In an episode framed by the news of systematic rape, torture and killing of eight women, the women of Mad Men learn to stand up for themselves, even while the very real specter of a different kind of damage — emotional and psychological harm — threatens them all. I’m proud we’re watching the women of the show learn to ask for what they want. But the consequences will last a long time.

Just as one of the characters commented that the lone survivor of the 1966 Richard Speck killings “probably won’t be able to speak,” what will happen the precocious Sally — a child who’s always desperately wanted to be an adult — actually faces the realities of a grown-up world? Grandma Pauline seems to be rushing her into that super creepy reality way too fast.

There was already some internet suspicion that because the young Miss Draper is so averse to becoming like her mother that she may be in the beginnings of an eating disorder. If that’s the case, Grandma Pauline forcing her to eat that nasty sandwich didn’t make things any better. But as if that wasn’t bad enough, her creepy discussion of rape, followed by feeding Sally a prescription drug, is sure to lay the groundwork for some demons that may not ever be exorcised. Good God, Grandma.

Speaking of Demons

Before the morning-after moment to confirm Don was in a fever dream (which we should have expected from a former writer for The Sopranos), I actually considered what it would be like to have a season in which Don Draper was on the run from the law. I keep reading the actors say Don’s going to “go in a really different direction” this year, so I guess anything’s possible. So assuming he didn’t actually choke a seductress/former lover to death, we ought to consider Don’s capacity for violence with women, what that says about what he thinks of them, and whether that is dangerous for the women close to him in his life.

Down With The Rapists!

And I’m not talking about Richard Speck. It was the ultimate HELL YES moment when I watched Joan kick out Greg. “I’m glad the army makes you feel like a man … You’re not a good man, and you know it. Even before we were married and you know what I’m talking about.” I think I could hear the collective cheers of America when that happened. But these actions, like everything else, have consequences…

Dawn and Peggy Stick Together

“I was the only one like me for a long time,” Peggy said to Dawn. Peggy has to be a woman in a man’s world. But Dawn has to be a black woman in a white man’s world. That scene in which Peggy asks Dawn whether she wants to be a copywriter, and Dawn doesn’t even imagine a job like that as something that’s possible for her, was heartbreaking.

Peggy extorts Roger: Dazzle Me

Peggy’s now in a position of power. “Why are you doing this to me?” Roger asks, after having to give up $400 because he failed to assign a campaign to any of the writers.  “Because you are being very demanding for someone who has no other choice.” BAM! Go Peggy!

Back to Sally Real Quick

In a recent character study of Sally Draper, Slate writes: “While so many other characters have mysterious or unknown pasts, Sally is someone we’ve gotten to watch from her own personal beginnings.” That’s likely why Matt Weiner has said that Mad Men is really a show about Sally. He has admitted that he “is” Sally, a child who grew up in those tumultuous times, affected by the ch-ch-ch-changes. I can only expect things to get weirder and harder for Miss Draper.

Loose Ends:

The bugles reappear. So does a huge knife.

Can I say again I’m scared of Grandma Pauline?

And how about that Michael Ginsburg? I really am going to love that guy. And if his Cinderella story “being dark” wasn’t a too-on-the-nose-metaphor for the whole episode, I don’t know what was.

Times are tough and uh, you can’t get anywhere,

Elise