In my opinion, Breaking
Bad is the best drama on television.
Now, I realize that this could be a controversial statement, no matter
how convinced I am of its value. Heck, I'll admit that, at the very least, it’s dangerously hyperbolic! And sure, you could argue that other TV
critical darlings, such as Mad Men or
Sherlock or what-have-you, could
stand toe-to-toe with the adventures of Walter White and Jesse Pinkman. But when I sit down to watch a new episode of
Breaking Bad Sunday evenings at 9:00
PM (Central time, yo!), I can always count on a draining, tension-filled, and
positively grueling experience that no other show can provide… and which no
other show has provided since The Shield
or the early years of 24. That, combined with a wonderfully dark sense
of humor, film-like cinematography, and a top-notch cast led by Bryan Cranston,
has made for one of television’s most awesome experiences… which, sadly,
started heading towards its endgame tonight, with the first of the final season’s
16 episodes. (For posterity’s sake, I
should mention that only the first eight episodes will air this summer,
wrapping up on Labor Day Sunday. The
second half of the season will begin filming in mid-November, and will air on
AMC next summer, in what will assuredly be a painful wait.)
And yet, as we head into these sixteen episodes, the
question that’s been on most fans’ minds since last October’s incredible finale
is: “Where do we go from here?” In that daring October 2011 finale, Walter
managed to devise – and successfully execute – a ballsy plan to eliminate his
employer, Southwest meth kingpin/fast-food chicken franchise owner Gus Fring,
with the help of our beloved bell-dinger, Hector Salamanca. With Gus out of the picture, Walt triumphantly
proclaimed to his wife, “I won”… a moment reprised at the beginning of tonight’s
episode. However, this is not the Super
Bowl, and Walt just isn’t going to go to Disney World. Now, that’s not to say that Walt isn’t going
to bask in the moment; in fact, when he gets home, he breaks out the booze for
a celebratory drink. However, Walt keeps
thinking of loose ends: first, to clean up the bomb-making equipment from the
kitchen… and then, to dispose of the Lily of the Valley plant that he used to
poison Brock. It sets up the foundation
for tonight’s episode, as everyone in the cast has to tie up the remaining
threads from last year in order to move on.
Chief among the loose ends: everyone’s favorite hitman, Mike,
whom you’ll recall was conveniently sidelined during the last few episodes of
Season 4, as he was shot and wounded during Gus’ epic poisoned-tequila
elimination of the Cartel. One of the
burning questions during the show’s hiatus was how he’d react to the news of
Gus’ death, and the show did not disappoint on that front. In fact, in true Breaking Bad fashion, the show cuts to the chase and gives us the
long-awaited, tension-filled Walt/Mike confrontation very early on… at the
18-minute mark, if I’m not mistaken. The
episode sets up the situation wonderfully, with Mike re-introduced feeding
chickens at the hospital where has was recuperating. But, in comes the orderly
to notify Mike… and before you know it, Mike’s driving to the desert to meet
with Walt and Jesse, where’s he’s noticeably pissed. But, the circumstances of the situation
forces Mike to work with Walt and Jesse to resolve one potentially dangerous
loose end: that of Gus’ ever-intimidating security cameras. You see, the camera footage (including that
of Walt and Jesse cooking in the underground laundromat lab) was all redirected
to Gus’ laptop… and if it falls into the wrong hands, then they’re all screwed.
And where’s the laptop?
In the Albuquerque police evidence room, natch. Not only have they come in to swoop all the
evidence from Gus’ office at the Los Pollos Hermanos restaurant… but the DEA’s
investigation has also picked up, as Hank descends, cane in hand, to inspect
the burned-out remains of Gus’ lab, where he noticed the torched remains of the
lab camera. It leads to what may be the
episode’s most laugh-out-loud moment, as Walt and Mike discuss a ridiculously elaborate
plan to eliminate the evidence to get a bomb into the evidence room, while
Jesse tries valiantly to be the voice of reason and logic. His solution is
simple: Magnets, yo! Thus, we head to
the junkyard, where Walt attempts to acquire a crane magnet to wipe the laptop’s
contents clean. It’s a welcome callback
of sorts to the show’s early days, where Walt’s chemistry expertise was used to
solve various problems on the meth front.
(Remember the explosive meth from episode 5? Or Walter’s very specific
request in episode 2 for a container to disintegrate a body in? Oh, those were
the days.) It leads to another fun
sequence: the test run of the magnet, which is stored in the back of a truck
with 21 car batteries wired together to make a portable power source. It's a scene that would make the Insane Clown Posse proud.
You’ll recall at the end of that scene that Walt makes one
request: to double the number of batteries in the bank. It’s the start of a new Walt, one who’s
seemingly drunk with power in the wake of his success over Gus. It comes up again when Walt, Jesse and Mike
head to the police department to use the magnet: Walt can’t help but turn up
the magnet to full blast when they get there… tipping the truck in the process,
ensuring that they’ll have to leave it behind at the police station. Yet, despite the risk of leaving the truck
behind, lest there be prints, Walt truly believes he’s above defeat: in Mike’s
car afterwards, Mike asks, “Did all that even work just now?” Walt says yes. How do we know? In Walt’s words, “Because I say so.” It’s a bold statement… and one that ensures
that Walt is setting himself up for inevitable failure. And, if anything, Walt’s efforts may not have
helped: even though the laptop might be destroyed, the magnet managed to
uncover a juicy bit of information: it damaged a framed portrait of Gus and his
partner (whom you’ll recall from last season’s “Hermanos” flashback episode),
which contained, underneath the photo, the numbers for a Cayman Islands
offshore bank account.
