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I'm once again just in for the recaplet, but I can tell you that both Joe R and I were very worried going in that this show had both the story motivation and the stones to kill Jesse off, and we apparently are not the only ones, as Walt is in such a frenzy at the beginning of the episode it looks like he's playing Grand Theft Auto in his Aztek and doing either a terrible or a wonderful job at it, depending on your point of view. He also instructs Saul to make sure Skyler gets all his money if he should, say, die in the twenty-four hours, so apparently he's once again willing to lay down his life for Jesse, which is certainly the best thing left about Walt in my opinion.
He goes stalking into El Pollo Knockoffo with that gun he bought a couple weeks ago and demands to see Gus, but only receives a phone call from Mike and Jesse, who are still in the car. Mike silkily assures Walt that nothing is wrong, but while Jesse drops the devil-may-care attitude and starts worrying about his own well-being at what seems like the eleventh hour, Mike zigs just when you thought he was going to zag, as out in the middle of nowhere, he digs up a bag of money from a secret location and tells Jesse they have several similar stops to make. He doesn't reveal exactly why Jesse is along for the ride, only saying it wasn't his call, and I would discuss the hilarious ensuing montage in which Jesse acts like a child with ADD to the point where Mike literally has to pull the car over like the stern parent he is, but I'm too happy that Mike didn't take Jesse out back that I don't care about much else. While waiting for Mike at the last pickup, though, Jesse notices an armed thug striding purposefully toward the car and takes action to save the stash – except this development was all an elaborate ruse set up by Gus to make Jesse feel, essentially, like he's worth something on his own and as such doesn't need Walt. Nice to know that Gus is back to playing the deep games instead of, you know, the ones involving box cutters.
For his part, Walt is still panicked and barges into the back of El Pollo Knockoffo only to find that Gus has vanished (I wouldn't be surprised if he has a series of secret exits in the place that only he knows about), so Walt has little choice but to cook on his own and sit with a haunted look as he and Skyler officially purchase the car wash, and then Skyler tells him she needs there to be no more secrets between them from now on, which could be the funniest thing ever said on this show. Also, fueled by Skyler listening to Walt's panicked message from earlier, he and Skyler Do It for, presumably, the first time since Season Two. Of course, though, Walt can never be happy with anything that happens to him no matter how much he thought he wanted it, as apparently, his readmission to their marital bed only causes those immortal words "I fucked Ted" to start ringing in his ears, and when Skyler invites him to move back in, he looks at her like she just farted right in his face. Then at dinner over at Hank and Marie's, Walt, stewing as only he can, gets hammered enough to slur to Hank that Gale wasn't so great – he probably just copied someone else's work! The real Heisenberg is likely still out there! Skyler, unsurprisingly, looks like she might commit murder/suicide during this speech, and probably actually will when she finds out that it made Hank take one more look at the Heisenberg case – and link Gale suspiciously to El Pollo Knockoffo. This is one of those episodes where it seems like nothing happened, and then you realize kind of everything did. -- Couch Baron
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Thanks once again to Couch Baron for coming to my rescue with the recaplet. Previously, Walter got worried that Hank would connect Gale's murder to Jesse, while Mike and Gus fretted that Jesse could be the downfall of their whole operation simply for being sloppy and generally checked out of life. So Mike took Jesse on a little road trip.
This week's pre-credits vignette probably shuts up the two or three people who complain about this show not being action-y enough. Because this sequence is 100% Walter racing his product-placed Aztek (I had previously embraced the Aztek as the kind of product placement I like because the car spoke so much to Walt's suburban displacement in the drug world, but that glamor shot of the car logo really made me squeamish) all over Albuquerque. He's frantic that Jesse is, right at this moment, being murdered, and the panic and concern that Walt's currently experiencing for someone else (especially poor Jesse) is encouraging. Then Walt decides to double-down (card-shark terminology!) on caring about other people by making a frantic call to Skyler. Actually, first he calls Saul, but it's only to make sure that in the event of his untimely demise -- which might happen, oh, any minute now -- Skyler gets all his money. "Every last dollar." When he does call Skyler, he gets her voicemail. In the calmest tone he can manage (the soundtrack helps him by downshifting into lullaby music, which is a nice touch), he says he just wanted to say he was thinking about her and the kids, "...and I love you." And then he reaches under the seat for his gun because it's back to the car chase!
After the title card, Walt comes screaming into the parking lot at El Pollo Knockoffo. To his credit, he does not take a handicapped spot -- you know, for a guy who's intending to murder his boss in a few minutes, Walt's being unusually conscientious today. Inside, he badgers the poor girl at the counter to let him see Gus Fring. The Sofia Coppola-ish girl is not having it. Gus isn't here, et cetera. With every denial, Walt gets angrier. He basically plays the "Do you know who I am?" card, like the name "Walter White" is supposed to open the secret vault to Gus's pleasure dome. Walt finally decides to wait at a table until she announces his presence to Gus.
