Recap:
Mike meets with one of his men, Dennis, in prison, reminding him that his deal with Fring to stay quiet is still valid. However, it seems that Dennis’s “hazard pay” has been wiped out by the feds, which isn’t the deal. Mike promises to make Dennis whole thanks to the new job with Walt and Jesse, and has a big list of other men affected by the loss of hazard pay and is visiting all of them.
Walt moves back into the old house, despite Skyler’s obvious apprehensions, which he completely ignores and shrugs off. He meets with Saul and Jesse, convincing Saul to let Mike in on the partnership, ignoring Saul’s apprehensions too. Mike arrives and makes it clear that he handles the business, no questions asked; Walt is okay with it, because “I handle him.”
Saul shows them various buildings to rent or work with, all of which are shot down for various reasons including humidity, size, location, smell, etc. Walt comes up with the idea of using making their lab mobile; they’d work with an extermination agency, and after the tent is up, they’ll cook the batch and bomb the place with the poison and leave. Saul hooks them up with a pest control operation that, while legit, are also burglars that they can control.
Badger and Skinny Pete buy huge roadie cases for Jesse, and when they deduce he’s starting up his business they ask to be part of it, and he turns them down.
As Walt and Jesse meet to discuss the specifics (like how to keep the smell out of people’s houses) Andrea and Brock interrupt them, having come over for dinner, which they invite Walt to as well. The next day, after cooking a batch and even interacting a bit with the exterminators, Walt and Jesse share a beer while watching The Three Stooges. Walt chats with him about his relationship with Andrea, giving him advice about the harm in keeping secrets and subtly pushing him to either tell her the secret or let her go, though he doesn’t outright say that.
At the carwash, Marie is having lunch with Skyler, being typically neurotic and talking non-stop. She brings up Walt’s 51st birthday, which upsets Skyler and drives her to start smoking. When Marie goes off on her for in, Skyler repeatedly yells “Shut up!” before completely breaking down.
Marie goes to Walt and tells him about Skyler’s breakdown, trying to figure out what could have caused it, telling Walt she won’t leave until he tells her the truth. Walt reveals “the truth”—about Ted, at least. However, he realizes Marie never knew about Skyler’s affair with him, until she infers it from the conversation. Later that night, Skyler wakes up to gunshots, and realizes Walt is watching Scarface with Walter, Jr. and Holly, and she’s noticeably upset by seeing them enjoy the violence.
Walt, Jesse and Mike sort through the money, and Walt is angry when Mike comes up short. He explains that part of it goes to drivers (since they don’t have distribution like Gus) and another part of it has to go to the hazard pay for his men to keep quiet. Walt is, again, very angry about this development, but after a heated argument, Walt concedes and pays his part.
Jesse tells Walt he broke it off with Andrea, unable to tell her the truth; Walt cuts him off, however, more interested in the money. Jesse tells him he’s looking at it the wrong way; they are making less money, but cooking smaller batches, and are therefore still getting a bigger piece of the pie. Walt promptly brings up Victor, Gus’s guard who got his throat cut in “Box Cutter.” Walt notes that, while he initially thought Gus killed him to make an example of Walt, he might have done it because Victor attempted to cook his own batch, took liberties and flew too close to the sun, and was killed because of it. Jesse is noticeably shaken by Walt’s non-nonchalant threat.
Review:
Remember when Walt was actually fairly likeable? Though he’s been on a steady downward slope since day one, this season’s major goal is painfully obvious: make it easy to hate him from every possible angle. He isn’t totally bad, not on the level of Gus, but any semblance of “ends justify the means” are far and few between. But what really makes this villain-protagonist idea intriguing is how it’s played out this week. Walt isn’t doing anything particularly devious or brutal here, he simply has no regard for anyone else but himself; aside from the four seconds he spends with his kids, everyone he touches he either shuts down or manipulates to his own gain, often at the cost of someone else. And unlike every season before it, there’s zero desperation behind it. No one’s really on his trail, no one is forcing him to cook, his debt isn’t life-ending. There’s absolutely no reason to behave like he is, outside of feeding his own megalomania.
The most frustrating (but entertaining) part of this is that he’s still completely able to be soft-spoken and warm, even when he’s being manipulative. He seems very sincere and season one Walt-like during his conversation with Marie (more on that in a second) and he’s incredibly fatherly and sweet to Jesse. On the flip side, though, he’s all but given up on being warm to Skyler, instead settling on smug, likely assuming he’s “won” in his battle for having power over her, at this point.
