As of now:

This is originally how I saw it as well. But the clues through-out the season, the girl at the front desk looking exactly like the girl in the ad…it seems too much to not be true. But I like that it's a little ambiguous.

I don't know if Peggy staying at McCann is really "settling." I loved the idea of Joan's offer and I wish that she had taken it just because it would've been awesome to watch. But realistically speaking, I'm not entirely sure Peggy would've been happy there. She's arguably more passionate about advertising than anyone…

Joan's delivery of "he's a terrible person" was perfect.

Yeah, I've seen a handful of people convinced that Peggy created the ad too. Plus, Peggy has been far better at the advertising game than Don in recent years. Burger Chef blew every one of his recent works out of the water. When was the last time we saw Don really nail a pitch? Season 4? He was off his game in Seasons…

If there's one thing I wanted more of, it was definitely more Sally. The show was setting up such an interesting direction for her once they realized Kiernan Shipka was actually a good actress, but they kind of abandoned it…probably mostly due to time constraints, but still.

I was disappointed with Peggy's story at first too. I'm still not 100% with it, but I like it a lot more when you consider that the arc of Peggy's professional career pretty much concluded with the BurgerChef pitch in "Waterloo" (where she cemented herself as an advertising powerhouse), so it makes sense that this…

My initial reaction was mixed, but the more I think about it, the more I'm liking it. I definitely need a rewatch. The ending of the episode was really powerful and a perfect close to the series, even if it some of the stuff in the episode leading up to it was messy.

It sucks that Mad Men seems like the one show that would definitely not do a spin-off or continuation, because it's the one show I think could undeniably pull it off. There's so many more possible stories with these characters.

It really seemed like we were heading for a dark ending after Season 6 and the first half of 7. It's pretty interesting how much they flipped it in the last 7.

This read actually makes me feel a lot different about this ending.

He didn't know it at the time.

Don's ending was depressing as hell.

It did kind of feel like they role-swapped Joan and Peggy.

Yeah, I think the ending is basically resisting the idea of a normal TV ending, where the protagonist learns something and changes. Don has learned nothing and hasn't changed at all, and likely never will. He had every aspect of his life ripped away from him, and he still learned nothing and didn't change at all.

I guess looking back, Peggy's arc basically concluded with her killing the pitch in Waterloo and cementing her advertising future. With that view, it's less disappointing to me. But still a little disappointing.

In all honesty, I felt almost the exact same way I did about Breaking Bad's finale. It was neat and tidy in a way the show typically wasn't, and it didn't come even close to the very best the show was capable of. And yet, it still felt satisfying, and like the "right" way to go.

I mean, Stan's great and I'm glad that they got together, but it seemed weird to me that her story concluded in a very typical relationship-y fashion. I feel like the fact that so many people were rooting for Stan/Peggy is clouding how generic and un-Mad Men-like that scene was.

Am I the only one who thought Peggy's ending was a hot pile of bullshit? Just seemed really reductive to have her story arc conclude with her getting together with a dude in the most rom-com fantasy way possible.

Just like Breaking Bad, Mad Men ended in a way that was both extremely safe and predictable by its own standards, but also not bad enough to piss too many people off.