Mad Men: Poor Sally

Oh, Sally, Sally. Sally with your tutu, Sally with your sad sad eyes, sad long before you lost Grandpa Gene. I totally didn’t expect where your storyline would take you, Sally, and I’m still not sure what’s next for you, except that you seem to be growing into the polar opposite of your mother, which is only for the best; but for the immediate future: Poor, poor Sally.

This week’s Mad Men marked the semi-unexpected death of Eugene Hofstadt, Betty’s father, whom the Drapers had taken into their home for what turned out to be a very brief interval. Not that much even happened while he was there. Carla almost got fired. Sally learned some valuable lessons about thievery and being fat. Bobby experienced willingly induced anaphylaxis and secondhand post-traumatic stress disorder. Gene was a complicated character, and I can’t say I’m sorry he’s gone, because he always made me nervous. I feel awful for Sally, though, and for Betty.

But, man, add this episode to the “Betty-is-seriously-messed-up” file. Her immediate reaction to the news of her father’s relatively shocking death? Sagging against the wall and assuring the extremely insensitive cop that she was fine. Although this is the woman whose husband, just two seasons ago, told her grief was self-indulgent. Granted, Don seems to have shaped up since then somewhat on the empathy front, but Betty’s also battling a lifetime of being told to hide her emotions – and that “You’re hysterical” accusation she hurled at the openly grieving Sally pretty much broke my heart for both their sakes.

Meanwhile, also dead is the Bye Bye Birdie ripoff campaign for Patio. Although the Sterling Cooper team produced exactly what was requested – a shot-by-shot TV commercial imitation of the Ann-Margaret sequence, complete with a terrible jingle, “Bye Bye Sugar,” that I bet that Smith guy wrote – the Pepsi folks aren’t into it. Probably because it was a really bad idea, as predicted by Peggy, who presents Don with the smuggest I-told-you-so smile I’ve ever seen. The most devastated staffer, though, is Sal, who made his directorial debut on the rejected ad. Don takes time away from his subtly grieving wife to reassure Sal, which I’m sure Betty wouldn’t have appreciated, but I sure did. Sal needs all the reassurance he can get.

Anyway, on to my weekly character ramblings. (Which some would argue is the best description of Mad Men itself.)

Last week I rambled about Peggy (who, yes, is one of those Manhattan girls). This week it’s Harry’s turn. I know he’s a minor character – so minor I bet some of you reading this aren’t entirely sure of who Harry is. (He’s the one with the wife and the glasses.) We’ve only had one Harry-centric episode to date, and even in that he was just one subplot among many. But I think it’s really interesting where they seem to be taking the character this season, and I hope it gets explored sometime soon. Pryce seems to have adopted Harry as a special pet, and we have no reason to think it’s not earned – SC, and probably every agency on Madison Avenue, is doing way more TV than ever before, and Harry got in on the ground floor before it had ever occurred to the company’s leadership to even create a television department. Kudos to Harry – he’s got a kid to support now, and he seems to have stopped whining about how much work he has to do. But he’s also become much more obnoxious, as evidenced by the look on his face every moment he’s been onscreen this season. And that time last week when Paul fantasized about beating him with his own fraternity paddle (which he apparently keeps in his office? Frat guys are weird).

I’m terrible at making predictions when it comes to this show. The traditional sequence would probably be for us to get an episode midway through the season that fills us in on the backstory of Harry’s ascension (assuming there’s more to it than what we’ve already deduced) and gives him a much-needed comeuppance before he goes back to being normal, stammering season-2 Harry. But I don’t see that happening. Not on this show that relentlessly insists on doing its own thing and pretending the television norms don’t exist. I hope we’ll at least get to find out more about Jennifer Crane, though. Is she still working for the phone company? Are she and Trudy actually friends, or is it just one of those things where Trudy beams at everyone she meets and Jennifer likes to call up everyone she knows to brag when she gets pregnant?

Anyway, now that Sally’s safe (well, physically, anyway, provided she doesn’t decide to act out by going on joyrides now that she knows how), I’m turning my concern to the new Draper baby. The first two kids survived the heavy smoking and drinking, but I would imagine Betty’s drinking has increased since Bobby was in utero. And Don’s warning about the dangerous peach got me nervous.

I’m not going to spend much time talking about the jai alai subplot (check it out, it’s a real thing) or Peggy’s new roommate (Peggy loves to have fun) because they’re both set ups for future episodes which I’m sure will be awesome. And I don’t want to think about Sal and Kitty, because Kitty seems super-sweet and she does indeed need tending. It seems likely this will be the season she learns the truth, and man is that going to be hard to watch.

And sadly, all Joan gets to do this week is spray Raid on the ant farm. Actually, forget Sally, maybe Joan’s the one to feel sorry for.

But we can be happy for Harry, if no one else. Harry appears to be A-okay.

Season 3, Episode 4: The Arrangements (originally aired September 6, 2009)

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