OMG THE ENDING TO SEASON SIX FOR DON. I am really excited about what the next season entails for him. I kind of agree that Don will probably never become a "good person," but I think that in a lot of ways that is not really the point? I mean, one thing that I think is really important is that in an imperfect world, where options for actually being a decent person are actually sometimes not always all that clear, finding a way to find peace with yourself and not to put other people down is *itself* a worthwhile goal, and I think Don is making real progress on that.
Great point. I loved the end of S6 for Don, after being disappointed by S5. I'm way more sympathetic to Don than I oughta be! I think he needed the shake-up of being way too honest in his pitch to Hershey and getting booted out SC 2.0 to make a change. IMO, Don's whole process of breaking out poverty and abuse and the Korean War demanded artifice, coldness, a lack of fidelity to family. mendaciousness and ambition on steroids. If Don was a little more honest, a little more patriotic, a little concerned with his family and forgiving on him, he'd still be Dick Whitman on the farm. If Don had scruples about how to work his way into business, he never would have gotten Roger drunk and fooled Roger into believing that Roger hired him.
I mean, maybe there was some way that Don could have served out his time in the Korean War and made it to success honestly while still being a good brother to Adam. However, I really didn't see those opportunities at hand. There are some good "Person secretly escapes dirt-poor, abusive childhood home and never looks back and becomes rich and good and wonderful and lives happily ever after because they always do the right thing now that they're free and they totally forgot their crappy family still living on the wrong side of tracks!" And despite my sarcasm, some of those stories do reflect a reality. However, there really weren't enough stories about someone who secretly escapes a poor, abusive home who attains prosperity and respectability....but constantly screws up everyone around them in the new respectable life because they're still pursuing their secret, anti-family, underhanded, cold methods that allowed them to escape and forget their flesh and blood.
A lot of Don's problem boils down to the fact that he keeps swimming like a hyper-active shark to get more, more, more- more sex, more money, more booze, more. And that was OK when he was an underdog and he wasn't in the position to hurt anyone innocent, save Adam or maybe the johns of the whorehouse that he was instructed to pick-pocket. However, the rules should have changed when Don became Top Dog and acquired a whole mess'o'people that rely on Don for fidelity and kindness, be they employees or family. And people that think they're dealing with their father (Don's kids) or a mentor (Joan and Peggy) or an ally and friend (Lane Pryce, Roger). However, a shark doesn't change his fins just like that particularly when he's swimming in a tank of sharks from Roger to Bert to Pete.
Having to take a leave of absence and hitting rock bottom in Sally's eyes forces Don to stop swimming as a shark for a little bit and maybe self-examine a little. So, far it looks like it's working. However, I can get a little sentimental about Don. I was badly burned when I thought there he was making substantial improvements when he was dating Faye Miller. So, I'm keeping it a little at arms length.
And this has been a long comment. I had feelings....No need to respond to all of my word vomit if you don't want.
YES, exactly! Don is a creature of his own inner aptitudes, and that is precisely the problem for everyone around him. And yet...I really felt for him by the end of S6, because for once he was the one spiraling.
Yay feelings! I want to respond more but I'm pretty tired, and might not get back to it. But I really like all this. MM is a show I love but haven't rewatched enough to form the strong set of opinions and meta-y thoughts that I have about other things, but somehow the end of s6 really made things click into place emotionally. I really love the shark analogy a lot.
(And given that you've made Willow/Don comparisons before, I think that's another place where I think they overlap; I think there is a kind of...desperate need to be doing things, constantly striving for better, which goes beyond simple ambition into something that is compulsive, like the dialogue with Oz over her overactive thinking and how only sex shuts it off, which is why some of the moments I have the most love for her are the moments where she does let go, even though I also love that ambition/compulsion -- I guess to continue with the random Oz theme the way she just drops the revenge spell and the flasks all go crashing down is a huge moment, because she's making the braver, more difficult choice to not be doing something. Which I think fits with what you've said about Don finding the implied rest suggested by his position on the couch. I think Don especially really closely associates rest of any kind with death, hence the fact that he can usually only get rest by pushing himself past his limit, drugging himself with alcohol or pushing himself past the limit of physical exertion with sex and impossibly long hours, because he wants to rest but he struggles with the kind of sense of security required to sleep fully expecting to wake up rejuvenated, that one can let things be for a time and then they'll still be there when he wakes up.)