Skyler’s torturous journey this season may or may not have come to a head this week, but it’s definitely reaching a boiling point. She works best when she’s smart about how she handles situations (the season 2 finale being a prime example) so seeing her completely lost, depressed, and without any direction at this point is exasperating, but ultimately justified. Her new role this season showcases the profound impact all this violence and terror can have on a person who’s never been previously exposed to it or doesn’t have the concrete ego that Walt does. Walt is the only one she can truly confide, but he’s a major reason for her stress and fear, and thus Skyler’s left completely alone. Sad as it is to say, if things don’t turn around somehow, we might be seeing a path to an attempted suicide in her future. Her kids could hold her back from the brink, but even that might not be enough.
The resulting scene with Marie was a high point of the episode, though. Betsy Brandt has a rather thankless role on the show, playing someone who, aside from a few scattered moments, is meant to be annoying and irritating. But between the nagging, Marie does honestly care about the people around her, and it makes the rare moments of pure sincerity that much stronger. It also makes it harder to watch when Walt twists this sincere moment of bonding into another form of manipulation. Sure, he treats the reveal of the affair with care, but by the end he more-or-less implies that Skyler was the bad guy who slept with another man while Walt was suffering from a gambling addiction. It doesn’t clear Walt of his fault, but it makes Skyler arguably look a lot worse than she is. And when Marie leaves, Walt feels like he’s “won” yet again; he doesn’t go comfort his wife, he celebrates his achievement with an apple.
And then of course, there’s Jesse. While Walt didn’t do anything as emotionally distressing as before—his speech about keeping secrets from loved ones is valid, whether it’s part of a manipulation or not—but it’s still another way Jesse’s life is being twisted in Walt’s favor. After all, having Andrea and Brock out of the picture is only going to make things easier for him; one less person to be caught in the crossfire, distract Jesse, or barge in during their meetings. And let’s not forget that Brock was the victim of Walt’s recent monumental turn to the dark side. Considering how ominous his brief moments with Brock were, it’d be no stretch to say Walt simply didn’t want to see Brock ever again so he wouldn’t have to face the guilt.
On the other hand, Jesse is the only character Walt feels honest with, and in spite of the manipulating, he does seem truly warm and caring when he gives advice. Walt still sees Jesse like a son, it seems, but Jesse has also been unknowingly wronged by Walt more than anyone else. The juxtaposition is both tragic and brilliant, and is sure to lead up to some great stuff.
And lastly, all of Walt’s business dealings pretty much follow the same pattern: treat everyone else like crap, stroke his own ego, and remind everyone how he’s the man in charge. What’s particularly interesting is that everyone—everyone—sees completely through him. Saul, Mike, and Jesse all know what Walt used to be and what he’s trying to do now, and know it’s going to bite him in the butt. The problem is, they’re all stuck working with him and can’t do anything about it. Like I said back in the premiere, Walt’s so focused on his goal that he’s blinded to anything else, like not understanding how much money he’s actually making, or ignoring any bit of advice he’s getting. Instead of listening to Mike and understanding that no one can become a drug overlord overnight, he figures he can just kill him to solve that problem. If we hadn’t been invested in Walt’s development over four seasons, we’d hate this dumb, oblivious egomaniac, and it’s a testament to the show that we’re still itching to see what’s going to happen to him.
There was also a plot involving the group’s new method of cooking, which is definitely clever and reminiscent of the early days of the show. But the meat of the episode is the many traps Walt’s laid for himself in the coming days. And while the episode lacked much suspense, the potentially huge plot developments and surprising moments—not to mention Walt’s creepy factor—still made for an engaging episode on par with early episodes of previous seasons. It’s still definitely a lot of set-up, but given the show’s track record, it’ll be worth it in the end.
Some stray tidbits
- Mike ignoring Saul during his entrance is hilarious.
- Many arcs on the show might follow standard archetypes and developments, but episodes like this showcase how much the colorful details make the show great. Cooking in a pest control tent? How does that idea even come up?!
- We only got a few minutes with them, but—Skinny Pete and Badger!
- It will be interesting to see if the exterminators become larger, more integral characters as the series progresses. We got a few moments with them as we explored the new system, especially Tyler warning Walt and Jesse of the Nanny Cam.
- There’s a couple of weird cinematography choices here that, while creative, weren’t completely effective. The House-like CGI shot of the meth being created at the cellular/molecular level, for example, would have made sense in the exploratory days of season 1, but not really season 5.
- Along the same lines, the film student in me loved the transition from the Scarface gunshots to the money counter, but it took away from Skyler’s moment of crisis.
- The plot point of Walt’s birthday is a nice reminder that the past four seasons have only taken place over the course of one year. It’s been a really, really, really crazy year.
