So, True Blood is back, after a rather disappointing season finale last year that failed to provide a resolution for most of the mysteries set up by season 5. It’s now de rigeur for every TV show to end its seasons on a cliffhanger, but True Blood’s previous form has been to wrap up the year’s storylines before introducing a new shock element to lead into the next. Season 5, for the first time, left viewers with very few answers to the questions posed throughout the year, and failed to really provide a satisfying ending to a season that had been rather disappointing overall.

So, will the new season succeed in wooing fans back? The season opener had a lot to pack in, mostly by dint of having so many loose strands left from last year, and seemingly tried to address them with some of the most frenetic opening minutes I’ve seen in a TV show. Eric and Sookie, still stuck in the underground HQ of the now-defunct Authority, were faced with the new, godlike rebirth of Bill Compton, while what was left of the Authority troops pursued Nora, Pam, Tara, Jason and Jessica through the corridors. Sam was rushing to the surface with Luna, now dying from the effort of having shape-shifted into Steve Newlin, and her daughter.

All were squabbling; Jason, gripped by his newfound vampirephobia, sniping at the others, while Pam and Tara, now apparently a couple, were already at the arguing stage, and Pam wasn’t taking kindly to getting orders from Nora. Sookie, meanwhile, still has to figure out the identity of the mysterious Warlow, the vamp who killed her parents and who now appears to her occasionally out of thin air. Oh, and there’s still the small matter of the impending war between vampires and humanity that followed the fanatical Sanguinistas’ bombing of the Tru Blood factories, forcing vamps back onto human blood to survive. Got all that?

This premiere seemed to try and address most of that within the first few minutes, giving an oddly unbalanced pace that veered from frenzied at the start to contemplative for the second half. The various parties’ escapes from the Authority HQ were rapidly intercut action sequences, courtesy of director Stephen Moyer. Perhaps that was why Bill himself was largely absent for much of this part of the ep, seen mostly as a snarling silhouette while everyone fretted about what sort of creature he’d become.

There followed torrents of exposition as the show set up threads to come. Jason is still being haunted by visits from his dead parents, who seem “kinda more racist than they used to be”, while Nora was intrigued by his mention of Warlow, who, it seems, is mentioned in the Vampire Bible as the first progeny of Lilith, making him obviously some kind of vampire Satan.

I like True Blood’s frequent, often critical allusions to Christian fundamentalism, though I thought last year’s religious cult and mention that “God made the vampire in his own image” was a bit on the nose. Still, it’s an interesting idea that vampires too have their concept of the Devil; and if that is who Warlow is, it makes him a more formidable and potentially more interesting foe than just bringing back Russell Edgington again to please the fans.

If Warlow is the Devil, though, he can’t be much worse than the vampires’ god. Lilith seemed to embody the very worst aspects of vampires last year; and now Bill has been reborn in her image. The script thoughtfully saved net forums a deal of trouble by coming up with the name ‘Bilith’ all by itself. Whatever has happened to Bill, everyone agreed that he wasn’t Bill any more – something reinforced by his Maker’s summons to Jessica, which virtually pulled her inside out.

And yet, when they did catch up with Bill (at his house; not a very inventive hiding place but the obvious place to go after one’s apotheosis), he seemed to be very much the same. Except, when he threatened Eric, he survived Sookie actually staking him.

This was obviously a turning point for Sookie, who previously has been unable to even contemplate harming Bill. To make matters worse, she’s obviously in love with Eric too, regardless of the fact that he’s no longer the amnesiac innocent she fell for a couple of years ago. No wonder she’s so confused that she wants shot of the lot of them, rescinding Eric’s invite to her house in the hope of returning to some sort of normality. Sorry, gal – this is Bon Temps, they don’t do normality.

As Andy Bellefleur was reminded in his continuing comic subplot of lone father to a litter of fairy girls. He got a tearjerking speech about parenthood from Arlene, after which he seemed to embrace the concept, lovingly taking nappy-changing lessons from Terry. It looked as wholesome as could be; except this is Bon Temps, so by the morning the kids looked to be grown to eight-year-olds.

Poor old Andy; having started as a faintly unsavoury and unpleasant character, he’s grown into the show’s comic relief. No wonder he works with Jason Stackhouse. I’m not sure where this plotline is going, and it seems rather slight and inconsequential. But I’m more interested in it than I am in the continuing exploration of werewolf politics, to which we  returned here.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s done well enough. But the werewolves were introduced primarily as adjuncts to the vampires, and for me at least, they’ve never been interesting enough as a subculture to justify the amount of time the show is increasingly expending on them. Plus, if we get balanced screen time between vampires, werewolves and fairies, it starts veering perilously close to becoming Being Human – and we’ve got two of those already.

Still, the charismatic Robert Patrick is always worth watching as Alcide’s dad; and the naked werewolf transformations provide plenty of the show’s trademark titillation, if that’s what you’re into. For me, the utterly gratuitous shots of a naked Joe Manganiello do take my attention away from any deficiencies in the plot.

Rather more interesting plotwise was the latest development in the growing hostility between humans and vampires, with the introduction of Louisiana Governor Burrell, incarnated by a bald, bespectacled Arliss Howard. Howard’s a good character actor who tends to play either put-upon Everymen or out and out villains; given his introductory speech, I’d say Burrell’s one of the latter. Miked up by seemingly every new network, he proclaimed a vampire curfew, and that the state would seize vampire assets and forbid them from owning businesses. Here we go, then: it’s every genre show’s favourite, the recreation of the Holocaust!

Subtle it ain’t, and I’m not entirely sure it works as an allegory either. The show’s frequent likening of vampires to every group in history victimised by bigots does tend to overlook the fact that vampires actually are vicious killers who survive by drinking blood, as opposed to the medieval propaganda that claimed Jews were.

While it may not entirely work as an allegory, and it’s a card that’s been played all too frequently in this kind of show, the idea of a vampire Holocaust at the hands of humans does have potential. But as I commented last year, the strength of this show is in its characters and their interactions, not in massive political power games – we have Game of Thrones for that. Burrell’s Hitler-like stance is plainly going to be a major plot thread this year – let’s see if True Blood can find anything new to say on the subject.

It looks like the other continuing plot thread – along with Burrell and whatever Bill’s apotheosis turned him into – is going to be the search for Warlow. We didn’t have to wait long, as he conveniently popped by to pick up the hitch-hiking Jason Stackhouse in an elderly station wagon that looked suspiciously like the one his parents died in.

Not that Jason realised who it was, at least initially – he’s never been the sharpest tool in the shed. The rest of us, though, were clued in by the fact that he was played by perennial bad guy Rutger Hauer – who, lest we forget, previously played the similarly named king vampire Barlow in the 2004 version of Salem’s Lot.

Hauer has always given good psycho, as fans of 1986 movie The Hitcher can attest to. Here, the roles were (perhaps knowingly) reversed from that classic thriller, with Hauer the driver who picks up the foolish young man. He was still the psycho though, his unsettling performance mannerisms undimmed by age. By the time he was cackling furiously and disappearing, leaving the driverless car to careen off the road, even Jason got the point that he might be a wrong ‘un.

So, a few new plot threads to go along with those still unresolved from last year, and some nice character development – particularly the nascent relationship between Tara and Pam, two women so bitchy they plainly belong together. Despite some uneven pacing, it was an entertaining enough opener, and True Blood has never been good at settling on any one (or two, or even three) main season plots in its opening episode. I’m not convinced the show really has that much more mileage left in it after starting, last year, to essentially repeat itself. But let’s see if this season proves me wrong as it goes on.

Not long ago, my friend Chris Hart posited that, insofar as it has one, Don Draper has become the ‘villain’ of Mad Men. Rarely has that seemed so true as this week. Lost in his constant existential turmoil, Don has always been self-centred, so intent on his own bitter self-discovery that those around him always take second place. This week, though, Don’s actions towards those around him seemed like they could have been motivated by nothing more than pure malice.

That could still be selfishness, of course. Don’s having a rotten time (even more so than usual), and it looks like he’s taking it on those around him. As so often in such a situation, foremost in the firing line is the one who has to live with him. Waking from last week’s guilt-driven drinking bout, knowing that his daughter has the goods on him and Sylvia, Don seemed to be preparing the ground for the end of his marriage. Fussing sympathetically around him (undeservedly, given that the hangover was of his own making), Megan commented that, “you look terrible”. To which Don’s callous rejoinder was, “so do you.” Ouch.

Is Don actively trying to push Megan away? Their marriage has been in the doldrums for some while now; as Megan recently commented frustratedly, “something’s got to change.” It looks like Don could be changing things – for the worse. But then he’s never more satisfied than when he’s screwing up his own life.

This week, though, he seemed to be determined to do the same to those closest to him. Topping Megan’s disappointment in Don was his daughter Sally, whose last hero-worshipping illusions about her father were cruelly shattered last week. Kiernan Shipka got a lot to do this week, as Sally’s anger towards her parents led her to decide she wanted to go to boarding school – well away from them both.

This seemed to please Betty, unsurprisingly, while Don took the news with caution. Where Sally’s concerned, he’s just waiting for the bomb to drop – note the look on his face when Betty, on the phone, started the conversation simply, “it’s about Sally”. And his relief when Betty told him his daughter didn’t want to visit with him for the foreseeable future; which still didn’t stop him ‘casually’ pointing out that he’d be working next weekend if she did want to come.

Sally’s introductory sleepover at the prestigious school also attended by Henry’s daughter had yet more echoes of classic teen movies, albeit really caustic, cruel ones like Heathers or Mean Girls. Having impressed the headmistress with a display of perfect behaviour (“it’s only me she’s rude to,” Betty noted sourly), Sally found herself billeted with two other girls for an overnight stay. Their opinions of her were crucial to her acceptance at the school.

It looked, initially, like Sally might be leaping from the frying pan into the fire. Both girls seemed to be bullies, intent on putting her through humiliating hazing rituals. But Sally Draper has grown up with Don, Betty and their friends, and she’s dealt with far worse than a pair of teenage bullies. She soon won them over by inviting Glen and his friend Rolo to join the sleepover, bringing with them cigarettes and booze.

Interestingly, it seemed like Sally didn’t share the other girls’ excitement at the prospect of smoking and drinking, more than likely because they’re her now-despised father’s trademarks. But Glen’s still her best friend, it seems, and a completely platonic one at that. Having disappeared with one of the girls for a quick fumble, Glen was outraged to find his ‘friend’ Rolo trying it on with the very unwilling Sally. “She’s like my sister, man!” he spat, before the two of them engaged in fisticuffs to bring the party to an end.

Marten “Son of Matt” Weiner seems to have grown far quicker than Kiernan Shipka since he was introduced as her friend a few years ago; he now looks far older than her. But for all that he’s the son of the showrunner, he still turned in a fine and capable performance here, always has in fact. His classmate Rolo was played by a very attractive young chap called Liam Aiken, who I was surprised to find was the prepubescent hero of 2004’s Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events. Growing up suits him.

“You like trouble, don’t you?” was the girls’ admiring opinion of Sally. Picked up by Betty the next day, Sally was surprised to find that, despite the night’s excesses (or more likely because of them) she’d received a glowing report and was more than welcome to attend the prestigious school. And, with Betty’s permission, she’s now taken up smoking officially. She may have come to hate her father, but she’s one step further down the road to becoming him.

It wasn’t just Don’s family he was lashing out at, though. In many ways, for Don, his colleagues are his family, and it’s a family whose balance has been shifted since the merger with CGC (even though it was his idea). So those at work found themselves in the firing line too.

Literally, in Ken Cosgrove’s case – though that wasn’t by any fault of Don particularly. In a blackly comic continuation of the plot concerning his repeated humiliation at the hands of the Detroit-based Chevy execs, this week saw him getting shot in the face in a Dick Cheney-esque ‘hunting accident’. As with the car crash a few weeks ago, the ep milked the suspense of whether he was alive or dead for quite some while, before he turned up back at the office with a piratical eyepatch and his resignation from the account.

That set up quite a few ructions concerning the agency’s most high profile client; but Don found himself more concerned with Ted. More specifically, with Ted and Peggy. After Pete’s observation last week that they had mutually compatible feelings for each other, they’ve obviously acted upon them, as Don and Megan discovered, bumping into them at an afternoon showing of hot new movie Rosemary’s Baby.

Given Ted’s rather frosty relationship with his wife, that’s hardly a surprise. But if he thought he was keeping it secret, he should think again – he and Peggy were swanning around the office with moonstruck smiles, finishing each other’s sentences. The very archetype of a couple newly in love, in fact. Even Ginsberg was nauseated enough to pretend he needed to relieve himself just to get them to shut up about each other.

Though that might have been the cranberry juice. After last week’s detente with Don, Ted was ploughing ahead with the Ocean Spray campaign, which apparently necessitated the creative team swigging down arcane beverages with names like ‘Cranprune’.

Unfortunately for Ted, Don Draper in a foul mood is not a man of his word. Having been informed that Harry, still in LA, had secured a massive deal with Sunkist for TV advertising, Don told Harry that they were dropping Sunkist. So far, so honourable; but after his realisation about Ted and Peggy, he was back on the phone to Harry to give him the go-ahead. The rest of the partners, not surprisingly given the money involved, took Don’s side. Only Ted’s wounded look showed that, unlike Don, he was a man of principle, and had naively expected his colleague to keep his word.

