MadMen Season Episode 5

This week’s episode was a huge shocker for me it was so good. It began with a dinner. Following this dinner at which Don and his boss receive an award called the Newkey, consisting of a horseshoe nailed to a plaque, Don and Betty go home extremely drunk and fall asleep in their clothes, then wake up tremendous hangovers. Don is late for work, but many people compliment him on his award. People in the office even tell him there is a photo of him in an advertising journal but Don says it is a good thing no one reads it. Peggy continues to tell him some people have commented on his lateness by saying his award has gone to his head. Don remark is how rude. Don has a meeting scheduled with his account executives, but only one, Ken Cosgrove, is there. Ken has been showing Peggy the short story he just got published in the Atlantic Monthly. He tells Don about it. Peter Campbell and Paul join the meeting and are surprised to learn that Ken is a writer and that he has published something. Ken tells them about the plots of his two novels, and Paul comments and of course Ken agrees. The meeting officially begins as they discuss a client, a bank that is giving away toasters to new customers. There is a general agreement that this give-away idea is not only stale but targets women who rarely control the family purse strings. Paul and Don come up with the idea of private or executive accounts for men. After the meeting, Peggy tells Don he has a call from Bix Beiderbecke. This turns out to be Midge who tells Don she used the late trumpeter's name because she wants to play the horn. Peggy picks up the phone without remembering that it is still open to the line Don is using. She overhears Midge ask Don to come over to her immediately. Peggy carefully re-cradles the phone. Don comes out of his office and tells Peggy he'll be gone until after lunch. Don and Midge and Midge points out, Don waits until that moment to complain about Midge calling him at work. Don tells her that he likes coming to see her, and she comments that he seems like two different people and that he becomes a different person as soon as he comes into Midge's apartment. The account executives gather in Peter’s office. Pete and Paul are self-pitying and jealous of Ken's success. Pete complains that Ken's father is just a salesman, and Paul wants to know, what difference does that make? But when Pete observes that Ken has been published in a national publication, which his own father reads, Paul agrees, that it hurts. We soon see Ken is talking too many of the secretaries about the novels he’s written and the one that was published. Paul walks in and says he read one and it is good. Saying that he would like to give his girlfriend a copy of Ken's story to read, Paul takes the magazine from Ken and tears out the pages, folds them, and puts them in his breast pocket. Later still, when the two men are alone, Paul apologizes for his behavior, explaining that he just never thought that he was in competition with Ken. You lose, says Ken. At a general meeting, Sterling compliments Ken on finishing something and makes several of his usual comments implying that nobody at the agency really ever does any work. Accounts from previous episodes are mentioned, so we know these are still occurring. Sterling says they will have to wait until after the November elections to see whether the government is likely to take any action against the tobacco industry. The meeting is interrupted by Peggy with a message for Don. A man named Adam Whitman has arrived and is asking for Don. Don looks absolutely stunned and shocked. He leaves the meeting and confronts Adam who says, it’s really is you, Dick. Adam continues to say that he is Don's brother, and he works as a janitor. He found the advertising journal with Don's picture in an office trash can. He had thought Dick was dead. Don tries to deny he is Dick, but Adam doesn’t believe that. Don promises to meet Adam at a coffee shop at noon. Don goes back to the meeting but is so distracted that he almost doesn't respond when he someone is speaking to him.Don meets Adam in the coffee shop. Adam reveals that Don disappeared after the Korean War and that his mother has now died. Don comments, she wasn't my mother and she never let me forget that. Adam says that after his mother died Dad passed, too. Don does not indicate whether he has any feelings about Dad passing. Adam says that, back in 1953, he had thought he saw Dick in his uniform peeking out of a window. He always had a feeling that his brother was still alive. Adam wants to know why Dick left, but Don only says he couldn't go back. Don finally admits that he missed Adam, but he won't tell Adam anything about his life now. When Adam says he wants to be in Don's life again, Don says, NO!!! He gets up to leave and says that this meeting never happened. While all this is happening, Betty and the kids arrive at the office because there