Mad Men season finale
Mad Men season four finished in a disaster.
Last season's finale was a triumph -- a triumph of work, talent, drive, and creativity over mundane and personal. This year, it's all about smoke and mirrors -- a small, but important professional win for SCDP, (they will dig themselves out of a hole, after all) -- completely overshadowed by what what would seem as an important personal triumph for our darling protagonist.
But is it really?
I vehemently disagree with M., my irreplaceable MM co-watcher, who thinks that Megan "wins" because she is the "real woman", who doesn't pretend, doesn't try to figure out what's work and what's personal, but just is.
Megan is candy. Megan is more of a chance to postpone looking at yourself in the mirror. Megan is another route for running away from himself. Megan is more of Don's refusing to think deeply about who he is, what he wants and how to achieve it. No wonder the proposal sequence felt like someone's dream -- it IS a dream, and it's not going to end well when Don gets to wake up.
*
Joan's pregnancy -- but of course she kept the baby. As a thirty-something professional myself, to me it was obvious she would not be able to go through with a late (her age-wise) abortion. It was obvious she wouldn't be able to ride in a bus with that thoughtful but serene face of hers. It was obvious she could not have shown up for work the next day, and behave as she did the day before.
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I am with everyone who loved, loved, loved Joan & Peggy's scene. That was definitely candy for the viewers. "I learned a long time ago not to get all my satisfaction from this job." -- "That's bullshit!"
*
Faye. I hate it that so many people hate her. She is the exact complex, thoughtful, passionate person Don needed in his life to face up to his (many) problems -- if not as a mistress, then as a friend, a confidante, a payed shrink, for Pete's sake. What he did to her was as shitty as Betty firing Carla. What a wonderful pair of shits these two still make, what a perfect couple.
*
Matt Weiner's son can't act.
*
Overall I thought the finale was written unevenly, and was not on par with the rest of the season -- which was fantastic. Like the rest of the Mad Men addicts, I have a hard time processing the fact that it's the end and nothing more will come for another eight or nine months, but I know I'll live. And what did YOU think of the finale?
Last season's finale was a triumph -- a triumph of work, talent, drive, and creativity over mundane and personal. This year, it's all about smoke and mirrors -- a small, but important professional win for SCDP, (they will dig themselves out of a hole, after all) -- completely overshadowed by what what would seem as an important personal triumph for our darling protagonist.
But is it really?
I vehemently disagree with M., my irreplaceable MM co-watcher, who thinks that Megan "wins" because she is the "real woman", who doesn't pretend, doesn't try to figure out what's work and what's personal, but just is.
Megan is candy. Megan is more of a chance to postpone looking at yourself in the mirror. Megan is another route for running away from himself. Megan is more of Don's refusing to think deeply about who he is, what he wants and how to achieve it. No wonder the proposal sequence felt like someone's dream -- it IS a dream, and it's not going to end well when Don gets to wake up.
*
Joan's pregnancy -- but of course she kept the baby. As a thirty-something professional myself, to me it was obvious she would not be able to go through with a late (her age-wise) abortion. It was obvious she wouldn't be able to ride in a bus with that thoughtful but serene face of hers. It was obvious she could not have shown up for work the next day, and behave as she did the day before.
*
I am with everyone who loved, loved, loved Joan & Peggy's scene. That was definitely candy for the viewers. "I learned a long time ago not to get all my satisfaction from this job." -- "That's bullshit!"
*
Faye. I hate it that so many people hate her. She is the exact complex, thoughtful, passionate person Don needed in his life to face up to his (many) problems -- if not as a mistress, then as a friend, a confidante, a payed shrink, for Pete's sake. What he did to her was as shitty as Betty firing Carla. What a wonderful pair of shits these two still make, what a perfect couple.
*
Matt Weiner's son can't act.
*
Overall I thought the finale was written unevenly, and was not on par with the rest of the season -- which was fantastic. Like the rest of the Mad Men addicts, I have a hard time processing the fact that it's the end and nothing more will come for another eight or nine months, but I know I'll live. And what did YOU think of the finale?