Why would Don do that? He’s acting like a jealous ex-lover, and yet nothing like that has ever happened between him and Peggy. Could it be that, deep down, he wants it to? Is it a more professional jealousy, that a man he thinks of as inferior has taken over mentoring his protege, and fallen in love with her to boot? Or is it as simple as wanting to destroy a seemingly happy relationship the like of which he seems incapable of maintaining?

Whichever it is, torpedoing Ted’s treasured Ocean Spray account was just the beginning. Ted had snagged the traditionally staid St Joseph’s Baby Aspirin brand, and Peggy had come up with what even Don acknowledged was a great idea for an ad – a pastiche of Rosemary’s Baby. The lovestruck Ted was passionate about it, seeing Peggy’s first chance at the Clio advertising awards, which Don himself has a couple of.

He probably shouldn’t have told Don that. Seeing how much it mattered to Ted made Don resolute in screwing it over for both him and Peggy. But not for the agency itself – a sign, perhaps, that he sees the company as an extension of himself rather than a collaborative effort.

Having summoned the sceptical exec from St Joseph’s in to justify the project’s larger than anticipated budget, Ted found himself floundering, until Don swooped to the rescue. Or did he? Don’s justification was that the project was close to Ted’s heart “for personal reasons”, then left an agonisingly long pause while the horrified-looking Ted plainly leaped to the obvious conclusion that he was talking about Peggy.

Don continued to bait Ted with obvious relish, inviting him to chime in with his reasons, before coming up with the flabbergasting and utterly unethical falsehood that the campaign had been the late Frank Gleason’s last idea. The St Joseph exec, as fond of Gleason as his partners, cautiously acquiesced – after Ted, eyes downcast, backed up Don’s story. The look of betrayal on Peggy’s face spoke volumes; as did the look of smug satisfaction on Don’s.

So Don rescued the account, and saved the idea for the campaign, while simultaneously baiting his rival into betraying Peggy and losing her the credit for an admittedly great idea. Confronting him in his office, Peggy gave him both barrels – “you killed him. You killed the ad. You killed everything. You can stop now.” – before venturing her own bitter opinion, “you’re a monster.” This week, more than ever, he definitely was. But a monster in the same way as an overgrown toddler throwing a tantrum when he can’t get his way. No wonder he ended the ep as he began it – curled up in the fetal position and looking desperately sorry for himself.

Where’s Bob Benson?

Actually, this week, we were back to “who’s Bob Benson?” Having seemingly unpeeled a few layers with last week’s heartfelt profession of love for Pete Campbell, this week’s script turned all that back on its head with new revelations about Bob that left us with more questions than answers.

This week’s ‘B Plot’ centred on Bob and Pete, in the aftermath of Ken’s resignation of the Chevy account. Like a true friend who’s scented an opportunity for advancement, Pete was happy to jump into the gap left by Ken. But there was a problem. The partners wanted Bob to work with him. And after last week’s apparent revelation about Bob, Pete was less than keen.

The internet has been awash with bizarre theories about Bob Benson – he’s a government spy, or a plant from a rival agency, or even, bizarrely, Joan and Roger’s grown-up son who’s travelled back in time. Last week, we thought we had some answers with his attempted seduction of Pete, that at least explained why he was so busy sucking up to this exec in particular.

But, it turned out, that may have been just a more advanced form of sucking up, perhaps prompted by Bob’s perception that Pete was inclined that way himself. Having been turfed off the Chevy account, he was to be seen cursing Pete’s name on the phone in perfect Spanish (though the less than perfect subtitles couldn’t seem to spell Pete’s surname). Hardly the actions of a man in love. Nor was his rather disturbing advice to Pete – “you should watch what you say to people.”

The mystery deepened further as Pete called in corporate headhunter Duck Phillips to try and get Bob placed somewhere else. Anywhere else. Duck did the logical thing, which apparently the SCDP HR department hadn’t – he looked into Bob’s references. And found that, to a one, they were false. He didn’t come from where he’d said, hadn’t been educated where he’d said, and indeed had never worked anywhere he’d said. He was, in actuality, a chancer pretending to be somebody else who’d taken advantage of the first firm trusting and unwitting enough to be taken in. Sound like anyone we know?

Pete certainly got the parallel. When Duck confessed, “I’ve never seen anything like this”, Pete sourly replied, “I have.” And remembering how Bert Cooper hadn’t even cared about the seeming trump card that was Don’s true identity, he threw in the towel to Bob, conceding that he’d work with him. Providing work was all it was.

That was a great scene, Bob’s perpetual smile finally wiped off his face at the thought of being discovered, only to return when he realised Pete planned to do nothing about it. But is Pete being cleverer than before here? Bob doesn’t know about the last time this happened, and now thinks Pete has damaging evidence about him. That should keep him in line – unless he knows all about what happened with Don Draper…

Historical Events.

Not many this week. Various parties went to see Roman Polanski’s recently released adaptation of Rosemary’s Baby, the novel of which we saw Sally reading a few weeks ago. A disturbing and atmospheric horror movie, Polanski’s film went on to become an acknowledged classic of the genre, pre-empting many other ‘demonic child’ efforts like The Exorcist and The Omen.

And Don, convalescing in front of the TV, happened upon a campaign ad for Republican Presidential candidate Richard Nixon. By modern standards, it came across as a remarkably crude and simplistic piece of political propaganda; possibly the point of showing it in a show which centres on advertising. It worked though; on November 5, Nixon was elected President. The irony of his pro-peace, anti-corporate stance here was all the more stark compared to today’s hawkish, paranoid and free market-obsessed Republican campaigns.

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Again, not many this week, though you can always rely on Harry Crane to be garbed in the worst excesses of the era. Thankfully, he was only wearing this horrific shorts/ open shirt combo in his hotel room while chatting to Don on the phone; but on recent form, he’d be shameless enough to wear it in public too.

Only one more ep to go this season, and only one more season to go after that. This penultimate episode didn’t have the shock factor of last year’s, with the dramatic suicide of Lane Pryce. Instead, it took the more subtle avenue of showing Don’s increasing disintegration, and how it’s shattering not just his world but those of his friends and family. Next week, will he implode? And will we ever find out just who Bob Benson is, and whether his uncanny similarity to Don has any more significance than dramatic effect? Let’s see if we find out next week.

Oh really, Roger Sterling? Not all surprises are bad? In the real world maybe, but this is Mad Men, where everything that happens to everyone is bad. If you really think some surprises here are good, just ask Don Draper. Or Sally Draper. Or, for that matter, Pete Campbell.

This week’s aptly titled episode, with the talented Semi Chellas again on co-scripting duties with Matthew Weiner, did indeed revolve around favours (or “favors”, for my American friends) being asked by various characters of various other characters. This being Mad Men though, there was nothing altruistic in granting those favours. They came with strings.

The ep centred around Don and Pete and those in their orbits, for whom no surprise is ever likely to be good, and no favour should ever be expected to make things better. It was actually structured almost like a trad episodic TV show, with an A plot and a B plot. The A plot concerned Don, at work and at home, as his pissing contest with Ted Chaough continued to escalate just as he discovered he could do a favour for mistress Sylvia that would leave her forever in his debt. The B plot (slightly comedic as often in such a structure), concerned Pete and his Alzheimer’s-stricken mother. Along the way though, these plots intersected with plenty of the other characters, causing some potentially long-lasting consequences.

To take the ‘B Plot’ first, Pete spent most of the episode fretting over his mother. She actually seemed to be getting along rather well with her new nurse, the charming Manolo – perhaps too well. Pete was initially impressed with Manolo – until a chance conversation with Peggy led to his discovery that Mrs Campbell, at least, thought she was in some kind of carnal relationship with him.

Anyone with any sense would have immediately dismissed it as the harmless fantasy of a lonely old lady whose mind was increasingly disconnected from reality. Pete, though, thrives on paranoia, and spent the whole ep with the thought niggling at him until he finally persuaded himself that it was true.

This was obviously not going to end well; and so it proved as he confronted his mother with his suspicions. She may be befuddled enough not to give up her fantasy, but she retained enough clarity to give possibly the most succinct – and hurtful – analysis of Pete I’ve ever heard. “You were a sour little boy, and now you’re a sour little man… you’ve always been unlovable.”

As ever, poor old Pete. The irony being that earlier, when he let his hair down (literally; I’ve never seen him look so dishevelled) at a bar with Ted and Peggy, he actually came across as quite a nice bloke. Perceptive, even, as he noted Peggy’s obvious feelings for Ted, and told her that Ted very noticeably reciprocates them. Pete Campbell, Love Guru – whatever next?

Of course, he has experience of this – at least where Peggy’s concerned. The unspoken fact of their child became – very nearly – spoken this week, as Mrs Campbell, her mind not at its sharpest, mentioned that it was good to see them back together “for the sake of the child”.

Of course, she was getting Peggy confused with Pete’s wife Trudy. But it was marvellously played by Elisabeth Moss, her face betraying hastily masked shock as she tried to figure out what Pete had really told his mother. Nothing, of course; but this issue surely must get addressed at some point by the end of the series.

Don, meanwhile, found work and personal lives entwined (not for the first time), as he discovered he was in a position to make the still-lusted-after Sylvia Rosen owe him – in a pretty big way. Her son Mitchell was back from France, and plainly infected by the revolutionary spirit of May ‘68. Unfortunately for him, that had led to him sending back his draft card for the US army in protest. And now he was bound pretty quickly for Vietnam; unless something could be done.

And Don was the man who could do something. You don’t spend years working on Madison Avenue without making a few influential contacts. After his initial suggestion to Pete Campbell was sneeringly rebuffed, he took the option of sounding out the execs of General Motors at a dinner about the Chevy contract; after all, GM were one of the biggest defence contractors at the time.

Trouble was, the GM execs thought draft-dodging was pretty disgusting. And judging by the rather horrified looks on the faces of Ted Chaough and Roger Sterling, they knew exactly what he was up to. Way to go, Draper – risk the biggest contract your agency’s ever had as part of a byzantine scheme to get another shag.

As it turned out, help came from the unlikeliest of places – Ted Chaough himself. We got a lot of insight into Ted this week, as his testosterone-fuelled alpha male conflict with Don continued. The merger’s not going too well, as Don and Roger have snagged Sunkist Orange Juice while, all unknowing, Ted and Jim Cutler have snagged Ocean Spray Cranberry Juice. Obviously neither company is going to take well to having the same ad agency as the other – another corporate fuckup caused by a lack of communication. Don may be keeping his doings shrouded in secrecy; Ted, on the other hand, is deluging the partners with so many memos they don’t take them in.

Don’s biggest rival he may be, but Ted came across as more than a little pathetic this week. “I don’t want his juice, I want my juice!” he whined to Jim Cutler, making a presumably unintentional innuendo. Thing is, Don barely even seems to know this pissing contest is going on; for Ted, it’s all-consuming. No wonder he spends so much time at the office his wife and kids barely see him.

So Ted it was who came through with help for Mitchell – as yet another favour. And like the favour Don was doing for Sylvia, it came with strings. He could get Mitchell into the domestic Air National Guard – if Don stopped competing with him. “This isn’t a handshake, it’s a binding contract,” was his firm assertion. It’s hard to gauge whether Don is still competing with him, or has given it up as a bad job; either way, I wouldn’t expect him to honour the “binding contract”.

Having accomplished this feat, it wasn’t long before Don found himself again in the reluctantly accommodating arms of Sylvia Rosen. Where, unfortunately for both of them, he intersected with his daughter.

In a plot seemingly nicked from a Lindsey Lohan movie, Sally had turned up in Manhattan with her friend Julie, and both had found themselves rather taken with the dishy Mitchell when they encountered him in the lobby of Don’s apartment building. I couldn’t help but agree – actor Hudson Thames (a very bizarre name) is definitely somebody I’d like to see more of.

So they had a sleepover while compiling a written list of “Things I Like About Mitchell” (Sally’s contribution – “his ass”). And again in classic teen movie style, Julie tried to act as matchmaker by slipping the list under the Rosens’ door, leading the frantically embarrassed Sally to borrow the doorman’s master keys under false pretences and try to retrieve it.

Which is where the fluffy teen movie comparisons end, as she found herself confronted by the insalubrious sight of her half-clad father deep in ‘congress’ with Sylvia Rosen. It was a well-directed moment; rarely has sex, even with Don Draper, looked so unsexy, and Kiernan Shipka perfectly conveyed Sally’s shock at the sight. Somewhat sexually precocious herself, she’s already been confronted by the less than pleasant sight of her step-grandmother going down on an eager Roger Sterling. Now she has to cope with her father – who she was previously defending to Betty as a hero – being just as much of a lascivious heel as anyone else.

Way to knock yourself off your pedestal, Draper. Don’s looked discomfited and dismayed before, but rarely, I think, this badly. Sally now has the whip hand on him, and he knows it; she’s not dumb enough to buy into that “I was comforting her” bullshit. The question is, will she keep schtum, or will her disillusionment – and her father’s chronic inability to keep his pants on – lead to the end of another Draper marriage?

