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Rating: 4.4 / 5.0 (13 Votes)
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Recap

After the fantastic season three finale, the fourth season of Mad Men returned in similar fashion. A lot happened since we left and a lot happened in this one hour of television.  We see the new Sterling Cooper Draper Price working out of a make-shift office building, the new Draper family situation is explored for the first time, and Donald himself learns a new way to sell both himself and the agency.

It opens with Don getting interviewed and giving nothing to the reporter. By not painting a pretty picture of himself, he painted a dull and unsettling one, which led to an extremely unflattering article.

Roger and Pete then meet Don and the three of them go right to a meeting with Jansen in the same restaurant Don was holding his interview.  Not the way Sterling Cooper used to run things, but that's what you have to do when your agency has no conference table.

The boys make their way back to the new digs; a scrapped together new office building made up of one whole entire floor.  Don has yet another meeting; this time with his lawyer about the divorce with Betty. Don disregards his lawyer's notion that he should get Betty out of his house so that he can sell it.

After Roger sets up Don on a blind date we get a taste of the new life Don has as a divorced man.  Shining his shoes while watching tv.  Making his own bed.  This is his new life.  

So Don hits it off with Jane's 25 year old friend.  That is until, as Roger put it, Don gets "a little grabby in the car."  So then Don takes care of his primal needs by boosting the economy.

Don's terrible interview skills cause more problems as SCDP soon loses the Jai Lai account, because he failed to mention them in his article (a job for the reporter Don adds).

Pete and Peggy come up with an idea to increase the SugarBerry Ham budget.  The fight between two actresses that they set up ended in one woman charging the other with assault and Don having to give Peggy money to bail them out.  Something that may have been the last straw for Don.

The premier ends with Don going on a rampage of swagger as he lays down the law with Betty on moving out of the house, boots the Jansen people out of his office, and then pulls out all the stops for his second interview with the Wall Street Journal.

Show:
Mad Men
Season:
Episode Number:
1
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Mad Men Season 4 Episode 1 Quotes

Roger: What happened there?
Jack: Korea.
Peter: We're grateful for your sacrafice.

Jack: Who is Don Draper?
Don: Excuse me?