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Skyler's been wiki-reading up on money laundering, so she tells Walt she's ready to take point on the car wash; Walt balks until he can leverage it for some quality family time. And Marie gets Hank to agree to leave the hospital by getting his nerve-damaged nether regions to spot wood. There, now on to the INSANE stuff.
Jesse has decided NO MAS with regard to dealers using kids to kill his friends. He tells Walt he intends to assassinate the pair who ordered Tomas to kill Combo (via a sophisticated plan involving ricin and a motel meth whore). But since the two dealers are, not surprisingly, under the Pollos umbrella, Walt thinks it's a terrible idea. Not to mention that Jesse, for all his faults, is not a killer. Walt won't support it.
Speaking of terrible ideas, Walt goes to Saul and devises a plan to keep Jesse from fucking things up for everybody by getting him tossed into jail (not jail-jail, apparently; nice jail). Fixer Mike gets wind of this and pays Walt a visit to let him know just how monumentally stupid that idea is. He also lets him know he's in Gus's employ, not Saul's. Mike also tells a story of his old days as a cop, when he almost killed a scumbag wife-beater who then went on to kill said wife, and how he's regretful he never pulled the trigger on the SOB.
So we all think that Mike is going to rub Jesse out, only instead he takes him to a meeting with Gus, Walt and Frick-and-Frack. Jesse is furious at Walt and initially refuses to make peace with the dealers, but when Gus orders them to stop using children, Jesse -- ever begrudgingly -- agrees to keep the peace. But that night, we find out Tomas has been murdered, in the style of a gang killing. Jesse's wrecked by this news, so he relapses on the meth and then decides to charge the two thugs in the dead of night with his gun drawn. They draw their guns, too, but before anyone (Jesse) gets totally murdered, Walt comes screaming by on his Aztec, running one clean the fuck over and leaving the other stretching for his gun. Walt gets to it first, picks it up, hesitates about a quarter-second and then puts a bullet clean through the guy's head. He turns to a shell-shocked Jesse and orders: "Run."
AAAAAHHHHHHH!
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Previously on Breaking Bad, Skyler offered her money-laundering services to Walt so his cover business wouldn't sound quite so ridiculous at dinner parties, and Jesse's pal Combo was shot and killed by the ten-year-old brother of the girl from rehab he's now predatorily banging. But hey, at least he's still off drugs!
The episode proper begins with the cheerful strains of The Association's "Windy," so you know we're about to see something fucking awful. And indeed, we get what could honestly be the opening credits to a TV show about a poor, gross, motel meth-head who gives out copious blowjobs to fat men in crappy cars so she'll have the money for a tint bag of the meth that's making her face look like a John Waters character. In the grand tradition of Breaking Bad opening sequences, it's impeccably filmed and cheeky and intriguing and completely unnerving.
As the song dies out, we see our girl (who I'm going to have to call Windy, right?) carrying a bag of fast-food burgers to a car. She walks past Tomas riding his bike around that little patch of pavement like he always does, so we know what corner we're on. And we know what car she's approaching. I have no idea if these guys have names or not, so I'm just going to call them Frick and Frack for now. Frick (who is bald and tatted up) and Frack (who is bearded and kinda tired-looking) accept her gift of grease-soaked meat product, and instead of returning in kind (ew), they hand her a bag of the blue stuff. From a block away, Jesse watches from his car. And he's thinking. Which is never ever good.
After the credits, we see Walt had taken Flynn out driving. Flynn happily asks if it's cool if he uses the Aztek here for his driving test week, since Mom's brakes suck. Walt says yes, though the fact that the camera just cut to an outside-the-car shot to emphasize the tape on the windshield -- reminding us how many times that glass has had to be replaced -- fills me with dread for some reason. Flynn then asks Walt if he's doing okay. Walt says he is, then Flynn specifically asks about his feet, and Walt looks down to see one foot on the gas and one on the break. Flynn says he knows it's not the right way, but it makes sense given his condition, and he just needs a note from a doctor for it to pass muster with his driving instructor. And then once he gets his provisional, he can work on it. Walt, in an uncharacteristic moment of accepting life's little imperfections, just smiles and says as long as it works for Flynn, it's fine with him.
