Quickie 'Mad Men' Recap

Tonight's episode of Mad Men ("Favors") went heavy on the Vietnam War theme in an interesting way. However, there were two big moments that must be discussed which overshadowed that.

1. Bob Benson (James Wolk) made his presence known again, as per usual, and this tonight we see him hit on...Pete Campbell (Vincent Kartheiser)! He did it in his normally slick way after entering Pete's office. Bob Benson just walking into the office made me jump up. I'm starting to think him entering the room excites me a bit too much. So Bob is gay, and little does Joan Harris (Christina Hendricks) know, he just wants to be her best friend, not her boyfriend. Or was he just concocting a sneaky plan to mess with Pete? Keep enchanting us, Mr. Benson. And bring back the famous short-shorts.

2. Sally Draper (Kiernan Shipka) also had a stand out episode, and is now officially the female version of Bob Benson in terms of entering a room like a boss. After getting the doorman's keys to go up and retrieve a letter her friend left for Sylvia Rosen's (Linda Cardellini) son. When she walks in, what does she see after hearing a feint moan in an open doorway? It's her trusty father Don Draper (Jon Hamm) banging Sylvia on the bed! She drops the keys, screams, they freak out, she runs. Later on he tries to explain to Sally that he was just "comforting Sylvia". I'm pretty sure a teenager knows what comforting is really supposed to look like Don. I'm now even more convinced Sally is going to head up to Woodstock 1969 next season, dance naked in the mud, and drop some of the brown acid. Let's just hope she doesn't run into Don banging some hippie in a van.

Another funny moment in the episode happened when Peggy Olson (Elisabeth Moss) has a rat in her apartment, which get in the trap but stays alive tracking blood on the floor. Our beloved Peggy had some fun lighthearted scenes this episode, which we love.

By the way, Linda Cardellini is bringing it. Hint hint, Emmy voters. There are just two (!) episodes left this season. Dear AMC, can't we get more than 13 episodes for the final season next year?

'Mad Men' Season 6 Premiere

The Two-Hour Season 6 premiere of AMC's Mad Men, 'The Doorway', has come and gone, bringing us to Christmas 1967 & New Year's Eve, leaving us in January 1968. The tumultuous year will be the focus this season, no doubt creating quite the backdrop for what should be an explosive season. Here are some musings:

1 . Sally Draper (Kieran Shipka) had the line of the night, "She acts like she's 25 because she uses tampons."  Teenage Sally is just as fun as pre-teen brat Sally. And I'm now fully convinced she'll be on her way to Woodstock next season.

2. Sideburns have exploded since the Summer of '67. Pete Campbell (Vincent Kartheiser) wins the award for the best ones. We're also seeing more and more moustaches & beards. Just wait until The Beatles' "White Album" comes out!

3. Nobody turns their Christmas trees off no matter how late at night it is. And this was way before LED lights, so they must have great smoke detectors. But they look nice, so I don't mind.

4. January Jones still has a fat suit, though its slightly smaller. So I guess "Fat Betty" is still around! By the end of the episode she dyes her hair black after a visit to some sketchy community apartment in an increasingly dangerous Manhattan. She's there looking for Sally's runaway friend, and gets an earful from a homeless guy about her bottled up existence in Rye, NY. So basically this is her version of turning goth. "Fat Betty" is now "Goth Betty". Earlier in the episode she gave us some seriously psycho humor, teasing Henry (Christopher Stanley) that if he wanted Sally's 15-year-old friend, she would hold her down for him. Maybe the new "Goth Betty" will stop being jealous of teenage girls?

5. Peggy (Elisabeth Moss) is basically the Don Draper (Jon Hamm) of her new office. Quite the workaholic, she expertly solves a crisis for their upcoming Super Bowl ad. Yet she is also a hard ass, making people work on New Year's Eve.

6. Roger Sterling (John Slattery) can't shed a tear when his 91-year-old mother dies, but balls like a baby when his shoeshine-guy dies. Don't ever change, Roger.

7. Megan (Jessica Pare) is now a soap opera star, and Don is now obsessed with death and finds heaven morbid. Megan has gotten him into smoking marijuana, but he is still the opposite of Roger, who took LSD and became more of a free spirit with it. Oh, and the question from the end of last season has been answered. Don has begun to cheat on her, and with the wife of his new doctor friend. She is Sylvia Rosen, and is played by Linda Cardellini, who you know from "ER", "Freaks & Geeks" and "Grandma's Boy". Between this and in Season 3 when he slept with Sally's teacher, he sure likes to pick dangerous ones. We do see regret though, which we didn't see when he cheated on Betty. Baby steps. He is clearly in a crappy state right now though.