Where’s Bob Benson?

This week, the perma-smiling Bob was mostly to be found in the vicinity of Pete Campbell, and answering a question I’ve posed a couple of times and Ginsberg actually asked last week – “tell me the truth, are you a homo?” Yes, as it turns out to no-one’s particular surprise, he is. What is surprising is the object of his affections – and for that object, it is, inevitably, not a good surprise. Bob, it seems, is in love with Pete Campbell.

Yes, I couldn’t help but guffaw at the revelation. Called in to discuss the ‘improper conduct’ of the nurse he’d recommended, Bob segued from pointing out that Manolo’s interests didn’t really extend to women to a heartfelt speech about how you can love someone so much that you’ll do anything for them, in the hope that the might love you back. Despite Pete’s description of Manolo’s tastes as “degenerate”, Bob pressed on with a subtle knee-to-knee touch that might have been innocent on a TV chat show, but in light of what he’d just said, was anything but.

It was a well-played scene from both James Wolk and Vincent Kartheiser, made slightly believable by my knowledge that, in reality, Kartheiser is actually quite an attractive man. Something about him as Pete Campbell is profoundly off-putting though. Pete wasn’t swayed from his decision to fire Manolo, and while, as ever in this show, plenty remained unsaid, he evidently understood exactly what Bob was getting at.

Poor old Pete; his mother may think he’s “unlovable” and he may even think that himself, but somebody loves him. It’s just unfortunate he thinks such love is “disgusting”. Bob, for his part, didn’t seem too put off. Maybe he’ll be back; or maybe we’ll discover that the other likely suspect, Ginsberg, also bats for his team. Somehow I can’t see them getting together though. Bob worships men like Pete (or at least his interpretation of Pete), who are successful businessmen. Still, it’s nice to have another gay man dealing with the period’s prejudices after the long-ago and peremptory departure of Sal Romano.

Historical Events

Nothing specific this week, but Vietnam continues to cast a long shadow over everything that’s happening in the US at this point. Mitchell Rosen’s little plotline showed another element of it – the draft, and how you might possibly avoid it, if you had any sense. Mitchell’s little protest got him classified as 1-A – “available immediately for military service”. Given his politics, he could have tried for 1-AO – “conscientious objector” and taken up a noncombatant role such as nurse or medic, but that wouldn’t keep him out of harm’s way. And as Ginsberg pointed out last week, US troops were coming home in bodybags by the hundred every week.

The holy grail for someone like Mitchell would be to get classified as 4-F – “unfit for military service for medical reasons”. Trouble is, as far as I could see, Mitchell was very fit. Leaving the option he was thinking of exploring – decamping to Canada, where the Department of Defence couldn’t get its hands on him. Trouble is, that was a federal crime, and those guilty of it had the choice of either remaining in Canada or going to jail on returning to the US – even after the war was over. No wonder Mitchell was so grateful to Don.

Dedicated Followers of Fashion

With most of the ep taking place in work hours, there weren’t many regrettable fashions on display this week. Pete’s double-breasted waistcoat (or “vest” for my American friends) was pretty swish:

But the only garishly 60s fashion on display was probably Mitchell’s trousers (or “pants”, for my American friends). Vile they may have been, but I found myself drawn to them, probably for the same reason as Sally Draper – their contents.

This was another incisive set of character examinations from Semi Chellas, who is rapidly becoming my favourite writer on the show. It may not have been steeped in semi-mystical portents of dread, but what we got instead was a complex examination of the failings of several of the main characters. To have significantly more failings than anyone else in this show is quite an achievement, but Don, Pete – and arguably Ted – managed it with alacrity. With only two more eps to go this season, this week had the feel of building towards a climax – like Don was until his daughter walked in. And that sudden switch is good drama.

After the tumultuous events of last week, this week’s season finale of Game of Thrones felt more like an epilogue than a climax. True, it was still a highly charged, and often tremendously violent piece of drama. But it also had the tall order of providing a capstone to just about all of this year’s multifarious plotlines, in preparation for next year. Benioff and Weiss’ script accomplished this with some aplomb, catching us up on just about every major character – the ones still alive, that is.

In that respect, last week’s carnage actually did the writers a favour, massively reducing the number of players we needed to see. But there are still plenty, including some old faces we haven’t seen since last year, so necessarily most of them got little more than brief vignettes here. Nonetheless, even these had enough character detail and fine performances crammed into them to shame most full episodes of other shows.

Some settings and characters got more than vignettes, however, in an episode that dwelled at length on family, birthright (or lack thereof) and the difference between nobles and commoners. With the Starks now virtually extinct, the last major family left is the Lannisters, and we spent more time in King’s Landing with them than any of the other major players.

They may be looking victorious, but it didn’t seem to make them any happier; indeed, just about everyone we saw this week was having a pretty horrid time. Sansa… Lannister, now, I suppose, had at least a brief moment of contentment when she seemed to actually be getting on with her new husband, almost accepting him as a decent man who wouldn’t force himself on her against her will. Unfortunately, that all went pear shaped when the news of her brother and mother’s deaths arrived – courtesy of her father-in-law.

The scene at the small court was packed with tension and drama – no mean feat for a sequence which was basically people sitting around talking. Virtually every major player at court was there, vying for supremacy; Maester Pycelle, still baiting Tyrion, Varys, the embodiment of watchful caution, Joffrey, still revelling in sadism – and, of course, Tywin.

Now more than ever we saw him proved the real power in the land, as he effectively sent the king to bed without any supper, reminding him that, “if you have to tell people you’re the king, it doesn’t mean anything.” Joffrey may be a vicious little psychopath, but even he knows better than to oppose his grandfather.

Tyrion, though, is more than capable of standing up to Tywin – verbally at least. Peter Dinklage and Charles Dance are well-matched in their scenes together, served by some excellent dialogue. We found here that, for all his (successful) scheming, Tywin was no happier than anyone else; having to live with his contempt for his disappointment of a son for the sake of the family name. It was a theme the episode returned to time and again.

Tyrion too was unhappy, teaching his squire Pod how to be permanently drunk. “It’s not easy being drunk all the time. If it was, everyone would do it.” Pod, at least, still seems to be enjoying his reputation for his skills at… whatever he does with women in bed; witness the girlish giggling from two ladies in the garden as he passed. It might seem like puerile humour, but given the relentlessly downbeat tone of recent episodes, even that felt welcome.

Cersei was no happier than any of the other Lannisters, pouring out her woes to, of all people, Tyrion. Hated her little brother may be, but he’s infinitely more approachable than their stern, forbidding father. Lena Headey got another chance to shine as Cersei recounted how her love for her children was the only thing that kept her going, and that even Joffrey as he is now couldn’t wipe out the memory of how he had been as a child; the only time Cersei had been truly happy. Still, happier times may be round the corner for her. Her brother (and lover) Jaime is back in town. He’s not quite the man he was, though. I wonder where that will go next season?

The Lannisters may be miserable, but at least they’re miserable in opulent comfort. The same couldn’t really be said of any of the other characters this week; but none more so than Theon Greyjoy. Still filling out the books’ implied backstory of what happened to Theon after the fall of Winterfell, this week the show gave us confirmation that his gleefully sadistic torturer is indeed the bastard offspring of the treacherous Lord Roose Bolton.

Ramsay Snow (I no longer need refer to him as ‘Simon out of Misfits’) was carrying on his usual torture, this week psychological as well as physical. You have to hand it to him; eating a giant sausage in front of the man whose penis you just cut off is blackly humorous. Having reassured Theon that the sausage was not, in fact, the organ in question, Ramsay had a good old taunt about phantom limbs: “when you see a pretty girl, where will it itch?” He then came up with the novel wheeze of renaming the presumably now quite smelly Theon as “Reek”, and hitting him till that’s what he answered to.

This is the first time I’ve seen the talented Iwan Rheon playing an out-and-out baddy, and I must say, he doesn’t disappoint. True, he’s not playing it subtly, but then Ramsay Snow’s not a subtle part. This the man who sent Theon’s father his son’s severed penis in a box as a means to discourage his territorial ambitions, after all. Patrick Malahide was as good as ever as Balon Greyjoy, though yet again I thought him too similar to Walder Frey – both in appearance and character – for the show to want to dwell on him.

The aftermath of the actual Walder’s actions was what coloured this week’s catchup with Arya and the Hound, who do seem to be becoming another of the mismatched buddy pairings the show is so fond of. After all, there’s no longer any question of the Hound getting a reward for returning Arya to the Starks; but he protected her nonetheless, getting her out of the bloody chaos as the Frey and Bolton armies slaughtered what remained of Force Stark from Winterfell. Unfortunately for her, he still couldn’t spare her the sight of her brother’s decapitated body with his direwolf’s head sewn none too artfully to the stump.

Still, at least they caught up with some of those responsible in the woods the next day, culminating in a vicious stabbing from Arya and much violent hacking from the Hound. Again, it looks like they’re mellowing towards each other; having discovered the knife she’d used was his, his only comment was, “next time you do something like that, tell me first.” I wonder if she still wants to kill him? The way she clung onto the Valyrian coin Jaqen H’ghar gave her, muttering “valar morghulis”, made me wonder.

We also caught up with the major threat facing all of Westeros, as Bran Stark’s party, still heading North, encountered Sam Tarly and Gilly heading South at the mysterious Nightfort. Bran’s horror story of the cook turned into a rat for killing his guests was surely meant to reflect on the actions of Walder Frey – does he psychically know about the Red Wedding already?

It did at least give them the willies as Sam climbed out of the well, covered in furs like a monster. But the real monsters are beyond the Wall. Bran has to go there, but I doubt you’d get Sam and Gilly back for all the tea in Valyria. Having equipped Bran and co with dragonglass daggers, they went their separate ways, and the last we saw of the solemn Bran was his gang heading through the Wall to a forbidding light at the end of the tunnel. I wonder where next year will find them, and whether Isaac Hempstead-Wright’s onset of puberty will now be so advanced that Bran will have to be recast? I do hope not.

As I’ve said before, while the White Walkers are meant to be the overriding threat that dwarfs the civil wars raging through Westeros, implacable magical foes are a bit two-a-penny in this genre, and the power games for the Iron Throne are far more interesting. Still, the two plots do seem to be converging a little bit this week, as Sam’s return to Maester Aemon (Peter Vaughan out of Porridge, as great as ever) led to raven-borne cries for help sent to all the combatants.

Thus far, we’ve only seen the response of Stannis Baratheon. But it was encouraging. The show spent a fair bit of time at Dragonstone this week, as the ever-conscientious Davos Seaworth tried to prevent his liege from sacrificing the unfortunate Gendry, going so far as to free the boy and send him off in a boat that looked none too safe. I hope this isn’t the last we’ve seen of Joe Dempsie.

Fortunately for Davos, Aemon’s message about the threat beyond the Wall was enough to give Stannis pause about having him executed. There are shades of grey here; Melisandre and her ‘blood magic’ are very much portrayed as evil, and Davos is a decent man. Yet her magic does seem to work – ask Robb Stark, if you could. Given that, you have to wonder about her contemptuous statement that the life of one boy might have been worth less than that of tens of thousands she could have saved. And yet, as Dostoevsky (and Robert Holmes) once asked, what price a paradise built on even one murder?

And just when I’d all but forgotten her, we caught up with Daenerys Targaryen and her unfolding quest for abolition of slavery in Essos. It was a brief coda, but a hopeful one, as the liberated slaves of Yunkai poured through the city gates to proclaim her “Mhysa” – Mother. It was an upbeat moment to end the season on, rather than the doom-laden cliffhanger of last year, but after the amount of gloom we’ve seen recently, you can hardly blame the writers for that.

The Big Acting Moment

A few this week. I’ve already mentioned Lena Headey’s superb soliloquy about motherhood, but it was at least matched by the quiet scene in which Ser Davos and the imprisoned Gendry discussed their lowborn origins. Liam Cunningham and Joe Dempsie were both excellent here; the irony being that Davos had been elevated from the peasantry to the nobility, while Gendry, as the son of the last king, arguably had a better claim to being ‘highborn’ than Davos did. Mind you, I did wonder why, if they came from virtually the same street, Davos has a very distinct (and convincing) Geordie accent, while Gendry just sounds like he’s from Nottingham.

Sex and violence

No sex this week, but oodles of violence. Most of it took place at the very start, as what remained of Robb Stark’s armies were massacred. There was so much gore going on, it takes a couple of viewings to see all of it. For instance, did you spot the feller being beheaded over a barrel (very convincingly) in the background of this scene:

Later on, though, Arya and the Hound’s little massacre of the Frey soldiers in the woods had plenty of pulsing blood too, as both hacked and slashed with gay abandon:

This was a gripping epilogue to another excellent season, even without a massive world-threatening cliffhanger. Take note, other showrunners – it isn’t necessary to constantly up the stakes of every season ending; in fact it becomes utterly impossible to top the drama every single year.

