Aug 282011
This is the Mad Men/Hurricane Irene Open Thread, for all those with an Internet connection and/or television reception.
This morning’s Mad Men showings are: The Wheel, For Those Who Think Young, and Flight One.
Discuss! And stick around during the week for more in-depth discussion of all three episodes.
Damn! In The Wheel, they cut out Ken’s speech where he explains why the most attractive women are the least confident. That was probably his best scene, the one where we can see he’s more than just a haircut. Why did they have to do that? AMC couldn’t do without an extra minute of commercials on a 4 year old repeat?
The Betty/Glenn parking lot scene is still uber-creepy to me.
I’d forgotten that at the end of Don’s genius pitch of the Carousel to Kodak, Harry is dissolving in tears and has to leave (presumably to reconcile with his wife). Perfect little extra touch.
Mel, I didn’t get up to watch it, but I’m sure they also cut out the scene where Pete told Trudy not to use her diaphragm. Those scenes were only aired once. We complained about it bitterly and at length here at the time.
Literally only once. I recall the night The Wheel first aired–I had 3 shows I wanted to watch at the same time that night. My DVR would only record two at once, so I recorded the Mad Men rebroadcast (it showed first at 10pm, and then rebroadcast immediately at 11). Then when Roberta and I discussed the episode, it became apparent she’d seen a scene I hadn’t. JUST AN HOUR LATER.
We were pissed.
It is on the DVDs of course and I’m sure it’s streaming on Netflix.
^
Yes, I remember that. I was confused at the time, akmost thinking I’d imagined Ken’s speech when it wasn’t there in the 11PM rebroadcast. I was glad that this blog was here to explain what had happened.
I know that more and more people see the older eps on DVD and online now, and that it will become the only way in the furure, but it still makes me mad . Hell, it still annoys me when I watch a Buffy the Vampire Slayer rerun and remember a good line from the orignal airing that’s been cut out.
When I was a teen, I watched Star Trek every evening at 5pm on WPIX Channel 11 in New York. I had, for the most part, never seen them during their original airings, and didn’t remember if I did (I was a little tot).
Around my senior year in high school, WPIX apparently purchased a different Star Trek package or something. Lines I remembered were gone, but WHOLE SCENES that I’d NEVER SEEN were suddenly airing. It was thrilling.
^
That reminds me of my most recent viewing of The Barefoot Contessa (1954) on TCM. In his voice-over narration at the beginning, Bogart introduces the billionaire Curt Edwards (played by Warren Stevens) as a poor litle rich boy who’d inherited all his money. But every time I’d seen the movie before, the narration said he was an up-from-the-bottom guy who’d made himself rich. I stll don’t know which version is the original. The funny thing is that the character works either way: You’re prompted either to have contempt for Curt and ascribe his vicious acts and attitude to his never having suffered like the rest of us do, or you’re told that it’s because, no matter how rich he has become, he’s still a gutter-fighting bastard.
Don’s pitch in The Wheel is my choice for best scene evah on MM. When I think of Don, this is who I’ll always remember him as. DD uber alles. He’s selling you a dream, but his hidden well of sentimentality and decency, for a brief shining moment, comes through. The Carousel serves as my ‘forever’ tableau. Obtw; how insanely talented is Ann Dudek?
One scene I cannot and have not really fathomed is where Peggy, in the tryouts for the Relaxa-sizer, is intentionally cruel to the woman during the audtion. At least, it seems to to be, or she is being obtuse to her own behavior. Is it revenge by the plain girls aginst the beautiful ones? Or something else I’m not getting.? Help needed –cogent analysis please!
You know what, Paul? You’ve inspired a post!
Peggy is too business minded to think of some plain Jane revenge against beautiful girls plot, imho. She so wants to get every aspect of her ‘account’ right that she really is obstinate in her behavior toward the voice-over talent. Plus, her added annoyance at what she thinks is Ken’s condescending comments about the inverse relationship between beauty and confidence that she wanted THAT specific girl for the job. Kenny’s choice was correct from the outset, but Peggy was determined to prove him wrong, and proceeded to grind that actress into dust while doing so. When Pegs acquiesces, and tells Ken to bring back his choice he pats her on the head! She deserved that for being so closed-minded. Also for being a dick to that actress. Hope this was worth reading.
#8–rewatching this episode, I couldn’t figure out what the actress was doing wrong. She sounded OK to me until Peggy started in on her.
By the way, have you all noticed that Excedrin is showing the 2005 EM commercial again?
I don’t know, was it Peggy being deliberately cruel just because she could? I always read the scene as her just having no frigging idea what was going on. She’s 20 years old. She’s had it drilled into her all these years that beauty is everything, and she’s gained all this weight and doesn’t know why (though she will in a few hours!), and has been the butt of jokes and bourne the brunt of criticism from gorgeous Joan over it — Joan, who thinks a secretary “doing well” means the guys all want to boink her. Of course Peggy would think, “Oh, Annie’s gorgeous, she’ll have no problem selling this!”, not realizing that the sound she wants is never going to come out of Annie, because that’s from the inside. She looks genuinely embarrassed when Annie leaves the room in tears, at least to me, as she sheepishly tells Ken he was right.
I look at The Wheel as the episode where Old Peggy died and New Peggy was born; just on that very day, just about everything she thought she knew was revealed to be wrong.
[...] The Wheel, Basketcase Paul Jefferson asks: One scene I cannot and have not really fathomed is where Peggy, in the tryouts for the [...]