Don and Megan share dinner in "To Have and to Hold"
Photo Credit: AMC
A review of this week’s Mad Men after I combine Football and
Broadway…
“I’ve been working there for 15 years and they still treat
me like a secretary.”
-Joan Harris
Joan it’s good to see you! After last week’s few scenes of
Joan being as brilliant as they were, people have been clamoring for the famed
red head to have a bit more to do. “To Have and to Hold” was the first time we
got to see Joan, and some of the other women for an extended period of time
this season with great results. Mad Men keeps churning out great episodes this
season and “To Have and to Hold” was no exception to the rule.
“To Have and to Hold” was very much about the women on the
show and how they are dealing with the problems of the late 1960’s. The men are
still as pig like as ever and the world seems just as tough to the women as it
ever has been. Take the confrontation between Joan and Harry for example.
Throughout the episode we see Harry trying to get into a partnership position
(admittedly in this episode he seems to charm his way into big things although
I don’t quite know how much work he does actually do) and thus taking shots at
Joan to try and prove the point of why he should be at that position. It’s
really sickening to the stomach to watch some of the things Harry tries to pull
throughout the episode to poor Joan. Joan works her but off for the nature of
the company and all it takes is the attempted firing of Harry’s secretary,
starts an unjust train of insults. At least the rest of the partner’s kind of
laugh it off. Roger and Bert seem to ridicule Harry in general anyways, so it
was fun as usual to watch him get dismissed for the things that he tried to do.
Overall Joan doesn’t seem to be in a happy place, which is
kind of echoed in her personal life as well. We see Joan and her friend Kate
attempt to hit the town on an adventure after Joan’s hard day at work. Kate
reveres Joan for being an executive and having money while in truth Joan is a
broken woman on the inside. She is still living with her young child and being
supported by her mother because of her loony husband that she divorced. Oh yeah
and she slept with creepy old Herb form Jaguar. Yet Joan has a hard outer shell
and she gives the perception off to Kate that she is just fine and ultimately
someone to be envied, when in reality she is broken emotionally in both the
workplace and in her recreational life.
“To Have and to Hold” also gave us a glimpse into the life
of Don’s secretary, who is oddly named Dawn. She got some interesting
conversations with her friend about the nature of her job and how she
ultimately feels about the workplace itself. It’s great to have someone who is
kind of on the outside looking in talking about how they feel about the kind of
messed up events that happen in this kind of messed up office. I mean we have Ken for a little bit of a
saner vision on the office but no one quite as on the outside as we got with
Dawn.
Megan also got a little more time on screen this week with
her acting career being a central part of the episode. Megan got to do a love
sequence on her soap opera to move ahead, and Don doesn’t like it! Gasp.
Whether Don was actually mad with Megan for “enjoying” her love sequence on the
show, or whether he was just looking for an escape to go and have sex with
Sylvia the irony present within those scenes that they shared was absolutely
fantastic and very evident for the boundaries that women live under at this
time. Throughout the run of Mad Men the men have been able to get away with
horrendous treatment of their wives, from drunken episodes to horrid adultery
yet Megan can’t even get away with doing her job. It seems fine for the
beginning portion where Don says that he doesn’t mind it but doesn’t condone it
but then things get a tad ugly. The first thing that strikes Don a little is
the dinner that they spend with the lead writer and his wife who want to set up
a strange sex night. Then things get out of control when Don actually shows up
to the filming of the show and freaks out at her.
Now of course Don could just be trying to have an excuse to
sleep with Sylvia for the night and found the love scene as a way out. The
episode was book ended with Sylvia and her relationship with Don and how he’s
actually more invested with the relationship with her than he is with Megan at
this point. Even when they’re still flirting together Don feels kind of distant
from Megan and in the end it feels like he’s rushing to see get away from Megan
to go and see Sylvia.
The final story that was prominent throughout “To Have and
to Hold” was the debacle of plan k, or the hunt for Heinz ketchup. Don, Pete, and
Stan all go after the big goal for Heinz Ketchup and, just like Peggy and Ted
(that wasn’t well conveyed in the episode by the way), failed to get their
goal. Don decided to go for the “it’s up to the imagination” ad campaign well
Peggy seems to go for the direct response. It was interesting to watch not only
the direct contrast of the campaigns but also the direct metaphor for the women
in the episode that Peggy delivered in her speech (intentional or not). Either
way, neither the direct nor the abstract way bring ultimate happiness just like
what the women of Mad Men began to find out throughout another fine hour of the
show.
Some other musings:
- I didn’t end up getting to it over the last few weeks but, man those commercial cuts are odd and jarring. Even with the ability to fast-forward through them (I like many critics begin the show 15-20 minutes late to be able to finish it on time while missing the ads) the story breaks that AMC tries to find to cut to commercial are pretty brutal. I guess it’s more Weiner and crew’s fault, as they don’t write the show with act breaks like an HBO show, but AMC ‘s job is still brutal (yet somewhat amusing at times).
- Stan is great I hope he will end up getting an episode in the future. Particularly great was the secret agent style music they played over his moving into the storage closet while working on plan K. So very funny indeed.
- Bert! I wish Bert could still be a more regular part of this show as he continues to be wonderful whenever his two lines come up. His conversation with Roger (who also only got about 2 lines this episode) about Harry was pretty gold in this one.
- I know it’s a given but I have to mention it every once in a while the acting on this show is wonderful. Christina Hendricks is fantastic here throughout her biggest episode this season. Also everyone no matter how small a role per week they get on this show works extremely well.
- Dang Scarlett always getting away with things. This time even fueling Harry’s fire to become partner; and it’s also implied that Harry is cheating on his wife with her…
- Ginsberg got a scene for once! I want more of him and his awesome mustache in the next few weeks!
Due warning! After next week it’s going to be hard to keep
up with a regular Mad Men review schedule as I’m going to be drowning in
exams!! I’m hopping still to watch them each and every week but the whole
writing a ton is not going to be easy. Still one week left until that hits so
expect a review next week then… We’ll see
That’s just me though. What did everyone else think?
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