Hello, and welcome to TV Tuesday- today I’m going to be talking about the fifth season of the hit AMC drama Mad Men!

The season just starts and we are thrown into the action. So the company Sterling Copper Draper Pryce didn’t go out in flames, and it’s still afloat. They are still on the hunt for more business but isn’t that the way it will always go? Heinz finally agrees to be represented, but they aren’t liking the creative. Peggy is on it, but she can’t seem to do a good job, and she tanks the meeting they have set up with the client. They were on the verge of getting Jaguar (the car) but that also tanks when Roger shows the client a good time, and things just go sour. But they get another chance, as always it seems, and they win over the account, but not with a price. One of the guys wants a night with Joan. Joan now has the upper hand so she agrees to do so, but only if she can become a partner, which obviously happens. Don tells Joan not to, but by the time he’s told her, it’s too late and is been done. 

Let’s talk about Betty for a second, damn girl- she let go and has become a well rounded woman, literally. She thinks there may be something wrong with her, and her doctor finds a lump which scares her, Henry and Don. In the end things end up all right, which is good. She ends up in a dieting class, where they talk about how much they have lost or gained in pounds and their good and bad weeks.

Do we have to talk about Don? He’s been in a lovey-dovey state since he got married to Megan. She’s good for Don I think. She’s not like Betty who will let Don walk all over her, she has a stance with him, even if he still shows dominance. He also doesn’t like that she’ll do things without him, since her acting could lead her to travel and Don flips his shit. So it’s starting to show in his work how out of it he is because he lets everything slip, and that’s why a lot of clients aren’t happy. Bert isn’t sad to let him know that he needs to slip out of his daze.

We get this scene where Don runs into an old fling, and things take a very bad turn. He strangles her to death and hides her under the bed. He wakes up the next morning and it was like it was all a dream- so did he? Or did he not? Will they we’ve bring it up again?  Sadly no. But at the end of the season Don keeps hallucinating his dead brother; he’s been having a weird season.

I guess we can count Megan as a main character now as she’s working with Peggy as a junior copywriter, coming up with ideas, that obviously Don loves her ideas because he loves her. She saves Heinz beans from pulling away, but I’m not a big fan of her. I don’t think many of the characters like her. But it later turns out that she hates advertising and wants to quit to pursue her dreams of being an actress. That pisses Don off because he loved that he could work and collaborate with her. They get into an argument over it, in the end she leaves SCDP and goes to acting school. 

Megan is a savage now that she’s an “actor”. Her friend asks her to ask Don about acting in their new commercial for a shoe company, and Megan just takes it away from her and asks Don for herself; what a snake. She obviously ends up getting it, and she hates that no one believes in her (namely her mother and Don). 

 He proposes to move in, which she thought would be a proposal to marriage. She tells her mother, and she’s not happy for her.  It’s not because he’s a Jew, but she thinks he’ll leave her when he’s found the right guy. Rude, but I guess a reality in the 1960s.

Because Megan has joined the team, Peggy is trying harder than ever to prove she is better than her, and that she’s a hard worker. It’s a little sad, and a step back for her. She was never this petty before. But near theend of the season she takes a drastic stance and decided to leave SCDP for their competitors.

Pete has been having a tough season. He’s getting into fights and disagreements with everyone. First with Roger because he thinks Roger doesn’t understand what he’s doing for the company, and well that’s his reason for getting into it with Lane- they actually get into a fist fight. Crazy. He seems to think he’s the best man on the team. But Pete has always been full of himself. 

and when he lets it slip that he’s the one Beth is sleeping with- the two get into another fight, but this fight is because Beth’s husband doesn’t care about his wife, which he doesn’t. He then gets himself thrown off the train by the guard who he fights as well. Oh Pete. 

Roger, wow, he’s having a fabulous season. He takes LSD with Jane- remember his wife? And they go on a trip haha. Afterwards he sees life in a whole different light. He takes this opportunity to tell her he’s divorcing Jane.

Sally hasn’t really been part of the season like past seasons. She’s here and there trying to act older since she’s in that stage of her life where all she wants to do is be older.  She still secretly talks to Greg, which is we all know will lead to something. While she’s talking on the phone she trips her grandmother (Henry’s mother) and this causes her a trip to the hospital, and she gets to spend more time with her father; in which she sees things she definitely shouldn’t see, poor Sally. 

Sally spends the weekend with her dad and when alone invites Greg over. Now I think they both like each other but won’t admit it. They go to the museum where Sally gets a surprise- she’s become a woman. This freaks her out and she takes a cab all the way home. The scene with her and Betty is so good, and actually kinda sweet. 

 He finally does and she’s so happy. But soon she finds out he has to go back. She’s not happy, but she knows that he has to; only he doesn’t. He volunteered to go back, even though he has a family, so she makes him leave, you go girl! Finally! She never needed him and I’m glad she finally figured it out. 

And Paul comes back!  But he’s become a Hindu. He goes to Harry for help to get out since he wasn’t invited to work for SCDP he fell from grace. He wants to be a writer, and gives Harry his script for Star Trek. Although it isn’t good, Harry does right by his friend and gives him money and ticket to LA. I hope we get more of this story.

We obviously get a new character, Michael, he’s a bit eccentric and kinda goofy. He joins the copywriting team and does well even though he butts heads with Don a lot. He does a good job, and has a lot of ideas.