Mad Men Recap: Oedipal Undertones "At the Codfish Ball"

As expected from the title, the episode focuses on queer familial relationships. Those can be horizontal between peers or vertical between parents and children. The episode is best epitomized by Dr. Calvet’s brilliant line: “No matter what, your little girl will spread her legs and fly away.”

Peggy wrestles with her relationship status, which is complicated. Abe schedules a weeknight dinner with her at Minetta Tavern. First, she prepares herself to be dumped. Joan convinces her he’s proposing marriage. Abe offers a proposal (to move in with her), which was not the proposal she anticipated.

She’s still caught in a transition phase, both personally and historically. As seen often this seaon, Peggy transcends the past generation, yet remains a product of it. She got dolled up before dinner, hoping for the traditional certainty and clarity she perceives marriage as providing. She gets thwarted. Joan recasts it for her in a positive light, though Peggy has trouble selling it to herself, let alone her mother.

Peggy tries to land blows, calling up her bigotry and pointing out her closer relationship with her deceased father, but her mother lays her flat, touching on her innermost insecurity. We see a parallel undercutting of Megan by her father.

Then there’s Sally who carries on her illicit friendship with Glen over the phone, that is taking on a slightly more adult tone. She has a father/daughter moment with Don where she tries to be Megan to impress her father by wearing the “adult” go-go dancer like outfit and the makeup. She’s also the unfortunate sponge, still being imprinted by everything around her. She wants to be an adult and go to the ball. Adulthood, she finds out, is not quite the romantic pictures she envisioned.

The episode ends perfectly, with everyone at the dinner table staring forward in collective yet isolated anguish. Then it continues, with an extra scene with Sally calling the city “dirty.” It’s a cheap double entendre, but it’s a sign Sally, once passively assimilating what’s happening around her, is now processing it.