Episode Report Card Joe R: A | 701 USERS: A- YOU GRADE IT The Winner of the Ham Battle is You
By Joe R | Season 4 | Episode 1 | Aired on 2010.07.25
Henry Francis is at his mother's house, helping her take the expanders out of the dining room table. In a moment that gives me the closest thing to acid flashbacks I'll ever get, he asks if he really needs to take the expanders down to the basement, since they'll need them again at Christmas. I heard that, Henry. "Did the children like their gifts?" Pauline asks. Henry recognizes this as something of a conversational warning shot, but he doesn't engage, simply saying they did. "It's nice the holiday is memorable for something else," she needles. Mrs. Francis, you can sit by me at the next holiday dinner. I love sweet potatoes, and we can shit-talk Betty Draper until the tryptophan kicks in.
Henry tries to make it seem like Pauline is blaming Sally for "getting sick," but Pauline has a point to make. She's raised plenty of children so she knows it when she sees it: "They're terrified of her." Henry says she doesn't know any of the people she's talking about, which is true. Doesn't make her any less right. "I know what you see in her," she persists. "And you could've gotten it without marrying." God love this woman. Henry begs her to give Betty a chance, even bullshitting that Betty "loves" her. "She's a silly woman," Pauline says, almost begging Henry to realize it. "Honestly, I don't know how you can stand living in that man's dirt." Bereft of a decent comeback, Henry just stomps off with one of the expanders.
At SCDP, Don (with Roger and Pete) is presenting an ad to the Jantzen folks. Don's busy setting the scene when Jim interrupts to ask if he can put his foot on the coffee table that's there instead of a conference table. "Pretend like it's your living room," Roger says, in that perfect Roger way where it seems like he's being accommodating but really he's telling you what a prick you are. Don continues talking about the beach and bathing suits, and how the differences between swimwear and underwear are miniscule variations of cut and cloth and what is essentially a gentleman's agreement. Don reveals the placard with his ad on it: a Gidget-looking bathing beauty wearing (fairly ample, by today's standards) bikini bottoms. Over the area where the top piece would be, there's a black bar, giving the illusion of toplessness. On that black bar is the slogan: "So well built, we can't show you the second floor." Like a lot of people, I thought the "second floor" stuff was a little too on the nose, thematically. Maybe if we consider that Don is intentionally deep-sixing his own pitch, this could be an internal fuck-you, but otherwise "second floor" doesn't make much sense to anyone not watching a TV show called Mad Men. Which I assume the Jantzen fellas are not.