MAD MEN JOAN SERIES
MAD MEN JOAN TV

He gives up drinking, gives in to drinking, gives it up and comes back to it all over again. Mad Men always brought Don to the brink of real change, only to yank him back again. The more we get to know Don Draper - the man, the constructed myth, the self-destructive legend - the less surprising it is that he returns again and again to an Old Fashioned.ĭon’s journey over seven seasons of Mad Men is one of a man who wanted with all his might to be a different person - something made literal in the first season, as it was revealed “Don” was a facsimile hiding “Dick Whitman,” the scared boy who grew up in a brothel and crafted himself a new, sleeker identity after the Korean War. The fact that this is Don’s drink of choice is a little on the nose, but in true Mad Men fashion, that detail is also meticulously chosen. He grills a waiter about his favorite cigarette brand, marveling at the man’s seemingly unshakable loyalty, and then orders another drink. Mad Men’s very first scene has Don Draper sitting in a restaurant booth, surrounded by smoke and other “Mad Men” who make their livings selling American dreams as he scribbles pitches for Lucky Strike on a napkin. Don Draper’s story is one of a man who desperately wanted to transform himself - and never could This picture could be from any season of Mad Men, and you’d never know the difference. Just as much as Mad Men knew Don Draper would never change, it discovered that its women - especially Peggy and Joan - were destined to take the kinds of journeys he never could. Eventually, all three women reveal rich inner lives their male counterparts never bothered to consider were there, and create the kind of lives they once assumed they never could have.įor as much as Mad Men was about the cyclical frustrations of petty men, it was also about the determination and creativity of women. In fact, as per creator Matthew Weiner, Joan’s original purpose was just to be a “courtesan” who taught people the ways of the office. And while Peggy’s storyline in season one develops into an obvious parallel to Don’s as she reveals a knack for advertising, Joan was never supposed to become the powerhouse she became down the line. Betty Draper is barely a blip on the radar, only appearing in the final minutes of the episode as the twist of Don’s suburban life. When we first meet Peggy Olson and Joan Holloway, they’re secretaries who know they’re smart, but are also staring down an endless row of grinning frat-guy superiors and trying to be realistic about their chances of success beyond their assigned desks.

MAD MEN JOAN TV

Mad Men didn't change TV as much as you'd expect. The women of Mad Men, however, are an entirely different - and far more dynamic - story.

MAD MEN JOAN SERIES

Sure, the writers and actors finessed their depictions along the way, but nothing about where each of those characters ended up by the series finale would have surprised anyone who met them in the first episode. Mad Men always knew who world-weary Don Draper was, who petulant prepster Pete Campbell wanted to emulate, who cavalier heir Roger Sterling was thrilled to be. Looking back at the pilot of Mad Men - which premiered on AMC 10 years ago this Wednesday - isn’t quite like looking back at the pilot of most shows, which tend to be almost hilariously different from whatever came later, when the series figured out what it actually wanted to be. Those patterns could be anything from the liquor they kept in their desk drawers to the women they slept with to the larger worldviews that kept them anchored to their own pasts - and, more often than not, ensured they sank. No matter how many times the men of Sterling Cooper (Draper Pryce) tried, the series always sent them back to the self-destructive routines they knew best. Mad Men was always a show about men who didn’t - or couldn’t - change.

Mad men joan