Of course, the wait only allows Walt's exponentially-expanding paranoia to truly flourish. Every security camera, every car pulling into the lot, every glance the counter girl shoots at him becomes fraught with dread. Finally, his phone rings; it's Mike, adopting the world's weariest tone and wondering just what the hell Walt thinks he's doing. So obviously Gus IS there, somewhere. Or else word travels awfully fast in that dry New Mexico air. Walt demands to know where Jesse is, and when he doesn't believe Mike's "he's with me" assurances, Mike puts Jesse on the phone. If you thought Jesse would be more forthcoming with answers for Walt, you're really underestimating the degree to which Jesse has stopped giving a fuck. "We're driving," he says. Driving where? "I dunno...north?" And while I personally found that part encouraging (i.e. they're not headed to the Mexican desert so Mike can feed Jesse to the cartels or something), Walt is endlessly frustrated at not only Jesse's lack of information but at the fact that Jesse doesn't seem overly concerned for his life at the moment. Walt's been screaming all over town, breaking every traffic law ever invented, and now has made a scene at Pollos, all for Jesse, who is barely raising his voice. Mike takes the phone back and tells Walt that "Jesse's with me today," and Walt should get back to the lab and muddle through today's cook solo. Walt should be taking Mike's conditional word usage ("today" implies that there will be a tomorrow, for Jesse) as comfort, but he's too busy shaking with rage at being brushed off -- by Gus, by Mike, and even by Jesse. So he decides to plow past the girl at the counter, through the employees' area, and into Gus's office. Which is empty. "This area is for employees only," the counter girl says. "I have to ask that you leave immediately." I suppose Walt can't exactly explain that he IS an employee, now can he?
Back in Mike's car, Jesse's nihilistic façade is showing the first signs of cracking. He's letting some genuine concern for his life creep in. Mike is utterly inscrutable as he pulls off the highway. "What you told Mr. White was just bullshit, right?" asks Jesse, as he stealthily pulls his keys out of his pocket and grasps them with his fist, so the keys stick out between in his fingers like spikes. "What do you care?" Mike asks. "Don't," fronts Jesse, who makes a feeble threat against Mike's good ear. They pull up to an outpost with a lonely windmill, and Mike gets shovels out of the trunk. This looks bad. Jesse is clutching his key-spikes as Mike heads out to a clearing and starts digging. But rather than carve out a Jesse-sized grave, Mike produces a sack of something that had been concealed in a well. Looks like a money drop. After throwing the sack into the car, Mike looks back at Jesse. "You comin'?" he asks, saying he's got six more pickups to make today, and he would like to finish before dark. Jesse slowly puts his keys back in pocket. So it turns out, what Mike said to Walter wasn't bullshit at all.
After the break, Hank is entertaining Perd (really Tim, but I've grown fond of referring to him as his Parks and Recreation doppelganger) and flip-booking Gale's page-corner animated drawings, because, of course, Gale did that. "He's like Scarface had sex with Mr. Rogers," Hank notes mirthfully. He's also our Heisenberg. Perd asks Hank if he has any theories on the murder, but Hank doesn't have any ideas. The only other people he's connected to the blue meth are "beanie-wearing jizz stain" Brandon "Badger" Mahew (slow your roll, Hank), and Jesse Pinkman, who ... well, there was some unpleasantness there, ahem. Perd's like, "I heard." He shows Hank a sketch of a "person of interest," which is, of course, Victor (R.I.P.), but Hank begs off any further involvement. Finding Heisenberg has provided closure for him. He gives a definitive "I'm done," and Perd can't say much to counter that. But as he packs up the file, Hank can't help but look on with what may be regret.
