This moment in the pilot episode of 'Mad Men' predicted how Don Draper would end up
We finally learned the fate of Don Draper on Sunday's series finale of "Mad Men."
For many, it was a surprise to see Don receive such a tame farewell as he sat in meditation on the Pacific Coast.
It's a scene between Don and potential client Rachel Menken (Maggie Siff) towards the end of the episode. Don invites Rachel out for drinks to apologize for the way he treated her at their meeting that afternoon.
Following Rachel's remarks, Don's confidence is completely shattered and he turns back into Dick Whitman (his real name from his childhood).
Look at Don's reaction once Rachel is done talking.
1. That Don wants everyone to believe that he doesn't care about anyone and will live his life only how he sees fit.
2. When he meets someone who has had a similar "disconnected" existence as him, he can't help but pull closer to them.
This is evident with Rachel, who he begins to sleep with in season one of the show, and even tells her he grew up with a prostitute for a mother and a drunk for a father. Like most of the women in Don's life, Rachel figures him out and leaves him. But Don always had a soft spot for Rachel. Her ghost even appears as a vision to Don following her death in the last season.
Completely disconnected from anyone who ever loved him and sitting with a blank stare at a hippie commune, he meets Leonard.
Leonard, like Don and Rachel, is out of place and sees the world laid out in front of him the way other people live it. He drives that home by telling the group a dream he had.
Hearing this leads to Don's transformation back to Dick Whitman once again. And Don can't help but to react once more.