Speaking of ridiculous amounts of money, let’s shift to Skyler’s
plot, where she has to deal with a loose thread of her own: her old boss, Ted
Beneke, whom she gave $622,000 or so in cash to pay off his back taxes and
avoid going to prison. Now, when Ted
slipped and fell near the end of last season, we would’ve thought that his
story was conveniently wrapped up. But
that’s not the case, as tonight, Skyler learns via Saul that Ted has woken up. Now, granted, Ted’s not that well off: he
still has severe neck injuries, he’s in a brace, and there are even screws in
his head. But Ted is apt to tell Skyler
that he doesn’t plan on saying a word about what really happened. Saul explains the situation to Walt at
episode’s end, but he doesn’t respond very well, on account of the fact that he
wasn’t approached when a huge chunk of his money was given to the man his wife
was sleeping with. It leads to a falling
out between him and Saul, who says he’s done with Walt. But Walt says those threatening words, “We’re
done when I say we’re done.” Even more unsettling
is what he says to Skyler in the final scene: “I forgive you.” It’s not exactly
a reassuring moment for Skyler… and it further sets up Walt as a man who’s not
to be messed with.
Which brings us to the scene I’ve held off on discussing
until now: the episode’s cold open, which flashes forward to Walt’s 52nd
birthday, as noted by his traditional bacon-and-eggs birthday breakfast. (You’ll recall that the show’s very first
episode opened with Walt’s 50th birthday, and just so you’re aware,
we haven’t seen Walt turn 51 yet… although this season’s fourth episode is
conveniently titled “Fifty-One”.) When
we meet Walt – or should I say, “Mr. Lambert” – he’s sporting a new look: a
full head of hair, a scruffy beard and wardrobe, and black horn-rimmed
glasses. As it turns out, Walt is at
Denny’s to meet up with his weapons guy – the one whom Walt bought his revolver
from last season. This time, however,
Walt’s making a wee bit of an upgrade: he’s purchasing an M-60 machine gun
(according to the Breaking Bad StorySync feature for tonight’s episode).
The mere presence of a flash-forward sequence alternately
excites and frightens me. Fortunately, Breaking Bad has approached its story
architecture in both ways. For example,
Season 2 was intricately structured to lead up to the season finale’s airliner
crash… as indicated by the recurring flash-forwards of a pink teddy bear
floating in a pool. For Season 3,
however, creator Vince Gilligan decided to take the exact opposite approach: he
opted not to write a season-long arc, instead forcing himself and the writing
staff to write the season by the seat of their pants… which led to a much more
immediate sense of storytelling, and probably one of the most thrilling seasons
of television in recent memory. At best,
tonight’s flash-forward signifies that Gilligan and his writing staff have a
story mapped out for this summer’s eight episodes, and most likely the rest of
the series. At worst, we have a show
that’s locked into an ending, without knowing how to get there.
Given how little time this show has left, I sincerely hope
it’s the former… but we’ll have to see.
As we head into this final stretch, nothing is more important to me than
knowing that the show has an endgame… which is very important for serialized
shows, and especially important for shows that know exactly when they’re going
to end. (For example, Lost knew its end date three years in
advance… and yet Lindelof and Cuse couldn’t devise an ending that could pay off
that much build-up.) But Breaking Bad has always had an
expiration date on it: either by way of Walt’s potential demise as a result of
his actions, or the always-lingering threat of cancer. (Certainly, that cough
in the Denny’s bathroom could not have been a throwaway moment.) Because of the fact that there are only 16
episodes left, Breaking Bad has a
tremendous opportunity to stick the landing and give us the ending that the
show – and its audience – deserves. Let’s
hope it pulls it off. :-)
Random notes:
- If you’re interested in joining our Breaking Bad journey, you may be happy to know that Netflix added the fourth season to their streaming selection today. If you can plow through all 46 episodes of Seasons 1-4 in the very near future – plus whatever episodes from Season 5 you’ll need to watch – I will give you a gold star. J
- “He knows.”
- The scene of Hank in the burned-out lab was epically filmed. I will miss the scenes in the lab, though… that was one heck of a set.
- “Keys. It’s the universal symbol for ‘keys’.”
- Mike’s alias: Inspector Dave Clark, like in the Dave Clark Five. (That may have been before your time.)
- “Did you just use the word ‘ethically’ in a sentence?”
- Saul was on fire with the pop culture references: first by invoking Hogan’s Heroes in front of Skyler, then whipping out “I’m your huckleberry” from Tombstone when Walt came to his office.
- Although I have DVR'ed it, I have not yet fast-forwarded through tonight's post-Breaking Bad premiere of their new reality show Small Town Security to check out the promo for next week's Breaking Bad and the 4-minute preview trailer for Season 3 of The Walking Dead. You think I was going to sit through that in full to get the goods on the shows I actually watch? Nuh-uh, AMC!
- Here’s a sneak peek scene from next week’s episode, courtesy of AMC. See you next Sunday!
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