Joan’s Life After Mad Men Ended
How big did her career (and coke habit) grow?
It is a fun but equally bizarre exercise to imagine the future of Mad Men. Peggy Olson could be alive today, but I can’t imagine her knowing who Mr. Beast is without reaching for a dull object to bash against my head.
Joan’s rise to partner in Season 5 got me reflecting on her overall rise in life. She starts Mad Men as high as she believes an unmarried woman can climb, with an office manager job feeding secretaries into the meat grinder. The show ends with Joan as the head of her own female-based production company, finally in control of her destiny and away from the men who think they know what is best for her.
Joan’s rise raises the question, what did the rest of her life look like after 1970? Was it only up from there?
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