“The Forecast” is deeply satisfying in the way that the best “Mad Men” episodes are.
‘Mad Men’
9 p.m., Sunday, AMC
3.5 out of 4 stars
The future, once full of dazzling possibilities, terrifies the characters of “Mad Men.” In the future, we are forced to face the reality that our unfulfilled dreams have soured into failures—or even worse, that we got everything we wanted and it feels like nothing.
“What’s next?” Don (Jon Hamm) asks over and over again throughout the episode as he struggles to answer the question himself. Roger (John Slattery) asks him to write a forecast of the company’s future, but Don can’t seem to figure out what the next step is. Ted (Kevin Rahm) suggests they should try to land another big name, like Goodyear Tires, but that doesn’t scratch Don’s itch. “Bigger accounts. That’s your greatest desire?”
In typical Don fashion, he goes to Peggy (Elisabeth Moss) to pick her brain, but instead of just asking for help, he masks his questions as a part of her performance review. No one else has been able to give Don a clear answer, but not only does Peggy know what she wants in the future, she’s willing to say it out loud. She wants to be the first female creative director in the history of the agency. She wants to have a big idea. She wants to create something of lasting value.
More Top Picks Best Liquid Motion Sensory Toys For Calming
Don is awed by Peggy’s focus and openness, but unwilling (or unable) to grant her this appreciation. “Why don’t you write down all of your dreams so I can shit on them?” she says as she walks out.
Peggy is the second of three characters to nail Don to the wall in this episode. The first is his realtor, who says she’s having a hard time selling the Upper East Side penthouse because it looks like “a sad person lived here” and “reeks of failure.” The third is copywriter Mathis (Trevor Einhorn), who screws up an account by taking Don’s advice. Don yells at him to have character and take responsibility for the problem himself, to which Mathis objects, “You don’t have any character! You’re just handsome. Stop fooling yourself.”
Ten years ago, Don Draper was the most mysterious man on Madison Avenue. Everyone wanted to get closer to him to soak up his power and success and maybe get a hint of what made him that way. But now, everyone has Don’s number—as Jim Cutler (Harry Hamlin) said a year ago, he’s “just a bully and a drunk.”
After Don, Joan (Christina Hendricks) is the character least open to change. She’s raising her four-year-old son in the same two-bedroom apartment that she and her roommate were bringing men home to a decade ago, even though she’s a partner and a millionaire now. She doesn’t need to work anymore, but as she confesses to her new man friend Richard (Bruce Greenwood), “I just finally got the job I always wanted.”
Despite her divorce and single-mother status, Joan has what she wants, but when she tells Richard about her son, he scrambles. “I had a plan, which was no plans,” he says, anxious about the idea of raising another child after his are grown. “You’re such a disappointment,” Joan tells him, but what she really means is that her situation is the disappointment. She has what she wants, but not everything she wants. Joan was the girl who knew what men wanted and how to give it to them—how did she end up in this future?
And finally, we have the indeterminable Sally Draper (Kiernan Shipka), who returns in fine form. She’s about to head off on a prolonged fieldtrip with other teens to 12 different states, and as Betty (January Jones) lectures her on the dangers of boys, the teen quips, “This conversation is a little late. And so am I.”
But things take a turn for the real when Glen Bishop (Marten Weiner) comes through town to tell Sally—and Betty—that he’s shipping off to Vietnam. “Are you [bleeping] stupid?” Sally demands, while Betty commends Glen on his bravery. Sally and Glen’s friendship is based in part on their mutual trouble with Betty, but Glen has also always tied mother and daughter together in his head. When he was 9, little Glen saw a sadness in Betty that no one else bothered to notice, and as the years went on, he’s been similarly perceptive with Sally.
At 18 years old and standing in the Francis foyer, Glen finds himself before both women, but it’s Betty’s gaze he leans into. Betty fired Carla for just letting Glen into the house a few years ago, but now that he’s grown up and sporting some serious muttonchops, she gets borderline competitive with her teenage daughter for his attention. “You look so different,” she tells him. “You look exactly the same,” he returns.
And she does. Betty wore a yellow dress when she cut off a lock of her hair for 9-year-old Glen, and she’s wearing another yellow one in this episode, when he tries to kiss her in her kitchen. “I know you know me. I know you know the man I can be.” The wants of nine years ago still haunt Glen, who isn’t old enough to realize that getting what you want doesn’t always lead to satisfaction.
Lauren Chval is a RedEye special contributor.
Want more? Discuss this article and others on RedEye’s Facebook page.