Ken is involved in a car accident with drunken Chevy executives that leaves him walking with the aid of a cane. He tells Don, Ted, Jim and Roger that Chevy has rejected yet another of the new firm's ideas. Don gets a call from Sylvia, who chastises him for loitering outside her apartment and says she's now more afraid of him than she is of her husband finding out about their affair. After hanging up, Don throws the phone against the wall and has a coughing fit. The CGC people are distraught by the news that Frank Gleason has died. With Ted taking the weekend off out of grief, Jim decides to bring in a doctor friend to inject everyone with an "energy serum" which will give them between one and three days of "uninterrupted creative focus, energy, and confidence" in order to get some serious work done on the Chevy account.
From there, things get seriously weird.
After racing Jim around the office, Stan challenges all comers to an arm-wrestling contest. Don tells Ken that he will have to brainstorm many ideas and that he (Don) must be able to look the Chevy execs in the eye. Ken responds by stating his responsibilities while doing a soft-shoe tap dancing routine. Don then goes to see the creative team and gives a rousing speech, following which he leaves the room, has an idea and goes back ... only to find that a day has passed and that, in addition to the team, there's now a hippy called Wendy (later revealed to be Frank's daughter) in the office.
Don calls Megan to say he'll be working late. This angers Megan, as she's got to go to a casting dinner and so has to leave the children (who are visiting this weekend) in the apartment on their own. After the boys go to sleep, Sally hears someone in the apartment. The intruder is an elderly black woman who introduces herself as Ida and claims to have raised Don, making her Sally's "grandma". Sally's sceptical, but Ida tries to ingratiate herself. When Bobby wakes up, Ida asks him about a gold watch of Don's that she wants to fix for him. Sally tries to call the police, but Ida grabs the phone and convinces them that it's a prank call. Eventually, she leaves.
Don experiences a flashback to his teens when he and his stepmother were living in Mac's brothel. The young Dick is ill, forcing Abigail to make him sleep in the basement. However, one of the prostitutes, Aimee Swenson, takes pity on him and nurses him back to health in in her room, feeding him soup. Dick's fever eventually breaks, at which Aimee's behavior towards him turns overtly sexual, as she lies down next to him and asks him if he wants to know "what the fuss is all about"; Dick, though clearly very uncomfortable with the situation, is still weak from his fever and reluctantly acquiesces. Aimee is subsequently thrown out by Mac for taking Dick's "cherry", while Dick is beaten by Abigail who assumes that it was his fault. This is shown to have formed the basis of an advertising campaign for soup that Don ran in the late 1950s with the slogan: "Because you know what he needs".
Back at the agency, Stan is injured in a throwing game and has his wound treated by Peggy. After she turns down his advances, Stan tells her that his cousin Robbie has been killed on active service. Peggy tells him that he shouldn't allow his grief to be an excuse for drugs and sex. She's happy when he makes a compliment about her looks, though. Don calls Peggy and Michael into his office. He says he has a great idea but is unable to articulate it. Frustrated, Peggy leaves his office to find Jim spying on Stan and Wendy having sex in one of the other offices.
Don eventually goes home, although he seems to be preparing to talk with Sylvia. In the apartment, he finds Megan, Betty, Henry, the children and a police officer who tells him what has happened. Betty scolds Don for leaving the children alone, and he faints.
The next morning, Don encounters Sylvia in the elevator; both say nothing. Don calls Sally to tell her he's okay, and admits that what happened was his fault as he left the apartment door unlocked. Sally says that she's realised that she actually knows nothing about him. Ted is greatly disappointed in the results of the weekend, noting that much of the "work" produced is useless. Don stands his ground, arguing that automobile accounts have not been good for the company: "Every time we get a car, this place turns into a whorehouse".
This episode contains examples of:
- All for Nothing: Jim's idea of getting a doctor to inject most of the staff with the "energy serum" does not produce the hoped-for result; Ted describes most of the "work" that got done as "gibberish", in which even the word "Chevy" was mis-spelt. Worse still, had Don not been injected, he would have likely gone home at a reasonable hour which would have averted Ida's break-in.
- Blatant Lies: Ida tells Sally that she's her grandmother, in spite of her being black. Sally doesn't believe her at all, but she can't catch her in a trap since she doesn't know anything about Don's life.
- Butt-Monkey: Ken is clearly this to the Chevy executives.
- Comically Missing the Point: Bobby, on being told that Ida is apparently his grandmother.Bobby: Are we Negroes?
