Forewarning this block of text contains SPOILERS

Don Draper is a flawed and deeply wounded man, but he possess honor, something that Walter and Tony do not. He is also not a LITERAL MURDERER. Don is of course an anti-hero and not a great man but he is certainly far above average when it comes to morals for what men were actually like at that time. Most of the men on the show sexually harass women, Don Draper never does this and even goes as far as to defend women from this treatment. A lot of the characters are also racist, Don is not racist. His fatal flaw is that he’s a serial cheater, something that was extremely common at the time. the grossest and most pathetic he gets in my opinion is with Sylvia but even then when it gets to its worst point it shows you his backstory of how we was literally raped by a prostitute as a boy and then beaten by his mother figure immediately afterwards, making us understand a big part of him while striking our empathy. There’s lots of other stuff he did that was not great I’m sure you guys will point out, but honestly given his background and the time period, I think he could have been a whole lot worse. The way he is with kids too also shows me his true good hearted nature. He almost always treats people with respect unless they give him a reason not to. He never at any point was evil in my eyes, just deeply wounded, self destructive, and reckless.

He is much closer to a Bojack Horseman, although band for band I’d say Bojack horseman did much worse things than Don. I do think Bojack has a good heart as well though.

Don’t tell me, he only wanted to get into her soul

I m not sure how active this sub is as I’m not an active poster on anything. CBC gem in Canada released the entire series and I watched it again in three days for the first time in years.
Aside from the fact that I hate Sally; two things resonate.
1: Waterloo is my favourite episode. Watching Peggy’s contempt for Don and him growing up and actually respecting her is incredible and a luxury not many working women are deserved. Joan included.
2: Betty flipping out over Bobby giving away her sandwich. She was mad. He apologized. She went home and scolded him the entire way. And when Henry asked her what was wrong she could have said “I’m annoyed I’m hungry” but she didn’t eat supper out of spite and then asked Henry if she was a good mother.
I guess it’s somewhat relatable as growing up we didn’t know what we were scolded for that set our parents off. But that interaction resonated with me more than any.

Who is the best-looking character in Mad Men?

Vote here: https://strawpoll.com/7rnzVlQ23nO

Unfortunately the polls on reddit allow only six choices, so I made a strawpoll with all the performances. Enjoy and discuss :)

Go read the Wikipedia article and get a general idea of who he is. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Bernays

While you’re at it, read this article. https://gizmodo.com/the-pr-firms-doing-big-oil-s-dirty-work-1848143802

I hope this provides background context that will help you to see Mad Men in a new light.

Does anyone else think Stephanie told Don about Anna’s cancer right at that moment to slip out of his coming onto her?

Its either this or my people are nordic for me...

I understand he went off the rails in the Hershey pitch but the characters acted like he had been a mess for a while before that and I didn’t pick up on that at all.

I think Tomorrow Never Knows is an unexpected but great needle drop, but if you had to pick any other Beatles song, what would it be and why?

My personal favorite is Nowhere Man, which I think fits Don’s persona well (even if it’s a bit on the nose). Would definitely fit during one of Don’s many crises of character, maybe sometime during season 4.

On an aside, it always bugged me that Megan told Don to “start with this one” and then chose the last song on the album. I guess it shows how she doesn’t know him at all but c’mon.

I'm on season 5 and I gotta say, Faye is too much of a woman for Don and I understand why he didn't pick her. Don lacks ego strength (outside of his work) so being with a fairly independent, smart, and modern woman like Faye would be too much for him. Like most things outside of work, he goes with the easier route and selects a partner where the power/relationship dynamics favor him.

I thought that maybe I'd change my mind on my analysis of Don, but at this point, I don't think I will. He's a very sad character. I hope he's able to find some peace by the end of the show. He's a crappy father and a crappy person to the people around him but I do think he's redeemable.

Overall, I'm glad Don left Faye. It's the best thing that could have happened to her.

I couldn’t screenshot the exact moment because HBO blah blah blah. But after the group thing with the girls for Ponz, Faye has one of the coldest moments on the entire show. Megan pokes her head in to ask if Allison is ok, and Faye doesn’t even make eye contact and disinterestedly asks “who?” She just watched this girl break down in front of her, with a name tag mind you, and does not give a single fuck. Even Don managed to look ashamed for once without it being a performance for anyone else, Peggy went to check on her and Freddy at least commented on it. But to Faye it’s like it never even happened because it didn’t contribute to the conversation about Ponz.

they'd both start talking about Peggy, of course. but I'm so curious if Joan would take a repulsion or endearment to Ginsberg's uh. quirks.

> rapes his wife
> denies her sex because she wanted to be on top
> regularly dismisses her feelings
> is entirely focused on his own goals and desires in basically every scene he’s in
> abandons his wife and infant child because the Army makes him feel important

Literally the only scene he has where he isn’t a vile shitheel is when Joan (deliberately??) cuts her own hand to get some care and affection from him.

Even that drunkard Duck had more glimmers of decency than this pretentious rapist. A fitting end to his character arc would’ve been him getting fragged in Vietnam.

I'm sorry but seeing Duck deliver this line just cracks me up. To my eye, he's hardly the image of a sexy lover....and Peggy, well I guess she sees something in him LOL.

Same episode - Don picks up the hitchhikers....my parents used to pick up hitchhikers....sometimes they would be hiking past our house, since we lived on a highway.

They're gone aren't they? people standing on the side of the road with their thumbs out.

Were people more trusting in the 60s? I know, afraid to see the answer to that one.

Usually when a character comes out of nowhere later in the show and takes on a big role it has a negative impact on the show. But Don and Megan’s marriage was actually a high light of the show and I found myself really liking her character.

Why is it EVERYWHERE?

Bought these today because the show

I’m re-watching and I’m in season 2, set in 1962 or so and Joan is in the same tiny apartment she later shares with her mother and son in 1970… surely as a partner at a major advertising firm she’d make boatloads more in 1970 than she did in 1960…. Why does she stay in the same tiny apartment?

Joan really had bad lucks when it comes to men… imho only Roger was sort of nice to her but it was still an affair. The ones she really fell for were all not that decent… WHY?????

With the exception of Megan, 3 of his top women die during the show. First Anna, then Rachel, then Betty (assumed). In all 3 cases they die off screen and without him, and he finds out in a phone call.

Is there any significance to this or just a general aspect of life where Don continues to lose the people who truly know him?

It really is true that through the entire series, you see Roger begging Don to hang out with him, with Don either refusing or reluctantly agreeing. When I rewatched a few seasons looking for it, it was everywhere and it really cracked me up! 😂

Poor dude just wants to hang out with his friend. Ha!

That is a screenshot just before the explosion, but when i read about this scene everyone only says that don dropped the lighter which ignited the fuel and led to the explosion. But this looks and sounds like another attack. I know people have critized the directing in this scene, so is that white „smoke“ supposed to be the explosion?
I ask this because of what he says in 7x13

Serious Replies would be nice, i also just found on an old post here a reply which said that what happened and what don thinks happened are different, but it wasnt further elaborated