I’m mad always and forever for: MAD MEN. SPOILER ALERT!! Sunday’s final episode of the greatest TV series ever made, will forever have me reeling, as it did from my first ride on that “Carousel” of Don Draper’s imagination. MAD MEN, a saga of men and women on Madison Avenue, served up the most compelling, unpredictable, and fully fleshed out fictional characters ever conceived, brilliantly set in motion by writer Matthew Weiner against the back drop of Madison Ave. They presided over the postwar commercial boom, the roiling 60’s and the birth of an image-based culture that would eventually turn its lens, endlessly, on itself. Don Draper and Joan Holloway the instantly iconic male and female archetypes of the era led a band of ad execs, secretaries, wives, mistresses, kids, vagabonds, and strangers over seven seasons and last night’s finale kept us on the edge until the last moments. Would Don do himself in? Would Joan live happily ever after with her handsome, wealthy new lover? Would Peggy be poised to take over McCann Erickson, who had taken over Sterling Cooper?
All of these characters remained in flux until the very last moments, in other words fully alive, and propelled by every decision they had ever made up until those final moments, and yet so spontaneous and full of mystery. I didn’t foresee Peggy’s sudden eruption of love!! I didn’t guess that guy would walk out on Joan– is he nuts?? No problem. As someone tweeted, Joan discovers SHE’S her own best partner as she births a new business HOLLOWAY/HARRIS on her dining room table. And how about Betty? Stoic and smoking in the final throes of lung cancer, with nary a hair out of place, and having perfectly prepared her daughter Sally to carry on.
But it’s Don who almost did me in. My heart’s still pounding at the thought of that desperate farewell phone call from the precipice of the far west coast to Peggy; then suddenly, by the grace of yet another tall blonde ethereal woman, he is gently led from the brink, lost and numb, to a circle of sharing where he suddenly recognizes himself in a nondescript stranger in pain, embraces his lonely, broken life– and realizes he is not alone.
Don’s last beatific smile–of revelation? while “ommm-ing” in a yogic posture gives way to that iconic COKE commercial– did Don write it?
Did he once again use his personal experience as grist for the advertising mill and in service of… of… a carbonated beverage? It’s easy to think, I mean-so hilariously apt and obvious. Don wants to buy everyone a Coke and the “home” he never had.
But I’d rather think Peggy wrote it. It’s a great ad, so calculatedly in sync with the times and yet so ingeniously refreshing. She’s Don’s unofficial protege, urging him to come back and work on COKE, and we last see her in perfect harmony, typing away as her new lover hovers nearby. I don’t want to believe that Don returned to that grasping nest of vipers at McCann and commodified his new awareness. Isn’t he, at last, better than that? I’d rather think he left the fixing of that “COKE machine” to her, and moved onto a place that I can’t imagine but know he will create. But even if he did write it, and he’s still the ad man, still able to channel what the world wants, he’s certainly more at ease now, and maybe getting it on with that willowy yogini.
And this is the beauty of that ending– Matthew Weiner’s ability to create a finale that’s not final, that’s ambiguous, rich with possibility, and opens up a world of infinite meaning. For seven seasons, Matthew Weiner has held a mirror up to life, leading us forward and back to what drives us, to some feeling of belonging we call home in a world that was always, and will always be– mad. I am in awe.
I’m still crying. The use of the phone as the instrument of most of the key moments was perfect.
OMG Janet–I ADORE this show. HATE that it is over. Will start to watch the whole thing all over again right from episode one, shortly. Remember so many of the key scenes were off camera or on the phone. Not just here, but all through the season. Every time it happened I would freak out….!
I have no idea if it was intentional or just a beautiful coincidence, but the company that produced that Coke ad (in real life…) was McCann Erickson — the same company Don is working for on the show.
And even better, the idea for the ad was from an ad exec named Bill Backer. Bill Backer … Don Draper … the alliteration is too wonderful to not be intentional!
If you watch closely, you’ll also see that the people at the commune –in particular the women– are wearing very (very…) similar clothes to the women in the Coke ad.
An incredible finale … one of the all time greatest!
That was no coincidence– you can bet Matt Weiner knew McCann Erickson produced that ad and had all those commune women’s dress echo the clothing of the women in the ads, and yes, DON DRAPER, BILL BACKER…BUT I still hate to think of Don going back there! ON the other hand Don can’t really be as perfect as all that. Can he.
Anybody can be perfect on TV … ;)
The irony of that final moment of the meditation group in their indian prints, dashikis and gauzy tops and Don Draper smiling serenely among them in his chinos and white button-down shirt! The art direction and imagery always got me. You’re right, Joyce. Deserves a binge-watch from the beginning.
Hey– thanks for reminding me that he’s in his chinos while everyone else is in dashikis and love beads. Guess he hasn’t completed altered his identity– adds to the ambiguity– did he or did he not author that AD?
LOVE THIS SHOW!!!
J
In one of Don’s phone calls with a colleague (I can’t remember which one), they tell him that McCann will take Don back in a minute… At that point I assumed that, on his self-realizing introspective cross country trip, he would eventually make it to L.A. and live his dream of a Los Angeles based McCann Erickson, the center of a recent previous show. At the end of his self-realization, he had not had a cigarette or a glass of alcohol, in quite a few scenes. He perhaps realized, as many of us have in our own lives, that all the machinations becoming the current Don Draper has come to naught. With an envelope of money and a paper bag of belongings Don does what I and some of my boomer buddies have done. Successfully incorporate my peace and love hippytude with our survival in modern dog-eat-dog America. By the way, as much as I believe this is what Weiner meant, I did go out with the same fantasy as Joyce…that he took the “willowy yogini” with him.
That phone call was with Peggy who also said–“don’t you want to work on COKE?” and I remember thinking it was the farthest thing from his mind. But of course, where else would Don fit in–and the folks from sterling Cooper are probably the closest thing to family Don has. And I like your idea– he will be in the L.A. office of McCann– so he will be out of the rat race of NYC. So maybe he did do the ad. But he and his yogini have a whole other life in L.A. LOL.
Don and Peggy will create the ad together.THAT is the “real thing”! Such a brilliant finale. I miss them all already!
Hey Marji –LOVE that idea– of course!!