The shot heard ’round the world!  Oh boy.  Last night’s Mad Men concerned itself with an event the writers have been building up to over the past season: the assassination of President John F. Kennedy!

The episode starts with Roger Sterling’s daughter Margaret throwing a hissy fit over an extravagant wedding gift Roger’s wife Jane had given her.  That, plus wedding jitters have got the girl thisclose to shutting down the wedding. Roger and ex-wife Mona are able to talk her down and the wedding will go on - on November 22, 1963!

At Sterling Cooper, Pete Campbell gets called in to speak with Lane Pryce, who informs him that Ken Cosgrove, not Pete, has been promoted to SVP of Account Services.  Pete, however, has been bumped up to Head of Account Management, which doesn’t pacify him in the least.  He goes home and is ready to call Duck Phillips about the Grey job, only to be stopped by wife Trudy, who convinces him to wait it out at Sterling Cooper, to see how everything goes.

Duck Phillips, meanwhile, is busy getting sexy with our girl Peggy Olson on a regular basis.  They’re in the midst of one such lunchtime rendezvous when they get the big news: JFK has been shot and killed!

Everyone at Sterling Cooper has already heard in the meantime.  The phones are ringing off the hook, people are starting prayer circles, the office is general  havoc.  Back home, Betty Draper and housekeeper Carla sit in front of the TV in tears, shaken.

Don Draper?  Cool as a cucumber!

But Margaret’s wedding must go on.  The next day, we see Don and Betty questioning whether it’s still on, and realizing they must attend.  Pete, on the other hand, is on an anti-Sterling Cooper high horse, and decides to pointedly not go, because no one at Sterling Cooper is upset enough about JFK’s death.  He needs to make a stand!  Wife Trudy follows suit.

Everything at the wedding is a bit of a mess.  Only half the guests were in attendance, a handful were in the back room watching TV, the servers hadn’t shown up, nor had the cake… Oy. 

Betty spots lover Henry Francis across the way and is relieved to find the woman on his arm is his daughter.  Roger gives a charming speech, the bride and groom begin dancing and couples join them on the floor.  Betty can’t take her eyes off Henry, and husband Don, perhaps moved by the moment, gives her a big fat smooch on the dance floor.

The wedding ends satisfactorily.  Roger and Jane are back at home and he’s annoyed with her.  It seems to me as though the generational gap is starting to take its toll on their relationship - Roger is treating Jane a bit more like a whiny teenager than a wife.  Even further, he relieves the stress of the long day by calling up former lover Joan Holloway.  She’s the only one who’ll say the right thing, he feels.  Uh oh!  Between Baby Jane and Dr. Greg, will we be witnessing a Roger/Joan reunion?  I can’t say I’d be disappointed.

Back at the Draper residence, Betty is still uncontrollably shaken by the murder of JFK…. which takes a turn for the worse when she watches the live murder of Lee Harvey Oswald on TV.  Betty decides to go for a drive and meet Henry, who has a shocking proposition: if she leaves Don, he’ll marry her.  She doesn’t have to decide right away; they kiss and part ways.

Betty’s emotions are running high!   She goes home and freaks out at Don, telling him she doesn’t love him anymore, the kiss at the Sterling wedding was passionless for her, that she can’t get past the lies.  Don responds with a calm “Everything will be fine,”  a phrase that is repeated over and over by characters in the episode.  He thinks Betty’s reacting to JFK’s murder alone and will snap out of it - though he’s clearly broken by her admissions.  Sigh.

The next day, Don shows up at the office to find a lone Peggy Olson there.  He declines her invitation to watch the state funeral, instead opting to drink alone in his office.  This is the weakest we’ve ever seen Don Draper; as he sits in his office with a drink, it immediately becomes apparent that his Oliver fantasy has crumbled.  Despite all his efforts, he has ended up truly alone.

A melancholy episode for sure.  I was stirred by not only Betty’s lack of feelings for Don, but the state of the Mad Men nation as they collectively mourned the death of their president.  I couldn’t help drawing the inevitable and uncomfortably eerie comparison between JFK and President Obama, as I believe the response would be quite similar to what we saw on the screen last night.  A feeling of hopelessness, of unfulfilled promises, of extinguished youth, a fear for the future.

In fact, the entire episode was nothing if not a slow chipping away of anything we ever had to hope for: the death of a promising leader, a disappointing career flop, the deterioration of a relationship in their early stages, the slow killing-off of a seemingly perfect marriage… the list goes on.  The Death of Hope episode ends with a fitting song: “End of the World” by Skeeter Davis.  Give this sucker a listen to further bum yourself out.

WOW!  Interesting, I thought, to have the JFK assassination fall in the second-to-last episode rather than the Season 3 finale.  What could they possibly have in store for us next week?  I’m shaking with excitement over here!

And it’s out the gates with a whimper!  Gossip Girl’s Season 3 premiere last night proved to be somewhat of a disappointment - too much build up, not enough substance.  But don’t fret!  They’re just getting us warmed up…

Serena van der Woodsen returns from getting crazy abroad with Carter Basin. The paparazzi are right behind her the whole time, catching shots of her dancing on a table, doing shots with Prince Harry, gettin’ topless, etc. Serena sibs Jenny Humphrey and Eric van der Woodsen attempt to hide the news from Rufus and Dan Humphrey, our two moral authorities, with no luck.  You can’t hide that mob following S around everywhere.