Meanwhile, Skyler's at home with baby Holly, looking up "money laundering" on Wikipedia. Not exactly the most original gag ever, but it got a chuckle out of me. She shuts the laptop down once she hears the guys pull into the driveway. Flynn confirms that Walt will pick him up for his driver's test on Saturday morning. Yeah, in light of events to come later, my guess is Walt's a smidge late for that appointment. Skyler crosses paths with Flynn in the driveway and stays out to talk to Walt. She wants to talk about the arrangement they discussed for the car wash, but Walt says he's dead set against it. Skyler once again makes the argument that the car wash story makes sense. Walt comes at it from a different angle: if he's ever caught, he wants Skyler to have had nothing to do with it, thus giving her a plausible deniability. Skyler's not sure how plausible the deniability is when your husband starts dropping sacks of cash on the doorstep after going on disability from the public school. "I'd rather have [the police] think I'm Bonnie what'shername than a complete idiot." I love lines like that, which capture the line these characters are straddling between moral sketchiness and suburban naivete. The camera keeps cutting back to these long shots, too, where Skyler and Walt (and their respective cars) are on either side of some invisible line in the driveway. That's the way it stands right now, Walt on one side of the line and Skyler on the other. But for how long? Then, Walt crosses over to Skyler's side of the line, and you know he's making his play. He asks why, in this storytelling scenario of hers, her estranged husband would be putting her in charge of his car wash business. Skyler, ever the storyteller lately, says Walt would "try anything" to seek a reconciliation with his family, futile though those attempts may be. But Walt's angling to end the estrangement as condition of letting Skyler into the plan. Skyler balks. Walt renegotiates. They bargain things down to four dinners a week, and Walt gets a key to the house. "That," Walt says, "is how we'll sell your little fiction."
America's Meth Kitchen. Jesse's flushing out a vat or something (this show has taught me a lot about how to cook my own meth, but not everything yet). Looks like he and Walt are finishing up. He asks Walt if he'd like to go out and get a beer tonight. Walt obviously begs off, forcing Jesse to be a lot less subtle about his invitation. "Seriously. Have a beer with me." He directs his eyes to the ceiling and the invisible recording devices couched therein. Walt gets it.
At the restaurant (Paul's Monterey Inn -- ooh, fancy), they stare at each other silently, their drinks half-drunk, before Walt finally says "What?" I love scenes like this that start in the middle, yet the characters apparently sat down, waited for a server, waited for their drinks, so easily 10-15 minutes of just, what, staring at each other? No way either one of them is that patient. Anyway, Jesse finally tosses a tiny bag of the blue meth onto the table. Walt scrambles to hide it, but Jesse just wants him to confirm that it's theirs. It is. Jesse says he bought it from the two guys who killed Combo. I'm not sure what kind of reaction Jesse was looking for here, but considering Walt's reaction to Combo's death the first time around was a pair of shrugged shoulders, the fact that Walt shakes this news off as "hearsay" shouldn't be much of a surprise. Even when Jesse tells him that the two scumbags ordered a 10-year-old kid to do the killing, and Walt finally looks shocked, his reaction isn't close to the vibrating coil of rage that is Jesse Pinkman. Jesse says Tomas can't be the only kid they're using either. They use kids because they're easy to control and because they'll only get juvie if they're caught. "Hearts and minds," Jesse says, recalling Walt's own words. "Get 'em young and they're yours forever." The rage in Jesse is directed outward, yes, towards those two scumbags, but the accusatory way he looks at Walt when he says things like "hearts and minds" contains some revulsion at the part the both of them have played in this cycle. One more feather in Aaron Paul's cap, who needs to win an Emmy this year. And he deserves it in the lead category, but I'll take supporting.
When Walt finally asks Jesse what he wants him to do about it, Jesse puts his head down and admits he needs Walt's help. "I need ricin," he says, at which point Walt immediately puts on the brakes. Jesse's contention is that Frick and Frack need to die, and as Walt taught him two short seasons ago, ricin is effective and untraceable. He can have Windy the whore put it in the burgers she delivers to them daily. Walt nearly chokes that Jesse would put the whole plan in the hands of a meth-head (like, um, Walt has done with Jesse). Jesse brings up the Tuco situation, how Walt was all set to use ricin on him. The whole world, Jesse says, would be better without these two guys. Walt's bottom line is that Tuco was going to murder them; Frick and Frack are not. It's the difference between self-defense and murder. Jesse tries again, hissing through clenched teeth that "Combo was one of us! Does that mean nothing to you?" Jesse still doesn't realize that it completely does not mean anything to Walt. He might shed a tear for Jane while hopped up on sleeping pills, but he's well beyond feeling any kind of kinship or guilt for Combo. Walt twists the knife a bit, saying Jesse is only finding out now because he was too wasted to find out when
it happened. Back then, he might've been able to take care of it. Now, he's sober. And "murder is not part of your 12-step program." It's manipulative and kind of mean, but it's also the most caring point Walt can make: Jesse is not a murderer. "I'm not and you are not. It's as simple as that." Walt's a pragmatist above all ("This accomplishes nothing!") but he cares about Jesse, clearly.
