you only live twice
SHOW SHOW SHOW SHOW SHOW.
My main feeling was "LADIES OMG OMG OMG.
Peggy is now Don: she met him as an equal, she is surely about to create the "You've come a long way, baby" campaign for Virginia Slims, she is clearly the boss in her department... it was just AWESOME. Yaaay, Peggy! \o\ \o/ /o/ I really like that Peggy's response to life is basically that change is inevitable and she wants to ride that wave. She's not going to settle with what she's given, she's going to see what the situation is and look for an opportunity and go for it, if she can.
And I think that's probably what the bit where she looks out of the window and sees the dogs screwing in the carpark is about. I think that's the first sign that Peggy isn't, like, seeing this as some sort of romantic achievement of a dream. Sure, it's great: she's still in a crappy hotel with dogs screwing outside. It's supposed to be funny, but it's also... very Peggy-pragmatic. She's enjoying her moment of being Don on a bed with a drink: that doesn't mean that's where she's going to end, or that she's going to be content with that.
(Don, however, is maybe possibly going back to his early-season ways of cheating every chance he gets. I kind of hope he doesn't - it would seem like they were selling all the stuff that's happened since then short, to me, at least a bit - but it wouldn't surprise me. And it would contrast with Peggy: as well as all the other ways they're similar, they are also both people who don't settle. But Peggy has a much more realistic approach to it than Don does, I think. Peggy wouldn't say something as daft as "aim for 100%"!)
Joan is apparently dealing with the change in both well and badly. Well: she's taking her role as a partner super seriously and is in charge of lots of exciting SCDP (or is it just SCD now?) expansion. Check the glasses and the suit: whether consciously or not, Joan totally gets that this is real change, a chance for real power, and she is not going to let it slip through her grasp. Hence the amazing silhouette shot: as Tom and Lorenzo said, she's the equivalent in that shot of the big red X she just painted on the floor. She's here, she's central, and you can't miss her. But personally she deals with that a lot less well - I don't think she really thinks she was wrong not to sleep with Lane, but it makes all the sense in the world that she'd feel guilty that she didn't. Joan has been told her whole life that her sexiness is a responsibility: men want to fuck her, but any consequences (kids or any other kind) are hers. And especially given that sex just got her the partnership - of course she feels funny about the whole thing. JOANIIIIEEE.
Megan... I am not quite sure what I make of Megan's storyline. I think at least part of it is that she has a lot less actual power than either Peggy or Joan does at this point, and that the power she does have is a lot like the character she plays: mythical. Not non-existent, but based on story, on perception. I think this is why we see her reel: not only do we get the Don-stares-at-pictures-of-his-wife thing again, but we are literally seeing her as an actress, and those faces we see? Are the ones she uses in real life. She's literally playing a part, all the time. And I don't think that's shown as necessarily a bad thing, but it is a Thing.
I also think Don's words to Peggy about how that's what happens if you help someone, they succeed and leave you, are going to be relevant to the Megan thing. Exactly how I don't know - is Don just assuming that's always true, and will push her away (say by cheating)? Will she in fact get a star part, and then resent him that it's always associated with his patronage? Or, as is more likely, some more complicated and nuanced thing?
I really liked that the boys' club Peggy left behind is in fact struggling a bit creatively without her. Diversity of perspective IS in fact a strength, an important one, and they're just starting to see the world where that is becoming more and more obviously true.
...and Roger is apparently dealing with that by getting naked. Hahah. I wonder if maybe I've been wrong about how stagnant Roger is... he kind of is, but he also has a base of confidence that allows him to roll with a lot. (Also, I guess he could end up a drug addict, but I don't really see that being his thing in quite that way, though.)
Pete's storyline was, I think, about Pete finally getting out of his own head a bit, only to be given exactly what he's been asking for this whole time now he doesn't know what to make of it. Pete went into the hotel room thinking it was All About Him... and okay, he is unlikely to magically not be at least a bit insular in that way, but he has... been confronted with the reality of someone else's pain, probably for the first time. That Beth is willing to so drastically change herself is also, I suspect, a shake-up to Pete's idea of there being an Essential Pete Campbell inside, the one to whom stuff Happens. He's always been someone who externalises his problems, and it wouldn't surprise me at all if this is the first time that he's had to wonder if maybe some of the problem is actually within him. He has taken a lot of things for granted - like that if he pays his ticket, he won't get chucked off the train - that he's now seeing aren't as true as all that.
Also, Pete getting smacked in the face is pretty much always going to be good television, haha.
I was very surprised that the firm did so well, actually... I don't see how Lane's embezzlement can be revealed non-anvilliciously, now. But maybe it won't be at all? I don't know! Maybe the doing-really-well was just to set up the next stage in the firm's career... and maybe almost ironically to say that if Lane had just managed things differently enough to last another few weeks, it would have worked out.
Basically, I loved it omg.
So hey, people: DISCUSS, OMG.
p.s. Bring on the next season already please, world!
