Summer TV Review: The Second Level of Mad Men

Sometimes we mix our pleasure with pain and it seems like Don Draper takes the same approach with a prostitute in the season premiere of Mad Men. With a cadre of flawed characters, Mad Men has always let us live with an uneasy relationship where we like unlikable characters and dislike those we would normally become sympathetic to in the real world. Take Don or Roger Sterling--lovable womanizers--and I'll take them any day over Betty Draper or Peggy Olson--beat down women not worthy of sympathy. It made me queasy even writing that last sentence but that foreign place that Mad Men makes us sit (even more foreign to many of us than 1964). But while most of the show has been a back-and-forth struggle between Don Draper and his work-home life, "Public Relations", the season premiere of Mad Men, seems to be pushing the show onto another level. Bert Cooper may "refuse to be any part of that charade" (one of the best lines from the first episode), but I'm ready an excited for what's in store for Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce (or SCDP as they are now known) this season on Mad Men.

Don debates who he really is during the Season 4 premiere (AMC)

We've spent the better part of three seasons trying to answer our opening question: "who is Don Draper?" The answer that we have received so far has been pretty consistent, a self-assured man hell-bent on keeping his personal life under wraps and surviving in a fast-changing world--while trying to keep up the airs that his personal life is A-O-K. Is it any wonder that Don felt somewhat uneasy by the questioning of the one-legged man from Ad Age (like Jack Hammond, Draper was also in Korea--and he too came back with something false) as it delved into Don's personal life and his marriage? It's no wonder that Don seemed to be more at ease by the end of the episode in his interview with the Wall Street Journal talking about the "scrappy upstart" as SCDP instead of Don Draper.

The problem may be that Don Draper is in full-on identity crisis. His wife is with another man tending to his own kids in the house he technically owns. His dating life is different now that he's a divorcee and bachelor instead of a married philanderer (and now that it's 1964). His office* and job responsibilities are new and different. While last season he was dealing with Hilton, this season he's dealing with a "two-piece" bathing suit company that doesn't want to be raunchy. Don's still a brilliant ad man, but he's also a hypercritical boss (and more about this later) who doesn't really know how to relate to people. While everyone (including the aforementioned prostitute) has plans on Thanksgiving, Don is left by himself in his bachelor pad in the Village (reminding me a lot of the 30 Rock Valentine's Day episode). He's a lonely soul who doesn't want to eat what the housekeeper makes for him and seems to only sleep at the office.

*Side Note: Loved that opening walk-through scene showing the maze-like structure of SCDP and everyone's office--including Joan's. Although male viewer's favorite female wasn't used quite a lot this episode, when she was used, she was on top of her game--an important addition to SCDP and a break from the loss of the Joan we really knew in Season 3. And the more we can have of the buxom redhead, the better we are in my book.

But it's that office that I think most Mad Men viewers yearned to get back to--a place that was too often sidestepped last season as Don's issues at home became more pronounced...and much more annoying. We're back to Sterling's quips--and he's back from a sad existence it seems as well, as revived as the company who he represents. We have Pete Campbell, account executive--though we have no clue what happened between him and his wife or him and Peggy after the huge revelation from last season. We have Bert Cooper upset about the second floor charade and lack of a conference table--though I think his real frustration is walking with shoes on his carpeting and the lack of feng shui in the new digs. We have Harry Crane with a sunburn--but his pleasantness has almost become unpleasant in an office full of characters. We have a new art director and boyfriend for Peggy--though I'm not sure which is which.

But as for Peggy, not much has changed since we last left her. She's still unmarried. She's still Don's punching bag. And although many have mentioned she now stands up to him and reminds him that everyone is trying to please him, this isn't any different from the season finale of last season. She does seem to have more confidence in this new company, but you wonder if maybe that confidence will be broken by the fall of her P.R. move in the premiere. In the end she was begging for money on Don's doorstep which means she wasn't any better off than when she started, a sad step back for a once-likable character*. It's interesting, though that in one scene Don is berating the Jantzens for being too traditional/conservative and then dishes out scorn to Peggy in another scene for not being conservative enough. "Gimmicky" doesn't seem to be Don Draper's way of doing business.

