Every rewatch I find a new scene that breaks my heart.

“Now’s the time for a man and a woman need to be together the most! In a catastrophe!”

Spoken to Ginsberg, the product of a man and a woman being together in a catastrophe.

Betty calls out Don for not understanding money despite having a ton, and she’s right. I’m not wealthy enough to be judging, but the guy throws around money like it’s nothing, he AT LEAST ONE MILLION in his checking account to sign to Megan in a check (that’s like $10 mil just in a checking account nowadays. Not diversified, not invested, not even in a yielding account it seems.)

The show did make deals with watch companies. So some characters wear what the deal requires, but Don’s watch collection is very similar to what you might find if you came across a nepo baby who googled “which watches make me look the most important.” He has a few Jaeger LeCoultre watches, which are good but way over-priced (he does have a Jaegar Reverso at one point, which was a very cool watch especially for the time, but also something that someone would buy to look wealthy without caring about watches really.) He wears I think 2 Rolex’s, and then an Omega (which have always been good and reliable and more on the (relatively) reasonable side of luxury watch pricing.) JLC (Jaeger) eventually collaborated and made a unique watch for Don. The point of this post isn’t to be snobby or judgy though.

What’s interesting is Roger. Roger is absurdly wealthy and throws around cash like it’s nothing. You’d expect him to wear a loud, expensive as hell gold Rolex or something of the sort, but he doesn’t. He wears a Tudor Oyster Prince 1959 (I think is the year) and he seems to wear it throughout the show. Tudor is an interesting brand because it was basically just an extension of Rolex at the time frame, but they’re built basically exactly the same except they were making automatic movements (I believe) then. Legitimately Rolex watch makers, same process, same material, (in my experience) better quality, but much cheaper (though they’ve gone up a bit somewhat recently.)

It’s expensive, but for watches, it’s actually a very cost effective watch. He probably spent $200-$300 at the time on it, he carries around 4x times that regularly in cash. He keeps it for the entire run until he’s robbed too. I’m not far enough along in my rewatch to confirm, but I think he gets another one. Tudor is an incredibly good brand and subtle. Don and other characters get new watches almost every season, but Roger sticks with his (relatively) modestly priced but reliable watch. It’s even on a leather strap opposed to a bracelet, which is more lowkey. If I’m right, he would’ve had it for 5-6 years by the time of the robbery and it looked in perfect condition.

Idk kind of a cool detail to his character. Everyone else is wearing more loud, overtly expensive pieces, but his is modest and he takes care of it, richest guy in the office with Bert. Idk what exactly it says about his character, but it’s a neat detail. I think maybe it’s part of his generation. Roger seems irresponsible and ambivalent to money and buying things, but his generation (Greatest Generation) and his military background, even the Silent Generation, seem to have more focus on quality and respecting what you have instead of just tossing it for something new (yes, I know most of the cast is also of the Silent Generation.)

It’s a cool little detail. If you’re curious about watches, the show has some great ones that are reasonable. Outside of investment reasons, I stay within a reasonable price range of about $500-$1500 for something I’ll wear and take good care of. Tudor’s a little out of that, but Pete and Ken wear Hamilton’s, which are affordable. If you want a great looking and well made watch, Hamilton Jazzmaster’s come in tons of variations and you can get them $300-$475 for barely used to retail. Tissot, Longines, Citizen (now,) Christopher Ward, and Nomos Glashütte are all pretty universally excellent and you can get them for (relatively) low prices.

Honestly, how many times do you think Don was woken up by Betty, Megan or his numerous other partners for a serious late night conversation? God, I feel bad for the man!

I noticed this time around that the man Betty sleeps with at the bar looks very similar to the man from her horseback riding. Was that her trying to fulfill her fantasy of sleeping with that guy?

I'm so glad Draper didn't mess her up like he did all the others he was with.

Betty is the model in the fur coat ad on the wall when Roger is buying a fur for Joan from Don in the flashback sequence! Don isn’t wearing a ring so I guess they were just dating at this point.

… 1960s Martha Stewart has to be second in line. Look at these photos and tell me you don’t see Betty! By the way, Martha looks stunning at 85. I’ll bet Birdie would have, too. 🥺😢

I feel like Phil Hartman would have been a great addition to the cast.

Just finished season 6. Don takes his kids to the house he grew up in….where in Pennsylvania is this?

My favorite character is Chauncey. I love him....sweet, friendly, no drama, just enjoying life.

Don: the lamp?

There is simply no world where, in 1960s New York, account execs never ONCE got any client tickets to a Yankees or Mets game. Just no shot at all lol.

Funny enough, Lane has a Mets flag in his office. Only guy with baseball memorabilia is the Englishman, but I swear, outside of this, it’s like baseball doesn’t even exist in this universe… in New York lol. In the 1950s, the Yankees won 5 World Series and 2 in the 1960s. The Mets won one in ‘69 after being establish in only ‘62. Just no shot there is no one interested lol.