Hank's hospital room. He and Marie and Flynn are playing cards, and if he wasn't already annoyed by his condition and his wife's cheerful humming, he's certainly annoyed by her habit of saying "knock-knock" instead of just knocking the table, like you're supposed to do (and then defending this practice by saying this is just how she plays cards). But it's Flynn who lays down the winning hand, prompting some carping from Hank. Marie looks at the kid skeptically, "Have you been playing cards with your dad?" Fortunately, he has no idea what she's talking about. She then tells Flynn -- in a passive-aggressive poke at Hank -- that the doctors have told Hank he's clear to go home, only he's not going to. Hank fumes and cites the fact that he's "shitting in a pan and peeing in a pitcher," much less his nonfunctioning legs, as reasons why he's not going home yet. "So people in wheelchairs should be in hospitals," Flynn says, in a tiny little moment of heroism. "What about people on crutches? Maybe I should be in here too." Marie smirks, almost imperceptibly, and Flynn has a bit of the "gotcha" gleam in his eye too. Hank's having none of it, saying, "Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Deal, you little prick." Flynn knows he's made his best effort and picks up the cards.
Walt and Saul waste time in Saul's office, waiting for Jesse, who's obviously not coming. Walt says Jesse "promised" him, but Saul knows exactly what that's worth. He wants to know what plan B is. How do they keep Jesse from killing two of Gus's guys. Pay him off? Walt shoots that down. They need to get him off the streets and calmed down. "What if we...maybe...could you get him arrested?" Walt asks. At which point a camera crew burst into the office, along with a besuited guy holding a giant check and Miss New Mexico wearing a sash and throwing confetti, all to congratulate Walt on coming up with the Worst Idea in History. Congrats! Saul laughs him off, but not hard enough. He lets Walt talk him into it. Not jail-jail, you know, but nice jail. There are nice jails! He wants Jesse in an orange jumpsuit, picking up trash off the side of the highway. "That's jail," Saul deadpans. Saul offers up "Roswell Correctional" as a decent "Level 2 joint." He'd recommend Springer but he's "heard chancey things about their bathrooms." He tells Walt this falls under his "premium services package," a.k.a. more cash, but says he'll call his P.I.
Jesse's in a gross hotel room with Windy -- which is somehow lit all green from the outside. He's giving her a pep talk, reminding her of where to put the poison (he got it on the internet), and she can never tell anyone about it. Ever. Seems like there are great plans all over the place today. He tells her to think of it like she's just delivering some hamburgers. "It's not just delivering hamburgers," Windy whispers to the floor. Windy knows the leap it takes to becoming a murderer. Not Jesse yet. He appeals to Windy's son, Patrick. Imagine Frick and Frack had him working as a mule. Wouldn't she deliver some burgers to protect him? And the other kids like him? She doesn't respond, but he tells her he'll be in touch tomorrow. He leaves as Windy stares at the two GIANT bags of meth he left on her table. She's still gettin' paid.
Walt's at home, babysitting Holly, when he gets a knock at the door. It's Mike the Fixer. I do enjoy him. Considering one of the last times these two were around each other, Mike put Walt in a chokehold with about as much effort as if he were changing socks, the chilly reception for Mike is expected. Walt tells him to use the phone, but this isn't a phone conversation. Mike strides in and makes a little fuss over Holly. Walt grumps at that, so Mike tells him to take a seat. Says Saul told him about their send-Jesse-to-jail plan, but he's not about to go through with it. Why not? "Because it's moronic." I love Mike. Also a reason? "The boss wouldn't like it." Walt's all, "Saul," which leads Mike to give Walt a tiny peek inside what must be an immensely vast Pollos empire: he works for Gus, not Saul. Walt's floored anew. Every week seems to bring another piece of evidence that Gus's empire is so much more than Walt ever thought. And he knows so very little about it.