I think Don especially really closely associates rest of any kind with death, hence the fact that he can usually only get rest by pushing himself past his limit, drugging himself with alcohol or pushing himself past the limit of physical exertion with sex and impossibly long hours
Absolutely. One of my favorite Don speeches and frankly, TV speeches every- "You're born alone and you die alone and this world just drops a bunch of rules on top of you to make you forget those facts. But I never forget. I'm living like there's no tomorrow, because there isn't one."
Don lies with the truth. (per our AtS conversations). However, Don generally reveals parts of himself even though his speech was intended as a smooth suave come-on to make Rachel Menken believe that he's a single guy that truly likes her to get her business, her affection and eventually, sex from her. Nope, Don isn't alone. He has a wife and kids that he's ignoring- but yet, he *is* alone inside and he *is* living like there's no tomorrow because he expects the bottom to drop out of his life any day. It makes him very dangerous. Don really believes what he's selling because it does have a bit of important truth to it even though the most salient points that have a pragmatic effect on other's lives are pure manipulative bullshit. Like, from the same ep- Don *does* think that it's comforting to refer to tobacco as "toasted" and it does give a downhome feeling that whatever you're doing is "Ok". Just, pay no attention to the cancer, heart disease, increased likelihood of strokes behind the curtain of cigarettes!
I agree that Willow has a similar compulsive ambition- to achieve more success, to escape whatever her past life was, and hedonistic pleasure. It's multi-dimensional ambition instead of someone like Peggy who is really pretty much just focused on life achievements. Peggy doesn't have the same loathing of her past self. She wants more out of life than her mother represents/wants but Peggy doesn't really loathe or feel ashamed of her background or especially herself for having such a background. Peggy is a sexual person but she's not as focused on it as Don especially or Willow. Peggy socially drinks or smokes weed; she would have no interest in Don's series of benders or Willow's inclination to do magic to get more and more pleasure.
Although, Willow frequently holds herself back on the excesses of ambition for achievements and hedonism or re-directs her ambition to a good place because Willow loves her friends and SO's deeply and wants to do right by the world. Don doesn't feel anywhere near as much duty or compulsion to be good or love for others so Don's ambition is unrestrained. Also, by S1, Don made it to a world perfectly engineered for his white, wealthy, executive male self to rule and proudly display his ambition for achievements and hedonism. (To an extent, he can't show off to his wife how much he wants to sleep with other women or anyone how much he craves drugs and alcohol or anyone the childhood root of his craving for more and more.) Willow, on the other hand, needs to hide her ambition and power to retain her acceptance in the Scooby gang or the rather provincial Sunnydale community.
Great point. I loved the end of S6 for Don, after being disappointed by S5. I'm way more sympathetic to Don than I oughta be! I think he needed the shake-up of being way too honest in his pitch to Hershey and getting booted out SC 2.0 to make a change. IMO, Don's whole process of breaking out poverty and abuse and the Korean War demanded artifice, coldness, a lack of fidelity to family. mendaciousness and ambition on steroids. If Don was a little more honest, a little more patriotic, a little concerned with his family and forgiving on him, he'd still be Dick Whitman on the farm. If Don had scruples about how to work his way into business, he never would have gotten Roger drunk and fooled Roger into believing that Roger hired him.
I mean, maybe there was some way that Don could have served out his time in the Korean War and made it to success honestly while still being a good brother to Adam. However, I really didn't see those opportunities at hand. There are some good "Person secretly escapes dirt-poor, abusive childhood home and never looks back and becomes rich and good and wonderful and lives happily ever after because they always do the right thing now that they're free and they totally forgot their crappy family still living on the wrong side of tracks!" And despite my sarcasm, some of those stories do reflect a reality. However, there really weren't enough stories about someone who secretly escapes a poor, abusive home who attains prosperity and respectability....but constantly screws up everyone around them in the new respectable life because they're still pursuing their secret, anti-family, underhanded, cold methods that allowed them to escape and forget their flesh and blood.