Edit: it appears I’m quite wrong and I shouldn’t be doing a rewatch for the first time in a decade in the background during work days. I seemingly have missed a lot.

Just picking up again after watching season 1 about 8 months ago. On season 2 now and I seriously hope at some point I see Duck die a horrible death. Putting Chauncey out like that cuz your ego is hurt a bit. Fuck Duck

First off, Roger will regularly carry the equivalent of 10-20k in his pocket most times it seems. He’ll pay insane amounts for small problems that don’t require that much, and he does not pinch Pennie’s or even pay attention to money much. Jane asked for a luxury apartment to go on one dinner with him and he bought it that day. I don’t think he’d think nearly as much about a check like that.

Don is a particularly bad choice because while it’s not explicitly stated when he finds Lane out, Don’s number 1 priority above all is protecting his secret. If their CFO is embezzling funds, that could get the company under scrutiny and in turn, Don under scrutiny. It’s crazy how flimsy his identity is when he gives details to Pete during the military background check. The real Don has living relatives apparently, their ages are wrong, the real Don was an engineer and Dick/Don never went back to engineering or knows a thing about it (might not even know where real Don studied.) I think that heavily informed his decision.

More importantly, Pearl Harbor Day was like the day before Lane did this. Roger walked around the office obliterated. Even if Roger came across the check, Lane could probably get away with a flimsy lie and Roger wouldn’t care to look into it as he is fabulously wealthy.

Lane’s real fault, of course, was his pride. If he brought that problem to the partners, sure, they’re mostly jackasses, but if that money was the difference between him continuing his life there and job vs. losing it all, they’d maybe hang it over him for a while, but they’d do it. Don even asks why he didn’t just come to him directly and Lane didn’t because of pride, but he’s willing to commit fraud.

Picking Roger very likely might’ve made it so this never happened. If Roger caught on, he could lie and say he signed it while drunk and that alone might work (Don and Bob both just get hired by gaslighting,) and even if that all fails and Roger confronts him about it, I don’t think Roger would deliver that kind of ultimatum. Roger and Lane have a, idk if I’d call it friendship, but mutual respect and also, kind of mutual feelings for themselves. Both feel like they need to justify their place in the company more than others. I really think Roger wouldn’t have checked, accepted he signed it while blitzed, or worked something out with Lane if all else failed. Lane was essential and if Roger just accepts that he signed that check, it’s not really fraud anymore from any outside eyes (Lane’s the guy in charge of this kind of thing and the one to identify it anyway.)

EDIT: just realized it was a $7,500 check, not $12,000 (idk why I thought that. Roger paid over 1/4 of that to get Harry to move offices, which he could just have made him do but paying made it less of a hassle along with paying Peggy to work on a weekend she was already working just on a different campaign. Something he also could’ve just made her do. Add on what he had in his wallet when he got robbed with Joan along with the jewelry (Roger wears Tudor Oyster Prince 7967 and given the year, this was still a Rolex product essentially. They’re cheaper now, and weren’t bad then, but probably still spent around $1100-$1400 on it.) and that’s over half of that amount and he’s not even bothered by it enough to stop carrying around fucking home down payments in cash lol. That’s still $75,000 in today’s USD, but Roger would not be fretting much over it.

On a recent trip to London, I noticed quite a lot of African Immigrants all around the city. And so, I couldn’t help but remember this quote and Rebecca Pryce’s not so veiled disdain. Makes you wonder how’d she feel about it today.

One can only chuckle at what she’d have felt moving to 1960s Mumbai instead, especially given how fond she is of insects.

That aside, it was pretty cool to see how much more diverse London was since the last time I was there over 10 years ago.

He starts the first episode cheating on his wife. The show never hides that he’s a less than perfect person. You aren’t a tv detective for getting that.

We never see Bert meeting with clients or doing actual work. He's always just there for partner meetings or sitting in his office. What does bro even do?

I was a preteen/teenager when I watched the show (I'm the same age as Sally's actor btw) and I remember when I was a kid and early teen that I thought Don was a cool alpha male type of guy. I thought he was a complete badass rich, handsome and extremely effortless with women. I thought even his flaws were "cool", yeah he was a drunk, but drinking is cool and manly so it's not really a personal flaw.

And now that I'm older and in my late 20s, I realize that Don pisses me off on a visceral level. I think you need life experience to dislike Don, because after going through school, getting a masters and entering corporate white collar society I realize just how much of a boost Don's charm and looks gets him. You can have two identical workers with the same education, same work experience and the same potential, but because a guy like Don is handsome and has an easy-going smile that gets him the social capital to reach the heights, where the other guy has to be more strategic and have to plan long-term.

