mad men

[Rhom]

The baby in their household _is_ Anita's. Peggy's kid was given up for adoption. I think she says as much in the finale, and MW has said that he wanted to mislead the audience into thinking that Anita was raising Peggy's child.

Oh...

Well I never caught that. I remember her telling Pete that in the finale, but I thought it was just her telling him that she didn't have the baby.

Hrmmm...

[The Iceman of the North]

Never caught up on that either.

[Anya, Vengeance Demon]

Well, looking at it again, all Peggy says to Pete is, "I had your baby. And I gave it away." I took this to imply that she put it up for adoption and never saw it again, and MW has subsequently validated that interpretation. But I can see why other people didn't necessarily see that as definitive.

[Rhom]

I'm still shocked... I've been thinking her sister was raising Petespawn all year.

Honestly, I'm a little disappointed. It really takes away some of the poignancy of the Peggy/baby scenes for me. Especially the early season ones like when she looks in on him and the other boys at her sister's house, holding him crying in church while everyone else takes communion, and when the priest hands her the egg at Easter "for the little one."

Hrmph. I don't know how I feel about all this...

[Nichole]

What? That baby is not Peggy's?

I need to re-watch season 2.

[Rhom]

MW has subsequently validated that interpretation.

Do you have a link to that interview? I've been thinking about this all day now and I just need to investigate it further.

:unsure:

[Anya, Vengeance Demon]

He's said it in a number of different places. Here's one:

I want to talk about Peggy. In episode two, we see the baby, we assume it's Peggy's baby, then in episode five we see that Anita was pregnant, and we don't find out until the last episode what exactly happened.

[...] You were mistaken. People wanted to believe that was her baby. And, by the way, that woman does not want to be around babies. That's really it. She does not want to be around babies, does [not want to be] reminded about this.

Here's another:

We started out talking about Peggy, and in my discussion of Peggy’s story line in the finale, I referred to an episode early in Season 2, in which Peggy visits her sister. In that finale discussion, as Weiner pointed out, I got a line of dialogue wrong (I’ve corrected the blog post in question).

I wrote that Peggy’s sister asked if Peggy wanted to “say goodnight to him,†and wrote that that was “a bit of misdirection,†a clue meant to indicate that the youngest child in the sister’s household could be Peggy’s own son. Weiner pointed out that all the sister asked was if Peggy wanted to “say goodnight†– no mention of “him.â€

However Weiner also talked about inserting indications in that episode and others that were meant to lead fans to wonder if Peggy’s sister might be raising the boy.

“I mislead the audience all over the place, and that’s the fun of the show. I give out little bits of information at a time and then play on that,†he said.

But [he was] clear about the fact that Peggy’s sister is not raising Peggy’s son. He said the child was given up for adoption.

He also refers to this a few times during the commentaries on the season two DVD. I think this comes up in "Flight 1", but it probably comes up elsewhere as well.

On whether it takes away from the poignancy of the storyline, I'd have to disagree with you. Obviously, your reaction is not going to be the same as mine, so you're not really "wrong." But to me, it seems like whether or not the baby is actually hers, Peggy cannot see that child or any child around that age without thinking about the baby that she gave up. The dramatic point of those scenes was the same, and your perception of Peggy's thought process and where she is emotionally doesn't really need to change either. The beautiful scene at the end of "Three Sundays" gave me chills when I first saw it (believing that she was actually looking at her own child), and it gave me chills when I saw it again six months later (knowing the truth).

[Rhom]

He's said it in a number of different places. Here's one:

Here's another:

He also refers to this a few times during the commentaries on the season two DVD. I think this comes up in "Flight 1", but it probably comes up elsewhere as well.

On whether it takes away from the poignancy of the storyline, I'd have to disagree with you. Obviously, your reaction is not going to be the same as mine, so you're not really "wrong." But to me, it seems like whether or not the baby is actually hers, Peggy cannot see that child or any child around that age without thinking about the baby that she gave up. The dramatic point of those scenes was the same, and your perception of Peggy's thought process and where she is emotionally doesn't really need to change either. The beautiful scene at the end of "Three Sundays" gave me chills when I first saw it (believing that she was actually looking at her own child), and it gave me chills when I saw it again six months later (knowing the truth).

Well, that certainly puts it out there with no wiggle room... Interesting. Now I have even more to ponder.

[Anya, Vengeance Demon]

Sesame Street is planning a Mad Men parody this year, apparently. Now I can't shake the image of Cookie Monster grabbing Abby Cadabby a la Don on Bobbie Barrett: "Cookie Monster will ruin him. Do as Cookie Monster say."

