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This review in no way takes the place of the excellent work done by phrelin. Just so happens I thought about the episode all night and couldn't wait to write about it.
Signal 30, it turns out, is the name of the Driver's Ed film Pete Campbell is watching at the beginning of the episode. I remembered watching the film, or one like it, back in neanderthal times when I learned to drive. I didn't remember the name. More proof that everything's on youtube:
This week's episode was particularly noteworthy given last week's treatise on the empowerment of women. This week was where we, the viewers, get to see the car crashes that will happen to the male gender as a whole through Peter Campbell.
One almost feels sorry for Pete. Not bad enough that he's losing his hair and hiding it badly. He's unable to captain his own dinner party and relies on "superhero" Don Draper to fix his sink. He can't control dinner party conversation, can't land an account, and relies on a paid courtesan's compliments to puff up his ego. He can't even seduce a 16-year-old girl (although why he wanted to is another whole treatise.) In the end he's brought down, physically, by an older man who, until that moment, had been the epitome of milquetoast civility. He can't even slink out of the office without seeing the man who did all of it right, Don Draper, standing in the elevator.
Pete is the living embodiment of the male gender in 1966. We men may still have run the world in 1966 but the days of stepping on women, pushing them aside or using them for pleasure were coming to a rude and abrupt end. Pete sees the car crash film and yet doesn't see the oncoming threat to his own way of life; he doesn't see that the road he's taken will end with a semi hitting him head on.
So it must have been to be a suburbanite in one's 30s in 1966. Viewed through the lens of fifty years of history, we see Pete's got it all coming to him. He deserves every punch, every embarrassment, not simply for disrespecting both Pryce and Sterling, but for the way he's always denigrated others for his own enjoyment. But, back then it was easier to imagine that things would always be as they had been, that one's wife would always defer and that women of all ages would fall prey to a successful man from Manhattan.
Not that it was really ever like that of course, but certainly more men thought it was.
I enjoyed so much of the humor of this episode, without which it would have been as gruesome as watching a car crash. The whole subplot with Lane's British compatriot was well played and the chewing gum... priceless. (no pun intended. Although, had Pryce actually been there...) I applaud Cosgrove for continuing to write, and for moving from sci-fi (then thought to be children's fiction) to far more insightful works. Ironic that he may get his greatest acclaim for a work about his one-time friend and now semi-nemesis Campbell. Sad though that he doesn't stick to sci-fi though, as so many of the sci-fi authors of the 60s are worshiped today.
Lane Pryce, oh dear Lane. He's the only one who feels remorse for his impulsiveness, and is therefore the only one rewarded by the very classy treatment given to him by Joan Harris. Even his folly, stealing a kiss when she is there to take care of him, is met with discretion. There's your lesson, gents: own up to your shortfalls. Women respect that.
A couple of notes: It's true, you cannot stop a washerless Delta faucet from dripping by turning up the supply. On the other hand, I sincerely doubt a Delta would have been in such bad repair in 1966 that water pressure would cause it to blow. They were still fairly new. According to Wikipedia they'd only been in production 12 years.
Oh, and not terribly surprising that Don would be keenly aware of Charles Whitman's name. The real Mr. Whitman killed several students at the University of Texas that summer.
Phrelin, I've covered the facts... please let me know what I've left out.
Signal 30, it turns out, is the name of the Driver's Ed film Pete Campbell is watching at the beginning of the episode. I remembered watching the film, or one like it, back in neanderthal times when I learned to drive. I didn't remember the name. More proof that everything's on youtube:
This week's episode was particularly noteworthy given last week's treatise on the empowerment of women. This week was where we, the viewers, get to see the car crashes that will happen to the male gender as a whole through Peter Campbell.
One almost feels sorry for Pete. Not bad enough that he's losing his hair and hiding it badly. He's unable to captain his own dinner party and relies on "superhero" Don Draper to fix his sink. He can't control dinner party conversation, can't land an account, and relies on a paid courtesan's compliments to puff up his ego. He can't even seduce a 16-year-old girl (although why he wanted to is another whole treatise.) In the end he's brought down, physically, by an older man who, until that moment, had been the epitome of milquetoast civility. He can't even slink out of the office without seeing the man who did all of it right, Don Draper, standing in the elevator.
Pete is the living embodiment of the male gender in 1966. We men may still have run the world in 1966 but the days of stepping on women, pushing them aside or using them for pleasure were coming to a rude and abrupt end. Pete sees the car crash film and yet doesn't see the oncoming threat to his own way of life; he doesn't see that the road he's taken will end with a semi hitting him head on.
So it must have been to be a suburbanite in one's 30s in 1966. Viewed through the lens of fifty years of history, we see Pete's got it all coming to him. He deserves every punch, every embarrassment, not simply for disrespecting both Pryce and Sterling, but for the way he's always denigrated others for his own enjoyment. But, back then it was easier to imagine that things would always be as they had been, that one's wife would always defer and that women of all ages would fall prey to a successful man from Manhattan.
Not that it was really ever like that of course, but certainly more men thought it was.
I enjoyed so much of the humor of this episode, without which it would have been as gruesome as watching a car crash. The whole subplot with Lane's British compatriot was well played and the chewing gum... priceless. (no pun intended. Although, had Pryce actually been there...) I applaud Cosgrove for continuing to write, and for moving from sci-fi (then thought to be children's fiction) to far more insightful works. Ironic that he may get his greatest acclaim for a work about his one-time friend and now semi-nemesis Campbell. Sad though that he doesn't stick to sci-fi though, as so many of the sci-fi authors of the 60s are worshiped today.
Lane Pryce, oh dear Lane. He's the only one who feels remorse for his impulsiveness, and is therefore the only one rewarded by the very classy treatment given to him by Joan Harris. Even his folly, stealing a kiss when she is there to take care of him, is met with discretion. There's your lesson, gents: own up to your shortfalls. Women respect that.
A couple of notes: It's true, you cannot stop a washerless Delta faucet from dripping by turning up the supply. On the other hand, I sincerely doubt a Delta would have been in such bad repair in 1966 that water pressure would cause it to blow. They were still fairly new. According to Wikipedia they'd only been in production 12 years.
Oh, and not terribly surprising that Don would be keenly aware of Charles Whitman's name. The real Mr. Whitman killed several students at the University of Texas that summer.
Phrelin, I've covered the facts... please let me know what I've left out.