- Dark and Troubled Past: Don's life in the brothel is explored a bit further in this episode. He was taken care by one of the whores when he had a fever. After he recovered, she raped him. She's later kicked out of the brothel for withholding payments to the pimp, but she screams out loud that she took Don's virginity. For this, Dick's beaten by his step-mother.
- Do Not Do This Cool Thing: In-universe: Peggy tells Stan that he shouldn't use his grief as an excuse for doing drugs and having casual sex. He's already on drugs when she says this, and he later hooks up with Wendy (who is also grieving).
- Double Standard Rape: Female on Male: Played for Drama when young Dick is subjected to this after Aimee rapes him. As Aimee is being kicked out of the brothel by Mac, she boasts that she "took that boy's cherry". Abigail immediately jumps to the conclusion that it was Dick's own fault somehow and beats him with a wooden spoon while calling him "filthy" and "disgusting".
- Dr. Feelgood: Jim's friend Dr. Hecht doesn't bother with medical examinations before injecting people with his special "energy serum" which is implied (although not outright stated) to contain amphetamines. When Roger brings up his history of heart trouble, it's casually brushed aside. Truth in Television, as there really were doctors who did this sort of thing at the time, most notably Robert Freymann, a New York doctor known for dispensing vitamin B-12 shots laced with amphetamines to a wealthy clientele note .
- Drugs Are Bad: While Dr. Hecht's the "energy serum" gives everyone who takes it a huge burst in creativity, the output is all uniformly terrible and unusable.
- Everybody Must Get Stoned: To help get everyone through a working weekend, Jim brings in Dr. Hecht who injects most of the employees with an "energy serum" in order to inspire them to new heights of creativity. He's is coy about what his concoction actually contains, but it is strongly implied that there are amphetamines in it. Ted, Peggy and (possibly) Ginsberg are the only characters who are present but don't take it.
- Foreshadowing: One of the Chevy executives fires a gun next to Ken's head, just to see his reaction. It's not long before he will actually get shot by one of them.
- It's All My Fault: As a result of the home invasion by Ida:
- Sally feels immense guilt about how she handled the home invasion. Don calls her the next day to assuage her guilt.
- Megan feels guilt as well because she left the kids at home in order to attend a casting dinner.
- Don left the back door to the apartment open thanks to his wanting to sneak to talk to Sylvia.
- Jerkass: The Chevy executives, collectively.
- Killed Offscreen:
- Frank Gleason succumbs to his pancreatic cancer.
- Stan reveals that his cousin, Robbie, who was seen in "A Little Kiss" was killed in action while serving in the Navy.
- Noodle Incident: We see Roger going in to get his energy injection, but we don't see what he gets up to as a result.
- Only Sane People: Ted and Peggy, as they don't get injected.
- The Peeping Tom: Jim, who seems perfectly happy watching Stan and Wendy having sex.
- Questionable Consent: After young Dick's fever breaks, Aimee starts coming on to him, and assures him that she'll "take care of everything", even as he is clearly frozen in fear of what she is doing and tells her "no" at first. While he seemingly acquiesces, he doesn't really consent. Also, he's a minor.
- Rape as Backstory: The Reveal of the episode is that this applies to Don. It is clearly indicated that having been raped by Amiee, who was also the only person who had treated him with something resembling maternal compassion, and then getting blamed by Abigail for having been subjected to said rape, traumatized Don and played a pivotal role in forming his unhealthy views on women, sex, and relationships.
- Riddle for the Ages: Did Don go home between giving the rousing speech and going back into the Creative room a day later? Also, how on Earth does Ida know Don's name?
- Ship Tease: Stan hits on Peggy while he's high. She gently turns him down.
- Shout-Out:
- Sally is seen reading Rosemary's Baby by Ira Levin.
- When Megan tells the Draper children that she has to leave them alone, they are watching The Prisoner (1967) in the bedroom.
- Stalker with a Crush: Don comes off this way towards Sylvia at the start of the episode, since he still hasn't gotten over their affair. Sylvia calls him out on it.
- Uncomfortable Elevator Moment: By the end of the episode, Don's resolved to let go of his feelings towards Sylvia. When the two have to take the same elevator car down, they exchange very brief pleasantries and stand in awkward silence the whole ride down.
- Unsatisfiable Customer: Chevrolet gives off this impression, rejecting all of the firm's ideas, resulting in a drug-fuelled emergency working weekend.
