Don mentioned the last development in a surprisingly

That should have been my clue that this was going to be a terrific--and funny--episode, perhaps my favorite of the season. Call me old-fashioned, but I like episodes that move, that use storytelling. This has been a frustratingly uneven season, in part because Weiner chose as his season-long theme the idea that people don't really change, history repeats itself, nothing new ever happens. That's either incredibly bold or idiotic for a dramatic television series.

It also conflicts, at least on the surface, with the actual events of 1968 that have played out during season six. That violent year was so jarring precisely because so many things seemed to be happening to which Americans did not know how to react. Multiple high-profile assassinations, urban riots, the fairy-tale widowed first lady marrying a Greek shipping tycoon--none of these had precedents or prompted familiar responses.

Don mentioned the last development in a surprisingly flirty phone conversation with Betty, which puts this episode in late October 1968. That means Sally has been refusing to return to her father's apartment for several months now. "She says she's not going again," says Betty, who is uncharacteristically restrained in not pushing Don to find an explanation for Sally's abrupt change in behavior. Don looks destroyed—equal parts anxious that Sally will tell Betty or Megan and devastated that he's lost Sally, possibly forever. The episode opens with him curled up in a near-fetal position on Sally's bed, and he's back to self-medicating with alcohol.

Do we have a running count of how many times Megan has said "I don't know what's going on with you/us" this season? Megan, honey, this is the deal with Don Draper. You'll never know what's going on with him but you can guarantee it's not good. At the office, on the other hand, Don is back on his game—assuming his game is torturing Ted and pushing away Peggy. It was bad enough that Peggy left him for Ted, but now Don has to watch her laugh at Ted's jokes, see Ted putting his hands on Peggy, hear Peggy constantly telling him what a good man Ted is. Running into them at the movie theater together—that's their thing! He and Peggy see movies in the middle of the day when they're stuck!—pushes Don over the edge.

Our Don is nothing if not predictably petty, so we know almost before he does that he's going to blow up his truce with Ted, which lasted all of two months. Don tells himself—and anyone who will listen—that he's doing it for the good of the firm. And it's true that both Ted and Peggy have let their feelings impair both their creative and their business judgment. But Don's actions will have the long-term effect of making this shaky partnership unworkable. He lies directly to his partners, assuring Cutler there will be "no more surprises." He humiliates Ted in the St. Joseph's meeting. And by giving Frank Gleason credit for Peggy's commercial idea, he ensures that if the TV spot does win any awards, they won't go to her. If Don had looked at her face by the end of that meeting, he would have seen what became clear in the last scene, that Don has lost both Sally and Peggy forever.

We even saw a few of the characters-we-love-to-hate showing signs of personal growth. When Pete uncovers the deception of Bob Benson—or Bic Bittman, as I'll think of him—he reacts very differently than the Peter Campbell of Season One. Remember that when Pete discovered Don's secret and ratted him out to Bert Cooper, he gained ... absolutely nothing. By keeping his mouth shut for Bob, BOPP tape Pete has secured the very best kind of ally: one who owes him.

I can't help thinking, though, that this could potentially turn out very badly for Pete, particularly if someone else learns the truth about Bob and realizes that Pete knew already. And the last time a partner agreed to keep a colleague's secret was when Don told Lane he'd need to leave the firm because of that missing check. I don't think Bob's going to end up offing himself, but I also don't think this plotline will have a happy ending.
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