*Side Note: I used to be a big Peggy fan back in Season 1 but I've slowly grown to dislike her. The show started out as a show about Peggy and Don and has slowly moved away from that to the point that I forget that's how the show opened. Peggy's sex appeal was something I never bought into (I don't really even find her attractive), but her character worked for me until she too became as conflicting as the rest of the characters on the show and her likability went out the window (again, this is just my opinion since I know many others love her).

I hated Betty coming into this season and I'm sort of glad that she's miserable. Betty had a lot of sympathy credits with the audience for how Don had treated her over the years but her actions last season slowly withdrew from that bank of credits. Now she's in overdraft. Like she does to her daughter with sweet potato pie on Thanksgiving, Betty is trying to forcefeed her new relationship on everyone. Her kids don't like the new arrangement and she seems resentful of them. Henry's mother isn't a fan of Betty and says so. And Don can't be happy about this situation either--setting up a delicious confrontation in the kitchen (which seems to be the place where most of the Draper's fights have taken place over the years) between Don and Betty/Henry. Even Henry tells Betty it's time to move out of the house. How long before that marriage begins to die?

Speaking of death, the one reference that I got in the episode was to Andrew Goodman, one of the three civil rights volunteers murdered in Mississippi. Although I got a 5 on AP American History and consider myself pretty well-educated, I'm lost with a lot of the references on Mad Men and would have never understood the "Marsha" and "John" banter had it not been for a New York Times preview a week earlier. I know that we've at Thanksgiving of 1964 after leaving off at Christmas of 1963 last season which means that we need to hold on tight as civil rights starts to blow up in the United States and the recently passed Gulf of Tonkin Resolution means that things are blowing up in Vietnam as well.

But in the end, we're back to Don and his quest to build up a "second level"--a facade that may or may not be there. Left to fend for himself, it will be interesting to see how Don's new personal life effects his professional life and whether SCDP can survive the scrappy start-up phase. Don's a mess and it's up to him to rebuild his personal life (though Roger certainly tries to help with his blind date set-up). With one big client--American Tobacco--left it's also up to Don to rebuild the public relations of this company. And by the looks of the end of the episode, Don not only will be able to do that, but seems to build us up for a fun season of Mad Men as well.

Season Grade So Far: A-. Still too early to declare this season an A, but a fabulous start and I can't wait to see what comes in the next few weeks. My biggest problem with Season 3 was that we left the office way too much and although many want to believe that the whole marriage break-up thing is temporary (including Don and Henry), I'm glad that it's seemingly not so. More Don Draper as the ad man, less Betty.

Best Line of the Week: "How are your balls? You enjoying yourself?" - Don's accountant or lawyer. Not sure who he exactly was, but it's not often someone speaks that honestly to Don Draper. Awesome, vulgar line that sort of got lost in this episode (though Roger's quip of "stuffing" Bethenny on Thanksgiving was really good and vulgar too). Second best line was "we're all here because of you" because it not only describes SCDP, but really the show as a whole.

Best Moment of the Week: The office walk-through. It was good to see the whole gang back together in new digs and it was a nice, almost opening credits type moment as they walked through and saw all the old characters reunited.

Question of the Week: Where the heck is Ken Cosgrove? He's in all the promotional material but he's seemingly not at SCDP. Is he with a rival firm? Will he come on board later? Will he still be so nice? I'm excited to find out.

So what are your thoughts? What did you like best about this episode and what concerns do you have about Season 4 of Mad Men? Let us know in the comments below.

Some other reading for you: Alan Sepinwall at HitFix, James Poniewozik at TIME,and Ginia Bellafante at the New York Times.