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The End of Mad Men: "Time & Life"

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The End of Mad Men 4:

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Time & Life

Sterling Cooper seems to be on its last legs, as we approach the series finale of Mad Men. But in spite of (or because of) the glum mood around the office, the crew is sharing some of their best moments in recent memory.

(Sorry for the delay on this thread!)

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"THE KING ORDERED IT!" absolutely killed me.  Classic Pete quote/delivery, perhaps even better than "NOT GREAT, BOB!"

 

I thought this was the best episode of this run by a lot.  Some quality Pete time, great Peggy/Stan moments, some fun office intrigue, and (with one exception) no plot line addressed that made me say "really, they've got 4 episodes left and we're focusing on these characters?"  The ad agency stuff always feels strongest to me when they're doing actual work.  I really hope we get to see Don do one last killer pitch, but given that he couldn't even make it through a few sentences of the pitch to McCann, perhaps Don the pitchman has already gone out with a whimper.  I feel this story is destined for an ending where Peggy is a partner in a small new firm, maybe even alongside Don (whose settlement with Meghan suggests he may not ultimately care about sticking around to get the money McCann owe him) and even Pete (a bigger stretch for his character to give up the cash, although it would eliminate the inconvenience of having to buy an apartment).  Then again, this episode mentioned both Don and Pete at least have non-competes, so maybe Peggy is the only major character with a path to both advertising success and freedom from corporate overlords.  I'm glad that there is still plenty of time for new scenarios to unfold.

 

I was, however, very disappointed to see Don returning to seek out Diana the waitress.  I had hoped against hope that her story was done, but at this point I assume she'll be involved all the way to the end.  It just feels way too late to have an entirely new character play a large role in where Don ends up, if that's actually what's happening.  If we are going to end the show with major involvement of a just-introduced love interest, I'd much prefer it be Peggy with Mathis' brother.  That relationship felt fresh and different, both for Peggy and the show.  We've already seen Don have countless relationships he seemed to believe were what he needed and would satisfy him, so it's hard to take his feeling of connection to Diana seriously.  I wouldn't be nearly as cynical about the idea that Peggy might've finally met her soulmate.

 

I also felt the final scene and shot pushed too hard on the idea that the partners have lost control and respect.  It's plausible that many people would react poorly to the news about the McCann absorption--lots of people's jobs are at risk, the change will have many unpleasant consequences, and the feigned excitement in the announcement was laughable.  But the entire floor ignoring them and emptying out?  I've been in one of those kinds of meetings before, and of course most of the room is pissed, thinks the management is lying, and assumes the results will be terrible for them personally.  But very few people would be actively disrespectful in that way.  At least half of those people would either want to hear what Don had to say (when is this happening? whose jobs are safe? when will we know? are there severance/early retirement packages for those who don't make the cut?) or would be terrified to step out of line at the time when it would be easiest to get canned.  Maybe I'm nitpicking and I should be a little more generous in my suspension of disbelief, but that bothered me.  Overall a great episode though.

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"Stop struggling. You've won."

 

I'm so tickled by Chaough this season. He's found happiness as a faceless middle management drone. His face when he found out that he would get his pharmaceutical was amazing.

 

One weird minor thing: in 2 shots where we saw the 5 former partners, we also saw 3 lights in the same shot (in the boardroom, 3 lamps overhead, and in the closing shot of people walking away from the partners after the announcement, 3 conspicuous globe lights). I assume they represented the 3 absent partners (Lane, Cooper, Cutler), but it's kind of weird that Cutler isn't dead.

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So many beautiful callbacks in this episode. Besides the threat of Diana showing up again, I thought this was an amazing episode. For as unrealistic as Joan's savior boyfriend is, I find myself really wanting her to end up happy. I don't really care where the other characters land -- I fully trust Weiner to do them justice even if they don't get a happy ending -- but I really want Joan to be in a good place. I was so distraught when she was the only one who didn't have a national ad campaign assigned to her during that McCann meeting, especially after Don flat out told her that she'd have to let go of Avon for the possible Sterling Cooper West. Give Joan what she wants, Mad Men!

 

 

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Listening to the episode, McCann-Erickson was indeed where they were avoiding going by creating Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce.  Season 2 ended up with them being sold to Putnam, Powell, and Lowe, and then the end of season 3 was them escaping from McCann when McCann buys PPL.

