I think this episode could unofficially be titled, “Walt’s Ego is Bigger Than Jupiter.”
On Breaking Bad, there is always so much attention paid to visuals, colors and sound, and all of this seemed especially true in this episode, starting with the sound of the metal detector wand thingy in the first shot of the teaser.
The teaser for this episode was the most straightforward we’ve seen this season. It was pretty great to see Mike dressed as a paralegal. And we meet another one of the guys on Mike’s list, Dennis, who was mentioned in last week’s episode during the conversation between Mike and Lydia–he’s the manager of the laundry. That lawyer, Dan, seems pretty nervous, what with the way he taps his fingers and the way he’s looking down and not making eye contact when he says he has his paralegal with him.
All of Dennis’ money was taken by the feds, just like the money Mike had set aside for his granddaughter Kaylee. Like I mentioned last week, a lot of this happened because of the magnet vs. laptop heist that Walt, Jesse and Mike pulled off in 501 that broke the frame, revealing the account info that gave the DEA the money trail. But that’s in the past, no way to get that money back, so Mike wants to move forward, and as for his guys, he’s promising to “make ’em whole.” Love that phrase!
Is it me or is this season already flying by way too fast?
Walt comforts Jesse
So let’s get to Season 5, Episode 2, “Madrigal.”
The opening shot is a perfectly swirled blob of mustard. I’m not sure if this was intended or not, but I immediately thought of the pilot episode, when Walt first finds out he has cancer and all he can focus on is the mustard stain on the doctor’s coat.
It looks like we are in for some unexpected teasers this season. This one went from Madrigal Electromotive exec Schuler taste-testing such flavors as “Franch” and “Cajun Kick-Ass” with a look of dread (he knows what’s coming) to killing himself with a defibrillator. I think the most compelling moment of that whole sequence was when he put the lead under his tongue. If he was the least bit unsure about what he was doing before, that was *the* decisive moment.
When he first starts taking off his jacket to perform his suicidal task, I immediately thought of Gus exquisitely taking off his jacket and folding it before making himself vomit the poisoned tequila in “Salud.” Schuler does have a level of care in that scene, removing clothes layer by layer, but he’s not as meticulous as Gus (could anyone ever be?) and in an interview about “Madrigal” Vince Gilligan says the connection wasn’t intentional, even though many fans and critics had the same thoughts. Even the pristine clinical feel of the lab feels a little like Gus.
Other notes from the teaser:
They were taking down the Los Pollos Hermanos sign, wow.
Was that Lydia in the background during the taste-testing? Because of my blindness, I sometimes have trouble distinguishing faces, especially in the background, but a few people to the right behind the guy presenting “Franch” and the other flavors, was a woman who looked a lot like Lydia, with her hair parted in the exact same place. Can anyone confirm or deny?
Well, last night was the long-awaited night that some of us have been counting down the months, days and minutes to. Finally, Breaking Bad is back!
I’ll be doing these commentaries every week, along with some other in-depth topic explorations related to the show. Since this is episode commentary, there will be spoilers.
Standoff
To me, the most intriguing part was the teaser. It’s a flashforward to Walt on his 52nd birthday. He has hair. He looks different. He drives a different car. He has a New Hampshire ID and license plate. He’s not wearing his wedding ring (thanks to Badger at the Scranton Branch aka freeforums for catching that). He’s using a new last name, Lambert, which (thanks to Huell over at the Home Office aka AMC forums for pointing out) is Skyler’s maiden name.
My first thought was Witness Protection of some sort. Or Saul’s vacuum/disappearing service. But in either case, what is he doing back in ABQ? And why would he be using a name, in either case, that could be easily linked to his real identity? My guess is that we will all be surprised, that we’re all making more assumptions than we really can about this teaser. Vince Gilligan and company have a reputation for surprising us in major ways.
Another big question in my mind is timing. People associated with the show have repeatedly said that about a year has passed in the time frame of the story since the pilot episode. Episode 504 is titled “Fifty-One” leading some to speculate (again thanks Badger) that this will refer to Walt’s 51st birthday. If that teaser is part of this 8 episode mini-season, which I doubt, that would mean it takes 50 episodes to get through one year…and then 4 to get through the next! That means either some really huge time jumps (which BrBa has never done except for at the end of Season 2 when Walt had his surgery and Jesse was in rehab) or that the teaser scene will occur later on, like in next year’s mini-season. That’s my guess. Still that would require some time jumps to get there that soon. Perhaps the cliffhanger at the end of these first 8 will be whatever sends him to New Hampshire.
It kinda makes you think that something really big and disastrous is going to go down. And what does Walt need that gun for? I bet, like with the teddy bear and debris we saw in season 2, it’s going to be impossible to guess where this leads.
I was honestly a bit surprised to see that Walt lives to see his 52nd birthday. But it does seem that the cancer is back. In the bathroom he’s coughing and taking some meds after the gun salesman guy leaves.
It also makes you wonder what’s going on with Skyler. I almost wonder if she’s the one who dies. There seems to be something mournful about Walt in that Denny’s. And the way he slowly rearranges his bacon into the number the way she did (a callback to the pilot, when Skyler arranged his veggie bacon into the number 50), added to the fact that he’s using her maiden name, seems like he could be missing her. Then again if she had died, maybe he’d still be wearing the ring. But then again, his wearing or not wearing of the ring could have more to do with his new identity than anything going on with Skyler. And maybe I just don’t want it to be Jesse who dies.
But there did seem to be some foreshadowing about it possibly being Skyler. The “previously on” section started with the scene where Gus threatens to kill Skyler and Holly (they didn’t show him threatening Walt Jr or Hank or anyone else). I could be reading into that but I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s some reason for how that was edited. And then after the teaser, she says she’s afraid of Walt. And then there’s that really ominous hug at the end between Walt and Skyler.
Last week, I wrote about Breaking Bad and endings in this post, and today I’m going to look at another show’s season ending, and discuss some writerly things about endings in general, particularly for crime writing.
Spoiler Alert: If you aren’t caught up and don’t know who did it, go get caught up…then come back.
Sunday, June 17th was the big Season 2 finale of AMC’sThe Killing. Like with Breaking Bad, I came to The Killing late in the game and just started watching it this year. There are a lot of things I really like about this show, most notably atmosphere.
I think this episode could unofficially be titled, “Walt’s Ego is Bigger Than Jupiter.”
Chrys Buckley 