She wants to be a trophy daughter.

Which is why the loss of her father is hitting her so hard. She and Trudy are very similar in that way. [ETA: x-posty w/Sophia]

You can go to school because you're encouraged to and you can even be interested in and good at what you're studying, but a self-actualized person will have a curiosity above and beyond their immediate surroundings. Betty doesn't.

True, but Bryn Mawr, being a Seven Sisters school, was definitely considered a good school, but even more so, it was a status school. It was a school where you could get recognition for acquiring both a good degree and a good husband. And I think Betty relies on that as example that she's not stupid. Betty, like so many beautiful women, relies on external examples for validation.

That's not how I'd characterize it. She really doesn't even know how to articulate to herself what she would want.

Peggy is really the only woman who can articulate what wants, I think, which was shown in her scene with Pete about the baby (she doesn't want that, she wants more)

Betty could, for a while, say that she doesn't want what she has, but doesn't know what she wants.

Bobbi Barret thinks she has power, but is all about using her feminine wiles to be the power behind the man, instead of the power.

Joan could have something more, and sort of has a niggling feeling that something isn't right, but clings to needing a husband.

Trudy wants a baby, but doesn't even seem taken aback and Pete saying he doean't love her.

And young secretary girl writes poetry and feels Roger makes her older and wiser, and they are two old souls, but he doesn't want that.

And Don actually goes for the more self-actualized Rachel, Anna, Greenich village hippy girl.

Greenich village hippy girl.

Excuse me! She's a beatnik. Midge.

Midge! I could not remember her name! Although Peggy looks more and more like her.

I think I finally understood Pete's growth with his pointed comment about making the Soviets back down. It didn't seem out of character, and it seemed remarkably perceptive for a guy who used to be completely unable to read a room.

On a completely shallow note, I loved a couple of Peggy's outfits this episode, so yay for sartorial character growth, too.

Oh, yes. The last few episodes she's had some knockout dresses. I particularly like the one she wore in the finale.

And in other shallow news, I was watching Chuck last night and thinking to myself how completely hot Captain Awesome looks in Mad Men genre.

Now, back to the characterizations. One of the things that I saw that I liked in those interviews was that he said you get out of the show what you bring to it. I was thinking about that and I realized that may be why the show seems to be all about the women to me. It's because I'm thinking about the women.

I still think we're on about Trudy acting out a role. Her little creased brow kiss was her playing a part. She only has to revise her identity periodically to keep up with the external world. But she does it less than she needs to. Very little intrudes on the world she's built in her mind.

I still think we're on about Trudy acting out a role.

I never thought about it that way before, but it makes perfect sense why she and Pete got together. Pete was also about trying to do what others expected, what's appropriate. His behavior never seemed natural. He and Trudy were stage-acting - two children paying dress-up with their respective Daddies' monies.

Maybe when Pete's Dad dies, penniless as it turns out, Pete starts to realize he's not just someone else's idea of a son/husband/accounts executive, but a thinking, feeling human being. He seems more comfortable in his own skin, and this reflects as success in his professional life.

Pete starts to realize he's not just someone else's idea of a son/husband/accounts executive, but a thinking, feeling human being. He seems more comfortable in his own skin, and this reflects as success in his professional life.

also, I think that he begins to see the fallacy of a facade that everyone expects. His dad had that, and his mom is now penniless.