By Couch Baron
Because of and despite the events of last time, Timmy Ketchup is meeting seriously with SCDP, although they're having to do so in Pete's TP-less apartment for the moment. Timmy Ketchup proposes that Don do some spec work for him and guarantees that if he likes it, Raymond will fall in line; if not, he'll never have to know. Don's still full of misgivings, of course, to the point that the only other person he allows Pete to bring in is Stan. The pitch in a hotel room goes well enough -- but when the SCDP team exits, they run into Chaough and Peggy, there to take their turn. Don listens at the door to Peggy's presentation, and it seems like she nails it, but Chaough and Peggy catch up to the SCDP boys at the corner bar and inform them that Ketchup bought a bigger agency's pitch in the room. It gets worse when Ken storms in having gotten an earful from Raymond containing the words "You're fired," and much like with Mohawk and American Airlines back in Season Two, by going after the huge bird in the bush, they lost the one that was feeding their hand. Hey, I'm not the one who has to sell copy. Also, Stan magnificently flips Peggy off and although I don't want him to stay mad at her, that was richly deserved.
Dawn gets a storyline that involves her, essentially, having no life and not wanting to rock the boat at SCDP. Unfortunately, she also gets in trouble for aiding and abetting Scarlett sneaking out of work. After Joan figures this out, Dawn comes in to see her and apologizes, and Joan replies by giving her watch over the time cards and supply closet. She does so in a hard-as-nails fashion, but it seems to me like if Joan's going to bond with any other woman there, it's likely to be Dawn.
Joan's old friend Kate, who we haven't met before, takes Joan out for a night of proto-cougaring, and although Joan's slower to get into it than Kate, neither does she refuse to make a young man's… well, life. Kate then confesses she wishes she had what Joan had, business-wise, and although Joan protests about how the men at work treat her, Kate tells her the way she sees it, Joan has everything in front of her for the taking.
Ken complains about his Dow Chemical father-in-law Ray Wise, prompting Harry to suggest a meeting about their Napalm image problems. They pitch Ray Wise on sponsoring a Joe Namath music special ("Broadway Joe on Broadway"), and Ed eats it up. Meanwhile, as I mentioned, Scarlett enlists Dawn's help in ducking out of work for a stint, and it takes Joan all of five minutes to sniff this out and can Scarlett. Harry, however, intercedes effectively, and then barges into the partners' meeting and barks at everyone about not yet being a partner, dragging Joan's honor through the mud in a thinly veiled way in the process. Even though the partners give him a commission on the Dow special that exceeds his yearly salary, he keeps on about the other thing, and Roger and Bertram basically agree that they'd rather kill each other and/or themselves before they dilute their ownership.
Megan has to do a love scene on TV, and tells Don in advance on the advice of a more seasoned co-star. She and her husband -- the head writer on the show, also known as Ted McGinley -- then take Megan and Don out before inviting them back for some pot and, well, swinging, and Don and Megan almost climb over each other in getting the hell out of there. They laugh about it in the cab home, but less amusing is when Don chooses the day of Megan's initial love scene for his first set visit, which leads to a nasty fight that sends Don running straight over to Sylvia's. Sylvia tells Don she prays for him to find peace, but he symbolically nixes that idea, so sure, let's all feel sorry about yet another Don Draper existential crisis. With all the sex he has, I wonder from a blood-flow point of view how he can even think about such things -- especially with the anatomy we all know he has.
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