First Impressions: Mad Men 5.x

All the pretentious Mad Men fans like to go on and on about the time jumps between season of Mad Men and how they are able to guess when the new season is taking place in no time, and this was actually the first time I actually cared enough to realize how far ahead the show went when I noticed that Baby Gene was still a baby. Although I almost thought the show went backwards in time after seeing Bobby Draper managing to get younger.

So here we are about six months later (I am still not pretentious enough to pin down the exact length of time) and apparently the new car smell might be wearing off the new Draper nuptials. As previous notch in his bedpost Dr. Miller so aptly predicted last season, Don only likes stuff that are new (she also correctly predicted he would be married within a year early last season). Note to any secretary who marries her boss who happens to have stolen someone else’s identify, throwing him a surprise party for his fake birthday may not be the best idea no matter how many awkwardly awesome Zoo Be Zoo dances you do for him at the party.

But more surprising than his party is that the marriage may actually work. Megan can play the mother that Don has be searching for all his life by monitoring his alcohol intake and she will even clean the apartment in her underwear (I bet she is up for punching him in bed too). You know that is something Betty (who thankfully was absent for the first two hours) would never do, mostly because that is something for the help and if she were to do it, she would dress in her Sundays best while doing it. Megan is Don’s mother, wife, and mistress all rolled into one. I may even take the under for number of women Don has sex with this season. Has Vegas even released their Mad Men prop bets yet?

I have long thought that Peggy Olsen would end up being the new Don Draper, she has her own secret life, but I am wondering if Pete Campbell may be filling those shoes who thanks to Peggy’s secret has his own (even if we have not seen or heard about him for about two season). And when he walked into him home in the suburbs, I actually had visions of his own Draper Manor and now has the same amount of kids as Don had during season one and even started feuding with Roger Sterling. All he needs now is his own unattractive bohemian mistress.

But the reason I continue to watch Mad Men after the boring first two seasons, is that around the third it surprisingly got funny. Well that and everyone could use more Annie Edison in their lives. There was plenty to laugh at. Bert Cooper arguing with Peggy’s hippie boyfriend, Roger and his teen bride ruining the surprise party, Lane continuing to be a creepy perv to poor effect, the unintended result of SCDP’s help wanted ad, the bean ballet, the partner’s meeting Pete’s office, Roger’s first meeting with his baby and how the baby got around, and Harry Crane’s recreation of Megan’s dance. Zoo Be Zoo indeed.

Mad Men airs Sundays at 10:00 on AMC. You can download Mad Men on iTunes. You can even buy the Zoo Be Zoo song sung by Megan Draper herself on iTunes.