We’re roughly halfway through Volume 3 of George RR Martin’s mammoth saga now (though some of the events have been liberally reordered to flow better as a TV narrative). Along the way, we’ve met a lot of new characters – the Tyrells, the Brotherhood Without Banners, Ramsay Snow – but lost plenty too – Lord Commander Mormont, Robb and Catelyn Stark and most of their bannermen. This may keep the crowded cast a little more manageable.

Next year will presumably deal with the rest of Volume 3, and after that it gets a little more complicated. The equally weighty Volumes 4 and 5 take place, for the most part, simultaneously, albeit in different locations. Another two seasons for those, on top of one more for this Volume? And there are supposed to be two more on the way, though Martin is not the quickest of writers. I’d say we’re looking at at least another seven seasons to finish this; for now, we have to wait until next spring to see where it’s going. And now my Watch begins…

Rarely has an episode of Mad Men been so light and fluffy, and (almost) devoid of the usual gloom and portents that characterise the show. And rarely has an ep had a title so literal, as this week saw Don, Roger and Harry jet off to LA on business, while back in New York, Joan tried to get more involved in the business herself – as opposed to just office admin.

I say ‘business’, but of course Don and Roger’s jaunt to California was treated more like the holiday it really was. Roger even stopped Don trying to do research on the plane, insisting all Don needed to do was “be you.” Well, if he can work out exactly who that is, I suspect even then it won’t be a face that would be ideal to show to clients.

The feel of the late 60s was all over this one. In NYC, Ginsberg was feeling rebellious like the hippy he really is, which led to a blistering confrontation with ‘the new Roger’, Jim Cutler. Cutler has thus far been portrayed as congenial and relaxed, vaguely reminiscent of Hugh Hefner in his laid-backness. Now we saw another side of him as he faced up to the new belief that big business might be, you know, a little unethical. This immediately drove him to the office of Ted Chaough, where he outlined a new plan to get rid of ‘the right people’ – ie the old guard from SCDP. Ted wasn’t taking him seriously, but I think a few people had better watch out.

Still, if anyone was going to get to Cutler, Ginsberg was. The frenzied eccentricity that drove Don so wild when he first joined was well and truly back this week, and Ben Feldman was superbly sweaty as Ginsberg first defied the boss then had a panic attack at the thought of representing the firm to clients. It was king of suckups Bob Benson who managed to drag him out of it, with a firm hand and the flattering command, “be the man who inspires me.” No wonder Ginsberg’s response (when he’d calmed down) was “tell me the truth – are you a homo?” Well, maybe. Perhaps Joan’s his fag hag. And I’ve wondered very frequently about Ginsberg in the past too – could they be destined to be Mad Men’s own ‘odd couple’?

Speaking of Joan, half of this week’s ep was very much her story, as she found herself unexpectedly in the position to woo a big new account. A ‘date’ with a friend of a friend turned out to be rather different, as the man in question was a big wheel at cosmetics firm Avon, and in the market for a new ad agency.

Given that Joan’s role as partner seems to have thus far involved little more than being an office manager, it was no wonder she seized the chance with both hands. She may not have gone about it the best way though, as she found herself on a collision course not just with the ever-seething Pete Campbell, but also, surprisingly, with Peggy Olson.

Then again, perhaps it wasn’t that much of a surprise. There’s always been a friction between Joan and Peggy, from the moment when Peggy expressed a desire to become something more than just a secretary. For Joan, there’s no such thing as ‘just’ a secretary; no wonder this longstanding enmity blew up into a full-on shouting match this week, as Joan asserted that Peggy had never respected her, while Peggy denied having slept her way to the top via Don Draper.

That, of course, is the nuclear option where Joan is concerned. Having compromised her principles to actually sleep her way to the top (arguably an act of self-sacrifice for the good of the company too), she’s constantly reminded of the fact. Along with the corollary implication that she wasn’t good enough to get there on merit. No wonder she has a resentment-masked envy of Peggy, who genuinely did get where she is through hard work and talent.

And no wonder too that she seized the chance to be involved with some real business so eagerly. Unfortunately for her, Ted Chaough saw fit to put said business straight into the hands of Pete Campbell; a tactless error to which Joan responded by effectively cutting him out of the deal and keeping him in the dark. That’s not the best way to deal with office politics, and shows that, however admirable she may be, Joan is far from flawless. No wonder Peggy was annoyed.

Still, in the end, it was she who came to Joan’s rescue when the furious Pete found out he’d been had, pretending her new client was on the phone. As she commented to Joan, “you better hope he really calls.” It was a good plotline for Joan, who really hasn’t found the position of partner quite as rewarding as she expected, and we saw the usual strong performances from Christina Hendricks and Elisabeth Moss as two very different women trying to make it in a male-dominated business environment in their own ways.

The particular males who usually do dominate the offices of… whatever it’s called this week were off having the time of their lives in LA. Or at least, Roger was. John Slattery was on supremely funny form this week, possibly thanks to the talented director, one John Slattery. What a guy.

Still, it was writer Janet Leahy who gave Roger such excellent lines, as he compared he and Don to conquistadores; “I’m Vasco de Gama, and you’re… some other Mexican guy. All we have to worry about is not getting syphilis”. Then, meeting with snooty and none-too-keen potential clients Carnation, he defended the honour of New York City ad men by dismissing those they’d had a bad experience with – “I’m sorry your last girlfriend hurt you.”

Eager to embrace the California party scene, Roger found a keen helper in the form of the ever-slimy Harry Crane. Harry’s getting harder to like these days; yes, he was very forward thinking in his plans to get the agency involved in the emerging TV ad market, but oh boy, doesn’t he just know it.  Still full of himself this week, Harry, keen to show off his media savvy and contacts, was soon dragging Roger and Don off to a Hollywood party full of movie types, where they bumped into yet another familiar face from seasons of old – Danny Siegel, incarnated by Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s Danny Strong.

Now keen to be referred to as ‘Daniel A. Siegel’, Danny seemed fairly sanguine about having been sacked from the agency way back in season 3. Roger wasn’t, though, and took every opportunity to sneer at him until, trying to chat up Danny’s silent hippy girlfriend ‘Lotus’, Roger challenged him to a fight. To which Danny, appropriately for his height, responded by giving him a sound punch in the balls. It was the only thing that actually made Lotus laugh; but not as loud as I did. Still, it made me wonder whether there’s any significance to the recent glut of long-vanished characters returning to the show. Before Danny, we had Duck Phillips, and before him Burt Peterson. Is everyone stuck in a Lost-style afterlife?

Don, typically, seemed to be. The only man who can contrive to make a drink-and-drug-fuelled party into a morbid, portentous existential event, Don decided to accept an invitation to try hashish from a hookah. This may be the first time he’s responded to the phrase, “there’s still a nipple free” without a bout of meaningless sex.

Not that he didn’t try. But he was distracted from copping off with the pretty young blonde who’d issued the invitation by the rather unexpected appearance of Megan in full hippy garb, asserting that she’d moved to LA to surprise him. It was a weird, off-kilter moment that only got more bizarre with the even more unexpected appearance of another old face – PFC Dinkins from the very first episode of this season, proffering the lighter that Don had returned to him.

Mad Men often has the tendency to treat its actual events like dreams, so it wasn’t until about that point that I realised we were in another of Don’s fevered hallucinations. Well, anyway, the point where Dinkins told him that he was actually dead – besides visibly missing an arm. “Why is your arm still missing?” asked the mystified Don, to which Dinkins responded, “dying doesn’t make you whole. Look at you.”

Typical Don Draper – he can’t even get high without thinking about death. As it turned out, he was pretty near it – having an out of body experience, he saw himself floating face down in the pool, for all the world like William Holden in Sunset Blvd. Perhaps, like Holden, he really is dead, and telling his story from beyond the grave; but if so, this is just the latest of many occasions when he might have actually died without us – or him – realising it.

Still, it can’t all be about Don – much as he may think it is. His tragically shrivelled mirror image Pete Campbell was having a pretty rotten time too. But then when doesn’t he? Not only was he seething with rage at Joan for having been cut out of the Avon deal, it didn’t exactly make him happier when Ted wasn’t really all that bothered by her behaviour. So, yet again mirroring Don (albeit unknowingly), he took refuge in the last place you’d expect from straitlaced Pete Campbell. Grabbing a handy spliff from Stan, he ended the episode getting righteously high. What’s the betting it doesn’t make him any happier than it did Don?

Where’s Bob Benson?

Bob seems to be finally developing into an actual character these days, instead of a mysterious smiling presence that nobody really knows about. His main character trait appears to be glib, slick sycophancy, that constant smile of his always ready to ingratiate. And perhaps it’s working too. Not only was he rescued from redundancy by Joan, this week found him handpicked by Ted and Jim to accompany the unpredictable Ginsberg to a meeting with clients Manischewitz wine.

Along the way, he displayed the usual unthinking anti-Semitism of the period, trying to reassure Ginsberg with the statement, “they’re your people.” AT least he seemed to realise and backtrack by mentioning that Manischewitz don’t only make kosher wine, but “wine for all sorts of churches.” Most people wouldn’t get away with digging themselves deeper like that, but Bob’s ready smile seems to be his Get Out of Jail Free card.

Historical Events

The feel of the late 60s was everywhere this week, what with Ginsberg’s workplace mutiny and the hippy party in LA. But actual events were on display too. We saw new footage of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago choosing their Presidential candidate, Hubert Humphrey, and their rejection of a peace motion over the continuing war in Vietnam – a war that Democratic President Lyndon Johnson got the nation into. Ginsberg’s fury with Jim Cutler included his mention of the “200 body bags a week” returning US soldiers home by this point; a fact reinforced by Don’s hallucination of PFC Dinkins, who, knowing this show, is almost certainly dead for real.

As Thunderclap Newman put it, there was obviously “Something in the Air” in 1968, as the DNC’s apparent rejection of ‘peace’ led to yet another of the riots that seemed to dominate the year. This one followed a week of protests near the DNC, and culminated in a pitched battle between protestors and the police, who, judging by the footage Don and Megan were watching from two separate coasts, didn’t exactly behave with honour.

The snooty execs from Carnation maintained that the night’s riots lost the Presidency for the Democrats. Perhaps they were right.

Dedicated Followers of Fashion

If you thought the late 60s clothes of Manhattan were hideous, Los Angeles showed you that NYC was actually a bastion of restraint. Hippy beads and kaftans were everywhere, in the most glaring colours imaginable. Harry Crane, as ever, displayed a breathtaking lack of taste with his bright orange blazer and cravat combination:

Still, I can’t fault his taste in cars. The Ford Mustang had been around for three and a half years by this point, and was developing year by year into a flabbier and less elegant shape. Harry at least had the good sense to stick with the clean lines of the ‘64 original, complete with Pony interior. Roger’s response? “Get something with a roof. I don’t want to turn up to meetings with bugs in my teeth.”

This was a pretty lightweight ep of Mad Men – though by the standards of any other show, the conflict between Joan and Peggy, and Don’s usual ventures into David Lynch territory, would mark it out as rather heavy. Still, as this show goes, it felt rather throwaway; enjoyable enough without really accomplishing anything. Of course, Matthew Weiner plays the long game, and some of the events here may turn out to have greater significance later on. For now, though, while I can always spend an hour watching Roger Sterling being cheerfully obnoxious, this felt like Mad Men on autopilot.

Wow. What is it about penultimate episodes of this show? Last year’s episode 9, Blackwater, was undisputedly the best ep of the season. Now, with this week’s action-packed Game of Thrones cutting down on the jaw-jaw in favour of the war-war, it looks like that might become a standard thing. There was violence, action and revelation aplenty as much of the previous scheming came to fruition; along the way, there was still time for a few heart-rending character moments. Oh, and another of the recently frequent weddings. Only this one decidedly did not go as expected.

Showrunners Benioff and Weiss were again on scripting duties, proving that they know at least as well as original author George RR Martin how to translate this story for the screen. After last week’s considered, narrow-focused character piece, this week  brought us up to date with most of the other narrative threads in a frenzy of excitement. Along the way were some genuinely thrilling action scenes at least the equal of any you might see in an actual movie.

Bran’s party were still heading North towards the Wall, while Jon and his untrusting Wildling commandos were heading South. It was perhaps inevitable that their plotlines should draw together, as both parties ended up converging on an abandoned tower during a thunderstorm. Bran and co were using it to shelter from the rain, while the Wildlings were chasing an escaped victim of their horse-robbing activities before he could rat them out to the Night’s Watch.

The scene built from fearful conversation between Bran’s group to outright tension as their frantic efforts to shush the terrified Hodor before he could tip off the Wildlings outside were intercut with the final test of Jon Snow’s loyalty. Apparently killing Qhorin Halfhand wasn’t enough to convince them; at least, not while Orell was still holding a torch for the smitten Ygritte. Challenged to prove his loyalty by killing the unfortunate horse breeder, Jon demurred – and all hell broke loose as the Wildlings realised they’d been had.

It was a terrific fight scene (the first of many this week), the combatants slipping in the all-too convincing mud as they hacked and slashed at each other. Mind you, hard bastard though he may be, I wasn’t convinced that Jon could take out so many Wildlings, even with Ygritte’s help. Which was where Bran came in.