This entry was originally posted at http://soupytwist.dreamwidth.org/89296.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
My main feeling was "LADIES OMG OMG OMG.
Peggy is now Don: she met him as an equal, she is surely about to create the "You've come a long way, baby" campaign for Virginia Slims, she is clearly the boss in her department... it was just AWESOME. Yaaay, Peggy! \o\ \o/ /o/ I really like that Peggy's response to life is basically that change is inevitable and she wants to ride that wave. She's not going to settle with what she's given, she's going to see what the situation is and look for an opportunity and go for it, if she can.
And I think that's probably what the bit where she looks out of the window and sees the dogs screwing in the carpark is about. I think that's the first sign that Peggy isn't, like, seeing this as some sort of romantic achievement of a dream. Sure, it's great: she's still in a crappy hotel with dogs screwing outside. It's supposed to be funny, but it's also... very Peggy-pragmatic. She's enjoying her moment of being Don on a bed with a drink: that doesn't mean that's where she's going to end, or that she's going to be content with that.
(Don, however, is maybe possibly going back to his early-season ways of cheating every chance he gets. I kind of hope he doesn't - it would seem like they were selling all the stuff that's happened since then short, to me, at least a bit - but it wouldn't surprise me. And it would contrast with Peggy: as well as all the other ways they're similar, they are also both people who don't settle. But Peggy has a much more realistic approach to it than Don does, I think. Peggy wouldn't say something as daft as "aim for 100%"!)
Joan is apparently dealing with the change in both well and badly. Well: she's taking her role as a partner super seriously and is in charge of lots of exciting SCDP (or is it just SCD now?) expansion. Check the glasses and the suit: whether consciously or not, Joan totally gets that this is real change, a chance for real power, and she is not going to let it slip through her grasp. Hence the amazing silhouette shot: as Tom and Lorenzo said, she's the equivalent in that shot of the big red X she just painted on the floor. She's here, she's central, and you can't miss her. But personally she deals with that a lot less well - I don't think she really thinks she was wrong not to sleep with Lane, but it makes all the sense in the world that she'd feel guilty that she didn't. Joan has been told her whole life that her sexiness is a responsibility: men want to fuck her, but any consequences (kids or any other kind) are hers. And especially given that sex just got her the partnership - of course she feels funny about the whole thing. JOANIIIIEEE.
Megan... I am not quite sure what I make of Megan's storyline. I think at least part of it is that she has a lot less actual power than either Peggy or Joan does at this point, and that the power she does have is a lot like the character she plays: mythical. Not non-existent, but based on story, on perception. I think this is why we see her reel: not only do we get the Don-stares-at-pictures-of-his-wife thing again, but we are literally seeing her as an actress, and those faces we see? Are the ones she uses in real life. She's literally playing a part, all the time. And I don't think that's shown as necessarily a bad thing, but it is a Thing.
I also think Don's words to Peggy about how that's what happens if you help someone, they succeed and leave you, are going to be relevant to the Megan thing. Exactly how I don't know - is Don just assuming that's always true, and will push her away (say by cheating)? Will she in fact get a star part, and then resent him that it's always associated with his patronage? Or, as is more likely, some more complicated and nuanced thing?
I really liked that the boys' club Peggy left behind is in fact struggling a bit creatively without her. Diversity of perspective IS in fact a strength, an important one, and they're just starting to see the world where that is becoming more and more obviously true.
...and Roger is apparently dealing with that by getting naked. Hahah. I wonder if maybe I've been wrong about how stagnant Roger is... he kind of is, but he also has a base of confidence that allows him to roll with a lot. (Also, I guess he could end up a drug addict, but I don't really see that being his thing in quite that way, though.)
Pete's storyline was, I think, about Pete finally getting out of his own head a bit, only to be given exactly what he's been asking for this whole time now he doesn't know what to make of it. Pete went into the hotel room thinking it was All About Him... and okay, he is unlikely to magically not be at least a bit insular in that way, but he has... been confronted with the reality of someone else's pain, probably for the first time. That Beth is willing to so drastically change herself is also, I suspect, a shake-up to Pete's idea of there being an Essential Pete Campbell inside, the one to whom stuff Happens. He's always been someone who externalises his problems, and it wouldn't surprise me at all if this is the first time that he's had to wonder if maybe some of the problem is actually within him. He has taken a lot of things for granted - like that if he pays his ticket, he won't get chucked off the train - that he's now seeing aren't as true as all that.
Also, Pete getting smacked in the face is pretty much always going to be good television, haha.
I was very surprised that the firm did so well, actually... I don't see how Lane's embezzlement can be revealed non-anvilliciously, now. But maybe it won't be at all? I don't know! Maybe the doing-really-well was just to set up the next stage in the firm's career... and maybe almost ironically to say that if Lane had just managed things differently enough to last another few weeks, it would have worked out.
Basically, I loved it omg.
So hey, people: DISCUSS, OMG.
p.s. Bring on the next season already please, world!
This entry was originally posted at http://soupytwist.dreamwidth.org/89296.html. Please comment there using OpenID.