The dark truth at the center of the episode is that business is always personal.
The writers also confront the dangers of not staying in the present.
Dan Gilroy’s directorial debut only offers a familiar vision of today’s newsman and producers as misery peddlers, and callow ratings slaves bordering on the monstrous.
Matthew Weiner and company make a point of echoing Cutler’s flippantly opportunistic nature twice over before the episode concludes.
The purgatorial mood that Matthew Weiner and his crew conjure here sets the stage for Don and company’s final season-long cocktail hour.