Three Up, Three Down: Mad Men, "Time Zones"

Well, it's the start of the first half of the last season of Mad Men, and we've moved into 1969. How's that working out?

Three Up

1. Joan Harris - After listening to Ken complain about how he has no help, Joan freelances a meeting with Butler Shoes, a client who is planning on taking their advertising in-house. With some help from a surprisingly non-lecherous professor, she gets information which helps turn the company's director of marketing around, to the point where he's asking her for advice. Ken calls her out on it, but it's a good step forward for Joan given how she's been marginalized in the past.

2. Megan Draper - Now set up in LA and still married to Don, she's living in the hills and just got a callback for a pilot being shot for NBC. Things aren't perfect - her career has clearly receded since leaving New York, and she's got some anxiety stemming from Don's part-time presence, but things seem to be moving forward for her - except there's some talk about "fixing her teeth," which is blasphemy.

3. Pete Campbell - Of everyone who's decamped to LA, Pete seems to be reacting to it the best. He hates the city (flat, ugly, brown air) but loves the vibe. He's tan, dressed for tennis and has hooked up with a comely real estate agent (who will hopefully get him out of his apartment overlooking the tar pits soon). I'd rank Pete higher if I didn't expect him to Campbell it all up in short order.

Honorable Mention: Margaret Sterling - She invites her father to brunch, where she forgives him for everything. He forgives her back, only getting that she's on some sort of spiritual quest late in the conversation. She seems happy, thus the honorable mention, but I do fear that she's hooked up with some sort of cult.

Three Down

1. Peggy Olsen - Peggy did not get the head of creative position once Don was cashiered, and is now the senior person under some guy named Lou who is both lousy at his job and has all the gaiety of an impacted wisdom tooth. On top of work problems Peggy is now the landlady for the building she bought with Abe, meaning she's stuck in dangerous territory with tenants who send their kids to yell at her about their toilet. Oh, and Ted is back from LA for a visit, which just adds to the problems in both personal and professional areas. Peggy breaks down at the end of the episode, realizing just how isolated she is.

2.  Don Draper - Don's "bicoastal" now, visiting Megan on weekends and such while "working" in New York. That "working" is doing freelance work with Freddie Rumson, who is the public face of the team when making pitches (their pitch for a watch company is the account that Peggy and Lou square off on for most of the episode). Don seems to have some positives here - he rebuffs a woman on the plane with whom he easily could have hooked up, for example - but at the end, sitting alone on his balcony in the cold, we get the bookend of isolation to Peggy. He's married, is getting some work done, but is essentially on his own.

3. Roger Sterling - Roger has turned his hotel room into some sort of commune/ashram/love-in, based on the number of nude people (and their various states of consciousness) in the room when his daughter calls to arrange brunch. His return from brunch shows that Margaret's forgiveness has sparked something in him, suggesting that all the free love and acid he can get isn't going to fulfill him.

Honorable Mention: Ken Cosgrove - it's only been two months since the last episode, so that eye patch may not be permanent, but its appearance does make me nervous. Ken is not having a very good time at work - he's the head of accounts in New York, has to juggle Detroit and LA and has little help - which given his ambivalent nature about his job must be killing him (I'm also guessing that Dave Algonquin hasn't had much time to write). I'd rank Ken higher if they didn't play him for comedy based on his newly limited eyesight.