This week's episode of "Mad Men" took place over a speedy long weekend in the office. The gang was struggling to come up with a pitch that their big shiny new client Chevrolet would like, and several of them took a vitamin-enhanced stimulant injection to keep them going. And thanks to the syrum and its semi-hallucinogenic effects, the office soon felt pretty surreal.
The stimulant also sent Don down the rabbit hole of his own memories, as he suddenly recalled the events that culminated in his first sexual encounter. It was when he was a young teenager living at a brothel with his step-mother. While she wanted to send him to sleep in the cellar when he came down sick, another prostitute took him into her room to care for him.
Aimee was kind to him until his fever broke, and then she approached him. "Don’t you want to know what all the fuss is about?" she asked him. Despite his protestation that he didn't, Aimee promised she would do everything. Later, when the truth came out, Don got a severe beating from his mother for the incident.
"He's having a realization about his relationship to sex and molestation. This woman who was kind to him, who gave him soup when he was sick, also took his virginity. We're getting a little bit of an answer of why this man behaves the way he does and what sex means to him," "Mad Men" creator Matthew Weiner explained in this video about the episode.
TVLine thought this flashback was just another weird part of an overall weird episode, but Buddy TV didn't seem to like it at all. "It's gross and sad, as is much of Don's history," they wrote. "On a shallow note, is it even possible to get an actor who looks less likely to grow up into Jon Hamm than the one they cast?"
"Mad Men" continues Sundays at 10 p.m. ET on AMC.
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