Mad Men - season 2

Mad Men returns on AMC tonight at 10 p.m. EST.

Looking forward to the 2nd season premiere.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

Thanks for starting this thread, Patrick. I was going to post a reminder this morning when I was on the board, but I got distracted. I am really looking forward to season two!

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

Looked good. Campbell and Co are under the belief that Peggy was at a "fat camp." lol. Don is popping "relaxation" pills that are making him impotent (unless his wife is doing that - bored with Betty, are we?)

Don's subordinates can't come up with a simple airline ad? Don is going to get angry. Very angry. Plus, when Don came late to the meeting, one of them was a smart-ass and said, "sorry we're late." Will Don accept that kind of sarcasm, when he's the big boss? Sterling is back in action - still smoking, despite his heart attack last season? Dumb-ass.

I like how Peggy got on Don's new secretary. Peggy is a heartless, mean, crass woman. Can anyone say "bitter?" She's trying to help the lady, I suppose, in her own way, but she could have advised her much better than that way. She made the poor girl cry in the break-room, enduring the wrath of the red-head who's name evades me at the moment. Mean bitches!

I look forward to the drama of Campbell finding out he's a father, after all (despite he can't get his wife pregnant). One thing I find disturbing is that Peter Campbell can't talk "regular" to his wife. He sounds like a robot, and I guess that's because he doesn't really love his wife? Or maybe Vincent the actor needs to act harder?

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

I don't know. The doc told him to chill out from work, not to let it run his life. I think he's actually taking it to heart and trying to be calm down more. I think we're seeing the early stages of Don realizing he's neglecting family for work.

Not that the rest of the episode wasn't riveting, but the most interesting plotline is Betty starting to figure out the things she can get if she bats her eyelids just a little bit. Someone is going to be waking up big time soon and Don's going to be in the proverbial doghouse.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

All the politically incorrect stuff is gold.

I half-expected Betty to service the auto repairman in their negotiations, but she did learn to use her feminine wiles to get what she wanted.

Peggy and Pete's quick conversation on kids was a bit heartbreaking.

The arrival of the copier and subsequent subplot as to its placement in the office was interesting.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

I was watching that little scene, and I THOUGTH Betty was going to give that man sex as the "exchange." The man got nothing, Betty got a fan or whatever for her engine...sounds like a lousy exchange to me. If I had been the mechanic, I'd have "assumed" Betty was going to have sex with me. Guess I'm a pig.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

^ Oh, I fully expected there to be some sex involved, based solely on the run in with the old roommate. My head kept shaking no while the brain said, logically, it made sense.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

I laughed to myself how, last season, everyone wanted Nixon to become president in 1960, and now that we're in 1961 and Kennedy is president, nobody is groaning about it (so far). They were rivited to their TV's watching Jackie the First Lady show around the White House...(being that I'm a Kennedy fanatic, I'm happy they're on the backdrop of this great show...perhaps it is a guarantee that the show will continue at least until Kennedy's assassination, which is three years later...so three more seasons...cool).

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

I'm not sure I buy into your assessment of Peggy. For sure, she's ambitious, and she is certainly aware of the "glass ceiling" that all women face at Sterling Cooper (as is Joan.) But "...a heartless, mean, crass woman," I don't see it. Yes, she set Don's secretary straight, but, in almost the exact same way Joan set her straight last season. Peggy obviously has ambition, and much to the chagrin of the rest of Don's creative team, she also has talent. What I get out of the character of Peggy is that she has the drive and the smarts to succeed in what is very definitely a "good ol' boys" club and she is doing her very best to try and figure out how to make that happen. She has to work twice as hard in her ongoing struggle to earn the respect of her male co-workers and supervisors. EVERYONE at Sterling Cooper is playing a game. But, most of the men get to play one one team, while the women play on another. Unfortunately for Peggy, she is not a member of either team and has to fly solo as she makes her way in the business world.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

Actually, they fastforwarded to February 1962 - 16 months after last season's ender (Thanksgiving 1960).

You had to pay attention to what Jackie says in that show about how long they'd been in the White House. There was, however, no other overt reference to the year. Maybe there were some other visual cues that I wouldn't have noticed. After the episode, there was a re-cap about where everyone was and how much time has gone by.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

I was a little disappointed in the season premiere. None of the scenes had much payoff as the plot meandered along. Not Betty with the mechanic, not Don with the doctor, etc. In a show which last season kept me firmly in the trenches of 1960, this one blew me out of period and place the minute they had the Don/Betty Valentine's Day drinks at the (Los Angeles) Biltmore Hotel lobby, the most over-used location in town. A couple like that would have gone to a much more modern place.

Also, the arrival of a Xerox machine in the office where I was working five years later was the occasion of a big meeting with the chosen "key operator" who told all the secretaries exactly how to use it and how to charge each copy to the correct account. Grown men didn't Xerox their faces in MY office. None of them were allowed near it. Also, there should have been a line about no one needing to "cut stencils" for the Gestetner/Mimeograph machines. That's what copy machines replaced.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

Speaking of Don and the doctor, I was surprised that with Don's blood pressure of 160 over 100, the doctor didn't read the riot act to him.

120 over 80 has long been considered the high normal value. At 160 over 100, Don should be having a stroke soon.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

But again, this show takes place in 1962, so that BP reading of 160/100 didn't faze the doctor then. Just look at all the smoking in the offices and anywhere else. It was a different time where different things were accepted without as much disdain or alarm. Just think it was just 46 years ago where smoking indoors at work was not a big deal.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

He didn't read him the riot act, but he asked how much he was drinking and smoking and told him he had to change his lifestyle or die young. I'd say that's pretty serious. He also prescribed blood pressure medicine and phenobarbital. Some pretty serious drugs.