Anyway, Mike's point is academic: Gus doesn't want Jesse getting thrown in jail. That's about eighteen kind of potential problems, and Gus doesn't like having problems for very long. Mike levels with Walt: "You've got a good thing going here. We all do. You really want to risk it all on some junkie?" Here's the dilemma again: is it smarter for Walt to just cut Jesse loose? Of course, now, cutting Jesse loose means letting Gus have someone (Mike himself?) kill Jesse. So Walt's past the point of no return already. Mike realizes the relationship Walt has with Jesse, but "this kids been on the bubble a while now. It's a long time coming." Walt's like, "What's that?" and instead of an answer, Mike gives a story. He used to be a beat cop, see, and he'd get these recurring calls for a domestic incident with this one married couple. This giant shitpile kept beating up on his delicate little wife, and she was too scared of him to press charges. They couldn't do anything about it if she didn't. One night, Mike's partner's out sick, so Mike has to go haul Gigantor down to the drunk tank alone. And "this sideways asshole is in my back seat humming 'Danny Boy.'" And that was all Mike could take. He drives the guy out to the middle of nowhere, puts a gun in his mouth, and threatens to open a hole in his skull until the guy is a whimpering, quivering, pants-shitting mess. After a few minutes, Mike takes the gun back and says "If you ever touch her again I will such-and-such and blah-blah-blah." "Just a warning?" Walt asks, hopefully. Bargaining with himself whether a traumatized, soiled, humiliated Jesse would be worth it to keep him out of further trouble. But no, Mike doesn't even have that to comfort him. Because two weeks later, the guy caved his wife's head in with a blender. So the moral of Mike's little story is that mercy is for the weak and it never works. "I chose a half-measure when I shoulda gone all the way. I'll never make that mistake again." He stands up and tells Walt, "No more half-measures." So there's that happening.
The day, Jesse and Windy sit in Jesse's car, waiting for Frick and Frack to show up. But they're inexplicably absent, leaving Tomas to ride his bike aimlessly. (Well, more aimlessly than usual.) Windy continues to fret about the practice of killing two people, and Jesse tries to reassure her. But he won't let her have another bump until it's done. Suddenly, there's a knock on Jesse's window -- it's Mike, and he and that silent dude who mans Gus's factory (his name is apparently Victor) dismiss Windy and escort Jesse to their car. This doesn't look good, and as Jesse gets into the car, he looks like a man who doesn't think he'll be getting out of it.
They drive him out to the trailers, where Gus met Tio and the Cousins and Juan Bolsa earlier this season. As Jesse marches grimly towards his double-wide destiny, he spots Walt's Aztek parked off to the side. So it's like that.
Mike and Victor lead Jesse inside, where at a large plywood table sit Frick, Frack, Gus, and Walter. Gus, dressed in a suit as opposed to one of his Cosby-er ensembles, tells Jesse they're here to solve the dispute between him and two of his dealers. Gus, I love you, and the even tones of voice are certainly effective, but if you don't start speaking up I am going to take my pollo business elsewhere, sir. As Frick and Frack stare on smugly, Gus says that there was blame on both sides -- they acted "rashly," but Combo was invading their territ
ory. Gus wants things settled, now. But all Jesse can see right now is Walt. "You told him?" he seethes, through clenched teeth. Gus stands up, which gets everyone's attention, and tells the dealers to wait outside. Gus lords over Jesse and tells him that Walt is the only friend he's got; if it weren't for Walt coming to him, Jesse would be dead right now. Jesse begins to turn towards Walt again, but Gus sharply rebukes him, and Jesse flinches hard. He's scared, and he's right to be.
Gus tells Jesse how this is going to go: he's going to call the other two in, Jesse will shake their hands and make peace, and that'll be the end of it. But Jesse summons up whatever courage he's got and says "No!" Walt urgently whispers for Jesse to cut it out, and even Mike leans forward like, "Ohhhh, what happens when you do that?" Jesse stands up and looks Gus in the eye. He says those two goons have 11-year-old kids killing for them. How is Gus, a reasonable businessman, okay with that? He turns to Walt, righteous and accusatory and awesome: "Are you okay with this? You got anything to say here?" Walt is speechless. Shamed, I'd say. Gus calls in Frick and Frack; he orders, "No more children." And he wants Jesse to agree to keep the peace. He makes him say it. And shake their hands. Jesse then turns back to Walt and stares him down.
Which has gotta make this ride home super awkward, right? Well it is! Forced into a conversational corner, Walt emerges with an old standby: lecturing! He tells Jesse that his actions affect everyone around him. It's sometimes hard to believe Walt allows himself to hear what he's actually saying. To process it and understand it. Because how else does he not choke on such obvious hypocrisies? Anyway, he maintains that he had "the best of reasons," but Jesse remains silent. And when Walt pulls up to his car, Jesse barely waits for Walt to stop the car before he bolts out and drives off. And as he does, he passes Tomas on his bike.
