Episode Report Card Couch Baron: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT It's A Man's World
By Couch Baron | Season 1 | Episode 2 | Aired on 07.25.2007
Don does some shirtless push-ups, for which we're all very grateful, and then puts his pajama top on as Betty gets into bed. He tells her that he does worry about her, calling her by the affectionate nickname "Birdy" for the first time. She says she knows, but haltingly presses the case for therapy, saying that it doesn't have as much of a stigma as it used to. Don, his fire gone now, wonders what the shrink could possibly tell her, and says that he always thought people see psychiatrists when they're unhappy. Well, Don, leaving aside any thought of some cracks in the façade of your blissful marriage, as Betty just told us, her mom is barely cold in the grave. That can cause a surge of confusing and pent-up "emotions" for those of us with "feelings" in the first place. Anyway, Betty backs off, saying she'll do whatever he thinks is best. She turns out the light, but while Don closes his eyes immediately, she keeps hers open and looks pensively outward.
Paul enters Don's office and apologizes for being late to Don, Sal, Ken, and Random Guy for being late. Paul pitches a couple ideas involving Right Guard being part of the space age, but Don is unimpressed, basically saying that women aren't going to buy it (for their husbands) because some idiot astronaut wears it. His ultimate point is that they should be asking themselves what women want, and he wonders if there's some "mysterious wish" women have that they're ignoring. The boys look unhappy, because when it comes to figuring out what goes on inside women's heads, their unwillingness is exceeded only by their incompetence.
Paul emerges, and when Peggy asks him how it went, he tells her, "I've still got my novel." Aw. She tells him she's sorry, and he asks her to buy him lunch...
...but at the cart, Paul actually pays for Peggy's sandwich. As they walk away, he asks if she's got a handle on the company's power structure yet. Peggy says that she knows the copywriters tell the artists what to do, but when she starts to say that the account execs boss the copywriters around, Paul almost bites her head off. Just take the sandwich back next time, dude. He tells her that the only person who tells the copywriters what to do is Don, before leading her into the media department, where he says ninety percent of the clients' money goes. "Creative is just window dressing -- it's thrown in for free." Well, it's good at least to know that in today's world, writers aren't taken for granted like that. No one's around, by the way, so I guess it's unheard of for anyone to hang out during lunch hour. Paul leads Peggy through Accounting and Accounts Management, the latter of which is filled, he says, with prep schoolers. "Account executives are always good at something, although it's never advertising." He points to the absent Pete as an example, and after a little bit where we learn that Paul is a Twilight Zone dork, he leads her back to her desk. As they unwrap their sandwiches, he tells her that there are women copywriters, even ones that are good at the job. He keeps babbling, about "Mary J" and oxtail dumplings and whatever, but Peggy eventually tells him she should get back to work, adding in a whisper that she thinks Don is still in his office. Paul takes his leave...