Chuck Bass and Blair Waldorf are back from summer with a romance in full bloom. We see Chuck being uncharacteristically sweet, tender, understanding… all that mushy stuff (”I’m not Chuck Bass without you”?  Puh-LEASE). They’ve stayed together since we last saw them and are apparently playing games to keep the spice up.  It seems Chuck gets the attention of an attractive woman, and just as the gal’s about to put out, Blair jumps in and screams at her, stopping the event.  It’s satisfying for both of them - however, Blair starts having her doubts and wonders whether they could exist without the games.  By the end of the ep, they decide to put an end to it, and role play instead - pervy Chuck-as-waiter / Blair-as-dissatisfied customer stuff. Will it last?  Do we want it to?

Li’l J and Dan are having a great time being rich, which BFF Vanessa Abrams notices immediately and is annoyingly unhappy with.  Homegirl throws a hissy after seeing Dan get in a limo after he’d told her he’d be taking the subway - which I can understand on his part, cuz you KNOW he’d never sneak by without a sassy comment had he told the truth.  Vanessa wants some time to talk to Dan, so she weasels an invite to the Vanderbilt polo match, which the van der Woodsen / Humphreys will be attending, at her new boyfriend Scott’s suggestion.

SCOTT, btw, is exactly who we think it is: Lily and Rufus’s lovechild!  He’s totes using Vanessa to get to his parents.  Why else would anyone date her?

But back to business!  At the polo match, Serena engages in another publicity stunt, jumping on a horse and riding off into the woods.  Travel buddy Carter Basin follows her, and we find out the pair are somewhat of a secret item - though she’s been telling everyone he’s been stalking her.  Carter asks her to tell everyone the truth.

Nate Archibald has also returned from his European extravaganza with a new lady - who turns out to be Bree Buckley (JoAnn Garcia from Privileged!), part of a family of Archibald rivals.  He takes her to the polo match to piss off Grandfather Vanderbilt, which rightly upsets her.  Nate apologizes, because he actually likes the girl.  Grandfather Vanderbilt, however, thought acting like a sweetheart, sees their romance as an opportunity to get the best of the Buckley family.  Mwahaha!

Vanessa and Dan, meanwhile, have a bit of an altercation, in which she accuses him of not acting like himself.  BORING!  Scott takes this opportunity to tell Rufus how much he loves his band Lincoln Hawk.  KISSASS!

But back to Serena, scandal monger.  In the end, Rufus, steps in for an oddly absent Lily van der Woodsen (supposedly tending to a sick granny), pays off all the paparazzi to stop following Serena… all but one, that is.

Serena’s got that last pap locked down!  It turns out that, as hinted at in the Season 2 finale, Serena has been on the hunt for her father this whole time, by way of a unique method: to garner as much bad press as possible.  She’s been acting out purposefully, to get daddy’s attention.  Will it work?

Exciting to get an all-new episode, isn’t it?  Can’t wait to see how Season 3 plays out…

*Happy Dance*

Earlier this week, we learned that American Idol winner Kris Allen and (now officially gay) runner-up Adam Lambert have signed record deals with 19 Recordings. Kris is with 19/Jive and Adam with 19/RCA.

But it’s no secret that Fourth Place’s awkward-but-amazing rocker teen Allison Iraheta was the contestant keeping my lighter aflame all season, so I’m stoked that 19 has officially announced that Allison is signed too - with Jive Records! Her debut album is expected to have a fall ‘09 release. Holla at that.

Ahhhh, after an oft-infuriating season of Idol, all is right in the world again. Kris, Adam and Allison were the rightful Idol contestants to be in the Final 3 and at least the record label agrees!

Hm, speaking of third-place-finisher/blood-curdling screamer Danny Gokey, surely someone soooo beloved by the Idol judges has a record deal as well? A spokesperson at 19 responds, “There’s nothing to report just yet.”

Aw, snap!

Hey everybody, get THIS!  There’s this woman from Scotland who knows how to sing good.  Real good. There must be a catch, right?

RIGHT!  Check this out: she’s not hot!

Yep, Susan Boyle mania continues.  If you’re not caught up, a dowdy woman went on Britain’s Got Talent and blew everyone away with her singing chops, and everyone’s STILL flipping their burgers over her.

Between you and me, I’m starting to get my knickers in a bunch over the response she’s been getting.  I do think she’s quite talented, but COME ON, PEOPLE!  Can we stop condescending to this woman?

BLESS YOU, SUSAN BOYLE!  Bless your heart for singing so god and being so not hot!  Peeee-ewwww.  I hope when I get crazy famous, people go nuts over how much it sucks that one person was afforded with so much talent on top of such dashing good looks.

But enough about me.  What were we talking about?  Oh!  So here’s the latest from the Internets and Boyle:

On The Tonight Show, obnoxious ole Jay Leno claims he might be related to Susan Boyle and does an impression.  NOT funny!  David Letterman would never stoop this low:

Next up, Susan goes on Larry King Live and sings a rousing rendition of “My Heart Will Go On.”  Britain’s Got Talent judge Pierce Morgan (though I know him as the British jerk from Celebrity Apprentice!) shows up via satellite and continues to kiss Susan’s ass, and invites her to dinner:

I love the awkward pause between the invitation and acceptance.  I really wish Susan had just been like “Aw HELL NO, I’m with Simon!!!”

Burp.  Best of luck to ya, Susan.