'Mad Men': A Question About Joan

Vacant facades of the 50's? How about the innocence of the 50's? Man, you people think to much...

The world would be a better place if it was more like the 50's.

Interesting...I don't think she is deluded and I hadn't thought that she was making it up but it makes sense. I think she really expected Roger to dump his wife and marry her but the heart attack episode proved her wrong. Perhaps she is inventing the engagement to force his hand. Roger does seem to have real feelings for her in his own warped playboy way. I think the introduction of Jane's character has been rich. She is like a young Joan playing the men in her office but she is also representative of her generation in her rebelliousness. I can't wait to see what Joan does next.

Doubtful Joan created her engagement. She may be unsure of her future marriage as any sophisticated 30 year old woman (or man) ought to be.

Probably she imagines her stature at SC has diminished. No Office Manager would have the authority to dismiss a partner secretary. That was poor research. An Office Manager is like a top sergeant, but definitely not an officer.

Peggy rightfully threatens her as top woman at SC.

The world would be a better place if it was more like the 50's - ONLY if you are a rich, straight, white guy!

I've thought she's making up the doctor since the beginning of the season.

It seems her hips get wider with every episode...the way she sashays around the office, she's becoming a parody of herself.

I love Joan. I doubt she' smaking up the engagement, as we have already seen the doctor. The only questions I have is, is it me or are her boobs getting bigger by the minute?
As far as the '50s being better, I agree - for straight, white men it was!

Innocent 1950s? Wasn't it President Eisenhower who warned against "the military-industrial complex"? ME needs to rethink what the 50s were really like.

As for the Baby Boomers, Matthew, close, but no cigar. The oldest one would have been but 16 years old at the time of season 2, and 1962 was still a very conformist year for teens. How can they be "coming into vogue"? (To be fair to Matthew, the term was in use as early as 1948.)

What was more realistic - and based on fact - was the reference to the SDS, new in the early 1960s in its contemporary form, but dating half a century or more back in various other forms. But Don Draper's target audience based on that presentation was for a slightly older demographic.

If Joan's power at the office is waning then she would obviously make a play to set herself up as "powerful" and "Indisposable" outside of the office. This is the invention. The delusion comes from not thinking beyond her wedding day; an all-too-common mistake.

Either way, Joan has been beaten this time and she will not suffer that humiliation quietly or without reprisal. No matter how beautiful she is, this side of Joan will be very unattractive.

A better place???????
Oh ME you are so giving away your identity -white male and heterosexual, and probably Christian. If you were Jewish, Muslim, Black, Asian, female, or gay - it was HELL. Please do go back to the 50s where you belong, if you really think they were that good.

Joan will be a great character to watch as the 60s develop -- characters like Peggy try to adapt, but Joan holds to the old ways. Great characters in this show for using as a lens to look back on past eras.

The innocence of the 50s? Tha'ts ridiculous. The 50s was a lot of things, but not innocent, and it was riddled with sexism, homophobia, racism, alcoholism, depression and fear. The world may not be perfect now, but "vacant facades" is a very diplomatic way of describing an era that is best left in the past.
We are all better off working today to create a better tomorrow than lamenting the passing of an era lacking in so much.

Innocent 1950s? Wasn't it President Eisenhower who warned against "the military-industrial complex"? ME needs to rethink what the 50s were really like.

As for the Baby Boomers, Matthew, close, but no cigar. The oldest one would have been but 16 years old at the time of season 2, and 1962 was still a very conformist year for teens. How can they be "coming into vogue"? (To be fair to Matthew, the term was in use as early as 1948.)

What was more realistic - and based on fact - was the reference to the SDS, new in the early 1960s in its contemporary form, but dating half a century or more back in various other forms. But Don Draper's target audience based on that presentation was for a slightly older demographic.

Joan is still a very modern woman ... using her pretty face, brains and body to gain power.

Interesting take. I have had a sense that something is amiss with Joan and you could be on to something. The fact that her fiance is a doctor seemed a bit too perfect. I am curious to see how things progress between Jane and Roger. iIthink Roger is assuming his helping her will result in a similar situation he had with Joan but I suspect he is in for a surprise.

The 50's were anything but innocent, ME. And the world would absolutely suck, institutionalized hatred and all.

Interesting idea about Joan. It does seem to fit the Mad Men mold. Can't wait to find out. I haven't watched this week's episode yet. Thank god for on demand...

Joan represents all that is wrong with the American psyche of the 50's and 60's. They've written her character for us to hate, justifiably. My best sense tells me there is no doctor fiance waiting in the wings. Like many American success stories she keeps reinventing herself (read: lies, cheat, abuses and steals) as she goes along. Her focus is Roger, and she will succeed.

I have had the exact same thought about Joan's engagement when she started talking about it. I know this season started over a year after the first season ended, but it did seem like it came out of the blue. Something about the way she talks about it seems just a little fake. It'll be interesting to see what else emerges about her and if she's engaged for real (if so: the poor sap).

And what about Roger reinstating Jane after Joan fired her? Or...at least telling Jane she was reinstated without telling anyone else. Setting up a catfight to feed his own (voluminous) ego?

It never occured to me that Joan might be fabricating her engagement, but it would certainly make for an interesting story; lots of plot twists and intrigue. Love this show, so I am confident that anything they come up with will hit the right -- and authentic -- note. As far as the earlier comment about the world being a better place if it was more like the 50s...perhaps in some ways that's true, but mostly if you are a white man or a white woman who doesn't mind being a second class citizen. If you are a person of color who had to suffer the discrimination, indignities and life-threatening behaviors and policies that plagued this country at that time, I doubt if you are pining much for the good old days!