Having already used his mysterious powers to still the quivering Hodor, he now used them to possess the direwolves, who came tearing out of the rain to rip the throats out of the Wildlings while Jon finally despatched the loathsome Orell with the words, “you were right all along”. The look of horrified realisation on Ygritte’s face as he fled was a picture; kudos to Rose Leslie for a good performance this week. I guess she was the one who knew nothing.

I must say, I had hoped we’d keep the ambiguity about Jon’s true loyalties a little longer than this; in the books, even at this point, you weren’t sure if he was truly betraying the Wildlings or simply killing them before they could kill him. But it also led to more interesting revelations about Bran’s mysterious power to enter the bodies of animals – and now, with Hodor, people too. As Jojen told him, nobody, anywhere has been able to do that. It looks like Bran’s another of the most vital pieces in the game – not the one to win the Iron Throne, but the one to defeat the implacable White Walkers. Like Dany’s dragons, he seems an obvious weapon to use against them.

Unlike his little brother Rickon, who has seemed little more than a spare part in the cast since the burning of Winterfell. Having had barely anything to do in three seasons, Rickon was finally off this week as Bran sent him packing with Osha rather than subject them both to the dangers beyond the Wall. Proving once again that this show has a way with child actors, Art Parkinson finally got a Big Acting scene with his tearful farewell to his brother. I’m not sure he really held his own against Isaac Hempstead-Wright’s earnest solemnity, but he really did try.

It was back to yet more 300-style shenanigans over the sea at Yunkai, as the long-promised battle for the city began. Or at least, sort of began. What we saw here was another cracking fight scene, as the dodgy Daario, still smitten by Dany’s dripping nudity, led Ser Jorah and Grey Worm through a secret entrance to the fortified city. Having already despatched the two guard on the gate, the trio were then met by another roaring horde. Cue yet more hacking and slashing as they cut them down efficiently, Daario proving his loyalty in the process.

It was an excellently choreographed fight sequence, Ed Skrein, Iain Glen and Jacob Anderson pirouetting like dancers as they repeatedly hacked down their enemies. But while it was a joy to watch, it did feel a bit anticlimactic when we cut to the next scene to show them arriving back at Dany’s tent to announce that the city had been taken. What, with just the three of them? All right, so maybe Yunkai’s slave soldiers didn’t truly have their hearts in it, but I’d expected to see a bit more of a battle than that.

Still, it did at least serve to confirm (if it needed to be) that Dany and Daario have real feelings for each other. Scary, violent feelings, probably, but feelings nonetheless. And at least we finally saw the fabled Unsullied in action, as the deceptively slim Grey Worm proved himself a force to be reckoned with equipped with a spear.

But missing out on a pitched battle for Yunkai felt like a price worth paying for the ep to be dominated by the most shocking and dramatic plotline – the unexpected turn of events at Edmure Tully’s wedding to… one or other of Walder Frey’s daughters. In many ways, the season has been building up to this since the beginning, with the increasingly desperate Robb Stark now left with no allies to turn to except Lord Frey – a man he’s bitterly disappointed already by breaking his vow to marry a daughter himself, thus giving the leering old Lord a royal connection.

Like most of Robb’s decisions since last year, it turned out to be a Very Bad Idea. Probably the worst he’s had yet. Still, he’s unlikely to repeat it. Turning up at Frey’s castle, The Twins, in hope of enlisting the old git’s army against the Lannisters, it looked bad from the start, as Walder sneeringly took the opportunity to humiliate not just Robb but his wife too. Understandable, I suppose, but David Bradley’s performance as Walder made his relish of the situation truly loathsome.

It was a tense scene, with Robb stayed from defending his wife at swordpoint by the more levelheaded Catelyn, while Clive Russell’s Brynden lurked broodingly in the background. Roose Bolton was there too, looking as untrustworthy as usual. And finally, this week, we got an answer to the question of just where his loyalties lie.

Even at this point, it looked like things might go off without a hitch – except for the intended one. But things took a very dark turn indeed at the reception, when the doors of the hall were swung shut and the musicians, previously so jolly, started playing a sombre rendition of the Lannister anthem ‘The Rains of Castamere’. So sombre was it that they had Coldplay’s Will Champion on the drums – he’s the one on the right:

The tune heralded Walder Frey’s true intentions, intentions that Catelyn Stark realised just too late – a wholesale slaughter of those who’d ‘betrayed’ him, as he threw his lot in with their enemies, the Lannisters. I’ve seen some wedding receptions go badly, but never quite as badly as this.

And it all started with Robb’s wife Talisa; as I’d guessed it might when they started waxing wistful about her pregnancy. That was the cue for her to be repeatedly and graphically stabbed in the stomach before the horrified King in the North, just as he too was pierced by arrow after arrow.

It was a truly horrifying sequence that served to underline (as if you could forget) that in this show, any character, no matter how important, can die at any time. And Roose Bolton finally confirmed that he too had sold out to the Lannisters, delivering the coup de grace to Robb with a vicious stabbing and the hissed words, “Tywin Lannister sends his regards”. I guess we now know what was in those letters Tywin’s been writing all season.

In the novel, this ‘Red Wedding’ is a truly horrifying event, foreshadowed by an unsettling sense of dread even when things seem all right on the surface. Benioff and Weiss caught that perfectly here. Foreshadowing abounded; early on, Robb speculated that, “we’ll lose the war, and die like my father – or worse”. And Arya, still travelling towards The Twins with the cynical Hound, was warned that this was the nearest she’d been to her family since her father’s death. And that, when things seem nearest is just when they’re at their most precarious.

True enough. Not only were Robb and his wife cut down, so were all of his bannermen and his Army of the North, waiting patiently outside with their ‘allies’. They too were massacred before the horrified Arya, who also saw her brothers beloved direwolf slaughtered with arrows.

Catelyn Stark was the last woman standing, but not even she could sway the loathsome Walder by threatening his wife (“I’ll get another”). And so it was that the King in the North met his final end, as his mother howled. It was another astonishing performance from Michelle Fairley; a shame we won’t be seeing any more of her. She ended up with her throat cut after cutting the throat of Walder’s wife, and the screen faded to black. The credits ran, for once, in complete silence. No matter how shocking the events in previous episodes, there’s always been some sort of music at the end; the silence here served to underline the emotional punch of the events.

The Big Acting Moment

Quite a few this week. As mentioned, Michelle Fairley made her swansong as Catelyn Stark truly memorable. She’s been a formidable presence, and the show will miss her. Which makes her senseless death all the more shocking.

But the rest of the Big Acting Moments really belonged to the show’s talented child actors. Art Parkinson’s Rickon, finally given something to do, was a little overshadowed by Isaac Hempstead-Wright and Thomas Sangster. But the ever-brilliant Maisie Williams was on top form as Arya, sparring with the Hound and even getting him to back down from killing the luckless innocent whose cart he’d just stolen. For all that they keep swearing to kill each other, these two are a priceless double act. That Williams can convincingly face down the immensely tall Rory McCann just makes her that bit more awesome, after having held her own against Charles Dance last year.

Sex and violence

No sex this week, astonishingly (though lecherous Walder wouldn’t stop talking about it). They probably didn’t have time for it amidst probably the greatest amount of violence the show’s ever had in a single episode. All right, probably more people were killed at the Battle of Blackwater; but these were people we actually knew.

And the most graphic violence was saved for them. Yes, there was plenty of spurting blood, hacked limbs and impaled stomachs in the fights between Jon and the Wildlings, and Dany’s men and the Yunkish. But the gore was shown mostly in long shot, and for a split second. The orgy of explicit gore was saved for characters we cared about, starting with the truly shocking repeated stabbing of the pregnant Talisa.

All of this may face the charge of being ‘gratuitous’. But while that’s often true enough of this show, the violence here felt dramatically necessary to emphasise the horror of the situation. It ended with two similarly graphic throat slashings, firstly Catelyn’s hostage’s, then her own.

This was a storming, shocking episode, the intensity of its violence equalled by the dramatic shocks of who the victims were. It looked like Brynden got away, and there was no sign of Edmure after he was escorted to the bedchamber; but Robb, Talisa and Catelyn are gone. Less violently departed are Rickon and Osha, heading for the Umber stronghold of Last Hearth. Though if Lord Umber was among the guests at the Red Wedding, they may not find any help there.

In an ep full of faithful renderings of memorable set pieces from the book, the Red Wedding was the standout – as indeed it is in the book. I knew it was coming, and it still shocked me actually seeing it; I can’t imagine how much more shocking it would be for a committed viewer who didn’t know what was on the cards. I must admit, I thought Benioff and Weiss would leave it to the last episode, as the seasosn cliffhnager. After seeing this, I can sort of understand why they didn’t – it’s just too dark and down beat an ending. If this had been the season finale, a lot of viewers might have assumed it was the end of the story as a whole. Next week, though, they’ll have to go some to top this.

“The Better Half” – a self-deprecating phrase often used by husbands in the 60s to describe their wives. Ironic, really, considering the second place wives always took to the ‘Master of the House’. Here, it meant that and more in a thoughtful, incisive episode of Mad Men that examined the characters’ relationships with their families and their partners, and asked, just who is the ‘better half’?

Not only that, the title also referred to the literal concept of duality; how characters reflected, complemented and even rivalled each other despite their obvious similarities. This was signposted a little clumsily early on with Megan’s new role in soap opera To Have and To Hold – she’s playing her own twin sister, in a fairly ridiculous wig. And having to fend off the unwanted sexual attentions of her castmate Arlene to boot.

But the most obvious duality was, again, that of Don Draper and Ted Chaough. The ep opened with a Friday business meeting, and already SCDPCGC’s two alpha males were at each other’s throats, quarrelling over the best approach to advertising margarine. It fell to Peggy to play peacemaker – asked to decide between Don’s idea of emphasising the taste and Ted’s idea of emphasising the price, she prevaricated, satisfying neither one.

It was a very Peggy-centric ep this week, something that’s always welcome with Elisabeth Moss on such good form. A few weeks ago, she seemed convinced that Don had orchestrated the whole merger just to get her back in his office; he pooh-poohed the idea at the time, but now I’m beginning to wonder if there was something to it.

Especially now that her stolen kiss with Ted Chaough was back on the agenda. “The oldest tune – the boss in love with his protege,” he mused, and straight away we were back to the resemblance between him and Don, whose feelings for Peggy have never been entirely straightforward. It was the first time either had mentioned the kiss since it happened, way before the merger, and it turned out he’d taken it way more seriously than she had, even contemplating taking it further. In the end, it was the thought of his family that had stopped him – as, for her, it was the thought of boyfriend Abe.

That’s something she’ll likely come to regret. For some weeks now, the show has been subtly showing Peggy and Abe drifting apart. It started with her reluctant acceptance of his idea to buy a house in a rundown neighbourhood on the East Side; like many a patronising middle-class liberal, he wanted to mingle with the socially deprived he thought he could help.

Peggy, for her part, is an upwardly mobile career woman – quite an achievement in 1968. Unfortunately, it’s distancing her ever more from her would-be ‘angry young man’. That reached crisis point this week as they began to find that the neighbourhood wasn’t as ‘gentrified’ as they had thought. Abe was stabbed at the subway station, but like a good little hippy wasn’t going to trust the pigs with the full story.

To be fair, he had a point – the cop’s first question being, “Were they coloured, or Puerto Rican?” But Peggy, a more conventional establishment woman, found his reluctance to pursue the matter baffling. From his perspective, she Just Didn’t Get It. Never mind that she had reason to worry when rocks started flying through their bedroom window.

The issue came to a head when Peggy, hearing shouting outside, began prowling the apartment with a crude spear fashioned from a broomstick and a kitchen knife. Thinking she heard an intruder, she whirled round – and promptly stabbed Abe in the stomach.

It was one of those shocking yet blackly comic moments that Mad Men does so well – remember the time that guy got his foot shredded by a lawn mower in the office? It’s a measure of this show’s ability to turn on a dramatic sixpence though that, after having guffawed out loud seeing one of the characters seriously injured, the humour turned to pathos as he finally broke up with her – from a gurney in the back of an ambulance.

To be fair (again), I saw his point. Peggy, like Don before her, used to embrace the counter culture, open to new ideas. And also like Don (there’s that duality again), as she became more successful she became more establishment. “You’re in advertising,” gasped Abe. “Your every waking moment is offensive to me. You’ll always be the enemy.” That’s a pretty decisive break up right there. And so once again, Peggy found herself back at work, torn between her (and each other’s) male equivalents Ted and Don. With both of them shutting the door on her.

The other family given the lion’s share of screen time this week was (quelle surprise) that of Don Draper. Or, to be more precise, his two families – the old one and the new one. For some time, we’ve seen Don drifting away from Megan just as Peggy drifted away from Abe, unable to sympathise with or even grasp her choices and problems. He went back to his old womanising ways, but even that didn’t fill the void for him. Has he been truly lost ever since he gave up his old, suburban family existence?

And yet, surprisingly, Betty seems to be in a similar quandary. Husband Henry barely seems to pay her any attention any more, focused on his political career; she’s so starved of admiration that she seemed grateful to be slobbered over by a lecherous lounge lizard at one of his fundraisers.