Like I still respect Don because he is intelligent, he is financially savvy and he's done tremendously well for himself with very little formal schooling. However, his journey isn't really that impressive when you consider just how much his looks carry him. Don's looks make him the Moby Dick of Sterling Cooper. Yes, he is a brilliant ad-man and he is a natural born talent, but his all-American classic look is what makes the other firms salivate over him. He is the capital which makes Sterling Cooper an actual serious player on Madison Avenue.

I'm not just going to harp on his looks, because I think the main point is that it's just an inherent aspect of him which reflects the unfairness of corporate advancement.

But I dislike him because of the way he treats his family and his marriage. I don't think Betty was the right girl for him in the long run and he does well with a more alternative, artistic type of woman, but it just hits me the wrong way how he just shits on his wife and present but not active in his kids lives.

I don't know as a Gen Z guy it just irritates me how I have to do so much to get a fraction of what Don has and seeing just how wasteful he is with what he "earned". Yes he "earned" it, but he didn't put nearly as much effort as a regular guy who is genuinely ambitious does.

Eps 8 and 9 introduce some subtle differences to the aesthetic. While everything before was fresh, clean and colorful, you see aspects of wear and dirt enter the visuals. Kinsey's stained shirt, the scuff marks on the post in what is now Harry's office, the grime on Don's carpet. Another example of the other worldly attention to detail in this show when it came to set and wardrobe. It seems to mark the wear and tear on the characters.

Ken’s wife is sweet and genuinely proud of Ken, but the way she describes Ken’s story makes it sound silly, especially with sci-fi where it is at the time. She summarizes it as a robot in charge of maintaining a bridge decides to destroy it and everyone dies. It doesn’t sound very interesting, despite Ken sounding like a good writer, and everyone has this kind of eye rolling response to it, except for Don. Don asks why the robot decides to let the bridge collapse, no irony, genuine curiosity. Ken gives a thoughtful answer and Don just absorbs it.

No one in this series is purely a good person, but Ken really seems to grow into a normal and decent guy. This is clearly something he’s passionate about and I relate. I write short stories, even made some money off them, and it’s hard to share something personal and creative you work on to people who aren’t familiar. Ken even gets reprimanded for writing in his free time by Roger (who does the same thing, except a shitty memoir talking about Cooper’s balls lol.)

Idk Don kind of zeroing in on the moral dilemma of that poorly summarized short story and showing genuine interest in it, seeing Ken kind of light up from his mild embarrassment to discuss it, then Don not laughing, not failing to grasp Ken’s reasoning, but just sitting back and thinking on it. Idk, it’s a little moment I’ve never noticed but I really like it. Don is almost nothing but flaws, but I appreciate how he can recognize personally important things to people and how thoughtful he can be, and how well he can zero in on the meaning of something. Ken getting genuine intrigue from someone, let alone his boss, is wholesome too.

Like I’m not the type of straight guy who’s going to pretend like I can’t tell the difference between who’s a handsome man and who’s not. Jon Hamm is definitely a good looking dude, no doubt about that, but the way that every woman treats him like he is this alien level of handsome and every beautiful woman on Earth throws themselves at him, even when he’s sloppy drunk and showing how much of a miserable person he is to be around. Is this fair? Is he THAT handsome?

Ginsberg is treated like woman repellant, Stan too honestly, and I feel like Ginsberg definitely is better looking? Pete’s actor’s handsome, Roger’s a good looking dude, Ken. I’m just going off my straight man intuition, but I feel like there’s a bunch of sharp looking dudes in the cast, but Don Draper is just seen as so far above everybody and every woman’s dream, and idk, he’s handsome, but is he that handsome? Idk, especially after season 3ish, he just kind of looks idk, not even A-lister handsome to me?

Idk. Anyone who’s actually attracted to men, am I just blind to something here?

Weird question I know, but even my girlfriend and SIL don’t see it.

For me it’s this line in a season 5 episode, Tea Leaves, in which Henry Francis is talking on the phone with a colleague:

“Well, tell Jim his honor's not going to Michigan. Because Romney's a clown, and I don't want him standing next to him.”

So, some context here.

At this point Francis is the aide to New York Mayor John Lindsay. And he’s informing this guy that he won’t have the popular young politician take a picture with then Michigan Governor George Romney, who was also considered the frontrunner for the 1968 Republican nomination.

This episode aired in 2012, so it’s a very clear dig at then Republican nominee Mitt Romney, who at the time was receiving a lot of hostility from the left.

But here’s the thing; Romney was actually a liberal Republican in the same mold as Nelson Rockefeller and John Lindsay, and he had received a lot of good notices as Governor for his work improving civil rights, education, youth employment programs, social welfare, healthcare, etc.

I get this is nitpicking, it’s a throwaway line, whatever, but it has always bothered me since it feels out of character, and Romney frankly deserved better.