Episode Report Card Couch Baron: A- | 415 USERS: A- YOU GRADE IT There's That Past, Informing the Present Again
By Couch Baron | Season 4 | Episode 5 | Aired on 2010.08.22
Don arrives at the office and is immediately accosted by Pete, who's bearing a bouquet of chrysanthemums and cultural instructions, namely that they shouldn't criticize the Japanese or give them advice. Wow, that is some bizarre, inaccessible stuff there, Pete. Don is more interested in how CGC is involved and how Pete didn't know that, but Pete tells him it's just them, JWT, and CGC before going to get rid of the flowers. "Apparently they symbolize death." He moans about all the conflicting information he's getting, as if the episode title wasn't a clue to expect it and all.
Cut to Bertram and the elder statesman of the Japanese contingent ("Ichiro Kamura") bowing to each other as Don, Pete, and two Honda underlings stand at attention. Don then takes them on a tour, with the youngest of the Japanese men ("Takahashi") acting as translator. When they reach what looks like the break room to me but what Don calls the "Creative lounge," Pete dorkily tells them that he can't tell them how "it" happens, "but it does happen here." The interpreter, understandably enough, doesn't know how to turn that bullshit into Japanese, so when Pete orders him to tell them something, he offers, "I don't know what this room is for." Heh. Joan then appears and, after being introduced, says she hopes no one has taken them to Benihana, and the elder statesman doesn't wait for the translation: "David. Ogilvy." Ha! I guess his book didn't cover everything. Joan assures them she has a good list of steakhouses, but the middle-in-age man ("Saito") is focused on something else: "How does she not fall over?" Misogynistic, yes, but in his defense I will say she's looking extremely rackalicious today, even for her. Joan says they're not very subtle, and Takahashi, looking straight at the way her bazooms are accentuated by her jewelry and sweater, agrees: "No. They are not." HA!