TV Review: Mad Men 5.1 & 5.2, 'A Little Kiss'
Mad Men's long awaited fifth season kicks off with a classy two-parter, complete with numerous shots of Don Draper looking out of a window pensively.
Mad Men A Little Kiss Parts One and Two
rating:4.5
Its been a while since we last saw Don Draper and company. Eighteen months, give or take. Too long. Ive missed them, though it was very kind of the series to give someone else a chance to win a bunch of Emmys. Now they are back, and thats good. But will the memory of what was live up to the reality of what is? We begin the new season at the end of May, 1968, with shots of a civil rights protest happening outside the office of Y&R, an ad agency in competition with SCDP. The idiot execs think there would be nothing more fun than dropping bags of ice and water onto the protestors, a plan which works quite well until some of them come upstairs to complain. This doesnt seem connected to the larger story, but trust me, it is. Then we go to Sally (Keirnan Shipka, whose voice seems to have changed quite a bit) waking up in the brand-new apartment that Don (John Hamm) is now sharing with his new wife, Megan (Jessica Pare). We get some lovely family moments, though its clear that Sally isnt terribly happy (big shock, I know), and we also learn that Don is about to turn 40, something Ill be doing myself next month. From there we go Pete (Vincent Kartheiser) riding home on the train, and as he does, I realize that hes turning more and more into Don. Hes a young up-and-comer who has a wife and a child and a house in the suburbs. Hes getting more and more ambitious and as we learn, hes not at all happy with his current position at the agency. Speaking of, we find out next that Bert Cooper (Robert Morse) is still at the agency, which is a surprise, since Id thought hed left. We also learn that Don and Roger (John Slattery) are sharing a secretary. Why? Well, it seems that Joan (Christina Hendricks) is out on maternity leave. And thats when we get our next scene, which is a close-up of a babys bare backside, parts and all, as baby lotion is being applied. This was not something I needed to see while I was eating a snack. Anyhow, it turns out that the baby is Joans son, who looks not far away from a newborn, which is a surprise because it seems to me that at least eighteen months or so went past since the end of the last season, so the baby should be about a year old. But never mind. It turns out that Joan is getting fed up with being at home all the time, and even though her mother is there helping, shes getting more and more stressed and is really starting to miss work. Back at the firm, we see that Peggy (Elizabeth Moss) is working on a new account for Heinz baked beans (with some help from Megan, it must be noted). She has an interesting pitch in mind that involves stop motion animation of dancing beans, but the Heinz people are cool on the notion. When Don comes in, apparently to save the day, shes appalled when he instead says that the clients are right and theyll try to do better next time. As all of this unfolds, we learn that Megan has plans for a great, big, surprise birthday party for Don. Given who he is and how he acts, you can probably guess what his reaction is going to be, especially when the song and dance number happens. You know the one. The one that makes even me wish Id paid more attention in French class Theres a lot of catching up in this episode, but not a lot of plot that happens. That isnt necessarily a bad thing; its been a while since we saw the team and its good to catch up and see what theyve been doing. Its basically an episode about the characters and not really about events. And things are interesting with the characters. Don seems entirely too relaxed and hes clearly lost the hunger for his job. Roger seems to be barely holding on and is resorting to efforts at poaching clients from Pete, who is now the main money maker for the firm. He seems appalled at the suggestion that Pete might take over his office but, tellingly, he seems to be the only one who is appalled. Theres a lot of interesting components in this episode. Time has moved on since the show began, and were just about to the Flower Power era. The rift between the Young Turks of the firm (Pete, Peggy), and the old establishment (Roger and Don), is starting to become very noticeable and it will be very interesting to see where it goes in the next few episodes. Also interesting will the racial issues that the show now seems to be ready to tackle. Overall I liked this episode, though I do feel that perhaps a two-hour block was a bit much, and I would have liked to have seen a bit more plot. I would have certainly liked to have seen Betty and Henry, since they were missing completely from the story. Despite that, I feel that the season is off to a strong start, and I look forward to seeing whats going to happen over the next few weeks.