I think Don suffers much from the Madonna/whore complex. Betty only wears fluffy, cute, girly clothes (his reaction to the swimsuit), his wife must be Ceasar's wife for him to maintain the Don Draper persona. But he beds worldly, furprint wearing women, because that's what he really wants. I think the only woman that was a true anomaly for him was Rachel.

I was so sad for Chauncey. He did not deserve that and they cast an older IS with a cute graying face too. (Good casting - you could imagine Duck and family picking up a puppy when they were all about a decade younger and much happier.)

I think that Peggy doesn't really know how to act as a grown up business woman so she's still testing the waters.

That last moment with Don and his daughter in the bathroom was really chilling and beautifully played. I'm never sure what is going on in his head but there was a profound...something happening there!

I'd have to rewatch to remember exactly, but my impression was that Sally (the daughter) said something to him that echoed something Bobbie had said to him earlier. Aughhh... I really need to rewatch. Such a dense episode!

The Decemberists in the opening really took me out of the moment. Have they used contemporary (as opposed to period) music before?

I don't recall them using contemporary music before - it was an odd choice.

I was wondering why I didn't recognize the song. Never heard of the Decemberists!

Just watched the ep.

Want Duck to suffer the tortures of the damned, preferably public. I sat there, through that whole ep, with a feeling of dread because I just knew that the selfish SOB would do something.

The final shot of Don was brilliantly framed, with the reflection.

I'd have to rewatch to remember exactly, but my impression was that Sally (the daughter) said something to him that echoed something Bobbie had said to him earlier.

He kept telling Bobbie to stop talking and she didn't, continually exposing his "reputation." (I love the ambiguity of not being sure whether he really didn't remember the Random House hookup or if that he's got a rep to the point where people are bragging about having slept with him.)

Then, when Sally said that she wouldn't talk, because she didn't want him to cut himself, I think hit him hard on a lot of different levels, the first being of course, echoing his words to Bobbie.

I think, too, that some of it may well have been wrapped up in his reaction to Betty and her bikini. Lots of layers in this ep.

I also found the Decembrists jolting. Though the use of Dylan at the end of S1 was anachronistic too.

I'm not sure exactly what was going on with Don and Sally there. Definitely related to him telling Bobbie not to talk. Also, when the servicemen stood up, his daughter was looking up at him with such undiluted adoration and he clearly didn't feel worthy of it. Though he did serve in battle, he doesn't feel like a war hero and knows his whole identity is false.

I think it's him feeling a hollowness very acutely.

You ever noticed how Don never apologizes? Like when Peggy has to remind him to pay back the bail money?

The more I watch, the more I'm taken with VK's performance. Pete is no generic weasel. Ken is closer to that - though he has the fiction writing dimension. Pete's got that weird knack to always say or do the thing which is exactly wrong by a quarter inch.

I'd like to think that when Don's daughter said thr line about not talking that Don was thinking that he hoped no one would ever treat his daughter the way he treated Bobbie.

The more I watch, the more I'm taken with VK's performance. Pete is no generic weasel. Ken is closer to that - though he has the fiction writing dimension. Pete's got that weird knack to always say or do the thing which is exactly wrong by a quarter inch.

I think it goes back to what we were talking about last week, with Pete-- it's an act. He so clearly doesn't know who he is and I don't think that he even knows who he wants to be, other than not like his own father.

The pervasive image I always get of Pete-- odd though it may be, is that of when a little girl clomps around in her Mommy's oversized heels and haphazardly applied makeup, talking to her dolls the way she hears her mother talking to others.

The final shot of Don was brilliantly framed, with the reflection.

I thought that shot was a beautiful contrast to the episode's theme and title - "Maidenform". Throughout we see subtle and blatant references to the female body - from the first shot of Betty and Joan dressing, to the bra models, to the fashion show, to Betty's swimsuit, to Peggy's dressing like a girl then a woman - I'm sure I'm forgetting some. But the last shot was Don - male, naked and vulnerable.

I think it goes back to what we were talking about last week, with Pete-- it's an act.

This is my read too. He's constantly trying to measure his behavior and appearance and comes off as awkwardly unnatural. Last week, when the fertility doc was questioning him, I think he kept looking for assurances that his answers were "normal". He also tries to latch on to a mentor so badly, whether Don, Duck, or whoever - a boy who had a father but clearly lacked a daddy.