So it was that, visiting Bobby at summer camp, Don and Betty were brought together again, and sparks flew. Bonding with their son (“I’m Bobby number 5!”, he excitedly exclaimed in, presumably, an in-joke about the amount of actors who’ve played the part), it wasn’t long before it was just like old times. Talking led to drinking, and drinking led to bed.

Their post-coital discussion was another insight into Don’s fractured psyche. “Why does closeness always have to mean sex?” he asked rhetorically, before comparing lovemaking to an arduous mountain climb. It’s as though, for Don, constant sexual activity feels like something he has to do; something socially obligatory in his role as a male. Turns out he’d be just as happy snuggling contentedly.

It was a moment of unguarded honesty the like of which we seldom see from Don, and it’s significant that it was his ex-wife he shared it with. Both seemed more content in that one night than we’ve seen them in several seasons. You could say it was rose-tinted nostalgia, perhaps; or that these two people genuinely do understand each other better than the replacements they’ve found. But social mores got the better of them again; Don awoke the next morning to find himself in bed alone. Betty was having breakfast with Henry and studiously avoiding his gaze, while Don slunk to the other side of the restaurant to stare forlornly at them.

Everyone’s family is dysfunctional, but few more so than Pete Campbell. “My family are a constant distraction,” he confessed; what with his senile mother and estranged wife and child, you could see his point. This was his riposte to a sincere statement about how important family should be from a familiar face – recovering alcoholic Duck Phillips, who we’ve not seen for several years. As an interesting aside, these are both men who’ve slept with, and hurt, Peggy Olson – Pete got her pregnant, leading her to give the baby up for adoption, and Duck toyed with her affections from the depths of alcoholism. She’s lucky the thing with Abe lasted as long as it did, with that track record.

Roger too was musing on the importance of family, as in familiar fashion, he botched a day out with his grandson. Promising to take him to “the zoo, and maybe the movies” (“a normal workday then,” was Joan’s sarcastic opinion), he earned his daughter’s ire by taking the four-year-old to see Planet of the Apes, much as Don had with Bobby recently. Unfortunately, Roger’s grandson was rather terrified by it. “We’re going to have to get rid of the dog now, he’s so terrified of fur,” was his daughter’s angry but hilarious assertion in the aftermath. “It’s like letting a four-year-old look after a four-year-old.” Too true.

Having failed at being a grandfather, Roger decided to have a go at being an actual father, popping round to Joan’s to see his son. Given that he barely seems to have given the child a second thought, and certainly won’t acknowledge that it’s his, you can see why Joan was less than keen. So much so in fact, that she’d rather little Kevin viewed her rapist ex Greg as his father. At least Greg’s off doing heroic things in Vietnam.

Where’s Bob Benson?

Well, blow me down if SCDPCGC’s genial mystery man hasn’t formed a ‘friendship’ with Joan, much  to Roger’s distaste. Turning up with a gift for Kevin, Roger was taken aback to find Joan and Bob preparing for a trip to the beach (though he still couldn’t remember who Bob is). No indication how close their ‘friendship’ is yet; as Joan commented the other week, he is a little young for her.

It’s also still a little unclear exactly what he does at work, though he’s clearly some kind of PA to Pete Campbell. He put on an epic display of kissing the boss’s ass this week as he recommended a nurse for the harassed Pete’s troublesome mother – “Your well-being is important to me.” Way to suck up, Bob. Nobody could be this nice, especially in this show – what’s he up to?

Historical Events

“All the teenagers of the world are in revolt,” asserted Don, unknowingly echoing Abe’s earlier comments about Prague and Paris. Paris had calmed down by this point, but Czechoslovakia was still trying to break free of the strictures of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union. Communist Party secretary Alexander Dubcek was trying to liberalise and democratise the USSR satellite state. Unsurprisingly, the Kremlin didn’t take this well, and on August 5, Czechoslovakia was invaded by Warsaw Pact troops. It would remain occupied until 1991.

The scary movie that Roger defensively referred to having seen as a child was presumably 1915 German horror movie Der Golem, or one of its several sequels. Surprising that Roger Sterling, previously so anti-Semitic, is familiar with a movie based on Jewish legend.

Some lovely classic cars this week – Don was driving a ‘68 Cadillac Coupe de Ville, while Betty was leaning provocatively over a Ford County Squire station wagon.

Dedicated Followers of Fashion

As you might expect from such a Peggy-centric episode, Elisabeth Moss got some good outfits this week. Starting with what looked like a castoff from 2001 A Space Odyssey, she progressed on to a blouse and then a dress that seem to indicate a predilection for polka dots:

On the male side, Roger was back to that old favourite – the Eye-Burningly Hideous Checked Sport Coat. Unfortunately for him, he couldn’t hold a candle to Bob Benson’s beach wear:

Nice legs, Bob.

This was a languidly-paced ep, after last week’s drug-addled psychedelia, that had some interesting insights in the script by Erin Levy and Matthew Weiner. Again, there was a theme – family and duality – that reflected on and gave insight to the regular characters. It goes without saying by now that the performances were top notch, but mention must be made of the excellent camerawork this week from director Phil Abraham. The repeated motif of duality and relationships that couldn’t quite meet up was effectively and subtly visualised – it was an ep full of side on two-shots between characters who were not – quite – touching. A nice representation of the themes not just this week, but of the show as a whole.

This week was one of those rather surreal episodes that Mad Men does so well, with a disjointed, hallucinatory feel that mirrored the perspective of the protagonists in its main plotline. Having found prestigious new clients Chevrolet to be demanding and impossible to satisfy, the staff of… whatever the newly merged agency is called pulled an all-weekend brainstorming session. OK, we’ve seen them do that before, usually with the aid of prodigious quantities of alcohol. This time, though, at the urging of new partner Jim Cutler, they were doing it with the aid of some pretty hardcore stimulants. The results were as messy – and as entertaining – as you’d expect.

The ep was bookended with two crashes, reflecting its title. It opened with a literal one, as we were plunged straight into Ken Cosgrove’s nightmare. Strapped into the driver’s seat of a swerving car at night, Ken was being bullied into going ever faster by the boorish, drunken Chevy execs, one of whom was waving a gun in his general direction. You could have been forgiven for thinking it was a misplaced excerpt from Aaron Staton’s other well-known role in computer game LA Noire, as the scene faded to black over the sound of crashing, grinding metal.

That was a weird enough opening, but things got even weirder pretty quickly. Ken, not dead after all, turned up at the partners’ meeting on a cane and revealed Chevy’s list of impossible demands, just as Ted Chaough got the news that his partner Frank Gleason had succumbed to his pancreatic cancer. Ted was therefore unable to take part in the weekend brainstorming session that was then proposed. As it turned out, that was probably his good luck.

Don, meanwhile, had other things on his mind than work, a recurring problem for him. He’s actually a highly talented ad man. If only he could keep his personal existential angst from preoccupying him when he should be doing his job, that is.

This week’s angst was, as ever, because of a woman. Don, still smarting from Sylvia Rosen’s dismissal of him last week, had taken to hanging around the corridor outside her apartment like a lovelorn puppy, smoking endless cigarettes. This, it transpired, was something of a problem. Arnold Rosen had seen all the cigarette ends and leaped to the conclusion his wife was smoking again. She, for her part, couldn’t tell him the truth without blowing the gaffe on their affair. Cue a scolding phone call to the crumbling Don, which told him firmly just where he stood, and led to an inexplicable bout of coughing that seemed to be more the result of stress than an actual illness.

The coughing led to a series of flashbacks to the life of the teenage Dick Whitman, that were interspersed throughout the ep. Still living in a brothel with his mother, young Dick had once contracted a cold so bad that he’d been virtually quarantined, in case it was TB. It wasn’t, but only young whore Amy was prepared to look after him. As this story unfolded, it was yet another revealing glimpse into The Origins of Don Draper, and particularly his none too well-rounded attitudes to women.

As Dick put it, “my mother can’t look after anything.” So Amy became a de facto mother to him, tucking him up in bed and feeding him soup as he recovered. Trouble was, she was also a prostitute, and more than prepared to teach the boy a thing or two about sexuality.

So, Dick, later to become Don Draper, lacks a proper mother, latches onto a prostitute to fill the void, and then ends up, hesitantly, having sex with her. When his actual mother finds out, she beats the living hell out of him for being ‘disgusting’.That’s a world of Freudian neurosis right there. No wonder Don’s feelings about women, love and sex are so screwed up.

This was gradually unfurled throughout the ep, as random things kept causing Don to stare into the middle distance, remembering. He does this a lot anyway, but this time it must have been more evident than usual, as various colleagues kept asking if he was all right.

He never is, of course, but this week he was worse than usual. Along with half the rest of the creative staff. Because they were all whizzing their nuts off on some unnamed “proprietary stimulant” that the genial Jim Cutler’s pet doctor had injected into them.

That was common enough in the 60s; there’s a well-founded rumour that JFK spent half his presidency on amphetamines, ostensibly to help him with back pain. If his mindset was anything like Don and the creative team this week, we’re probably lucky he didn’t start a full scale nuclear war through incompetence. Because, as anyone who’s tried them will tell you, that kind of stimulant may fill you with energy, confidence and brio but actually ends up making you less capable of functioning intelligently than if you were sober.

And so it was here, as the working weekend quickly degenerated into some kind of mad speed party, the creatives playing bizarre games under the impression that they were somehow producing useful work on the Chevy account. Stan was perfectly happy to be the object of a William Tell recreation involving a drawing of an apple and the throwing of craft knives; with predictable results when a blade ended up embedded in his arm.

Ken Cosgrove, previously limping around on a cane, chose to impart his frustrations with his job to the baffled Don via the medium of dance – specifically, an actually quite good tap routine. This was so weird that I still wonder whether it – and quite a few of the events – really occurred in Don’s imagination.

Don, meanwhile, was whizzing around the office, his hair unkempt and his face sheened with sweat, convinced (as you often are in this mindset) that he’d found “the answer”. Not to the Chevy problem though – to “everything”, as he explained to the baffled Peggy and Ginsberg. Peggy, in keeping with SCDP tradition, had eschewed the drugs for good old booze, but Ginsberg was in the frustrating position of being the only sober one in the office. Luckily for him, Don was so out of it that he didn’t notice he was being humoured like a madman (so to speak).

Don’s “answer” revolved around a nonexistent soup account the company had dealt with some years ago; it wasn’t hard to guess that it was his memory of Amy feeding him soup playing into this. As he lost all sense of time, the ep lost it with him. “What… it’s Saturday?” he asked, mystified, as Peggy suddenly turned up in the outfit she’d worn to Frank Gleason’s funeral. An enigmatic hippy girl suddenly appeared, doing Tarot readings in the creative office. Later, she turned up in Don’s office at his invitation; an invitation he had no memory of having made.

It all had a convincingly disjointed, illogical feel that mirrored Don’s fragmented mind, under the influence of whatever he’d been shot up with. And since Chevy was hardly at the top of his mind, the ‘problem’ he’d been working on was how to reconcile himself with the now-distant Sylvia. His sudden fixation with an old oatmeal ad that extolled the virtues of traditional motherhood led into yet another flashback, and it wasn’t hard to see his bafflement at the wholesome image in the ad contrasted with the sordid reality of his own upbringing.

In the week that Baz Luhrmann’s adaptation of The Great Gatsby has been released, it’s never been more evident that Don is Gatsby for the late 60s – you wonder whether his eventual downfall will mirror that of Fitzgerald’s status-obsessed, lovelorn hero.

Predictably though, the weekend’s ‘work’ produced nothing of value, as the annoyed Ted found on his return on Monday morning. As he pointed out, everything they had produced was meaningless gibberish; “you’ve even mis-spelled ‘Chevy’!” Roger Sterling’s experiences with LSD may have shown us the positive side of the late 60s obsession with drugs, but here we saw the negative – the illusion of competence, even greatness, none of it real.

The only other perspective we saw this week was that of Sally Draper; but her little storyline was every bit as surreal. Left to babysit her brothers in Don’s apartment while Don worked and Megan went out to schmooze the theatre community, Sally was somewhat startled by the unexpected appearance of a slightly unkempt old lady claiming to be her grandmother. This was news to Sally, and rather less than plausible since the lady in question happened to be black.

It’s hard to know if this was another of the show’s comments on the burgeoning Civil Rights movement. Perhaps it was to emphasise that not every African American was a put-upon, oppressed decent sort. Certainly Ida (if that was indeed her name) was frighteningly off-kilter, as seen through Sally’s eyes. The flashbacks to Don’s youth played into the narrative, as together with Sally, you wondered whether she really was telling the truth about having “brought up” her father. But no, Ida turned out to be an itinerant burglar who’d been working her way through the building, and hadn’t expected to find anyone in Chez Draper.

Sally escaped unscathed, though Don’s return to the apartment found him faced with cops, less valuables than he used to have, and a furious Betty. Having just spent three days on stimulants with no sleep, the inevitable happened – he fell unconscious to the floor, the second ‘crash’ of the episode.

