Mad Men: The JFK Assassination

Incredibly moving episode this past Sunday portraying the assassination of JFK.

The show is successful in illuminating the paradox of American democratic capitalism, as the murder of a culturally significant political figure drives a wedge into the daily struggle for upward mobility. Meanwhile, allusions throughout the season to the violence in Vietnam (bloody foot, burning monk, Greg joining the army) come to an abrupt culmination as we watch Ruby murder Lee Harvey Oswald on live TV (and then in slow motion). The Draper marriage dissolves as JFK is buried, and guests force themselves to attend the marriage of a couple they hardly know, nobody really sure even where to sit. Great television.