Episode Report Card Couch Baron: B | 330 USERS: A- YOU GRADE IT My Dinner With Awkward
By Couch Baron | Season 2 | Episode 3 | Aired on 2008.08.10
Don's now dressed and reading the paper, and when Betty walks in, he greets her jovially. Betty's obviously still shaken about the whole incident with Arthur, but Don's too busy with his pitch to notice; he invites her to Lutece, which makes her smile, and then tells her about the other attendees, which elicits this: "Is this one where I talk or where I don't talk?" Note to Don: In future, give the bad news first. He valiantly tries to keep upselling the dinner, saying he needs a "shiny and bright" better half for this one, but she gets snippy about how she'll need something to wear, and he's not giving her any notice. "No notice at all." Finally acknowledging what's bothering "Birdy," he tells her that they'll go there alone another time, and she wordlessly withdraws. Forget what she's going to wear -- I don't think he gave her near enough notice for shiny and bright.
At SC, the entire conference room is filled with people watching the Defenders episode. After a good long segment, someone pipes up that he wants to see the rest, but he gets the idea, so the lights come on, and Harry makes his case -- it's primetime at a deeply discounted rate, and on top of that, it's a great match for Belle Jolie lipstick. Yes, as I mentioned in the recaplet, they're pitching to the guy who wanted to play Seven Minutes In Heaven with Sal last season. Sal's Not-Boyfriend doesn't see that, so Don explains the controversy will pull in viewers, and "women will find a way to watch this, maybe just because they don't want to get left out." Upon being asked by SNB, Peggy backs Don's assessment up, and Ken suggests putting on a warning, saying something how about research shows that rules are meant to be broken. Harry: "Thanks, Ken. He has the research." Hee. Harry must figure he gets a lot of those to make up for the extra hundred a week. SNB still isn't convinced, saying that Belle Jolie is a family company. "This is not wholesome." Not to sell out my own kind, SNB, but I doubt the extracurricular stuff you do is going to be a Leave It To Beaver subplot any time soon either. Harry gives it one more college try, with more fire than is usual for him, but SNB (his name's "Elliot," it finally comes to me) declines, although he does say he's impressed they brought it to him. "I wish we were a different kind of company." All the subtext is kind of hard to keep up with sometimes. As they head out, Don claps a disappointed Harry on the shoulder, and then Elliot contrives to be at the door just in time to meet Sal and ask how it's going. Sal is all, "Very well, thank you," and it's just as well I don't own a Priss-O-Meter, because it would have exploded right there.