While Mad Men gets an incredible amount of (deserved) attention for its writing, acting, and costuming, in recent years, it seems like that praise, while still present, has been overshadowed by something else: fan theorizing. Over Mad Men‘s past couple seasons, there have been countless theories written by fans, critics, and others about the show, predicting that Pete would commit suicide, Don is D.B. Cooper, and Megan is going to meet a similar tragic end to that of Sharon Tate. None of those has ever come to fruition (and I don’t expect them to, especially regarding Megan since Matthew Weiner poked fun at that theory a little bit last week, with Meredith talking about the “Mason brothers”); however, now, in this final stretch of episodes, a new theory has emerged and is getting a lot of support, and it predicts that Don, at this moment on the show, is actually dead. And while people have brought up a great deal of evidence that they believe supports that theory, there’s actually just as much information that disproves it.
First and foremost, let’s just remind ourselves of what kind of show Mad Men is. Mad Men isn’t Lost (and I say this as someone who loves Lost); it’s not interested in mysteries or puzzles that need to be solved. That’s never been a part of the show’s DNA, and it’s never been the type of show that Weiner has made. This has always been been a series more focused on character rather than plot, and to take six-plus seasons of realistic drama, only to morph the final batch of episodes into a supernatural-esque dream world, doesn’t ring true with Mad Men‘s history and the kind of series it has been since the beginning of its run.
Second, as we saw in this year’s Mad Men premiere, “Severance,” Don is still seeing ghosts. Rachel visits him in the audition room before he discovers that she has died, and later in the episode, he is able to interact with her family and pay his respects. This sequence of events could very well be foreshadowing Don’s untimely demise at the end of the series (although, despite what others have said, there’s no way that he’ll literally be the falling man from the credits—way too “on the nose” for Mad Men), as these ghosts that he has seen throughout the years, from his brother to Burt to Rachel, have been acted as guides somewhat, visions from Don’s past that try to remind him of what should he cherish in life before it’s all gone.
Finally, and this piggybacks off of my last point a little bit, Don’s actions have impacted characters on the show in scenes when they’re not with him; if he were dead or in a coma, everything he would do would take place in a vacuum of sorts and have no actual affect on anyone. For example, after Don gives Megan a check for $1 million in “New Business,” she then goes and fights with her sister, and her outlook on life is different because of the physical and actual check that Don has provided for her. If Don were dead or in some other type of disconnected state, there’s no possible way that his interactions with Megan could carry over into the next scene she was in, unless she is also dead, which would mean that Mad Men‘s final episodes are taking place in a purgatory-like plane of existence, similar to (spoiler alert) the sideways world in the final season of Lost. And as I said before, Mad Men and Lost are not the same types of shows.
Ultimately, if there’s anything that might be mined from what’s been happening with Don in these first two episodes back, it’s the possibility that Diana (Elizabeth Reaser) may be a hallucination he is having, a figment of his imagination that has transformed into a dark reflection of himself. Perhaps that’s why Don believes that Diana looks familiar, maybe that’s why he’s so drawn to her, because she represents his original dream of happiness, that unattainable goal that he believed could be achieved with a new name and a high-paying job.
Or maybe Diana’s just a woman that Don is just fascinated with because, simply put, Don Draper likes women, and he likes what he can’t have—her initial hesitations would have only made her more desirable to him. And if Diana’s just a woman, maybe the ghosts that Don sees are just that: spirits. Maybe they’re not there to warn him of his impending death but instead to symbolize what he’s become, a specter of a decade that’s now long gone, someone who continues to float through existence, never able to find the peace he so desires.
I keep saying “maybe” and “perhaps,” because when it comes to Mad Men, we really never know what will happen next or what exactly everything means. The only thing we can rely on is the strength of the show’s characters and the hope that all their journeys, especially Don’s, will have satisfying endings during these final few episodes. That’s what keeps me watching.
[Photos via AMC]
Related: AMC
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