Mad Men Post-Mortem: Christmas Waltz Comments

Haysi

Wed, 23 May 2012 03:25:51 +0000

It seems she has spent the whole season quietly seething with the occasional outburst. I was noticing how especially constricting her Marilyn dress was this episode. Is she ready to break out? Oh, Joan.

ManchuCandidate

Wed, 23 May 2012 03:21:13 +0000

Exactly. I was thinking how much of it was based on Joanie's own personal feelings. We humans spend way too much time projecting ourselves onto others.

ManchuCandidate

Wed, 23 May 2012 03:19:08 +0000

I'm not on Team Don/Joan, I'm with you. I'm just basing it on my own observations of Joanie's remarks to other ladies in particularly towards Don. I'd rather they stay separate as it would kill the dynamic of the show and tie too many of the characters together.

Haysi

Wed, 23 May 2012 01:23:19 +0000

I didn't get a Christmasy vibe off this episode. I don't think they were trying very hard.

Haysi

Wed, 23 May 2012 00:30:20 +0000

See, I'm rooting for them not to get together. I want Joan to get liberated once she finally signs those divorce papers. I could be wrong--as I am most of the time about matters of the heart--but I think Joan is over guys like Roger and Don. I do hope they don't leave us hanging one way or the other.

Daisy_Sage

Wed, 23 May 2012 00:06:23 +0000

I've wondered about that too. Joanie seemed a little extra pissed when Megan magically pulled the rabbit out of her hat of getting the boss to propose to her after knowing her for five minutes. I don't think it was just Joan's resentment that Megan hooked up the easy life so young and so easily while Joan had been working to build something somehow for years.

GenderFenderBender

Tue, 22 May 2012 23:22:18 +0000

Here's an interview with the playwright of "America Hurrah": http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2012/05/22/the-pla... Very cool.

TheEmbiggening

Tue, 22 May 2012 21:30:25 +0000

Doms&Subs, Doms and subs - and a few switches for good measure. Merry Christmas! On the side of the Dominants we had Lane's tax lawyer (putting the screws to his client), Mother Lakshmi (wielding her sexuality as a powerful weapon against the scourge of Harry Crane/Intellectualism), Peggy negating Kinsey's efforts with chilling executive-ness, Joan (shutting out Roger, excoriating the front desk girl, hunting with Don), Don (appropriating Pete's Jaguar thunder, hunting with Joan), and finally Megan (spaghetti). In the submissive position, we had Lane, desperately struggling for purchase; Pete, trying unsuccessfully to top from his perpetual bottom; and Paul Kinsey, at ragged loose ends. The switches were Harry Crane, moving as he did from supporter to trader to savior in Kinsey's world; and Megan, balancing as she does between attempted honesty with Don and pulling severe rank. Harry concocting the money/LA thing for Kinsey showed his great ability for delegation, something he (Harry) will need when he moves into television full time. Megan's gentle comments about the play was a valid flip side to her Dinner Imperative. That slam of Don's spaghetti plate on the table was definitively Dominant - she wasn't asking, she was telling, and Don was meekly doing, pasting himself to the mat with a resigned sigh after her accusatory "You used to love it before I came". The poor man didn't even get any wine. For politeness' sake, let me preface this with "I may be wrong": Don and Joan can never be together because they cancel one another out. They are both dominants, hunters, deadly capable - too consumed with their own power games, neither one can truly bow to another. They cannot balance one another, nor can they power one another by sacrificing themselves for each other - it would be a horrible fable wherein he sells his fingers to buy her a bra, and she sells her chi-chis to buy him some gloves, and their combined hate for themselves and each other would destroy everything around them. For them to fall into each other would be Wasteful, and Joan knows this much better than Don, who doesn't want to face that fact - Joan is stronger than Don. Happy Pearl Harbor Day, Old Roger, Old Boy, and Merry Christmas to all!

GenderFenderBender

Tue, 22 May 2012 16:34:20 +0000

Yeah, they've never hooked up. It would be too perfect.

GenderFenderBender

Tue, 22 May 2012 16:31:13 +0000

Why did Don take off his jacket when he was giving the morale-raising speech? Was he going to fix a faucet?

