These pics are too rich in detail not to have some fun with them. We still maintain that you can’t predict storylines or look for deeper meaning in these pictures, but the costuming always tells a story of its own.

Ken is the only man in this picture who will look back on this decade and not cringe or laugh at what he was wearing. Loving Peggy’s white gloves.

A Seagram’s ad. “Mr. Carson’s suits provided by Botany 500.”

Kitten heels and colored tights.

She looks absolutely stunning here, but we have to admit, it feels a little off from the direction the character’s been moving, style-wise. Her clothes have gotten less sexy and more business-like over the course of the series, as befits the character’s arc. On the other hand, if you’re the account rep for AVON, BITCHES and it’s 1969 and you look like Joan Holloway Harris, how could you not dress like this.

Jim Cutler never changes. Ted has discovered the Dry Look.

We feel like this scene is missing microphones and guitars. And possibly Ed Sullivan.

Portraits in Bitchface. Sally can go head to head with her mother on that front. Love her lace tights. And Mrs. Francis definitely got her mojo back in time for the seventies. She’s a tiny bit bold for a Republican political wife of the period, but you could argue any politician with a wife who looks like a movie star would encourage her to turn it up a notch.

And speaking of epic bitchface, who wins in the following matchoff?

We’re sorry that Pete and Betty didn’t have more scenes together, so we can judge more effectively who has the more potent bitchface. We’ve gotta say, based on these pics, Pete takes it by a nose. A nose slightly uplifted in disgust at you.

That is one hell of a swoop on Betty’s head. A whole can of AquaNet went into that one.

Up till now, the only woman to wear hoops has been Dawn, Don’s secretary.

Tom’s grandmother had that exact brooch. We suspect a lot of people’s mothers and grandmothers had that brooch.

FIERCE.

We predict orange and pink as the dominant color scheme this season, just as blue and green dominated last season.

Never changing.

Miss Holloway upped her jewelry budget, clearly. Five years before, the only time you saw earrings like that, they were on a hooker. Peggy’s formerly “ethnic” hoops and Joan’s and Megan’s formerly shockingly vulgar danglies signal the ways in which dominant white culture and traditional thinking on morality were changing. In other words, you could look at the earrings on the women here and note how they represent both the advance of African-American civil rights as well as the turning point of the sexual revolution. Now that’s some primo costuming.

[Photo CRedit: Fraken Ockenfels 3/AMC]