"Mad Men," Year Six

Major spoilers ahead for the most recent season of "Mad Men"

In the later seasons of "Mad Men," Don Draper has rarely been a character I've found compelling. He's always driven the action, making many major decisions, but he's often been a character that everyone else in the show reacts against. Don's ongoing journey of self discovery, trying to reconcile Dick Whitman with the Don Draper persona, the past with the present, and the success of being a top ad men with his growing spiritual emptiness, was certainly interesting to watch, but he always adapted to each new challenge and bad stretch, or found an escape hatch. He was great at always making that bold decision that pulled himself and the firm away from the brink every time, from marrying Megan to merging his firm with Ted Chaough's.

Season six, however, covering the tumultuous events of 1968, was the year that Don didn't bounce back. Instead, we find him forced out by the newly reorganized and renamed Sterling Cooper & Partners, his marriage to Megan on the rocks, and completely unable to maintain the pretense of being Don Draper anymore. On the one hand this is a huge step forward for Don's personal growth, as exemplified by the very last scene of the season, where he takes his kids to go and visit the unsavory ghosts of his childhood. The whole illusion that so much of his life has been built on may be about to dissolve. However, in the process Don has jeopardized both his career and his family, and it's been pretty breathtaking to watch. I love that after a string of bad pitches, it looked like things were about to turn around thanks to the typically Don Draper moves of combining firms and establishing a rivalry with Ted. However, in the finale it's apparent that it hasn't helped at all. The Hershey pitch is one of the best and most obvious theme-underlining moments of "Mad Men," where Don delivers a beautiful, nostalgic campaign idea for Hershey's and then completely subverts it, himself, and the whole business of advertising, by telling the truth. Escape, contemplated in so many ways throughout the episode, is no longer an option.

Don wasn't the only one who had an eventful year. Peggy's story so far has largely been about her rise as a career woman. This season focused on her personal life to a degree we hadn't seen since the first season. Everyone who wanted Peggy to end up with Don got a taste of what that might look like when Peggy has an affair with Ted, a great character who illuminates Peggy's fears that she's become too compromised by her career to have the kind of home life that she wants. After a tragicomic attempt to nest with Abe, her rejection by her biggest supporter at work seems to drive home the message that she can't have it all. The Peggy and Ted breakup over broken promises mirrors the fight between Don and Megan that seems to signal that their marriage is done. But in spite of the reckless affair, I'm still hopeful for Peggy. I love that she's come far enough to have friendly drinks with Pete, that her friendship with Stan survived the poaching of a client, and that she's emphatically taken sides against Don now. Their old mentor-mentee relationship is done too.

And then there's Pete, whose year was about as bad as Don's except that we could all see it coming from a long way off. Trudy's forced him out of the house, the firm has exiled him to California, and his mother's dead. Two of these things are connected to the show's most intriguing new character, Bob Benson, the con artist who spent the season slowly climbing the firm's ladder in Don Draper fashion. Pete's reacted how we expect he would react to all the other calamities this year, except for that moment when he corners Bob, and decides he might make a better ally than enemy. It offers the hope that he can learn from past mistakes and grow into a better person. Of course, this being Pete, the idea blows up in his face and perhaps indirectly leads to his mother's death. And never has a "Mad Men" storyline been so morbidly funny as Pete and Bob's clashing over the gay Spanish male nurse who ends up eloping with the addled Mrs. Campbell. And can you imagine what Pete Campbell is going to look like, operating in California among the hippies next year?

As for the rest, Joan and Roger got backgrounded mostly, though Joan had that really strong episode with Avon and Peggy. Roger keeps getting more world-weary, and I'm looking forward to his resentment of Bob coming to a head. Bob represents the new guard, of course, and may perhaps finally be old guard Roger's undoing. Tap-dancing cyclops Ken, Harry, and Stan were great every time they appeared, but I wish Harry's ultimatum had gone somewhere. There were a lot of these little unfinished threads this season, including Ginsburg's freakout and Dawn's doubts about the firm. There wasn't enough Betty or Sally this year for my liking, but they were used very well. Betty is skinny again, and becoming a better human being, winning over her daughter a little more. As for Sally, her episodes were few, but they were big ones. Her catching Don and the aftermath were instrumental to how Don's story played out this year. My guess is that she'll continue to have a major effect on his actions in the future.

One more season to go. Let's hope Matt Weiner sticks the landing.
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