A lot of Don's problem boils down to the fact that he keeps swimming like a hyper-active shark to get more, more, more- more sex, more money, more booze, more. And that was OK when he was an underdog and he wasn't in the position to hurt anyone innocent, save Adam or maybe the johns of the whorehouse that he was instructed to pick-pocket. However, the rules should have changed when Don became Top Dog and acquired a whole mess'o'people that rely on Don for fidelity and kindness, be they employees or family. And people that think they're dealing with their father (Don's kids) or a mentor (Joan and Peggy) or an ally and friend (Lane Pryce, Roger). However, a shark doesn't change his fins just like that particularly when he's swimming in a tank of sharks from Roger to Bert to Pete.
Having to take a leave of absence and hitting rock bottom in Sally's eyes forces Don to stop swimming as a shark for a little bit and maybe self-examine a little. So, far it looks like it's working. However, I can get a little sentimental about Don. I was badly burned when I thought there he was making substantial improvements when he was dating Faye Miller. So, I'm keeping it a little at arms length.
And this has been a long comment. I had feelings....No need to respond to all of my word vomit if you don't want.
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(And given that you've made Willow/Don comparisons before, I think that's another place where I think they overlap; I think there is a kind of...desperate need to be doing things, constantly striving for better, which goes beyond simple ambition into something that is compulsive, like the dialogue with Oz over her overactive thinking and how only sex shuts it off, which is why some of the moments I have the most love for her are the moments where she does let go, even though I also love that ambition/compulsion -- I guess to continue with the random Oz theme the way she just drops the revenge spell and the flasks all go crashing down is a huge moment, because she's making the braver, more difficult choice to not be doing something. Which I think fits with what you've said about Don finding the implied rest suggested by his position on the couch. I think Don especially really closely associates rest of any kind with death, hence the fact that he can usually only get rest by pushing himself past his limit, drugging himself with alcohol or pushing himself past the limit of physical exertion with sex and impossibly long hours, because he wants to rest but he struggles with the kind of sense of security required to sleep fully expecting to wake up rejuvenated, that one can let things be for a time and then they'll still be there when he wakes up.)
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Absolutely. One of my favorite Don speeches and frankly, TV speeches every- "You're born alone and you die alone and this world just drops a bunch of rules on top of you to make you forget those facts. But I never forget. I'm living like there's no tomorrow, because there isn't one."
Don lies with the truth. (per our AtS conversations). However, Don generally reveals parts of himself even though his speech was intended as a smooth suave come-on to make Rachel Menken believe that he's a single guy that truly likes her to get her business, her affection and eventually, sex from her. Nope, Don isn't alone. He has a wife and kids that he's ignoring- but yet, he *is* alone inside and he *is* living like there's no tomorrow because he expects the bottom to drop out of his life any day. It makes him very dangerous. Don really believes what he's selling because it does have a bit of important truth to it even though the most salient points that have a pragmatic effect on other's lives are pure manipulative bullshit. Like, from the same ep- Don *does* think that it's comforting to refer to tobacco as "toasted" and it does give a downhome feeling that whatever you're doing is "Ok". Just, pay no attention to the cancer, heart disease, increased likelihood of strokes behind the curtain of cigarettes!
I agree that Willow has a similar compulsive ambition- to achieve more success, to escape whatever her past life was, and hedonistic pleasure. It's multi-dimensional ambition instead of someone like Peggy who is really pretty much just focused on life achievements. Peggy doesn't have the same loathing of her past self. She wants more out of life than her mother represents/wants but Peggy doesn't really loathe or feel ashamed of her background or especially herself for having such a background. Peggy is a sexual person but she's not as focused on it as Don especially or Willow. Peggy socially drinks or smokes weed; she would have no interest in Don's series of benders or Willow's inclination to do magic to get more and more pleasure.
Although, Willow frequently holds herself back on the excesses of ambition for achievements and hedonism or re-directs her ambition to a good place because Willow loves her friends and SO's deeply and wants to do right by the world. Don doesn't feel anywhere near as much duty or compulsion to be good or love for others so Don's ambition is unrestrained. Also, by S1, Don made it to a world perfectly engineered for his white, wealthy, executive male self to rule and proudly display his ambition for achievements and hedonism. (To an extent, he can't show off to his wife how much he wants to sleep with other women or anyone how much he craves drugs and alcohol or anyone the childhood root of his craving for more and more.) Willow, on the other hand, needs to hide her ambition and power to retain her acceptance in the Scooby gang or the rather provincial Sunnydale community.
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