Recap / Mad Men S 7 E 12 Lost Horizon

I don't want to take you out of your way.

Joan is mistreated by McCann's chauvinist executives, in addition to which one of her accounts is jeopardized by the careless incompetence of a McCann colleague. She ultimately takes her complaint to Jim Hobart, who offers to buy out her $500,000 stake in the company for 50 cents on the dollar. Joan threatens legal action and bad publicity, but eventually capitulates when even Roger is powerless to help her.

Peggy, meanwhile, has not even got an office at McCann's premises even though all of her male colleagues do. On principle, she refuses to leave the SC&P offices until this is remedied, and during the interim she bonds with Roger, who also lingers at the remains of his agency. Eventually, Peggy makes her triumphant entrance at McCann, acting like a brash male — hung over, sporting dark sunglasses, smoking and carrying Bert Cooper's 19th-century Japanese print of "The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife" that Roger gave her.

Don is invited to a meeting with Miller Beer focused on how to market the company's forthcoming "low-calorie beer" product (not yet known as Miller Lite). As a younger employee captures the attention of the meeting with a vivid description of the product's core target Midwestern consumer (the kind of presentation that Don used to star in), Don quietly leaves the meeting and starts driving west. In the middle of the night, he becomes so tired behind the wheel that he hallucinates holding a conversation with Bert Cooper. After arriving in Racine, Wisconsin, he goes to Diana Baur's former home, hoping to find her but instead finding Diana's ex-husband's new wife. Don spins a tale about needing to deliver a contest prize to Diana, and is shocked to meet the daughter Diana left behind. His ruse is found out when Mr. Baur arrives. Baur tells Don he is not the only broken heart Diana has left behind and forces Don to leave. Don continues driving west, picking up a hitchhiker on his way to St. Paul, Minnesota.

This episode contains the following tropes:

• Be Careful What You Wish For: Jim Hobart has spent a decade trying to get Don to work for him, but once he finally achieves this, Don walks out of a meeting, and out of the premises, with no explanation. Hobart complains to Roger, whose explanation is simply: "He does that".
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Hobart reveals himself as one. After appearing so genial to the SC&P crew previously, he spends his time here dismissing Joan's concerns and holding out on paying her the full sum of money agreed upon when she decides to cash out.
• Blatant Lies: Don's attempt at ingratiating himself with the Baurs; the husband sees right through him.
• The Cameo: While Don's driving to Wisconsin, he briefly hallucinates a conversation with Bert Cooper (Robert Morse), who died in "Waterloo", telling him that his road trip is a bad idea.
• Cardboard Box of Unemployment: Played with twice. When Peggy moves into a new office at McCann carrying a bankers box full of personal trinkets. The first attempt at the move◊ is a false start, but by the end of the episode the move-in is played much more triumphantly◊. (The box used in filming the scene was later auctioned off as memorabilia.)
• Continuity Porn: Literally so in the case of Bert's 19th-century Japanese erotica print which adorned the wall of his office, and will now adorn the wall of Peggy's new office at McCann. Also, the old SCDP and SC&P logos can be seen stacked against the wall in the gutted-out offices.
• Dead Person Conversation: Don has a brief one with Bert.
• Dude, Where's My Respect?: Joan goes through it once again, and this proves to be the last straw before she decides to leave the firm altogether.
• During the War: Roger tells Peggy a story from his Navy days when he couldn't jump in a lagoon because it was too far a drop from the deck of his ship.
  Roger: I did it. I just needed a push.
• End of an Age: Sterling Cooper went through many incarnations but it is now being shut down for good. All the employees leave either to McCann or other job opportunities and the furniture and equipment is carted away. By the end, even the inner walls have been taken down. Peggy and Roger resist leaving as long as possible but in the end have to move on.
• Fantasy Helmet Enforcement: Averted. Mad Men isn't a show targeting an audience under 18 but the sequence where Peggy is roller skating to Roger's recital on the organ consists of her in her office clothes (with a miniskirt), pantyhose covered legs, no pads on her knees and elbows, and no helmet. Justified in that the episode took place in 1970 and such equipment was likely not worn during skating or bicycling.
• Friendship Moment: Peggy and Roger bond in the stripped-out SC&P office over Cinzano and an electric organ. He laments the demise of his company, and she reveals the extent her ambitions.
  Roger: Even if your name's on the damn door you should know better than to get attached to some walls.
  Peggy: Well, hopefully I'll have that problem some day.
  • Also between Don and Betty when he drops by to pick up Sally, only to find she's already left. Betty's genuinely excited about her psychology course, and Don's genuinely happy for her.
    Don: Knock 'em dead, Birdie.
• Gaslighting: Pretty much what happens to Joan and Peggy. They're made to feel like they're demanding or crazy by McCann. Peggy stays put until she gets her own office while Joan fights back hard yet leaves.
• Know When to Fold 'Em: Joan only accepts half the money she's owed as a partner for leaving because she knows she can't win against McCann.
• Mood Whiplash: Of a good sort. Peggy, seemingly all alone in the SC&P office, starts hearing creepy organ music. She goes to investgate ... and finds Roger playing an electric organ.
• Naughty Tentacles: As depicted on Bert's 19th-century Japanese print of "The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife", which Roger gives to Peggy.
  Roger: It's an octopus pleasuring a lady.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: The show is good about depicting even their most unsympathetic characters as showing some sort of decency, albeit fleetingly in some cases. In this episode though, the men at McCann make life for Joan hell. All three express misogynistic traits to her, even sexually harassing her and refusing to take her seriously, but Dennis also reveals himself to be ableist after Joan calls him out for offending their wheelchair-bound Avon client.
• Reality Is Unrealistic: Hanna Rosin, writing for Slate, thought that the sexual harassment Joan suffers was too crude to be believable for the era. Scott Lemiuex, writing for the blog Laywers, Guns & Money, pointed out that a lot of modern sexual harassment cases are far worse than what was portrayed on the show.
• Screw This, I'm Out of Here!: Joan decides to cash in on her money and leave, tired of the sexism that she's still forced to face at McCann. Additionally, Don decides to just walk out midway through a meeting, and pretty much vacates the state.
• Shout-Out: Don is Jim's white whale. He all but admits that the main reason why McCann bought SC&P was so they could get Don working for them.
  • Also this, from Don and Bert's 'conversation':
    Don: Remember On the Road?
    Bert: I've never read that book, you know that.
    Don: I'm riding the rails.
    Bert: Wither goest now America, in thy shiny car at night?
• Stealing from the Till: Ed, one of the SC&P copywriters who did not have his contract picked up by McCann, spends his last few days of employment making personal long distance phone calls on the company's dime.