It was an odd little subplot, but it served to reveal a very important truth to Sally abut her father. As she pointed out on the phone to him, she’d asked ‘Ida’ for plenty of detail about Don, and she’d had plausible answers to everything. And since none of it was true, Sally had realised what many of the show’s characters have since it began – “I realised I don’t know you at all.”

Where’s Bob Benson?

No sign of SCDP’s genial mystery man this week. But things were weird enough even without him.

Historical Events

Not many this week. Nobody even mentioned last week’s assassination of Bobby Kennedy; while I didn’t want another navel-gazing ep with the characters reflecting on what a historical tragedy meant to them personally, I was a bit surprised that it wasn’t even brought up.

Vietnam still rumbles on though, and there was a nice scene between Peggy and Stan as he revealed that his cousin had just been reported killed in action – three months after the fact. “That means my aunt wrote sixteen letters to him he never saw.” It brought the tragedy of the war home by connecting it to the characters we know, and was nicely underplayed by both Elisabeth Moss and Jay R Ferguson. It also seems from this that the damage caused to their friendship a few weeks ago may be healed.

In popular culture, Sally’s bedtime reading material surely meant that she was not in the best frame of mind to deal with a home invasion. She was glued to the most popular horror novel of the 1960s, Ira Levin’s Rosemary’s Baby – a tale of a New York apartment building stuffed with Satanists who conspire to get the innocent young heroine pregnant with the child of the Devil. Roman Polanski’s movie version will have just been released at this point, but maybe Megan shouldn’t let her see it.

Dedicated Followers of Fashion

Not many fashion faux pas this week, surprising given the drug-addled nature of the ep. Mysterious hippy Wendy (who turned out to be the daughter of the late Frank Gleason) was decked out in the requisite beads and flowery kaftan, but that’s no surprise for a hippy of the era. Sally Draper too was getting fashionable, with a rather short skirt that shocked the prim Betty. For her part, Betty’s fashions still seem mired in the early 60s rather than their tail end:

Peggy spent much of the ep in a sombre funeral dress, but earlier she had been wearing what appeared to be a stripey orange seat cover, complete with nipple-reflecting buttons:

And while he’s normally pretty respectable, I’m not sure how Ted Chaough thought this jacket was a good idea:

As ever, it was left to Megan Draper to be the best dressed, with yet another slinky dress that looked good on her despite embodying some of the worst excess of the era:

This ep, scripted by Jason Grote with the usual oversight of Matthew Weiner, was a surreal, drug-addled experience; to borrow the ad slogan of one of 1968’s most popular movies, it was “the Ultimate Trip”. As ever in Mad Men though, nobody came out of it any happier, more enlightened, or even having produced any worthwhile work. As a result, it didn’t advance the overall narrative, but amidst the fun and games, yet more light was cast on the enigma that is Don Draper, a man never happier than when in a fog of self-doubt and self-loathing under his 60s Alpha Male exterior. Not much may have happened here, but we learned a great deal, in a revealing and often bizarre hour of TV.

Oh, and interestingly, the disreputable Dr Hex actually echoed almost verbatim what I wrote last week: “What are you going to call yourselves? SCDPCGC? That’s a bit of a mouthful.” I promise I haven’t been reading Matt Weiner’s notes…

With dozens of intermingling plotlines and enough major characters to fill a small army, Game of Thrones rarely gets to linger on any one setting or group of characters in much detail. When it does, as with this week’s episode, it’s always a treat, allowing the treacherous characters and their Machiavellian schemes greater depth. And despite the fact that not a one of them can be trusted (except perhaps poor, naive Sansa Stark, who somehow still doesn’t get it) I can happily watch this lot showing us more of themselves.

This episode focused on just three of the ongoing plotlines, bookended by brief visits to two of the others. The Second Sons of the title were a group of mercenary sellswords whose favours Daenerys Targaryen was trying to sway against the slavers of Yunkai; but more than that, second sons – and their often unpleasant duties – were everywhere. Poor old Tyrion, despised by his manipulative father, is one; so is the stern Stannis Baratheon, who for all his unyielding nature is looking rather like the best candidate for king right now.

Sandor Clegane, too, is a second son, but one who’s decided that duty isn’t worth its salt. A brief scene at the outset caught us up with him and his reluctant travelling companion Arya, as she tried (unsuccessfully) to brain him with a rock. Since that’s basically the way characters get to know each other in this show, it was hardly surprising that they seemed to forge a grudging respect for each other. “You don’t want to be alone out here girl,” he rasped to Arya, “someone worse than me will find you.” Averring that no one was worse than him, she was met with a contemptuous snort. “You should meet my brother.”

Arya wasn’t entirely unhappy though, as the Hound revealed that he was taking her to the Twins, thence to be reunited with her family at the joyous occasion of her uncle’s wedding to one or other of the Frey daughters. Maisie Williams’ look on hearing this was a nice subtle bit of acting as she tried unsuccessfully to contain her relief and happiness. And who doesn’t love a wedding?

With Tyrion and Sansa’s much-unwanted wedding finally taking place, the lion’s share (as it were) of the episode was in the Royal Court. Everyone was there for the wedding, regardless of whether they actually had any lines. Varys was seen briefly, Bronn raised a smile to his friend/employer on this most ‘joyous’ of occasions, and even grumpy old Maester Pycelle was to be seen, Julian Glover frowning with the best of them to make up for not actually having anything to say.

And what bride wouldn’t be delighted to be given away by the King of the Realm? Well, this one, certainly. Joffrey was at his most unpleasant this week, walking Sansa down the aisle because, as he reminded her, her father wasn’t around any more. And who’s responsible for that, Your Grace?

Sansa wasn’t the only one to be on the receiving end of his smugly vile attentions though. He can’t have forgotten being slapped more than once by his uncle Tyrion, even after he’d become King; now he took the opportunity to relish and magnify his uncle’s humiliation. Tywin Lannister just doesn’t care that his schemes make people unhappy, but Joffrey actively relishes their misery. And does what he can to increase it, further humiliating both his uncle and his former fiance by removing the stool Tyrion needed to drape a cloak around Sansa’s shoulders. What a dastard.

Cersei, of course, has all this to look forward to. She may not be a second son, but as a daughter in this medieval world, her lot is actually worse. She’s got her upcoming nuptials to a man who isn’t interested in women, and she’s seen her cherished position as Regent diminished first by her father, and now by Margaery Tyrell, who’s already exerting a better hold on Joffrey than she ever did. No wonder she was bitter.

Cersei’s been rather neglected of late, having little to do but sulk at her lost power and her unwanted engagement. So it was nice to see Lena Headey back on form as the embittered Queen Regent decided to show the calculatedly nice Margaery that she’s not as toothless as she may seem. Explaining the story behind Lannister anthem The Rains of Castamere, she told the story of how her father had ruthlessly slaughtered House Reyne, then the second wealthiest family in Westeros (“Aren’t the Tyrells the second wealthiest now?”), finishing up with a smiling threat – “If you ever call me ‘sister’ again, I’ll have you strangled in your sleep.”

Margaery was visibly disconcerted, no mean feat given how skilled an operator she is. So her brother didn’t stand a chance, trying to make peace with his reluctant fiance by means of an anecdote. “I don’t care what your father used to say,” snarled Cersei before he could even finish a sentence. Poor old Loras. He may be skilled at armed combat in the field, but he’s totally lost in the kind of combat here.

A wedding enjoyed by none of the participants (except, perhaps, Joffrey) was followed by an equally joyless reception. Olenna Tyrell at least was having fun, working out the labyrinthine family relationships that would result from all of this; Loras, for example, would be both the brother and father-in-law of the potential Joffrey/Margaery progeny.

Tyrion, for his part, did what he does best. He got drunk. Drunk enough to once again try taking Joffrey down a peg, threatening the smug, sneering boy tyrant with castration just to shut him up. I doubt the Royal Court has ever heard such a tense silence, but luckily for Tyrion, Joffrey can still be overruled by Tywin, the real power in the land. Charles Dance was as commanding as ever as the elder Lannister, effortlessly taking charge of the situation and contemptuously ordering his drunken black sheep of a son to bed with his new bride.

Luckily for Sansa, Tyrion wasn’t just drunk – he remains, at heart, fairly decent (by Westeros standards). It was a touching scene when he conceded that he would never hurt her, and chose to sleep on the couch rather than work on producing the heir his father was so keen on; “And now my Watch begins,” he slurred, making a deliberate parallel to the sworn celibacy of the Night’s Watch. Shae, at least, seemed relieved.

Stern, unyielding Stannis Baratheon can’t be doing with the empty pageantry of the Court – I wonder what it would be like with him as King? We caught up with the dark doings at Dragonstone at some length this week, as Melisandre arrived with the baffled Gendry in tow, the better to further her sinister mysticism.

Stannis knows exactly what Melisandre wants with Gendry, recognising his lineage instantly – “half Robert, half low-born”. He was therefore a little surprised when she ordered the boy treated like an honoured guest. Why not just get on with it and kill him? Of course, Melisandre isn’t that direct. Telling a charming story about how soon-to-be slaughtered lambs can have their meat soured by sight of the butcher’s blade, she plainly had more subtle means to extract what she needed from Gendry without slaughtering him.

As something of a fan of Joe Dempsie (which I may have mentioned once or twice) I wasn’t entirely unhappy that her chosen method involved taking his clothes off and dragging him to bed. A shirtless Joe Dempsie is always worth a look; though if you like the ladies, Carice van Houten wasn’t shy either. Pity it all had to end up with leeches – but then, it’s his blood she really needs, for spells which may promise death to the “usurpers” Robb Stark, Balon Greyjoy and Joffrey Baratheon. Since her Red God actually does seem to come up with the goods, those three should be worried. As should Gendry – his blood supply isn’t limitless.

We also got to catch up with Davos Seaworth, and Liam Cunningham was as charismatic as ever as the down-to-earth Onion Knight. It was sweet to see him patiently plugging away at learning to read; but he was direct and thoughtful when Stannis came down to release him, theorising that his former liege really needed him as a conscience. What else could stop him murdering (sorry, “sacrificing”) his nephew?

It’s hard to tell how much attention Stannis was paying; Stephen Dillane is magnificently hard to read as the stone-faced pretender. He got to do the old “end justifies the means” speech rather well, and once again, the Red God’s prophecies seemed pretty accurate. He foresees a huge battle in the snow – and that’s where the real enemies of Westeros are massing. But is even stern old Stannis unyielding enough not to break before those cold, blue-eyed demons?

Dany Targaryen too is getting pretty hard and unyielding. In the warmer climes of Essos, she was faced with the challenge of an army of sellswords hired by the Yunkish slavers – 2000 in all. Hardly a match for her 8000-strong army, but a problem nonetheless. Her solution – invite them for a drink.

Emilia Clarke’s getting the whole ‘Warrior Queen’ thing down pat, remaining unflappable even in the face of the loutish Mero, commander of the Second Sons. His suggestion that she should “show me your cunt” was met with a condescending smile; but as soon as he left, she was ordering Ser Barristan to “kill that one first”. Mero did have a point though – you’re not going to get very far as a mercenary if you allow your clients’ enemies to outbid them.

The only one of them that seemed to have any real mettle was the hunky Daario Naharis (Ed Skrein), who Dany kept making bedroom eyes at. Well, we know she likes beefy, long-haired killers. No wonder he was so entranced with her as to lop off the heads of his comrades and join her cause. One more victory for the Targaryens.

If only Dany wasn’t so taken up with her whole abolition of slavery obsession, she could probably take Westeros right now. Those dragons are plainly going to come in useful at some point, as this week we got to properly see the real Enemy – the mysterious White Walkers.

In a coda to the episode proper, we finally caught up with the fleeing Sam Tarly and Craster’s former wife/daughter Gilly. They got a sweet scene together as they discussed naming the baby; though Gilly’s utter ignorance of something as simple as names (the only male name she knew was ‘Craster’) hinted at a horrific upbringing.

They look to be getting along very well. But any incipient romance was nipped in the bud by the sudden arrival of a flock of ravens, like extras from Hitchcock’s The Birds. And behind them was the demonic figure of a Walker, come to claim Gilly’s baby.

This is only the second time we’ve got a good look at them, and I have to say, this one looked rather more convincing than the slightly cartoony one seen in last season’s finale. It died well too, as Sam discovered what the black dragonglass knife he’d found was really for; stabbed in the back, it cracked and shattered like ice. It was a terrific effect, putting some of the earlier CG to shame.

Sex and violence

Plenty of sex this week (as ever), but for once it wasn’t nameless extras or minor spear carriers cavorting naked – it was some of the main characters. Principally, of course, it was Joe Dempsie and Carice van Houten as Gendry and Melisandre. Both have form at this kind of thing.

Dempsie seemed to spend about half of Skins naked, showing off more flesh than the rest of the cast combined, while van Houten debuted in a Paul Verhoeven movie – Zwartboek – which required her to graphically demonstrate how she dyed her pubic hair to avoid detection by the Nazis.

Previously, the only main male cast member to show off his… er, member was Alfie Allen; that record remains unchallenged, but director Michelle McLaren seemed to be having fun dancing around that area of Joe Dempsie, shots cutting as the camera reached mere millimetres from his groin.

