When someone dies, you make sense of it the way you can.
It's 1970 and Don has resumed his womanizing ways as a bachelor. He has a cryptic dream about Rachel Menken and attempts to reconnect with her, only to learn she recently died of leukemia. He also encounters a waitress named Diana at a diner, convinced they have met before, but she insists they are strangers —- before both having sex with him and confiding in him about her daughter's death two years before.
Following a meeting with Topaz, whose pantyhose product has experienced falling sales, Peggy and Joan attend a business meeting at the McCann Erickson offices, during which Joan is sexually harassed. On the way out, Joan and Peggy argue; Peggy asks Joan why she dresses as she does if she doesn't like the attention, since she's rich and can do anything she wants. Joan decides to go shopping at the boutique where she once worked.
Ferg Donnelly of McCann pays a visit to the SC&P office, where he and Roger fire Ken — seemingly out of spite over the fact that Ken had previously left McCann to join SCDP and had made derogatory remarks about Ferg's Irish heritage. Irked by the fact that Roger did nothing to defend him, Ken subsequently takes over his father-in-law's position at Dow Chemical and informs Roger and Pete that he will actively make Dow a difficult client to them.
Peggy goes on a date with Johnny Mathis' brother-in-law. The date goes well, and the two make impromptu plans to travel to Paris, but these plans are put on hold as Peggy cannot find her passport. The next morning she dismisses the experience as drunken foolishness. Don and Diana finally seem to pursue a relationship.
This episode contains examples of:
- Always Second Best: Topaz, one of the firm's clients, wonders about whether their advertising strategy should be more focused on aping one of their cheaper competitor's lines of thinking. Peggy recommends against this, citing this trope.Peggy: You'll be second, which is very far from first.
- Aren't You Going to Ravish Me?: Of a sort happens and it involves the sexual harassment Joan experiences at the hands of the McCann Erickson men. During the meeting, Joan and Peggy are seriously approaching them about the Topaz account, the men make stocking comments about Joan that the two women ignore, and then finally one of them remarks to Joan how she should model brassieres. Later, after wrapping up the meeting as smoothly as possible, Joan and Peggy get into an argument after Peggy makes the comment that Joan can try dressing a little more conservatively, Joan then makes a nasty comment stating how the men didn't bother Peggy because SHE DOESN'T LOOK LIKE Joan. Peggy angrily tells her off and they fume.
- Back for the Dead: Rachel Menken shows up in Don's imagination, and is later revealed to have passed away. Also an interesting case of Back for the Finale, since it's the first season she's showed up in since the very beginning of the second.
- Bad Boss: Roger does nothing to defend Ken, who's been one of his most loyal and hard-working employees, from Ferg's wrath.
- Best Served Cold: Back in season 4 when Ken jumped ship from McCann Erickson to SCDP he took a valuable account with him and was apparently overheard referring to his former bosses as "black Irish thugs". With McCann Erickson having acquired a controlling share of SC&P they finally get a chance to get revenge, although they wait a few months until Ken's father-in-law retires from Dow Chemical as they don't want to risk losing the business. The very next day, they order Roger to fire Ken.
- Blind Date: Peggy gets set up on one with a co-worker's brother-in-law. It goes along better than expected.
- Call-Back: A date that Don brings back to his apartment spills a glass of blood red wine roughly in the same spot where he hallucinated killing an old flame in "Mystery Date".
- Career Versus Family: Averted in Rachel Menken's life, she had both and was very happy.
- Carpet of Virility: Ken has a fair amount of chest hair.
- Cool Old Guy: What Ed Baxter seems to have grown into over the years. Never has a man been so proud of properly preparing a Pop-Tart.
- Despair Event Horizon: His firing hits Ken hard, and the next day Don finds him siting in a phone booth outside the agency's doors so despondent that he cannot will himself to walk through the doors one last time. Don's concern helps Ken get over this somewhat, but later Pete's It's All About Me attitude to the whole affair pisses Ken off so much that he switches from despair to Tranquil Fury.
- Double Entendre: The McCann Erickson executives who meet with Joan and Peggy release a constant barrage of these throughout the meeting. While the two keep their composure throughout the meeting, it's shown to have annoyed them greatly later on in the episode.
- Dude, Where's My Respect?:
- Ken almost falls into a Despair Event Horizon when he realizes that his years of loyalty and hard work mean nothing to Roger and Pete and that they are willing to throw him to the wolves when McCann Erickson demands that he be fired. Only Don is willing to stand up for him. This is then subverted when Ken discovers that although he gets no respect in the agency, he is very much respected at Dow Chemical where they offer him the position as Head of Advertising in the reshuffle caused by his father-in-law's retirement.
- Joan is getting more and more irate about being treated as eye candy by the clients, instead of as a partner in the firm with significant pull. The meeting with Topaz panty hose leaves her fuming with anger.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: Rachel Menken achieved this before she died. She got the loving husband, the career, the children, the love, and the successful business she was working for in Season One.
