Mad Men: Am I supposed to feel sorry for you?

Wow. I’m pretty sure that was the first time we’ve seen Don Draper cry.

Here’s what happened this week:

Don and Suzanne Farrell exchange subtext-laden dialogue about pasta and plan a getaway to Connecticut. Betty confronts Don about his secret box, while Don lets Suzanne sit in the car outside, and Don’s eyes bug out for a while before he finally ‘fesses up his whole secret past. Betty, initially furious, can’t help but feel sorry for him and finally allows him to join the family trick-or-treating trip, but the resolution to all this certainly won’t be as simple as that. At work, a former client comes back to beg Sterling Cooper’s finest to resuscitate her dying dog food brand (the scandalous news that her food is made from horsemeat has driven her company into the ground, even though all dog food in 1963 was apparently made from horsemeat), but really she’s there to hook up with Roger, who she dated when they were young’uns in Paris in the 30s. Roger gets her drunk, then turns her down, and she turns down SC’s appeal in return. Meanwhile, Joan calls Roger for headhunting help, and he obliges. Greg is interviewing for psychiatric jobs, and badly; Joan finally runs out of patience with his uselessness and whacks him in the back of the head with a vase. Seriously! It looks for a second like Greg is going to retaliate physically, but instead he joins the Army and might have to go to Vietnam, “if that’s still going on.” According to Greg, this means Joan doesn’t have to work anymore. I suspect it may mean more than that.

So, let’s start with Don, since this quiet family confrontation is what the show’s been building up to for three seasons now. And let’s talk about those tears. It’s always weird to watch a character break out of his normal mold; for some reason, it always seems like a particularly huge deal when it’s Don doing it. We’re so used to seeing Don in control, to seeing him pissed, to seeing him going after something he wants, to seeing him bemused; it ranges from odd to bizarre to freakish to see him smile, to see him flounder, and, this week, to see him break down. He’s on the verge from the moment he realizes Betty’s found his box (which she keeps flinging around; dude, I understand where she’s coming from but I still wanted to yell at her right there) and then finally gives in for real when Betty probes to find out what happened to his younger brother (which was so long ago now, but really, in the scheme of things, was probably the biggest thing to ever happen on this show. Yes, even bigger than the lawnmower thing).

Those scenes were hard because for the second time this season, even though I knew Betty had every right to be feeling and acting the way she was, I found myself on Don’s side. Even though it was wrong for him to lie to her, and to assume he could keep this huge part of himself locked up in a drawer forever without bothering Betty’s pretty little head about it. Not to mention the fact that this whole conversation took place while Don’s mistress was waiting outside in the car for a romantic weekend getaway. Still, still, I was watching the scene thinking, “Come on, Betty, you can see how upset he is, give him a break!” Because again with the show and the writing and the acting and the fact that Don is, you know, the protagonist. It doesn’t seem fair, but there you go. The only character that we, the viewers, have been set up to sympathize with as much as Don is Peggy, and in the rare occasions where those two have a conflict, it’s always obvious which of them is in the right. This Don/Betty thing is so much more complicated, with so many arguments on both sides and then the gender roles and rules of marriage of the era that hang over everything adding yet more complications… Betty has to prove adultery in a court of law to get a divorce, or Don gets the kids? Speaking of which, when Betty’s family lawyer asked her if she was afraid of Don, she said no, which – really? I’d be kind of afraid of Don, I think, if I lived with him. Everyone who works with him seems kind of afraid of him. And now that she knows his secret, including the convenient-sounding accident in Korea that led to him taking the original Don Draper’s identity – she’s still not scared. Which just goes to show that despite everything that’s happened, Betty still knows the real Don/Dick better than any of us.

Anyway, going back to the mistress in the car. I felt bad for all that complaining I did last week about Suzanne Farrell when we saw her climbing out of the car with her suitcase and walking home. But then I stopped feeling bad when she got that phone call the next day and all she cared about was how Don was. And then I started feeling bad again when she asked if she had to worry about her job, because that hadn’t occurred to me (so many things don’t occur to me with this show until someone points them out to me; it’s the only time I ever feel dumb anymore while watching TV) but Betty could easily get Suzanne Farrell fired. Then, I remembered Suzanne Farrell’s melodramatic line about going into this with her eyes open and I stopped feeling bad for her, because if she wanted to hook up with a hot older married man she probably could’ve found a way to do it without using her parent-teacher conferences as her own little 1963 version of Match.com. So, I’m glad to see her gone, but I bet she isn’t really gone for good, even if this is the end of Don’s extramarital adventures for the season.