GenderFenderBender

Tue, 22 May 2012 16:29:22 +0000

I still don't really understand the Lakshmi character. That whole scene with Harry was so bizarre. Granted people in real life don't always follow logic when making decisions but it was very out of alignment. I also didn't care for the way the actress read that line about Paul being "a great closer" - it sounded too contemporary. That was the only smudge on an otherwise excellent episode, though.

GenderFenderBender

Tue, 22 May 2012 16:26:35 +0000

Power Rankings: http://www.grantland.com/blog/hollywood-prospectu... "You desperately ached for Don, feeling a booze-lubricated stirring in his long-dormant oats-sowing machine, to stop fighting the irresistible violence of its firing pistons and steam-belching exhaust pipes and finally — finally — sleep with Joan. And their congress would have been magnificent, all broken vases and overturned couches and splintered credenzas and fat lips and underthings shredded as if pre-treated with bacon extract and set upon by starving mongrels in an alley of a São Paolo slum. These two have chemistry they've never been allowed to weaponize for fear it would reduce their soundstage to smoldering rubble and send the rest of the cast scrambling for gigs on a CBS horny-doctor procedural or some USA thing about a psychic accountant within two episodes of their universe-realigning intercourse. And we got so close, didn't we?"

GenderFenderBender

Tue, 22 May 2012 16:25:52 +0000

I could totally see Joan as a late-blooming feminist under the right conditions. Her reaction to Peggy saying she was moving in with Abe (at first she looked like she was ready to ridicule Peggy, until it dawned on her that marriage isn't all it's cracked up to be) made me think she could do it.

bobgeorge

Tue, 22 May 2012 16:17:22 +0000

The equality of their real life male/female celebrity helps, IMHO. They are the Homecoming King & Queen. And they both rule benevolently. ETA - They must fuck.

Cunning_Linguist

Tue, 22 May 2012 16:16:16 +0000

It's the equality that really intrigues me and makes me want them together. Because they would work.

ManchuCandidate

Tue, 22 May 2012 16:04:00 +0000

And Grantland... http://www.grantland.com/blog/hollywood-prospectu...

DearBrutus

Tue, 22 May 2012 16:02:28 +0000

I remember a few seasons ago when Joan commented on Don being so attractive that he didn't need to get his sex in the office.

DearBrutus

Tue, 22 May 2012 15:59:58 +0000

The show hasn't gone into detail about Lane's money trouble, but they do make sense. Although Don and Roger are rolling in the dough, they are head partners at the firm, Don's divorce didn't seem that expensive, and Roger has his family's old money. Even though Lane's name is on the door, he is just a junior partner, and since he didn't bring any business to the firm, he likely either has a small share in the partnership. Keep in mind that the other junior partner, Pete, only has a nice lifestyle because Trudy's dad bankrolls it. Although Lane isn't rolling in the dough, I suspect that he is trying to maintain a nice lifestyle. They seem to have a nice Manhattan apartment, and he is sending his kid(s?) to an expensive private school. It is likely that he is spending a ton of money to try to keep his wife content since she still doesn't like living in New York, and he still might also be maintaining some type of home across the pond. And he probably spent a good amount of bank at the playboy club when he was separated from his wife. The one thing I think they fucked up is the tax issue. It was my understanding that Brit expats don't pay taxes on foreign income. But who knows, maybe there was so long ago tax bill that he didn't pay when he was still in the UK? Or maybe he did sell his home in London, and he has to pay the taxes for it? For a show that is so heavily researched, that seemed really off to me.

Duo_tone

Tue, 22 May 2012 15:57:00 +0000

There's a sense of equality in the Don/Joan relationship, as well as chemistry. Hmmm. Weiner reportedly has his ending figured out. I wonder....

ManchuCandidate

Tue, 22 May 2012 15:52:15 +0000

Jon and Christina seem to have good chemistry together. Their rare scenes together are golden and lacks the ice chill between January and Jon. Considering Joanie's bitchy remarks about Bets and Megs, I suspect that our flame haired queen of the office had a crush on Don Tall Dark and Handsome at one time.