160/100 wasn't any more acceptable in 1962 than it is now. He probably just sees a lot more of it than a doctor today would.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

FWIW, the mechanic replaced a fan belt in her car. A very common and easily replaced item on a car in the 60s, especially before air conditioning was more common in cars.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

Yeah, in an engine bay as roomy as cars had those days, you could do it as fast as it appeared that guy did. One bolt loosened, slide the belt on, route the replacement, tension the alternator and tighten the bolt back.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

great, fine - but what did the guy get out of it? That's the part I missed.

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

^ I think he expected sex or something along those lines along with the cash. But I also think it was more of an experiment on Betty's part to figure out if she could be like her friend or not: trade on her looks to get "stuff."

Re: Mad Men - season 2 premiere 7/27/08

I think he absolutely did expect something. Maybe he wasn't sure they'd go all the way, but he was definitely thinking he'd get something for his trouble.

Having changed out a fan belt, yes, it's about a 5 minut operation if you know what you're doing. So I had no problem with that, and the part was cheap.

Actually, I felt that scene was a perfect setup to follow what had happened with the horses, where some guy was clearly flirting with her.

She knows that Don has cheated on her; she's always stayed in her role, but now knowing that she knows someone who went the other way, she's pressing her boundaries to see if she could have went a different direction in her life - which is a great extension on her failed attempt to get back into the modeling career.

The things I love are:

It's been 16 months, and Duck has taken a serious role in the firm now, and is butting heads with the person who hired him in Don. After coming in being picked up basically from the scrap heap, it didn't take Duck long to build back up his own little regime.

I thought the handling of the Kennedy presidency was pitch perfect - even during the party for Nixon, the ad people pointed out that the election to them was just a job of sorts, and the big concern was serving their client - Proctor & Gamble to help Nixon.. they were kind of believers, but not much. So, their quick change as long as money stayed good at the firm - perfect.

I'm also really enjoying seeing Don in the real leadership role, having to fend off those in the ranks below.

Unhappy:

If the storyline about needing to have a baby goes on forever, that is the only one that I feel pretty blah toward.

Mad Men - Season Two, episode 2: "Flight 1"

well, Pete Campbell is still sportin' his pastel-blue suit and forgetting his dignity at the door by confiding in Don about his father being on the ill-fated Flight 1 out of "Idlewild Airport." The first time, Don was obliging, showing he was a bigger man by consoling and advising him. The second time, Don all but told him to get lost. I wonder what Pete was going to say to him before he was told "it's not a good time."

Betty Draper is still asserting a hold over her marriage to Don, trying to see how much power, if any, she holds over him.

I wonder if Joan will get even with that guy who posted her age on the bulletin board. Now THAT'S nerve!

If the gang at the office was rapt over the radio about the downed airliner, imagine how rapt they'll be come October, 1962. Will Sterling say, "back to work" then?

Re: Mad Men - Season Two, episode 2: "Flight 1"

Mike,
Thanks for the update, for unknown reasons my DVR did not get the first 15 minutes of this episode.
I wasn't completely lost, I was 15 when that plane went down in Jamaica Bay so I remember the incident.

Re: Mad Men - Season Two, episode 2: "Flight 1"

Don was pre-occupied with having to cut loose Mohawk Airlines, a client that he personally promised the equivalent of his word, now made worthless by Duck's ambition. Pete probably wanted some advice on whether or not to pimp his personal tragedy as a selling point for Duck to acquire American Airlines as a client. Once Don gave Pete the brush-off, Pete decided to go behind Don's back and get onboard Duck's coattails.

Re: Mad Men - season 2

Something is continually bugging me about Trudy's character. Anytime we see her, she comes off as entirely one dimensional, which is very odd considering the rest of the cast. I can never quite figure out if its the actress who has the problem or the very limited amount of screentime she gets.

It also amazed me that this was a very important episode for Don and Pete, yet it never felt like a VIE. Not with dramatic music cues and other telltale signs.

Re: Mad Men - season 2

Well, Mad Men is the kind of show that rewards patient and careful viewing on the viewer's part. They do a good job of showing, not just telling (Peggy's scene at the end was pitch-perfect, yet it was all visually told).

Re: Mad Men - season 2

Ah, remember when you could smoke at the movies?

Gotta love the hail storm.

Don's persuasiveness took on a different tone with Bobbie at the dinner. Didn't really see that tact for Don to take, but it was effective.

Betty knows how to handle herself nowadays (she's definitely different than she was in season 1).

The irony of asking Peggy about what she thought of the controversial TV episode (being screened for the lipstick manufacturer) was sublime.

Re: Mad Men - season 2

My mouth was hanging open the entire time. What he did to Bobbie in public was completely un-Don-like.

Re: Mad Men - season 2

Half of me was going "Ooo...Commissioner Gordon won't like that!" (actress playing Bobbie also played Barbara Gordon in "The Dark Knight")

Re: Mad Men - season 2

^ Hehe...that was Melinda McGraw. She was Cyd on The Commish with Michael Chiklis many years ago! Tony Scali wouldn't like it, either!

Re: Mad Men - season 2

why, exactly, did Don fire his secretary? Just because he goes in and out at will and she can't cover for him in the way that would excuse his behavior...that's her fault?

Re: Mad Men - season 2

I don't think that it was un-Don like. He played her game, or so he thought.

At dinner, he quickly realized that she had other motives and he that he had to take care of matters more assertively in a language that she could understand. It was obvious the from the production room scene that she was ulta confident that she gets what she wants and she is manipulative in the worst way. It was ugly for sure, but Don had to make it clear to her, that he could in fact get the word out and that idiot would not get another job, which trumped her legal card.

This was just another great episode. So many great details on this show.