Titillation indeed. But if you thought it was erotic, think again – the scene ended with him having a leech lowered onto a sensitive area and crying out, “No! Not there!” Ouch.

For all Joe Dempsie’s heroic willingness to get his kit off though, female nudity still won out this week. Not only did we see pretty much all of Carice van Houten, but Emilia Clarke also bravely (and equally gratuitously) bared all. Tempted by the hunky Daario’s romantic gift of his former comrades’ severed heads, she rose dripping from the bathtub to show him pretty much everything (though I’ve a feeling the shots from behind were a body double). Who said romance was dead?

And the violence? Well, the leeches weren’t very nice, and the White Walker met a crumbly end. But probably the most gruesome shot was the aforementioned severed heads, so realistic that one of them was very recognisably actor Ramon Tikaram out of This Life:

With showrunners Benioff and Weiss on scripting duties, this was actually – in my opinion – a better ep than the one last week that was actually penned by George RR Martin. The choice to limit the focus to just three of the story’s multifarious plotlines was a good move, allowing the characters and settings to really breathe. As ever, the most fun was to be had with the treachery and backstabbing of the Court at King’s Landing, though the intimate three-handed drama at Dragonstone was quite effective too. Of the three, possibly Dany’s liberal crusade was the least enthralling; but it looks like she may have found a new squeeze to replace her beloved Drogo.

Only two more eps to go this year – and three more weddings in the offing, at my count. If they’re all as dramatic as this, it’s hard to see how the show can go wrong.

Steven Moffat loves to engage with the fans of Doctor Who. And he particularly loves to bait some of the more humourless fans whose presumed ownership of the show makes their gorges rise in anger at the thought of anyone doing something with it that they personally don’t like. He’s got form, provoking them with titles like Let’s Kill Hitler and The Doctor’s Wife (which turned out not to be literal), then having the Doctor seemingly actually get married – or did he?

Moffat was at it again with this highly anticipated ‘series finale’, letting everybody know that it was called The Name of the Doctor well in advance. Predictably, many of the more humourless fans were immediately outraged. “HOW DARE HE RUIN THE MYSTERY BY TELLING US THE DOCTOR’S NAME???” they thundered on Gallifrey Base, as if this would somehow change the very nature of the character they’d loved for years.

This somehow never bothers Superman fans, though the revelation of his Kryptonian name Kal-El took place well before the internet enabled entitled fans to pour out their vitriol. Come to that, the world of Who fandom wasn’t exactly rocked when fellow Time Lord Drax referred to the Doctor as ‘Theta Sigma’ in 1978’s The Armageddon Factor (this was later retconned as being his ‘college nickname’).

Other humourless fans sourly declared that Moffat plainly had no intention of making such a revelation, and that the title was no more than the misdirection he’s become renowned for. And, unsurprisingly, they were right. But it wasn’t just misdirection; that title, built up to over the last couple of years, reflected a very pertinent and important plot thread in this quite complex episode. The only title I can think of that would have been more to the point would be The Grave of the Doctor – and I can’t see that one going down well in fandom either. Though from a thematic perspective – and this was actually in the dialogue – In the Name of the Doctor might have been even more appropriate.

After the excessive spectacle of previous years’ series finales, The Name of the Doctor was a surprisingly low key and cerebral. No warring armies of Cybermen and Daleks here; but for all its fairly small cast and murky settings, the stakes have rarely been higher. At stake was the Doctor’s entire existence – and given the amount of times he’s saved people, planets and even the entire universe, his erasure from existence was obviously going to have massive consequences. This was nicely visualised by the stars winking out one by one; though the show has done this before, in both Journey’s End and The Pandorica Opens (and 1981’s Logopolis for that matter).

But here, the intellectual nature of the plot was well-balanced with emotions, especially Moffat’s own towards the series he loves. Every episode in this 50th anniversary year has had some kind of callback to the series’ past, but it was never more evident than here, as we started at the very beginning – the First Doctor stealing a TARDIS and making a run for it from “Gallifrey – a very long time ago”.

Previous Doctors were all over the place here, mostly in a lovely montage digitally inserting Clara into old footage, or digitally inserting them into new footage. Brilliant though this was, my nitpicking techie side couldn’t help but find some of the technical details a bit lacking. People on YouTube without BBC resources have done better colourisations of William Hartnell, and the interlaced video that the shot of Tom Baker was drawn from meant that he seemed to striate into disconnected lines as he moved. Much better to have drawn his appearance from the film-based material used for most of the others, or find a shot where he wasn’t moving so fast like the one used for Sylvester McCoy.

Still, that’s quibbling. How many viewers will have noticed that kind of minutiae? Even I was charmed by the sequence, though admittedly I was beginning to tire of it by its third appearance. All three appearances were necessary plotwise though, and I guess they didn’t have the budget available for three wholly different montages. It was, nonetheless, a charming and inventive way to pay tribute to the show’s past without wheeling on a visibly chubbier Colin Baker in a blond wig.

Nostalgia aside though, this episode had a tall order to fulfil in giving viewers answers to some of the mysteries Moffat has intentionally strewn his run with. He plainly loves his plot arc puzzles, and at one point they were in danger of overwhelming the show rather – could anyone have made sense of A Good Man Goes to War or Let’s Kill Hitler without intimate knowledge of all the preceding Matt Smith episodes?

Thankfully he seems to have backpedalled on that for this series, making most of the episodes self-contained with only glancing references to the ongoing plot. That’s as it should be, in my opinion; this is Doctor Who, not Babylon 5, and the stories should be easily accessible for the casual viewer.

The Name of the Doctor managed to pull off the trick of following up the convoluted plot while still not alienating those who haven’t intently watched every Moffat ep for clues. The focus was on the Impossible Girl, and on that Question That Must Never Be Answered. Once it was clear that those were the stakes, further knowledge wasn’t really required. Of those two, we finally got an answer to the first, which actually made sense, and (which will please those humourless fans) we decidedly didn’t get an answer to the second.

Moffat’s imagination, sense of humour and distinctive dialogue style were all over this, as we were led from 1893 London to the Fields of Trenzalore via a mysteriously well-informed murderer, a dreamtime ‘Conference Call’ and an unwilling TARDIS literally dropped onto a planet from orbit. It was nice to see Vastra, Jenny and Strax again; I particularly liked Strax’s vacation destination of pub brawls in Glasgow (“I wish he’d never discovered that place”).

Slightly less welcome (for me at least) was the return of River Song. Still, this is a Moffat series finale, and like her or loathe her, she’s a vital component of his ongoing narrative. Alex Kingston, to give her credit, was less of a ham than usual, though this was as much down to the script as to her acting choices.

In an ongoing narrative begun way back when David Tennant was still the Doctor, this felt like it was actually the end of River’s story. After all, there is little left to discover about her, and little left for her to do. No surprise then that the River we saw turned out to be the ‘saved backup’ the Doctor had left in the Library that very first time he met her, when she really died. Their farewell scene was tender and touching, and left no doubt that, however much some fans may protest, the Doctor was genuinely in love with his ‘wife’. That was a deep, heartfelt kiss, followed up by an equally heartfelt farewell: “Goodbye – sweetie.”

Appropriately in this anniversary year, the villain turned out to be reconstructed Troughton baddie the Great Intelligence. This was hardly a surprise given its return appearance in The Bells of St John, but it’s always good to see Richard E Grant pop up to chew the scenery. And at least it wasn’t the bloody Daleks again.

The Intelligence’s sinister henchbeings, the so-called Whispermen, were disturbing creations, with their blank faces and tendency to speak entirely in rhyme. Moffat loves a bit of lexical jiggery-pokery, and it was to the front here with the ambiguous phrase “the Doctor has one secret he will take to his grave, and it is discovered”. The neat twist being the ambiguous subject of the sentence; it isn’t the Doctor’s secret that’s been discovered, it’s his grave.

This may also wind up a lot of fans, as the Doctor now, technically, has an expiry date – at a mysterious battle on the gloomy planet of Trenzalore. Of course, that event can be postponed as long as the show needs it to be; but the fact that the giant, dying TARDIS had the current console room, along with the crack in the window caused by the fall from orbit, rather implied it wasn’t that far off. Still, time is mutable, and never more so than in a Moffat episode – who knows what changes may occur to avoid this version of history ever happening?

It turned out that the Doctor’s grave was the key to everything, and the key to getting into it was saying the Doctor’s name. Hence, we were treated (hopefully for the last time) to the Intelligence repeating The Question over and over again, with the Doctor’s friends’ lives at stake: “Doctor Who? Doctor Who?”

As it turned out, we didn’t find out. The tomb was opened, from the inside, by the one person who did know his name – River Song. And we never heard what she said. It’s arguable that she made things worse by letting the Intelligence in, but the alternative – the deaths of Clara, Vastra, Jenny and Strax – would be unthinkable in this show. And in the event, River saved the Doctor from having to spill his secret; though I would have wished he’d made more of a deal of the relative unimportance of his actual name compared to the one he’d chosen.

So, when Time Lords die, they don’t leave a body (“Bodies are boring. I’ve had loads of them.”) but a conveniently accessible map of their own timestream, the wounds they’ve torn by battering their way through history. This was rather at odds with the previous Time Lord deaths we’ve seen; I don’t recall the Castellan in The Five Doctors turning into a glowing helix. Still, as the Doctor commented, “I’ve travelled in time more than anybody.”

The Intelligence’s revenge plan was typically timey-wimey in concept. Leap into the Doctor’s timestream and kill him over and over again, shattering history in the process but at least leaving the villain satisfied (although technically, dead). By this point, if you hadn’t guessed the answer to the riddle of Clara, you hadn’t been paying attention. The only possible resolution to save the Doctor was for somebody else to leap into his timestream after the Intelligence. And as Clara pointed out, we’d already seen it happen. It was the only possible explanation to her repeat appearances throughout the Doctor’s personal history.

So now Clara’s always been in the show, from the very beginning, even advising the First Doctor which TARDIS to steal. Retconning the entire history of the show is audacious, but again Steven Moffat’s done it before. The end of The Pandorica Opens features the destruction of everything ever, and The Big Bang features it conveniently restructured, perhaps differently. Besides, continuity in a 50-year-old TV show is a nightmare, and Who’s already has plenty of contradictions – what’s one more?

The ep could have ended there, with the Doctor’s timeline safe thanks to Clara’s noble self-sacrifice. And I wouldn’t have minded a bit – I’ve never really warmed to Clara, finding her more of a plot device than a well-defined character. Still, having her catchphrase as her parting shot – “Run, you clever boy. And remember me.” – was a bit tear-jerking.

But no, she’s not gone for good. Because a surprise epilogue revealed that this isn’t the end of the story. Clara has – for reasons still unrevealed – survived the process, and is stuck in the Doctor’s timestream, which is full of subtly shot lookalikes of past Doctors to please fans. So the Doctor takes on the ultimate paradox – leaping into his own timestream to rescue her. And along the way, there are further ruminations on the ongoing theme of just how ‘good’ the Doctor is.

Moffat’s been banging on about this for a while, and it was brought to the fore here as the Intelligence contemptuously mentioned the billions he’d slaughtered, including such recent victims as Solomon from Dinosaurs on a Spaceship. He also mentioned that, whatever name he might have chosen, in the future the Doctor will be known by other names – including ‘Valeyard’.

So was it that dark, future incarnation of the Doctor that we saw at the cliffhanger climax? Matt Smith’s speech to Clara brought another dimension of meaning to the episode title as he explained the significance of names we choose for ourselves – ie, “The Name of the Doctor” meant precisely that, that ‘the Doctor’ really is his name.

It also played in to what this dark, future version of the Doctor has done to deserve his predecessor’s shame. “What I did, I did without choice,” stated the very recognisable voice of the silhouette before them, “in the name of peace and sanity.”

“But not in the name of the Doctor,” spat Eleven, getting to Say the Title. It was a spine-tingling moment, though it did render the immediately subsequent, and madly dramatic, caption – “Introducing John Hurt as the Doctor” – rather contradictory.

Who is he then, if he doesn’t deserve to be called ‘Doctor’ any more? Is he, indeed, the Valeyard – that dark version “somewhere between his twelfth and final regenerations” we saw in 1986’s (awful) Trial of a Time Lord? I don’t normally plot my calendar so far in advance, but it’s safe to say that when the story is continued, on the actual 50th anniversary of November 23rd, Microsoft Outlook will show me as ‘busy’.

I really enjoyed this, and found it, both intellectually and emotionally, the most satisfying series finale Steven Moffat has done. It was a clever and sophisticated bit of writing, with real heart alongside the obligatory timey-wimey puzzles. It wasn’t without flaws – once again the jeopardy was undercut by revoking the actual onscreen deaths, something Moffat’s been doing since he started. And there were loose ends – how exactly did the murderer DiMarco know so much, and what became of him? For that matter, how did The Silence know so much about this in previous eps, and why does it matter so much to them?

There is, of course, still time for these questions to be answered. And some of them may be answered in the forthcoming 50th anniversary special. Now that we know the Doctor’s stuck in his own timestream, it makes perfect sense of why other Doctors might appear in the show, though who knows how many…