8. Alex Mack (Larisa Oleynik) and Rory Gilmore (Alexis Bledel) were not in this episode. I can't remember their characters' names so we'll go with those. And its more fun that way.

9. We didn't see much of Joan Harris (Christina Hendricks) apart from when they had to take portraits. Fear not though, now that she is a partner our favorite wisecracking redhead will be featured more soon.

10. Vietnam is starting to become heavily referenced, as it should now that they've entered 1968.

'Mad Men' Season 6

The sixth and penultimate season of Mad Men begins this Sunday, April 7th, a week after the season finale of The Walking Dead. Yes, AMC gets to follow up one hit show with another. Good decision to have it begin a week after The Walking Dead, and a sincere thank you to AMC because it will help hold us over until our favorite zombies/walkers return in the fall. 

One of the big questions is always "what time-frame will Mad Men pick up in?" Season 5 ended in 1967, and we famously got a dose of an actual Beatles song, "Tomorrow Never Knows" from their 1966 album Revolver. In a video interview with Jon Hamm posted on the Rolling Stone website, Hamm explains he prefers The Rolling Stones to The Beatles. Mad Men also featured The Rolling Stones' "I Can't Get No (Satisfaction)" in Season 4. Maybe this time we'll get a song from both bands at the same time? Other musicians who could start to be played in episodes are Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, The Doors, and Aretha Franklin.

Christina Hendricks as Joan Harris

AMC also just released 10 photos from Sunday's two-hour premiere, and some of the photos feature Christmas decorations and a tree, so we can assume Season 6 picks up in November/December 1967. Most of the season will take place in 1968 that means, and should be heavily influenced by the civil rights movement and the escalating protests of the Vietnam War.

The seventh and final season should take us into 1969, with the moon landing and Woodstock. I'm looking for an episode called "Sally Goes to Woodstock". Just hopes she stays away from the brown acid. I was hoping that we'd get a few seasons that take place in the 1970s, for some leisure suit and bell-bottom fun, but it looks like that may not happen. Unless the end of Season 7 takes us there.

Mad Men Gets The Beatles

AMC's hit show Mad Men finally got an actual Beatles song on last nights episode "Lady Lazarus". At the end of the episode, Don's (Jon Hamm) younger wife Megan (Jessica Pare) gives him the latest Beatles album, "Revolver" (the show is currently in late 1966). She tells him to play the outstanding psychedelic track, "Tomorrow Never Knows." The song kicks in and we hear the rare sound of an actual Beatles song on a TV show. You can listen to it below.

The reason it's so rare is because the songs are expensive to license, and they are also picky about it in general. When the film Dinner For Schmucks got the right to play the song "Fool on the Hill" in the movie, Paramount/Dreamworks paid $1.5 Million. (Yoko Ono & Paul McCartney also saw the movie first and enjoyed it.) For Mad Men, Lionsgate reportedly paid $250,000 to feature the song. Its not just the money though, because many have tried to get songs and have been turned down. They have to like the script & context of the song before signing off on it. Paul & Ringo are fans of the show, which helped. I believe this is the first time a Beatles song has been featured in a TV show, at least recently. A few movies have had Beatles songs in them though: Ferris Bueller's Day Off, The Social Network, Bowling For Columbine, & Nowhere Boy. Plus their own movies of course.

The cost is referenced in the episode itself as a joke. Early in the episode the characters are pitching an ad campaign with their concept playing off the Beatles film, "A Hard Day's Night." Their task is to find a song that sounds similar, since it is too difficult and expensive to get an actual Beatles song for an ad campaign. Its a little wink and nudge at the audience that AMC spent the big bucks to finally get a Beatles song in an episode. And it worked out perfectly, because the track fit in so well with the story and the time frame they are in right now. Don doesn't understand why music has become so important, because he grew up in the 1930s/1940s when it wasn't. There were no larger than life musicians. Halfway through listening to "Tomorrow Never Knows", after seeing clips of Peggy (Elisabeth Moss) smoking a joint while working and Megan laying down at her acting class with her mind "turned off, floating upstream", Don turns the song off and walks away. The generational differences are surfacing as Mad Men moves through the psychedelic era of the 1960s. Don is out of touch and can't understand the Beatles or the younger generation, yet he married into it. Pretty sure this marriage will end up on the rocks. What are the odds Megan becomes a member of the "flower power" movement?

And if you haven't listened to The Beatles masterpiece Revolver by now, go out and get it. Remember to "lay down all thought, surrender to the void" (unlike Don).