Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Mad (Wo)Men 6x12: "My father's never given me anything."


After Sally walked in on Don and Sylvia, this week, unsurprisingly, she has no interest in visiting Don and Megan in the city. When Betty calls Don to tell him, he is expecting her to know everything. He’s waiting for the lashing that is to come, but Sally hasn’t informed Betty of the incident.
Instead Betty tells him Sally is interested in attending boarding school. The girls Sally stays with during her overnight visit are the stereotypical “bad girl” boarding school types. They expect her to provide liquor and smokes. Sally comes through by calling her friend Glen, who attends the boys’ boarding school down the road. He brings along a friend, and when Glen and the blonde girl go into her bedroom, it leaves Sally with Glen’s friend, Rolo.
No doubt Sally is going to have daddy issues after last week, but even despite that, her parents divorced and remarried other people, and it’s unclear what effect this has on Sally’s psyche regarding relationships. She seems less preoccupied with boys and more interested in activities and friendships. Last week, it was clear her friend had more experience with boys and Sally concentrated more on her memorizing for their Model UN event.
This week, Sally politely tries to change the subject when Rolo tries to get her to fool around. When that doesn’t work, she calls in back-up in the form of Glen, who abandons his make out session to physically defend Sally’s honor. “She’s like my sister!” He yells at his friend. Sally is pleased by Glen’s actions, but apologizes to Glen and the blonde for ruining their fun.
Some have claimed Sally was being manipulative in using Glen, but after Don let her down, she needs someone she knows will defend her. In this case, it happened to be Glen.

Peggy and Ted are more giggly at work together than usual and it’s obvious to everyone in the office, including Ginsburg, Ted’s secretary, and Joan.
It’s unclear whether Don had noticed their flirting previously, but when he and Megan run into Ted and Peggy at the movies, Don isn’t tricked by the flimsy excuse that they were simply seeing the movie as inspiration for the St. Joseph’s aspirin commercial pitch.
Once Don realizes the aspirin commercial is severely over budget, he informs the client, and watches the fallout happen. When Peggy confronts him about the situation, she claims he did it because Don can’t stand that Ted is a good man.
“He’s not that virtuous,” Don replies. “He’s just in love with you.”
Peggy is furious Don essentially, if not literally, called out her and Ted’s relationship. Her anger may be valid, considering Don is a cheating cheater who cheats, but if the situation were reversed, Ted would be PISSED that Don was withholding information from a client because of his feelings for a woman.
“You’re a monster,” Peggy tells him before leaving. When Peggy quit in The Other Woman, it was because she knew she had to get away from Don in order to grow in her role as a copywriter and she thought CGC, specifically, Ted, supported this growth. But now she is back at SC&P and she feels she can’t grow because she spends so much effort dealing with Don’s petulant behavior. However, in this scenario, Don might be in the right.
Over the past few episodes, Peggy has shown how she does not support other people’s  rule breaking. She didn’t support Joan trying to land the Avon account because by the rules, it was Pete’s account to have if Ted or Don deemed it so. She wasn’t supportive of her ex-boyfriend, Abe’s choice to move to the developing UWS neighborhood. Peggy wants things the way she wants them and her relationship with Ted is no different. She doesn’t seem to mind breaking the rules, not only at work, but personal ones–Ted’s marriage vows, for one–as long as it’s what she wants.
But if someone points out she’s in the wrong, she is loathe to admit it, especially if Don is the one doing the calling out.

Even though Joan’s appearance this week was brief, she was having none of Ted and Peggy’s flirting during the casting session.
Joan was the one who filled in Don on how overbudget the commercial was. While many think she did not have cruel intentions by doing so, it could also be a backlash against Peggy after the Avon situation.

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