commits adultery, has babies and doesn’t tell the father, neglects their children, and only stop smoking and drinking to commit adultery, have babies and neglect their children some more. But the beauty of the show is that despite all of this (slightly exaggerated here) bad behavior, you can’t help but sympathize with them and root for them as they blindly stumble about trying to make sense of their lives. Beneath Betty’s steely, Hitchockian blonde façade, there’s a vulnerable woman who took all the steps she was supposed to and still can’t figure out why she’s not happy. And beneath the narcissism of Roger Sterling (John Slattery) is well… more self-involvement, but he sure is fun to watch. Especially when he’s headed to the bar or the nearest 20-year-old female, which is pretty much all the time.
The show wrestles with all the great themes, like religion, mortality, and the definitions of personal and professional success, often seen through the lens of the ads the mad men work so hard to create. The acting is almost theatrical (especially the performance of Elizabeth Moss, who plays Peggy Olson, the ambitious young secretary turned copywriter, whose scenes were so electric in the finale); it’s so alive on the screen you’d think the emotions were happening right before you.
I jumped in this season and can’t wait to see what I missed in Season 1. Marathon soon. I’m wondering if I can get away with dressing up in a 1950s costume, drinking scotch and smoking Lucky Strikes all day while living in my parent’s house (They may think I’m crazy though. I’m living in the looking glass, too).
