Geroni-no

We weren't even 24 hours clear of Don Draper showing his kids the whorehouse where he grew up when the latest Internet theory about Mad Men hit the ether: Don Draper is D.B. Cooper. And while this is much more cogent than all of the Megan Draper as Sharon Tate nonsense, how likely is it that Don will end the series by going into free-fall over the Pacific Northwest? Let's unpack this theory.

All of the airplane imagery points to this. Yes, airplanes feature prominently in the show. But this is also the period where air travel began to open to the masses, and you see the start of the growth curve in air operations.The 1950s and '60s also saw double digit growth in US commercial aviation. As mentioned on the show, having an airline in one's portfolio, even a regional airline like Mohawk, was second only to a car company in terms of profitability and status. It would be unusual if an airline didn't figure prominently in the show.

Air imagery in other areas worked to drive other plot points. Having Pete's father die in the American Airlines Flight 1 sets up a decade of failure for Pete. Ted Chaough's plane gives him a form of power over Don (remember how nervous Don was during their flight) and furthers Ted's relationship with Peggy when they're socked in during a visit to Ocean Spray. And North American Aviation served as a wedge between Pete and Don due the background check Don would need.

I'm thinking all of this is selection bias. If you want Don to be D. B. Cooper, you're going to start seeing planes everywhere, and give them more significance than intended.

Did this season really mirror the first season? Critical to this theory is that this past season brought characters back to season 1, and as season 2 started with the AA1 crash, this final season would also include a historically pertinent airline-related story line. I think there is something to this season sending characters towards their origin, but with a significant difference:

• Don is cheating on his increasingly restless young wife, but with Megan the cheating isn't serial (as far as we know it's limited to Sylvia), and her restlessness is as much about her career than it is about her marriage.
• Peggy's feeling for Ted are much deeper that what she had for Pete, and has now become incredibly relevant at work as she's the highest ranking creative person in New York (for now, at least)
• Joan has more real power at work as a partner, but has less influence based on the open secret of how she earned her partnership and on her stagnant career path (compare her position to Peggy's).
• Pete's knowledge of Bob's identity has done more to actively hurt him than his knowledge of Don's identity. By not exposing Bob, Pete lost the Chevy account, lost his mother to Bob's partner in crime, and is heading to California in whatever counts for shame in his head.
• Betty looks like her old self, but now has a protector-husband in Henry, enjoys the glamor of being a politician's wife, and is even Sally's preferred parent.
• Duck Phillips is "around," but is unlikely to still be around once a new creative person is installed at SC&P. His initial meeting with Pete makes it clear that his work as a headhunter fits him better than advertising ever did.
• The agency is Sterling Cooper & Partners. And the partners may be making all the difference here. If it were just up to Roger and Bert, they may have found a way to keep Don on board in the wake of the Hershey's pitch. But you throw in Pete (who has never liked Don), Joan (who is likely still angry with Don for firing Jaguar), Cutler (who was suggesting a coup back when Don and Roger were in California), and Ted (whose relationship with Don is, at best, rocky), and Don's ouster is much easier to rationalize.

Where this leaves Don, then, is back before we ever met him, Don Draper the unemployed. And instead of trying to burnish his Draper persona to make it more real, he's opening up about his past and potentially creating something new. What we have in this list (and with Don in his new open about his past persona), is a 2.0 version of the characters and institutions that frame the show.

The shedding of Don Draper. There's the idea that Don has been shedding his assumed identity since Anna's death in season four, and there's something to that. He was up front with Megan about who he was, and he's made references to growing up on a farm and in Pennsylvania. But it could be that the shedding and the death references - from the Royal Hawaiian ad to Don winding up in that pool in the Hollywood hills - were showing Don where he was heading if he did not open up. Which leads to...

The two Don Drapers print ad. My interpretation of the ad, then, is that the Don with his back to us is the Don we've seen up to now, protecting his fake identity and heading the "one way" that path leads (to the cops who are arresting him, or waiting for someone to claim his body after he jumps from his apartment balcony?). The Don that's facing us is looking askance at that Don, and is being led in a different direction by the woman whose hand he's holding. It could be Megan leading Don to California (by way of separation and firing), Sally leading Don to be more open about his past, Betty leading Don to realize his emotional deficits, or even Joan leading Don to realize that his impulsive decisions cause more harm than good (I'd list a Peggy variant here, but Peggy would only wear something that sheer for Ted). The ad, then, rather than showing a Don who is disappearing, is showing a Don who is taking a different path (or is showing Don 1.0 disappearing to allow Don 2.0 to emerge).

But Don looks like D. B. Cooper! And acts like him! Well, they do dress similarly, and both keep their hair slicked, but it's hardly an unusual look for the period. And I really don't think the Cooper sketch looks much like Don at all. As for how the two men act, based on the accounts of the skyjacking both are cool under pressure. But is it enough to get Don to skyjack a plane? It seems like a bridge too far. Also, would Don ever cut his bourbon with soda? In any case, whatever similarities the two men have, I think there's still a major obstacle to this theory.

The Cooper skyjacking took place in 1971. While I don't think it's a stated parameter, Mad Men is about the '60s. It starts in March 1960 and uses historical events to anchor the timeline or directly influence the plot. Jumping into the 1970s would be a disruptive narrative shift out of tone with the rest of the series. It's much more likely that the series would tie its end to something like Altamont, the concert whose violence and disorder is informally considered the end of the '60s. But even if we overlook this, there would still be a lingering question.

Why would Don hijack an airplane? The piece suggests that both Don and Cooper exist in an isolated emotional state, and that both need to do something dramatic just to feel something. That's possible (though it's a complete assumption with regards to Cooper, and suggest a deeper void in Don than we've seen), but it would completely go against Don's nature to disappear in such a public fashion. He's much more likely to take a cue from his Royal Hawaiian poster and disappear into the sea, literally or figuratively. Assuming he's cashed out of his partnership, he'd have enough money to live on if he chose to disappear for good.

We have no idea what sort of Don Draper - if any - we're going to wind up with at the end of Mad Men, but I think the signs point more towards Don 2.0, a synthesis of Dick Whitman and Don Draper whose ultimate disposition will be written in this final season.