If you read the Maier book, it's clear that the writers are setting things up long in advance—beyond the obvious spoilers, I mean, the characters mention things about themselves that won't be important for another 40 years. Personally, I think I'd enjoy this show even without worrying about whether everything is going…

"clown-shoed stack of mayo-slathered Wonder bread"

Your description is apt and much better than what I could have put down. Her confrontation with him seemed simultaneously hypocritical and self-aware.

The bit with Austin staggering around punch-drunk was awkward, so I'll go with an A-. It's bolstered by Margaret curling up on Barton's bed and the way Gini so gently confronted Bill. From the way her voice quavered and dropped, I got the impression that she was just flat-out running away from the complex truth rather…

I'm letting my emotions cloud my judgment, but I totally love you.

Friend of mine on the bus swore that it was the greatest thing he'd ever seen, and loaned me his VHS recording of Devilfish. "Let me clear the table there for ya, ma'am!" was the beginning of a decades-long obsession with 7th-grade me rolling on the living room floor, shrieking and having a conniption from laughter.…

A-. I felt like this was more chess piece maneuvering for the buildup to the finale, but I'm okay with that. The brief flashbacks to them going nuts at the beginning was worth it.

The part with Bill watching the footage of Gini was awful, but I was getting more of a tragedy vibe, like he was mourning the loss of this side of her.

Right—one of those power trips where the prof is looking for excuses to head off your ego before you get too arrogant and assured.

DePaul purposely docked Virginia a single point so that she wouldn't have gotten a full 100% in front of the class and in front of Lillian. She purposely did it so that Virginia would win, in a sense, but not win *too much*.

I dunno about this episode undoing last week's—the way they were looking at each other over the projector in the last scene seemed to cement the fact that they're developing strong feelings of affections for one another. That seems to be purposely set up against the fact that this episode didn't have explicit sex (at…

Gini was giving him the cold shoulder in the first half of the episode, and especially iced him during the interview by claiming that she didn't have a partner and wasn't having sex at the moment—pretty harsh to just say that to the guy you are definitely sleeping with these days.

He was the analyst. Kind of hard to see because of the lighting, but that was him.

I had the impression throughout the episode that Gini is developing some warmth or fondness for Bill, particularly during the scene at the beginning when she's talking to him by the elevators. She kept almost-smiling at him, and the way she presented his hat seemed slightly flirtatious. She was the one who insisted…

Jane has demonstrated herself to be very comfortable with full nudity in the study setting. She stripped right down in the pilot.

Her response to him was wonderfully complex, which I didn't fully appreciate until after I went back and rewatched that scene a few times. I was honestly almost *angry* with Gini for the way she told him that no, they would not be starting the study back up again that fast. It seemed almost sarcastic or cruel of her…

I'm surprised by how okay I am with following Barton's and Ethan's storylines when the show is live—it's nice to get a break and get into other people's minds. As good as Mad Men is, I frequently find myself wondering what characters like Joan and Peggy are up to when there's too much focus on Megan, but I'm really…

I definitely hope so; if they follow the biography, there's quite a bit to be told, because Bill didn't just suffer physical abuse. There's a really sad method to his madness.

But I think they did make a stab at including people of a variety of ages and body types in the previous episode during the study montages. Working class average people, and an older woman—it was a "normal" sample. That's not the furthest that the show could have gone, given that those aren't named characters with…

What?! Noooo, no no no. "A" episode for sure. All three of the important women in his life held Bill's hand at one point, and he carefully outmaneuvered them—Libby can't find the right purchase in any kind of emotional interaction with the man, his mother pretends like she's there for him but it's all platitudes until…