is an appointment with a photographer for a family portrait. Peggy panics and seeks advice from Joan about what to do. Joan persuades Peggy to tell where she suspects Don is and Betty thinks Don is with Midge. Joan says Peggy should not have told that but promises she'll never tell. Joan being ever so helpful advises Peggy to keep it simple and just say she forgot to remind Don and to let him come up with his own excuse and that for sure he'll have one. Peggy tries to entertain Betty. At one point of this, Betty makes the remark that Peggy knows Don better than she. Peggy does not say anything. Don returns and says he was at the printers. Peggy tries taking the blame, but Don plays the gracious boss. When he walks out with his family, Peggy is considerably relieved. Peggy talks it over with Joan, telling her this is an odd job. Joan says that this is the greatest job. Pete and his wife, discuss a short story he wrote because if Ken writing his. Pete’s story about is about a hunter and a bear. Trudy thinks it is odd because the bear talks. Pete explains that the bear is not talking; that is just what the hunter thinks the bear is thinking. He would like her to help get it published by using her connection even though Pete knows that Charlie is her ex-lover. Trudy is clearly hurt over being asked to do this but she reluctantly agrees to go see him. Trudy meets with Charlie he propositions her, but she pleads for him to drop it. Trudy reports to Pete that his story is to be published in Boys' Life magazine. Pete is disappointed. They'll probably put it next to an ad for exploding cigars. He whines that his story is good enough for the New Yorker and accuses Trudy of deliberately holding him back. Trudy says she could have gotten it into the New Yorker Pete asks why didn't she? Trudy wants to know asks how he could put her in that position. Pete just pouts, evidently not picking up, or not caring, that Trudy is implying that in order to get his story published in a better magazine she would have had to sleep with Charlie. Don receives an envelope from Adam. It contains a photo of Dick in his uniform with Adam. With it is a slip of paper from a hotel with a note from Adam telling Don his room number is 5-G. Back in the suburbs Betty is talking to Don about her parents' summer home in Cape May and how it is so far away from New York that Don is hardly ever there. She asks Don why he is preoccupied, and he says he is trying to decide whether he must go back to the office tonight. After dinner, Don calls Adam if he will come see him in twenty-five minutes. Don opens a desk drawer and puts an open briefcase on top of the desk. He reaches into the drawer and begins to remove something that you can’t see. Don brings the brief case to Adam's room Adam is ecstatic, saying Don looks more like the person he remembers than he did before. Don asks whether Adam has anyone in his life. Adam answers him no. Adam comments Don's success and says they always said Don was too smart for his own good. Don explains that he has a new life and it only goes in one direction: forward. He opens the briefcase and gives his brother five thousand dollars. Don tells Adam to take the money, leave New York, and never contact him again. Adam says that this isn't what he wanted from Don. Don tells him, this is all I can give you. Don tells Adam to go back to thinking that his brother is dead. He urges Adam to reflect on the fact that with five thousand dollars and how he could make a new life for himself. Don allows Adam to hug him, but Don breaks it off first. When Don get’s home, Betty tells him she knows that Don is uncomfortable about having to use her parents' summer home. Betty suggests that they buy a summer home, closer to New York. Don says that he likes going to Cape May and maybe we can afford to buy a summer home next year. With this the episode ends. But for me it just stirred up so many questions? Like who is Don really? Does Betty know anything? What will happen to Adam?

            The same theme I have seen continued yet again. The theme of adultery plays over and over again. Don cheats on Betty with Midge. Peggy finds out and does nothing except gossip to Joan. This leads me to my next theme. I also saw the gossip train continue. Many so many people in this show talk about each other behind their backs they all talk about each other. The theme of smoking continues. Everyone in this show is a chain smoker.

            The scriptures that come to mind for the adultery is again Hebrews 13:11. Which discuss marriage and how it should be held in honor among all and God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous it says it clearly how adulterers are going to be judged. For smoking I remember 1 Peter 5:8 which says be sober-minded; be watchful. And for gossip I found Leviticus 19:16, Proverbs 11:13; 20:19, Psalms 34:13; and 52:2 which all discuss gossip and the tongue being deceitful on some way.