‘Mad Men’ season 7 endgame debate: All about Kiernan Shipka’s Sally Draper

We feel like in the midst of covering so many major characters on “Mad Men,” Sally Draper can occasionally get lost in the shuffle. What’s the reason for that? It’s really rather simple, in that she is young, often irritating to the adults, and is the sort of character that flutters in and out of storylines.

However, she definitely meets the criteria of what we are hoping to present in our endgame debate series: Reasonable takes on characters who has been around for at least a few years, and had a major role in pushing the story forward. Sally has certainly done that. Without Kiernan Shipka’s character discovering Don’s affair with Sylvia, we’re still not sure if we would ever have seen any movement at all from Jon Hamm’s character. She was the impetus for the change, and for that touching scene at the end of season 6 where Don shows her the house where he grew up.

It is for this reason that we actually think that season 7 could be the year where Sally starts to go back on the straight and narrow (after going off the rails at her new boarding school), but not before potentially dealing Don a death-blow in the process. In order for these two to really have a functioning relationship again, the first thing he has to do is not hold the secret over her head, or say that she has to pretend as though she didn’t see anything. Such a thought is of course not even remotely conducive to a good relationship.

Is Sally always going to rebellious? Probably, and she will probably also be frustrating for most of the time, but she will likely be around for a while after both Don and Betty are gone, so hopefully her father will actually be able to inject a little bit of honesty and wisdom into her life before that time comes … that way she can actually be prepared for whatever horrible things come her way in the future. We don’t want to necessarily see Sally start to become mild-mannered and kind; but, we do want to at least think that she could function in the real world at the end of this.

Where do you want to see Sally end up by the end of “Mad Men’s” run? We want to hear all of your thoughts and theories below, and for more of the latest “Mad Men” endgame debates, all you have to do is visit the story over at the link here.

Photo: AMC