The Crash
Season 6, episode 8: a weekend at the agency on an energy serum, told out of order.
"The Crash" is the eighth episode of the sixth season of Mad Men and the 73rd episode overall. Matthew Weiner and Jason Grote wrote it, Michael Uppendahl directed it, and AMC first aired it on May 19, 2013. It is widely seen as the show's most experimental episode.
Quick Facts
- Series
- Mad Men
- Season
- 6
- Episode
- 8
- Director
- Michael Uppendahl
- Writer
- Jason Grote; Matthew Weiner
- Guests
- James Wolk as Bob Benson
- Length
- 48 minutes
- Air date
- 19 May 2013
Lore & Background
"The Crash" was watched by 2.16 million viewers. Critics' first reviews were mixed, but in the years since it has come to be regarded by some as one of the series' greatest episodes.
Reader's Guide
The episode takes place over a single weekend and moves between three settings: the agency, the young Dick Whitman's childhood in a Depression-era brothel, and the Draper children at Don's apartment. After Ken Cosgrove is hurt in a car crash with drunken Chevrolet executives and another Chevrolet pitch fails, Don orders the team to work through the weekend.
Sylvia calls Don and begs him to stop pursuing her. As the agency mourns the death of Frank Gleason, staff are offered an energy serum promising one to three days of creative focus, and Don and the creative team take it. Coughing spells send Don back to memories of being ill as a boy and being cared for by Aimée, one of the prostitutes in the house. Meanwhile his children are left at his apartment with Sally in charge, and a stranger enters.
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