[Anya, Vengeance Demon]

Vanity Fair has an article on Mad Men that's really pretty fantastic (and includes some mild spoilers for season three). Among other things, it goes into further detail than I've seen before on why, exactly, HBO passed on the show. Apparently they were interested to pick up the show, provided that it was run by David Chase as well as Matt Weiner:

Weiner and Chase both told me that at one point HBO indicated it would make Mad Men on the condition that Chase be an executive producer, and Chase said he had further discussion with Weiner about directing the pilot, but despite being “very tempted†by directing, he said no to both propositions, wanting to move away from weekly television. Still, Chase championed the script, and Weiner said he never really got a straight explanation from the network for its pass, which still seems to irk him. “I would go through David Chase’s garbage if I was at HBO, trying to find more of what he does. But they were not like that.â€

There's a lot of other interesting stuff in there as well.

[Blaine]

That Vanity Fair article was excellent.

Here's a pretty cool interview with Jon Hamm (of Jon Hamm's John Ham) on AVCLUB. He doesn't say a lot about the new season, but I thought this was a pretty well broken down explanation of the Weiner/AMC contract negotiation:

It was effective in that Matt got what he wanted, and I think that Lionsgate and AMC got what they wanted. I think at the end of the day, Lionsgate and AMC both realized that they didn't want to do that to this show. To bring somebody else in to run this show, especially so early in its run, would have been not just bad for the show - cataclysmic for the show, really - but it would been bad for their brand.

He also has a lot of love for Breaking Bad (so does this mean we can quit comparing the two? Hopefully):

AVC: Do you watch Breaking Bad?

JH: I love Breaking Bad.

AVC: Do you root for it to succeed, since the better it does, the better AMC does?

JH: It's definitely part of the home team. And I'm a huge fan of Bryan Cranston's. I think what he does on that show is magnificent, and I think that what they've done overall is pretty impressive. So I'm glad they're getting recognized just as much as I'm glad we are.

[Anya, Vengeance Demon]

Given the critical acclaim for both shows (the Metacritic scores for MM season two and BB season two are virtually identical), and the general love for AMC, home of the "two best shows on television," I suspect that we'll be plagued with the "which is better?" question even after the two shows are off the air. It's not as if people aren't still ranking Deadwood, The Wire, and The Sopranos, after all.

[Calibandar]

I've watched the first 10 episodes of season 1 now, and quickly moving through them. Season 2 has now been ordered on DVD.

I wasn't quite sure I'd like it during the first couple of episodes but it is turning out to be really to my taste. Very good storytelling, atmosphere and interesting characters. Love the setting. No criticisms really.

[Anya, Vengeance Demon]

For those who are interested in some (vague) indications about where season three is heading, MSN.com has the official summaries for the first six episodes online.

SPOILER: Mad Men

Some folks who have seen the season premiere noted that Kiernan Shipka, who plays Sally Draper, is now a series regular. This is borne out by the fact that Sally looks to have a multi-episode arc, which will be interesting to see.

The summaries also read to me as if Betty's dad ends up staying with the Drapers for a few episodes. This could be because William is tired of shouldering the burden alone, or it could be that Gene's health has declined to the point that they want him to be close to hospitals in Manhattan, or some combination of the two. In any case, I'd be willing to bet money that Gene dies in episode four, "The Arrangements."

[Iskaral Pust]

Just finished season 2 on DVD and ready to follow season 3 as it airs. The discussion here is great.

Just to chime in on a couple of debates within this thread:

I thought Kurt's outing worked fine because of the poignant contrast to Sal in the previous episodes. I'd like to see more contrast between Smitty's (?) acceptance of this versus Ken's reaction. The other guys haven't yet asked Smitty if he knew.

I thought Pete was holding the rifle because of his earlier reference to possible looting, but it's also a symbol of his independence from Trudy. I don't see him as suicidal at all.

I thought young Don was badly acted, especially the goofy "I've met a girl". But his relationship with Anna was great to see.

[Anya, Vengeance Demon]

I thought Kurt's outing worked fine because of the poignant contrast to Sal in the previous episodes. I'd like to see more contrast between Smitty's (?) acceptance of this versus Ken's reaction. The other guys haven't yet asked Smitty if he knew.

I haven't seen that episode in a little while, but doesn't Smitty effectively admit that he knew by saying something like, "He's from Europe. It's different there"?

