On the surface, this week’s Mad Men (titled after the infamous Driver’s Ed shock video featured within), is a lot about sealing the deal for some of its characters. But the context makes all the difference. Lane struggles with the Jaguar account man and fellow Brit Edwin Baker, trying to make friends; Pete tries to lure a high-schooler into a date, can’t do it and cheats on Trudy with a whore instead. As if there weren’t already a million reasons to cheer for Lane to kick Pete’s ass, this one will do. But Pete Campbell was knocked around by much more than Lane Pryce’s dainty English fists. A more implicit recurring theme of “Signal 30” was of inversions, be they role-reversal or a sudden change of expectations, brilliantly executed by Don and Pete’s two scenes together. The difference between the taxi and the elevator rides is as enormous as they were depressing, and illustrates the themes of this episode perfectly.
In the taxi home, Pete rides a wave of arrogance so high as to call Don “a nun” for staying faithful to his wife. It’s an incident made somewhat understandable given the heavy drinking. To carry it into the boardroom the next day is inexcusable. You just don’t call Lane Pryce a homo. “You’re a grimy little pimp,” he snarls at Pete. Lane wins the fight, and order is restored to the universe. Not for Pete, though. The elevator down is an inverse of the taxi scene just a night before. It stands in stark contrast. He confesses: “I have nothing, Don.”
It is no secret that Pete Campbell is not the show’s most likable character. Roger asked before the fight, “I know cooler heads should prevail, but am I the only one that wants to see this?” Mad Men has earned the right to make a wink like this. But of course, Pete’s entire arc this episode is not fan service. For the first driver’s ed sequence or two, I wasn’t entirely sure if it was a dream sequence, given the way this season has played out. It draws an interesting parallel to Don’s struggle last week, a parallel made more explicit by the taxi/elevator scenes. What is truly impressive is that Pete hit rock bottom in such a way that even those who love to hate him may very well have been crushed by it.
The Campbells’ dinner party illustrates Pete’s hopeless competitive side among other things. Ken Cosgrove gets roped into detailing his sci-fi novel (quite hilariously); Pete seizes the opportunity to tell Sterling about it and knock Ken down a peg. The sink breaks, but Pete can’t make it with the toolbox in time for Don to toss off his (quite hilarious) suit jacket and fix it himself; a problem that was Pete’s fault to begin with—like many others, perhaps a problem of overconfidence. But Pete takes victories where he can find them, letting his daughter become the focus of discussion in front of childless Don and Megan.
Lane, meanwhile, has Jaguar in the palm of his hand. Taking Sterling’s advice, he tries to let Baker spill his own problems—but of course, “I haven’t a complaint in the world,” he tells him. So, Lane has to invert it, and complains about his wife to no avail. Nevertheless, he presses on, and he doesn’t want Don, Roger and Pete to steal it away from him or mess it up trying. Faced with a problem, Lane persists and takes the respectable course of action. To contrast them further, Pete is quite the opposite. Faced with a problem, he hits on a high-schooler. Faced with another problem in Suburgatory’s Parker Young stealing said high-schooler, he lets loose at a whorehouse. Pete goes so far as to make the prostitute convince him to have sex with her as part of a larger ego trip, rather than just going for it like he wanted to anyway.
Still, “Signal 30” is not entirely the trainwreck its title suggests. Even in the taxi scene, there’s hope. Pete finds another empty victory where he can, and takes it, mocking Don for not having had a prostitute. Even Roger did. But Don is not to be made fun of. “Roger is miserable,” Don says flatly. “I didn’t think you were.” It’s the best sign that Don and Megan’s relationship is healthy since he choked an ex-lover in his dreams last week. This one was just a little more subtle—and a lot richer for it.