 

On top of that, McCann was the agency that tried to lure Don away in season 1, where Jim Hobart offers Betty a modeling gig as a way of trying to pursue Don.  In fact, she was hired as a model for the Coca Cola account.

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You guys totally forgot the scene where Peggy told Pete about their illegitimate child... basically just to punch him in the existential gut (her motivation? kind of unclear). It works all too well.

 

See ep. 13 (Meditations in an Emergency).

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I don't have much to contribute, but I love that Lou Avery moved to Japan to work with Tatsunoko Production, which was just entering a decade of prosperity as one of the first television-focused anime studios in Japan, before the mid-eighties crash wrecked it and all the talent left.

 

If it makes any haters of Lou feel better, his fifteen thousand-dollar "down payment" is probably most of the money that he was going to see, because cash-starved Japanese companies preferred to buy and sell rights for production and distribution outright, rather than chance it on fees and residuals. Tezuka Productions famously sold a single season of Astro Boy to a smaller subsidiary of NBC, mostly concerned with low-level syndication, for chicken feed in order to make ends meet. They thought they were selling it as a loss-leader to NBC proper to entice the huge company to pay out the big bucks to fund more episodes, but NBC was not enticed, because twenty-six episodes was enough to fill in some holes in its annual schedule of reruns in places like the Midwest. Hence Tezuka's "limited animation" became the standard for the entire industry.

 

Apparently the Campbell Macdonald feud is a real thing???

 

http://rowan-canyon.tumblr.com/post/117522167731/the-order-given-to-capt-robert-campbell

 

Totally, and any non-ridiculous person reacts to it how Pete (initially) did.

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So happy you guys read my editor email "on air". Jake's Amazon Instant streaming seems like the way to watch since you lose those frustrating ad breaks; but as per usual, it's not offered outside the 'States. 

Since I only started picking up on this editing thing in Season 6, I'm curious what editing styles previous editors instilled on the show. Wilson's first episode was "The Gold Violin" late in season 2 (which features one of my favourite opening scenes with a smooth talking car salesman selling Don on a Cadillac); since then, he's edited an additional 21 episodes, more than any one of the other ten editors this show has had. Christopher Gay is 3rd with 14 episodes, and Malcolm Jamieson is 2nd with 15. I'd love to study Jamieson's contribution to the show in more detail as all of his 15 episodes came within the first three seasons of the show (most notable of which was pilot). I imagine Jamieson had a fairly instrumental role in establishing the show's editing style, one I'd be curious to know whether Wilson adopted or adapted. 

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I saw from Jake's tweets that he's already aware he was mistaken about Pete's ignorance of Peggy's child, but I was not as much surprised by Jake's error as I was by the fact that no one else on the cast remembered that scene either.  For me, Peggy telling Pete "I had your baby, and I gave him away" was one of the show's most powerful moments ever.  All is forgiven though because Jake mentioned Nowhere Man, which was great! (I think, I was 13 then and haven't seen it since it aired, but I loved it at the time)

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I was also kind of amazed everyone forgot the Peggy/Pete scene, until I thought about how the show really works to make you forget it. Outside of that one moment, Peggy and Pete never directly address their shared past. The writing in later episodes (and a lot of the non-verbal acting) displays a shared history of some kind between these two characters that is clearly significant, but since nothing is explicit it's really easy to forget the details and only pay attention to the larger picture. The surface-level glimpse at the Peggy/Pete relationship makes it feel more realistic, like you're actually watching two people with hidden motives and interests interact, versus watching two characters with well-established and repeated backstories. I especially like that Peggy's character is not defined by her decision to give up her son. It clearly affects her emotionally, but it's not her whole identity. It makes Peggy's line to Stan about not knowing lots of things about lots of people much more significant.

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Totally, and any non-ridiculous person reacts to it how Pete (initially) did.

I loved Pete's mid-line pivot in that scene. He's like "this is absurd!" and you think, "yeah, that guys' a jackass!" and then Pete follows up with "we were following the King's orders!" and you're like "...ooooooohhhh, Pete's objection is only superficially the same as a normal person's objection."

 

There are people to whom that kind of thing did (and still does) matter. The whole storyline trades on Pete's family being those kinds of people, and then Pete reminds you: I'm also one of those people.

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I was hoping that the editor Tom Wilson was the same person as the author of the comic strip Ziggy

 

Or Biff from Back to the Future.

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couldn't wait for the new thread: I really really liked the new episode, man. 

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