"What price would we pay? What behavior would we forgive?"
This line still rings through my head as I try to piece together the massive changes that have occurred in the last hour of showtime in Mad Men. As I have been saying for weeks in these reviews, something is building up here and the end of the season is going to be extremely exciting. Well, if you think Mad Men is still slow after watching this episode, you may need to get your head checked.
This quote that Don Draper uses in the pitch for Jaguar is not just fitting for Jaguar, or even just for this episode, or season. This is Mad Men. It is a character study of a series of hard working individuals in the advertising industry that have a moral compass stuck spinning in the Bermuda Triangle.
"What price would we pay?" Well, let's ask Don if he is happy with paying the price of his cheating and being forced to see his kids every other weekend. "What behavior would we forgive?" Ask several of the men in this office (Don, Roger, Pete, Lane) and see how they have forgiven themselves for cheating on the women in their lives, treating co-workers as scum, and doing whatever it takes to reach the top of the ad world.
But this can't just end with the men. Sure, this is Mad Men, but this episode and this entire season has shown us the impact of women on this world, both directly and indirectly. And last night was no different.
"Let's stop playing games your love affair with Manhattan is over," Trudy tells Pete. But Trudy has no idea what she is stating. Sure Pete looks like a great father and family man when he reads Goodnight Moon to their child, but Trudy hasn't seen what Pete does outside of the house. He cheats on Trudy with another man's wife, continues to pursue her, sleeps with a woman at a brothel, flirts with a high school girl at a driver's ed class and tries to get her to go on a trip with him, publicly ostracizes Roger Sterling in front of all of SCDP, and then what he did last night (which we will go deeper into momentarily). Unfortunately Trudy, if upstate New York is where you want to raise you child because of the scum, noise, and danger in the city, the fact is your husband's love affair with Manhattan is not even close to ending. Anything but.
More evidence needed? Well take the dinner Pete and Ken take with one of the Jaguar executives, Herb. When he asks in about Joan and starts to imply that it would really help SCDP's chances to land Jaguar if he could spend a night with the redhead bombshell, Ken immediately throws the notion away by saying Joan is married, but Pete pushes the issue and says he will see what he can do. Before you know it, the slimiest Pete we have ever seen is sitting across Joan's desk discussing the proposition and saying what it could mean for the company. Joan says they could never afford it, but Pete is not done yet.
In a meeting with all the partners, Pete brings up the proposition to all of the senior partners. Don immediately says no and walks out of the room. Clearly, we see the relationship between Don and Joan is extremely strong and their night out in the previous episode meant a lot to Don. But the meeting doesn't end. The other three senior partners are not willing to openly like the idea, but they don't turn it away. Slowly, Pete gets them to agree with him and tells Lane to look into getting some money together to offer Joan. You can hear future Don Draper during this scene again: "What price would we pay?"
To read the rest of the review (IMDb form too short) visit: http://custodianfilmcritic.com/mad- men-5-11-the-other-woman/
This line still rings through my head as I try to piece together the massive changes that have occurred in the last hour of showtime in Mad Men. As I have been saying for weeks in these reviews, something is building up here and the end of the season is going to be extremely exciting. Well, if you think Mad Men is still slow after watching this episode, you may need to get your head checked.
This quote that Don Draper uses in the pitch for Jaguar is not just fitting for Jaguar, or even just for this episode, or season. This is Mad Men. It is a character study of a series of hard working individuals in the advertising industry that have a moral compass stuck spinning in the Bermuda Triangle.
"What price would we pay?" Well, let's ask Don if he is happy with paying the price of his cheating and being forced to see his kids every other weekend. "What behavior would we forgive?" Ask several of the men in this office (Don, Roger, Pete, Lane) and see how they have forgiven themselves for cheating on the women in their lives, treating co-workers as scum, and doing whatever it takes to reach the top of the ad world.
But this can't just end with the men. Sure, this is Mad Men, but this episode and this entire season has shown us the impact of women on this world, both directly and indirectly. And last night was no different.
"Let's stop playing games your love affair with Manhattan is over," Trudy tells Pete. But Trudy has no idea what she is stating. Sure Pete looks like a great father and family man when he reads Goodnight Moon to their child, but Trudy hasn't seen what Pete does outside of the house. He cheats on Trudy with another man's wife, continues to pursue her, sleeps with a woman at a brothel, flirts with a high school girl at a driver's ed class and tries to get her to go on a trip with him, publicly ostracizes Roger Sterling in front of all of SCDP, and then what he did last night (which we will go deeper into momentarily). Unfortunately Trudy, if upstate New York is where you want to raise you child because of the scum, noise, and danger in the city, the fact is your husband's love affair with Manhattan is not even close to ending. Anything but.
More evidence needed? Well take the dinner Pete and Ken take with one of the Jaguar executives, Herb. When he asks in about Joan and starts to imply that it would really help SCDP's chances to land Jaguar if he could spend a night with the redhead bombshell, Ken immediately throws the notion away by saying Joan is married, but Pete pushes the issue and says he will see what he can do. Before you know it, the slimiest Pete we have ever seen is sitting across Joan's desk discussing the proposition and saying what it could mean for the company. Joan says they could never afford it, but Pete is not done yet.
In a meeting with all the partners, Pete brings up the proposition to all of the senior partners. Don immediately says no and walks out of the room. Clearly, we see the relationship between Don and Joan is extremely strong and their night out in the previous episode meant a lot to Don. But the meeting doesn't end. The other three senior partners are not willing to openly like the idea, but they don't turn it away. Slowly, Pete gets them to agree with him and tells Lane to look into getting some money together to offer Joan. You can hear future Don Draper during this scene again: "What price would we pay?"
To read the rest of the review (IMDb form too short) visit: http://custodianfilmcritic.com/mad- men-5-11-the-other-woman/