[Iskaral Pust]

I haven't seen that episode in a little while, but doesn't Smitty effectively admit that he knew by saying something like, "He's from Europe. It's different there"?

Yes, but we didn't see much reaction from the others to his acceptance. Ken, for example, is immediately uncomfortable with Kurt's homosexuality, and you would expect that he might now be resentful or distrustful toward Smitty for having known about it, accepted it and kept it secret.

[Anya, Vengeance Demon]

So, season three started tonight. I really enjoyed "Out of Town" quite a bit. Spoilers had leaked out about most of what happens, and yet the funny thing is that everything was still surprising. I knew that Pete was getting a promotion, but not that he was going to be a mouse in Lane Pryce's little game. I knew that Don was going to find out about Sal, but not that Sal was going to get close to getting what he's desired for all this time.

And speaking of, now's a good time to link to Matt Weiner's extensive interview with Alan Sepinwall on the premiere and season three--no spoilers, don't worry--in which he talks about Sal and the bellhop:

MW: Don is certainly submitting to a weakness, and to his own self-pity. And Sal...

AS: Poor bastard.

MW: "Poor bastard"? I think people might cheer.

AS: Yeah, but they're cheering, until once again (it doesn't work), just like with the Belle Jolie guy.

MW: But the door opened way bigger this time. I think he saw there was another way for this to happen. And he kissed this man, which he might never have done. Yeah, it was thwarted, and tawdry, but I think you see in the end, when he's talking about the ad and says, "He's handsome," it was a positive experience. He knows he's safe. He's been living in fear for God knows how long.

I think that's interesting, and certainly suggests that Sal will be seeking out men in the future (even if he has to be more careful about it). Matt Weiner also confirmed that Joan did marry the rapist, and that Roger married Jane (and indeed is fresh from his honeymoon in Greece, which explains Bert's reference to Grecian treasure).

Mainly, I thought this was a strong episode--not perfect, and I think the reason why Dick Whitman was named "Dick" was particularly strained, like Dennis Quaid saying that knowing is half the battle in the G.I. Joe movie--but really funny (I'm still laughing at Sally "taking to your tools like a little lesbian") and good at setting up a lot of interesting plot-threads for future episodes.

Yes, but we didn't see much reaction from the others to his acceptance. Ken, for example, is immediately uncomfortable with Kurt's homosexuality, and you would expect that he might now be resentful or distrustful toward Smitty for having known about it, accepted it and kept it secret.

Well, I don't know that Ken would resent Smitty for that, because I think that presumes a relationship between them, when most of the time the Smiths were off doing their own thing and the chipmunks didn't deal with them much at all. I think Ken would write off Smitty mentally the same way he does with Kurt, but I'd be surprised if he felt resentful at all. (Also, Ken doesn't seem like the resentful type: see, for example, tonight's episode.)

[Rhom]

Nice episode with a lot of set-up for later in the season. For some reason, I had it in my head that this season was set 3 yesrs after season 2... which obviously wasn't the case.

In the brief season preview after the show, Weiner said this season is about change. I suppose we'll be seeing it on screen then; because Pete and Trudy seem happier than they've ever been and Don's still not faithful (not that I expected him to be... but I thought he'd give it a try).

The firing of Bert Peterson seemed strained to me... presumably he was the guy who replaced Duck as head of accounts. We'd never heard mention of him before, and if he was Duck's replacement then he was only in the job for a few months anyways. I found it hard to have much reaction to his tirade other than to laugh.

Pete has become even more weaselly than ever. His giggle/cackle when he closed the door to his office thinking he was the Head of Accounts was interesting.

Joan made an offhand comment to Peggy that she'd be leaving the office now. Is that something we expect to happen on the show? Will Joan leave? I can't picture the show without her, so I would think something will have to happen with the Rapist to keep her working.

As I logged on this morning, I read IP's discussion of Season 2 and specifically Kurt's outing and the reaction it brought. I find that interesting in light of Sal and Don's moment last night. Don obviously knows what he saw, but surprises Sal by never adressing it. Obviously Don has been living a lie for so long, he is willing to overlook the lies other people tell. (I liked Don's throwaway line last night about his birthday and that seeing his driver's license wouldn't help.)

All in all, not a bad episode at all. Glad the season is up and running.

[Anya, Vengeance Demon]

Actually, Burt Peterson's been mentioned on the show a couple of times in season two; Pete and Duck both hated him. I had gotten the impression that he was in the accounting department, but I guess he was another account executive who got moved up to the head position, only to prove that he couldn't handle it.