What would Don Draper do? Pretty much the same thing as Tony Sorpano

I've spent the past few weeks extolling the awesomeness of Mad Men to my friends and family. I was initially cool to the show, mainly because of the frustrating pace of the action and its at-times condescending humour. But eventually I was won over, mainly by the final four episodes of season one, which I consider some of the best television or film I've seen all year. But the third episode of season two, "The Benefactor" made me want to wash out my mouth, much like its central protagonist, Don Draper. (Warning: inevitable spoilers for Season 2 to follow.)

Among my reasons for loving Mad Men is that although it's got a lot in common with The Sopranos, the characters on Mad Men can't just solve their problems through casual violence. But "The Benefactor" pretty much smashed that theory of mine to bits. Already debate has been raging over the Internet (check out the comments at Alan Speinwall's blog for a taste) over Don Draper's decision to "take the reins" with the wife and business manager of a difficult client. That's a delicate way of saying he roughly grabbed her by the hair by one hand, and grabbed a much more delicate area below with another. Even worse, we were treated to the sight of Don wiping his hands afterwards, just to hammer the point home.

Don Draper has done some pretty despicable things over the course of the series, and his actions in "The Benefactor" make sense not only in the context of the immediate story but also with what we know about his past. But what bothers me is how the episode was clearly written to make the audience feel that the wife/manager Bobbie was "asking for it." In fact, I'm a little sickened by some commentators, particularly at EW who think what Don did was "cool."

Clearly, Don was in need of a worthy adversary. He easily dispatched Pete's feeble challenge to his throne last year to emerge as a partner at Sterling Cooper. But this year he's struggling in the workplace due to the arrival of Duck Philips. In fact, Don's actions in "The Benefactor" are a sign of how desperate he is to regain Roger and Bert's favour. Don's losing his touch and he knows it. I couldn't imagine the Don Draper of season one getting himself so worked over by Bobbie in the first place.

Make no mistake, it was fun watching Bobbie turn the tables on Don and nearly get away with it. She worked well as the mirror equivalent of Don. Whereas Don is a creative and successful man who uses his beautiful wife as window dressing, Bobbie is a woman who manipulates her successful husband behind the scenes. They're both disgusting characters, but we're meant to sympathize with Don because he's the star of the show. But I never like rooting for sexual violence, and I wish the writers could have come up with something else to make their point. Once you open up the show to a certain level of violence (even if it's implied) it's hard to back down the next time. Frankly, I prefer to see Don take his revenge in more creative ways than a stereotypical male revenge fantasy. (Judging by some of the comments around the Internet, there are still plenty of men who cheered Don on, even if dedicating a blog to more extreme thoughts will get your fired.)

So thank goodness for the scenes in "The Benefactor" between Harry and his wife. Here's a guy who seems to have the most progressive (from our point of view) relationship with his wife. He was honest about his one-night stand last year (too honest) and is now making a real attempt to relate to her as a human being. I was a pleasant change of pace from the unrelenting bleakness of the rest of the episode.