I hate to make it sound like I love an airplane crashing, but it serves to show how incredibly detailed Matthew Weiner is in his construction of Mad Men. It's approximately 2 weeks after last week's time placement, as Flight 1 crashed on March 1st of 1962. I don't imagine he's going to format every show this way, but anyone think of another scripted show, whether drama or comedy, that has ever illustrated this kind of between-episode time passage so lucidly?

Some things:
Don has always called Betty "Bets" as a nickname. Also "Birdie."

It's the sister, not the mother, who appears to be raising Pete-spawn.

You know, the more I think about that Joan and Paul and Sheila scene...Paul started out by pretending he'd never met Joan's boyfriend, and making a mean joke about him, and THEN Joan got catty.

Just to chime in ... I must say that the scene in which Pete admits that he has yet to cry, and subsequently his seeking out of some form of solace, is one of the best crafted scenes I've personally seen in this series.

Pete, as we have come to know him, is sly, cold and calculating (summed up perfectly in his ironically off-color joke about the crash), however in this scene we see a vulnerability that has yet to surface. Here we see him searching for an emotional outlet; at first he considers his wife, then glances over at Peggy, and then finally goes to "papa" Don, who turns him away. In Pete's world, as I gather was the case for many men and women of this generation who put as much time into presenting a stable "front" as coping with their own weaknessess and fallibilities, he bottles up the anger, sadness and grief to "put on a face" for American, and thus mask his pain in the immediate shadows of his father's tragic end. This, no doubt will factor into his character development throughout the season.

Shel, thanks for that. And how terribly awful. But thanks...

I thought that the scene was brilliant. Here you have an all-appearances, tight-ass, dysfunctional waspy to the utmost family, and I thought it was portrayed perfectly. I thought that the pink elephant moment was stunning. Just the kind of controlled, random mini-meltdown that hints at a woman whose world has just crashed down, but who feels strongly that decorum must be maintained.

I don't know about the Laura thing, but I do know that Weiner likes changing her name up. Sometimes Don calls her Birdie. I think it has something to do with the idea that she doesn't have much of an identity; she'll take whatever you throw her way.

I've noticed in both episodes that Betty is now being called Bets and Betsy. This is such an odd alteration, did anyone else pick up on it?

I'm trying to figure out why the change and here's my theory. Matthew Weiner mentioned that one of the things influencing his creation of Mad Men was The Dick Van Dyke Show. In season one, Mary Tyler Moore's character was called Laurie. Then it was changed to Laura and never explained. She remained Laura forever. Could Weiner be doing an homage -- very slyly -- to that show by changing Betty to Betsy?

Any thoughts?

Anyone else think that the only thing funnier than Paul with a beard is Paul with a beard and ascot?

Last year, we lost my little sister suddenly. It was the first time I'd ever really had to deal with that type of grief. I thought the scene with Pete's family together was amazingly accurate. No one knew what to say, people noticed stupid things - like that elephant, people sat around uncomfortably, silently. My step-mother was overcome with grief and tried to focus, almost randomly, on other things in the room that she'd somehow never noticed before.
Having just gone through that type of unexpected, sudden death in the family, I commend the writers for their accuracy. But I'm sad for them as well - it means at least one of those writers has lived through that type of situation recently. It's horrid, and awkward, and uncomfortable. And the scene was just so accurate.

I loved the rest of the show as well - I wish I could find something wrong with the show. I loved seeing Peggy's absolute denial that the child is a part of her, and her sheer ambivalence at holding the baby. And I do love Betty - she's a tv character that I actually worry about.

wasn't it Mohawk airline that went down, this is my first ep of Mad Men and i love it

Duck's move just underscores what hasn't changed in advertising over the years: that an account guy would sell his mother, his left kidney AND his soul just for the chance to be at the table for a new business pitch. The shamelessness of Duck using Pete is nothing new...or perhaps it was new in 62 and in 2008 is just chalked up to "tradition."

I'm with LW--Duck doesn't actually care about Pete one way or another, but built him up so that he could use him to land an account...which would not only cement his own standing at S-C, but would knock Don off a perch. It's clear that Duck and Don don't get along.

And, as I've observed elsewhere, Pete didn't simply pimp his own father's death to further his career, or out of the pain at Don's rejection: he actually used the death of his advertising-hating father (a fact the script carefully reminded us of) to further himself in the very career his father hated. That was pure, sweet revenge.

This was a well-constructed episode, with fewer of the flaws I've griped about in episodes past, and more lovely observations. The Draper kids, sitting on the stairs listening to the grown-ups, when they should have been in bed, was a lovely touch and--as discussed over on Alan Sepinwall's excellent Mad Men thread--as true to its period as it would be implausible today. I also really liked the way they're showing Don and Betty's changed relationship: now it's DON who will do anything to avoid a fight, and who sits by impotently (oops! again?) as his wife lights up outside. He calls her Bets now, all the time, never Birdie. Their dynamic has shifted considerably.

I felt for Don at the end, with Henry Lamont from Mohawk. Lamont said Don fooled him, when Don was actually being sincere--the man who has built almost an entire adult life on fooling everyone around him.

There has also been some discussion over at the Sepinwall blog on the woman at the very end: was she a particularly attentive waitress, or a hooker? I tend to think the latter, myself.