In a show full of subtleties, layers and contradictions, Joan is bitingly the same. The strongest and most obvious contradiction is her leadership and above the fray attitude in the office when she is prone to far more pettiness than she lets on.

As for her engagement being a rouse, we did see her at one briefly on a couch with what seemed like her fiance, with the ring on. It seems that it therefore would not be concocted. On some level, she certainly seems to have settled for this doctor. She's slowly been recognizing (shown powerfully by a promo for the show) that sleeping with men does nothing but worsen her loneliness.

Joan and Sal would make the perfect couple...so long as they could reach an 'understanding'.

The show would have made a good book or series of novels. Blogging about them is akin to writing scholarly papers about what Shakespeare was really saying, or was Stanley in "Streetcar Named Desire" a closet homosexual. It's fun to read what others are thinking about this well-written show.

Many commenters at Basket of Kisses are positing the fake engagement theory. But think it through. She's got a big rock on her finger. An office manager can't afford to pay cash for that, and a single woman in 1962 could never get credit.

Matthew - interesting theory. But the bigger question to me is, is the actress playing Joan the same woman in those ThermoSpa commercials that have popped up all of a sudden?

I Love the show, and I wouldn't doubt she created a fake engagement but my interests are with the subservient wife of the show's star. Can she live her life knowing her husband is a scoundrel and womanizer

I don't think there's a character on Mad Men that isn't more complicated as he or she seems on the surface. And isn't that what that era (and the show) was about? Joan's facades will be revealed in time. I suspect she really is engaged, but I don't think the handsome doctor is all that handsome or all that great. Joan plays by the rules of the game and makes the most of any situation. My guess is that since she couldn't have Roger, whom I bet she truly loved, she went shopping for a marriage of convenience. Female careers were viewed as something to do until the wedding bells chimed; I suspect Joan didn't get what she wanted at the office and took matters into her own hands. Game over? Perhaps. But I know there's more to it, it's Mad Men, and it's brilliant.

SOme people have started to reffer to Jane as the "Eve Harrington" for Joan's "Margot Channing." The comparrison is apt but even All About Eve was not nearly as vicious as this battle is setting up to be. Jane is Joan's perfect monster. Acting subservient to the men in power and just aloof to the junior execs to keep them wanting more. It is just like what Joan does only it comes at a point where it would be used to hurt Joan. "Cria cueervos y te retacan los ojos." At least Peggy was polite and respectful about asserting her difference.

Why did Betty throw up in the beautiful Cadillac? Ans she trashed the park with litter too. And then she dissed the incomparable Jimmy Barret. Bad episode for her. Yeah Joan looks like the Hindenberg lately. Cosgrove better watch his back...literally. Do you think Draper killed the girl at the used car lot that blew his cover????

I watched that and couldn't help but think of the office politics that I encountered when I first entered the work-force out of college, office temping in the early 1990s. There were still holdovers from that 1960s era. In a small office of a small business - you were stilled refered to "girl" as in, "I'll have my girl get you a cup of coffee." Larger corporations, to their credit, didn't allow such references.

Joan is typical of the office managers I encountered in that small business environment, except they were in their 40s / early 50s. The exact age of Jane actually. They didn't mind being called "girl" even though they were grandmothers. They certainly didn't like me, a cocky kid with a college education who didn't type quite as fast. Some felt threatened while others played mind games worried that I would take their job. As if I wanted their jobs fetching coffee. Once they knew that, it annoyed them even more, the fact that I didn't want to be an office manager.

What Joan points out to me is that there's a expiry date on ladies like her. Will she play out to be a cautionary tale for other ladies? I also noticed that the one male who has her number - it's not Roger but Paul Kinsey. I wonder if whatever blows up in her life, he'll be there.

We saw a man in her apartment in episode 2.1, but that doesn't mean it's the Doctor. He could be made up. She could have got the ring from her dead mother. Who knows?

I wish Joan worked at my office. The secre....a-hem I mean Administrative assitants around here are moderately rude and off standish. A Joan would be a welcome edition with her congenial demeanor and rockn' bod.

Makes me wish I could take the ol DeLorean back to 1962 and take Joan out for a steak dinner :)

Where are girls like that when you need them.

I love the show, got the first season but am waiting on the second season to watch in marathon mode.

It's a shame it's on AMC, I don't think most people know about it. I thought it was awesome to see how my grandparents lived in the 60's. Yeah, I'm 24 but I'd rather be in the 50's and 60's too; somehow it's less complicated and more respectable.

And similarly, I do work in an office evironment and strive to climb the ladder. This show just seems to entertain the thoughts I would never have the guts to act upon in real life.

GO MAD MEN!!!!

To answer Cape Cod Cowboys questions and comments:
1. Betty's anger and frustration over Don's affair was witnessed by her physical symptoms of throwing up in the car. I think this was also meant to be a statement on his feeling of status for the car-note the running theme thru that episode of keeping it clean.....checking the kids hands etc

2. she did not diss Jimmy Barrett-she was furious that he would stand there and blatantly tell her Don was screwing his wife.

3. You must be young! no one picked up litter and trash in the 5os and 60s...that did not become a big deal till late 60s and 70s...we all used to just throw trash out of our car windows on highways...etc. Note that in that same scene Don tosses his beer can in the lake.....it is another detail true to the era such as smoking and drinking.

4. interesting thought as to whether he killed the lady in the car place.....

Betty did indeed diss Jimmy. Her comment was anti-Semitic! She's a jerk!!

I don't think that Joan has fabricated her engagement but I do believe that she gets tired of having to keep "it all together" for herself and everyone else. I do believe that she will get mean....
Also, I think that Peggy was raped by her sisters husband and had a baby from him as did her sister.... therefore her sister's contempt for Peggy... who knows?