- It's All About Me: Pete somehow manages to complain about the way his money from the firm buyout is being given to him in increments in front of Ken, who was just fired.
- Innocently Insensitive: As mentioned above, Pete towards the recently fired Ken.
Aaron Staton revealed in an interview
that this was ultimately Ken's breaking point, and pushed him to take his the job at Dow.- Peggy, when she nonchalantly suggests to Joan that she should know what treatment from men to expect, due to Joan dressing the way she does.
- Laser-Guided Karma: When McCann Erickson request that Ken be fired, Roger simply throws him to the wolves. Pete tries to be sympathetic but will not fight for Ken either, and manages to turn their conversation into another It's All About Me tirade about how Pete is not getting his millions from the buyout fast enough. This mistreatment spurs Ken into action, and he becomes Head of Advertising at Dow Chemical. Now that he represents a vital client of the agency, he is going to make Roger's and Pete's lives hell.Pete: Shit.
- Morton's Fork: After being served an entree that he did not order, Stevie notes that, no matter what he chooses to do next, he'll likely look unattractive in front of Peggy.Stevie: So I can either be a jerk and send it back, or eat it and look weak.
- Mundane Made Awesome: You will never in your life be so proud of toasting a Pop-Tart as Ed Baxter is.
- Named Like My Name: It's revealed in this episode that Mathis's first name is Johnny.
- Nice to the Waiter: Roger is a bit boorish to the diner waitress (Diana) early in the episode. That said, he's pretty quick to realize this and decides to leave a $100 bill (equivalent of $600 today) as a way of covering the group's meal (which cost just over $11).
- No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Ken suffers this from quitting his job with McCann back in season 4 in order to work for SCDP. He was always The Reliable One in the agency, even losing his eye in a hunting accident with clients from Chevy, but when push came to shove, Roger throws him to the wolves.
- Oh, Crap!: Pete's reaction upon hearing that Ken has taken a job at Dow, elevating himself to the status of client. Meaning that now Pete and Roger have to start working on how to please him.
- Retail Therapy: After the disastrous meeting with the pantyhose executives (and the subsequent elevator fight with Peggy), Joan decides to treat herself to a shopping spree. However, one of the shop's employees vaguely recognizes Joan from when she used to work there in Season 3, slightly cutting into the mood.
- Self-Deprecation: Meta example. Ken notes that his recent experiences should provide him with a few good stories for his next piece of writing. Pete tells him that he should stay away from writing about advertising as it's not that interesting note .Pete: This world is boring. You should write an adventure story.
- Shipper on Deck: Stan, for Peggy and Stevie. A lot of it comes from him thinking it would do Peggy some good to relax a little.
- Shirtless Scene: Ken, briefly, walks around in his apartment with his pajama shirt unbuttoned. As noted above, it reveals a fairly nice Carpet of Virility.
- Shout-Out:
- Roger, seeing the diner waitress (Diana) nose-deep in a book, gets her attention by referring to her as "Mildred Pierce". The book she's reading is The 42nd Parallel by John Dos Pasos, the first book of his USA trilogy.
- One executive refers to Harry as "Mr. Potato Head". Said toy — the first to be advertised on television, interestingly enough — had been manufactured since 1952, although the plastic potato body only became part of the toy set in 1965.
- Stock Footage: Don can be seen watching Nixon's Cambodia Incursion Address.
- Time Skip: The previous episode ended shortly after the Moon Landing in the summer of 1969. This one picks up near the end of April in 1970.
- Title Drop: When Ken tells Roger and Pete that he won't need any severance pay, as he's already got a new job lined up.
- The Topic of Cancer: Rachel's sister reveals that leukemia was the sickness that eventually took her. Earlier in the episode, it was revealed that she had stepped down as head of her father's department store a few months beforehand, likely due to treatments or from growing too frail to continue. Interestingly, cancer was what previously had taken Anna Draper, Don's confidant, from him.
- Tranquil Fury: Ken, after taking his father-in-law's old post, delivers this gem to Roger and Pete, completely with a grin on his face.Ken: I'm taking Tom Schafer's old post, Head of Advertising.Ken: No, it's going to be way worse than that; I'm going to be your client. And I hate to tell you, but I'm very hard to please. Till we meet again. [Leaves]Pete: Shit.
- Wall Bang Her: Don and a waitress who reminds him of Rachel, in the alley behind the waitress's restaurant.
- What Have You Done for Me Lately?: Roger's nonchalant attitude towards Ken after the latter learns he's been fired.
- With a Foot on the Bus: Arguably invoked with Ken when he gets sacked, only for him to reveal later that he's now a client, meaning that he's not leaving the show.
- Wrong Guy First: Turns out, Don was this for Rachel. And, as the finale reveals, Stevie for Peggy.