And speaking of marriage… there are a lot of complicated relationships on this show, but Joan and Greg’s marriage is currently the hardest for me to wrap my mind around. I understand where Joan is coming from, of course, and when she whacked him with that vase my jaw dropped to the floor but I wasn’t actually surprised, you know? But then came the flowers and the apology and the significant-for-next-season decision to join the Army, and I was even more blown away. Because I really don’t know what marriages were like in 1963, so I don’t know if they really are in an unusual situation or if this totally happened all the time, where the jackass husband angered the wife so much that after years of quietly taking it and being supportive she finally lashes out with a potentially lethal blow to the head, and then he takes the gesture as a reprimand and apologizes and changes his ways? Because to me that whole thing was completely alien. But I don’t know, maybe that’s how it was for everyone and the adult version of Sally Draper would make fun of me for not knowing that.

And in our third complicated relationship of the week, we have Roger and his onetime true love, Annabel. Just like with Joan and the vase, it’s rather shocking, but not really that surprising, to learn that Roger was someone’s “the one” once. In her head, if not in reality. Now that Annabel’s husband has died of lung cancer (Don, being Don, lights up a cigarette at this news), Roger is very much on her mind. Roger, being Roger, wants to be on some people’s minds; some people’s he doesn’t. Roger claims to be unwilling to sleep with Annabel out of loyalty to Jane, but I think he’s just relishing the opportunity to reject Annabel the way she rejected him. I think if another adultery opportunity – say, one Mrs. Harris, for example – presented herself, Roger’s behavior would be quite different.

I guess this is as good a week as any to talk about Roger. He’s probably the funniest character on the show, along with Pete, and also arguably the most pathetic (although he’s got stiff competition on that front) thanks to his season 1 heart attack storyline. Now, he’s taking up space, spending his off-time with Jane and his on-time golfing, lunching, and sassing Don. I do think he had some interest in advertising at some point, the accounts side of things anyway, but he gave it up years before the show began. Now he doesn’t bother to put on a show of “working” anymore. He enjoys the social aspects of advertising, the excuse to wear fabulous suits every day, the parade of pretty secretaries in and out every year. He knows no one has the power to do anything to him; he’s the son of the founder of the company, and his name comes first on the sign even though the other founder happens to still be alive. It’s hard to feel anything but sorry for and annoyed by the character, especially since we see him from Don’s perspective, and although I found the Annabel plotline entertaining, I didn’t sympathize with either her or Roger. Nor do I sympathize with Jane, or Mona, or anyone who’s ever been a part of Roger’s life except Joan. All these people are, again, utterly alien to me. Funny, sad, but not remotely relatable.

Also this week: We get some fun class stuff where Roger’s horrified to learn that Don has eaten horsemeat, and Betty’s evidence that Don was once poor is that he doesn’t understand money (and Betty managed to make even me feel bad when she said that, and I was just watching it). Also, again, with the not enough Pete. And not enough Peggy, for that matter. Come on, I love Betty scenes, but there’s a reason those two are second and third in the credits. And not enough of any of the underlings, either. I mean, when was the last time we saw Ken? I never thought I’d miss Ken, but there you go. And finally, I would like to note that Sally gave her parents a look of concern the morning after the revelation, and that Don and Betty’s bedroom door was open for a big chunk toward the end. What does Sally know, I wonder? What does she comprehend? I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: Poor, poor Sally.

So with two episodes to go, the big revelation is already out there. We’ve got a presidential assassination to come, we’re still waiting for Peggy to make up her mind about her career path, and Sal is still MIA. And I kind of… don’t know where the rest of the season is going. Will Betty leave Don? Will SC get sold to Gray? Will Pete challenge Duck to a duel? Or will we all just mourn a president with the same conflicted feelings with which we mourned Grandpa Gene?

Well, I’m only betting on one thing: We haven’t, sadly, seen the last of either Miss Suzanne Farrell or Mr. Henry Francis. Ugh. Next season try and keep it in your pants, Draper.

Season 3, Episode 11: The Gypsy and the Hobo (originally aired October 25, 2009)

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Photographs courtesy of AMC and Carin Baer