Hank's hospital room. Marie gets the sexy task of spongebathing her lumpy curmudgeon. But maybe I shouldn't be so quick to crack on Hank's sex appeal. Because after another unsuccessful attempt to talk Hank into moving back home, Marie tries a different tactic. She slips her hand under Hanks's gown, between his legs. Hank is half-stammery and embarrassed, half-dismissive and mad, but Marie's mood is more curious. Hank tells her nothing's going to happen -- paralysis and all -- but Marie's not so sure. Confidence, another reason I love Marie. She makes a bet with Hank: if she can get him hard, he'll agree to come live at home, today. Hank begs off, but she baits him into it. And then she gets to work. She's got one minute. He taunts her at first, then irritatedly tells her to quit, and then ... well, there's something. Not to dwell on the intricacies of Hanks's nethers, but it seems like it moved. Marie smiles a gloaty smile. And we cut to Hank and his box of get-well gifts getting wheeled to the exit, peeved bewilderment on his face. Seriously, why aren't the DEA and Gus not involved in a fierce bidding war for Marie's services. Lady GETS IT DONE.
Jesse's back in Andrea's bed, smoking a post-coital cig. She can tell he's had a bad day, but he's not exactly up for sharing. She gets a phone call, and by the time it's to her ear, I'd called it, and I bet you did too. It's Grandma. And she's frantic. Andrea puts her hand to her mouth and croaks, "Oh God." Jesse leans in closer as the camera backs away, and we see 5-year-old Brock looking on as his mom gets the sad news. ...Okay, but he hasn't been at the doorway this whole time, right?
Cut to cop cars surrounding a stretch of pavement that could only jokingly be called a playground. Tomas's bike is on the ground, and the kid -- Andrea's 10-year-old kid brother -- is covered by a sheet. Andrea can see his sneakers, though, and she cries and struggles against the cops. Jesse looks on in wide-eyed horror.
At work the day, Walt's all dressed in his finest yellow haz-mat suit, calling Jesse and getting no answer. He pissily announces to Jesse's voice mail that he's starting without him. We time-lapse into night, where Walt, clearly still stewing about Jesse, watches Jeopardy with Flynn. Neither one of them are phrasing their answers in the form of a question. Walt can't concentrate so he excuses himself to the bathroom to make another call. He gets Jesse's voice mail again, to which he leaves a defensive message about how he's not going to apologize, and they're just going to have to agree to disagree. Back in the dining room, Walt goes to turn off the TV but catches a news report of an 11-year-old kid getting shot gang-style in South Valley. Skyler asks him to turn it off (it's weird she's not more suspicious of why this particular report is captivating her husband) and says it's been on the news all day. Walt sits down for about three seconds before his protective instincts become too overwhelming and he hops up and says he has to leave.
Jesse's in his car, tapping out some meth crystals into a CD and crushing them. He rolls up a dollar bill and snorts them up, which we see through Jesse's blurry car window, an awfully nice touch. So he's all meth'd up (didn't mean to do that, honestly) and staring out ahead, at the car circling the concrete park, stopping for the random junkie to make a buy. Jesse picks up a gun from the floor of the car, works up his courage, then cocks it and steps out of the car. He strides across the street, and about halfway to the other car, Frick and Frack spot him, and they get out and start coming his way. This is going to be bloody and awful and NOW. Jesse's face tries to retain the fury he's had all episode, but the fear is putting up a hell of a fight. Ten more paces. Frick and Frack have stopped and put their guns out. Five more paces. Jesse pulls out his gun. This is probably suicide and Jesse probably knows it. He points his gun and so do they. But before anyone shoots, here comes an Aztek speeding from out of the frame. It plows through Frick and Frack, running over the one and flipping the other over its top.
Jesse's in shock as Walt emerges from the car. The dude under the car is most certainly dead. Walt heads right for the other one, who is struggling but alive, reaching for his gun. Walt takes it out of his grasp, hesitates for about two and a half seconds, then blows a hole through his head. Jesse reacts to this like he's just been punched in the stomach. Guess he really isn't a murderer. Walt sure is, though. He turns to Jesse as the camera sweeps up to his face, and says the only sensible thing you can say at this point: "Run!"
Joe R can't think about this week's finale for more than four minutes before he has to sit down. He can be reached for lavish praise and nothing but at
href="mailto:joseph.reid21@gmail.com">joseph.reid21@gmail.com.
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