Well, that’s your lot, series three has come to an end. But what an end! Despite some dips in quality during its run (compared to the first couple of series at least), the series went out with a bang.

The episode was definitely Mad Men at its most purposeful and streamlined, as instead of getting the usual relaxed mix of glacially paced subplots, everything was based around Don. And it seems that he has got his mojo back, even as his life was falling apart.

Informed at the start of the episode by Conrad Hilton in an unwelcome reappearance that Puttnam, Powell and Lowe, and by extension Sterling-Cooper was to be sold off to giant, soulless company McCann, Don was finally given a reason to stand up and fight for his company. And also to tell Connie just where to shove it, thanks to him deciding that the sale to McCann was the perfect reason to ditch Don’s work, although once again I couldn’t help but think of poor Sal (as I often seem to do), as he was unfairly seen as being a liability who’s employment by the company would cost them a multi-million dollar contract, whereas Don can gladly throw another one away with no consequences. But at least we’ve finally seen the back of Connie (at least I hope so, I bet he’ll make a reappearance next series just to piss me off).

Oddly it turns out that Hilton knew more about Sterling-Cooper’s fate than anyone who was working there. On being informed of the news by Don, Bert Cooper and Roger Sterling marched into Lane Pryce’s office to find out how much they could buy it back for, to be fobbed off by Lane saying that that was no longer an option. However, it turns out that Lane didn’t know the whole story either – a phone call he made later to ever-slimey limey Saint John Powell in the London office revealed that his position was at stake too. And so, in an action-packed series of events (by Mad Men standards), the four collaborated on a daring heist, Lane fired Cooper, Draper and Sterling from their positions (which would in turn get him fired), and the four, enlisting help from the most trusted members of the company, and Harry Crane, proceeded to steal contracts and office supplies from Sterling-Cooper and set up their own independent business. And aside from causing a colossal headache for the Brits, and abandoning most of the office staff without even saying goodbye, it was a rather happy development for all concerned. Peggy rejected Don’s original heavy handed approach to get her on board – when he effectively ordered her to do so she finally gathered the courage to stand up to him and point out that she had no reason to as he doesn’t value her work. Which lead to a really quite touching scene later on in the episode where Don visited Peggy at her small and untidy apartment (I blame her roommate for the mess), and opened his heart to her, finally offering her some praise and winning her over with a quite depressing speech about the state of the nation following Kennedy’s assassination (it’s almost like the swinging sixties were over before they really began in Mad Men’s world). Pete Campbell also finally got the validation he was looking for, and what’s more he actually got it from Don after he insisted that Don tell him why they needed him. Although he had skived off work to attend an interview at Ogilvy, which required a hasty change into his dressing gown in an attempt to keep up the charade when Don, Roger and Bert came to see him, Campbell was offered the chance to be the new business’ head of accounts – and arch-rival Cosgrove wasn’t even asked. An opportunity he jumped at, and it seems his new found enthusiasm has helped out his marriage with Trudy too, for the first time in ages there was some passion between them, and she even dropped in to the business’ new headquarters (Don’s hotel room) to hand out sandwiches and cake to everyone, which might have been uncomfortable for Peggy, being that she and Pete now share a desk, but it still felt like a happy moment. And Harry Crane was given the option of either joining the company or being locked in a storage cupboard overnight, which is more than he deserves really.

But, most importantly, Joan’s finally back, as she was the only one who could make sense of Sterling-Cooper’s chaotic layout. Needless to say she was absolutely magnificent, throwing herself into the task completely, and even seeing to the needs of the rest of the business’ skeleton staff before they had thought of them themselves.

Of course, the other plot line this week wasn’t nearly so cheerful, following Betty’s actions to get a divorce from Don. Which, despite her best attempts to create a perfect Stepford-style divorce, where nobody complained or showed any emotion whatsoever, all got rather ugly. Despite Betty’s general whiny uselessness and frequent neglect of her children this is definitely one break-up where it’s impossible to take sides as both seem equally unpleasant. On finding out from Roger (who found out from his daughter) about Henry Francis’ designs on his wife, Don raced home to confront Betty about her infidelity, which it goes without saying was incredibly hypocritical, and also very disturbing – the part where he practically spitted the phrase ‘You’re a whore’ in her face, particularly so. But the characters who suffer the most from this are Bobby and Sally who on being sat down in the lounge so their parents could have a ‘it’s not your fault, we still love you very much’ chat when breaking the news of the divorce to them, reacted so badly that even robotic Betty couldn’t stop the tears. It’s a shame that they couldn’t have kept the same actor who played Bobby in series two though as I imagine him in this scene would have been absolutely heartbreaking (perhaps it would have been a bit too heartbreaking). Even though Don was absolutely vile to Betty, at least he threatened to take the kids away from her as he’s right they would be much better off with him – Betty is apparently the sort of woman who’ll move to Reno for six weeks with her new lover and baby in order to get an easy divorce but leave her two older kids behind with the maid.

And so now we just have an unbearably long wait until series four (however long the actual wait is going to be – fingers crossed BBC 4 manage to bring the airdates forward a bit so we’re only slightly behind the US) to find out what happens at Sterling-Cooper-Draper-Pryce (not the most catchy of company names it must be said), and with the Draper family. Although it looks like the new series will be more driven with its now more stream-lined cast, it’s a shame that we could very well be saying goodbye to many familiar faces from Sterling-Cooper, in particular Paul Kinsey who’s expression at finding they’d poached Peggy but not him was a joy to behold, ditzy Lois, smarmy Ken and of course, poor old Sal. Hopefully they’ll be able to make guest appearances now and then at least. Anyway, what did you all think of the episode, and do you have any predictions for where the show will go next?