He wants access to that dimension that those particular songs provide - both musically and lyrically. He's not just presenting the era - he's making plain that he's taking an aesthetic stance outside the era and commenting on it.

Exactly—he uses the music almost as an omniscient narrator. And I agree on what you're saying about his use of seminal events. It makes it all the more interesting to ponder where, exactly, he's going to pick up next season.

I'm'a stick with Clay-Liston. Not because I have any evidence, mind you.

oh, and did anyone else wince when Trudy said "If you loved me, you'd want to be with me" and Pete said "that's true" and then she just kissed him and they went to load the car. whoa.

But I think he was planning (or she was hoping he was planning) to come down on the train later anyway. He wasn't planning on going in the car with her. That's why she gave him cash in case the "trains aren't working."

I LOVED Duck being blindside by Don not having a contract. It was mentioned, but casually, a bunch of times and it just highlighted how out of place Duck is there.

Oh, also, it felt like they cut the show for it to run ads normally. There were some awkward transitions I thought (like Betty going from looking at the store window to being inside the bar).

Oh, also, it felt like they cut the show for it to run ads normally.

oh, yeah, they totally did. The transitions were very abrupt in places, but would have been fine for commercial breaks.

I'm'a stick with Clay-Liston. Not because I have any evidence, mind you.

That is a good reference point, because that's probably the earliest cultural conflict between old school/new school notions of masculinity as it was played out in sports. In football you don't get it until it's Namath vs. Unitas (1969) or in baseball with the long haired, mustachoied A's vs. the clean cut Reds (1972). (All of those instances of the newer, more "feminized" masculinity triumphing.) It's largely a generational shift as the Greatest Generation of WWII vets (and its ideal of a stoic, hypermasculine culture) is succeeded.

There's been a long focus on the changing roles of women, but there's an intriguing shift in the notion of masculinity coming as well. The Beatles will be a huge shock along that faultline.

Loved the look on Duck's face when Don was all, "I don't have a contract."

BUH - WAH?? I was counting on that to be all self-righteous and pompous and and and....fuck. I need a drink.

I have nothing to add that even come remotely to what all of you have said ever so smartly and wonderfully. Although I will say that even knowing how the Bay of Pigs turns out, I love that writing for the show is so good, that I actually caught myself thinking, "I hope they're still there Monday!"

Heh. I didn't see The Simpsons Mad Men parody.

But I think he was planning (or she was hoping he was planning) to come down on the train later anyway.

I think that's exactly why she kissed him. She took his ambiguous answer as an assertion of what she wanted to hear.

I'm'a stick with Clay-Liston. Not because I have any evidence, mind you.

And we had some foreshadowing of that with the Don/Jimmy bar fight scene.

I wonder though... what about MLK's "I have a dream..." speech. That's August of '63 and with children and civil rights and the future being such a strong undercurrent this past season it might provide an interesting starting point. Or do we think it might fall under the aegis of an event that's been "done" to death, as it were?