Back to our road warriors, Mike makes a warehouse pickup while Jesse hilariously "stands guard," his head on a swivel. Mike takes one look at him and, annoyed, says he doesn't need to do that. But Jesse thinks he's supposed to be the backup, right? In a "guard-type capacity." So why doesn't he get a gun? Mike turns him down flat, and Jesse sulks. Mike won't even let him have a cigarette. This leads to a time-lapse montage of Jesse farting around while Mike does the work. Watch as Jesse leans on the car, lays on the car, sleeps against the window, twitters his lips, stretches his face, fiddles with the radio knobs, fingers his cigarette pack, yawns, and blindfolds himself with his seatbelt. He's never been more attractive to me. Finally, he accuses Mike of trying to bore him to death. He also notes that these dead drops are similar to what he and his boys used to do (albeit with FAR smaller sums of cash). The idea, as it must be for Gus, is to maintain a separation between chain and supplier and reduce risk. This burnout knows his shit. Not sure if Mike's taking note. But Jesse is clued in to what they're doing. (Well, look who's engaged in his own life now?) He's here to do a job, and "if I'm the guy, you should just tell me what the hell's up." Well, that's enough to get Mike to pull the car off the side of the road. "You are not the guy," he says, not mincing words. "You are not capable of being the guy. I had a guy, but now I don't. You! Are! Not! The Guy!" Cool takedown, but interesting for a couple of points: 1) Seems Mike was closer to Victor than we previously thought, or at least fond of him; how pissed must he be that Walt got to keep his protégée while he lost his? And 2) Mike admits he has no say in Jesse being there, another example of how entirely powerless he is in Gus's regime. I'm telling you, Mike is going to swing the balance of this season. He orders Jesse to sit, shut up, and stay in the car.
Meanwhile, Walter is slogging his way through a solo cook at America's Meth Kitchen. When he's finished, totally gassed from doing everything himself, he barely has time to sit down before his phone alarm chimes and it's off to Skyler's where he and his wife sign the papers for the car wash. Skyler appears nervous that they're actually pulling the trigger on such a big step. "We'll be fine," Walt assures her. Boy, did Skyler need to hear that. "Tell me again," she says, and you know I'm a sucker for these kinds of moments. He does, and he places his hand on hers. She tells him that this time around, there can be no more secrets. She needs complete honesty from him, to which Walt immediately lies by agreeing. "How about a drink to celebrate?" she asks. "Nothing too expensive," he notes with a bit of a wink. Okay, that's a pretty good one, Walt. Skyler then plays her voice mail, which has Walt immediately bracing himself. But of course the only thing Skyler picks up from his frantic message is the part where he says "I love you." And before you know it, it's TO THE BEDROOM! Somewhere, Ted Beneke weeps silently.
Walt and Skyler lounge post-coitally, making small talk about how the sheets smell different and Skyler's new haircut. She asks if he'd be up for another dinner with Hank and Marie, since Marie says it's the only thing that'll get Hank out of his room. Then, Junior comes home and calls out to his parents. Walt has no choice but to call out a suuuper-awkward "We'll be out in a minute." Junior has the grace to be grossed out by the whole thing. Skyler and Walt are equally mortified. She says Junior's definitely going to inquire about their living situation now, which gives Skyler a roundabout way of asking Walt if he'd like to move back in. You know, so they have an easier time explaining things to Junior. If Skyler gets her own office at that car wash, she should definitely invest in a plaque that reads "It Just Makes Good Sense." Walt, however, is saved by his phone alarm, which tells him it's time to return to the lab.
At the lab, Walt's trying to operate the forklift, and it's not going well. Oh, the joys of seeing Walter fail at something, and then lash out at the universe for it. The irony is, the forklift is the one thing he SHOULD be able to operate alone. But still, he screams into the security camera: he's finished! "Nothing else until I get my partner back!" After some time-lapse of the Laundromat, Walt's sleeping in the break room when someone enters the lab. Not Jesse, obviously, and not Gus, but our buddy Silent Cal, who fixes Walt with a look of disdain while Walt rants at him. He just silently mounts the forklift, picks up the barrel that was vexing Walt so, and moves it where it needs to be. FACE, Walter!
Now it's night, and Mike and Jesse pull into an alley for their final pickup. While Jesse waits in the car -- drumming on the dash and yawning -- a car pulls up at the end of the alley, and some dude gets out with a shotgun. Again, any time I encounter the episode title within the story, I'm expecting something awful to happen. Jesse manages to spot the guy just in time; thinking quickly, and from the passenger seat, he throws the car in reverse. Shotgun dives for cover as Jesse rams the car he just got out of. Jesse then hoists himself into the driver's seat and hauls off, with Shotgun and his driver close behind him. Mike runs out with his bag of money to find both cars gone in a cloud of dust. Cut to Mike wandering the streets of this awful neighborhood alone, calling to someone or other in the Fring organization for a pickup. But no, cancel that, because here's Jesse, pulling up in the car. He breathlessly recaps the events for Mike, who merely says, "I saw." Like a withholding father, this one. Exhausted, Jesse pulls out a cig, then dejectedly hesitates as he remembers the no-smoking rule. Mike finally softens, just a bit: "Go ahead, kid. Smoke up." Aw! Dad's letting him smoke in the car!
The morning, Walt's at home, making coffee in the kitchen. Junior joins him and surprises Walt by asking for a coffee. He drinks it black, of all things. He struggles a bit to find the right words for his dad, eventually settling on, "It's really cool to have you here." Aw, Junior. He asks about Walt moving back in -- Mom says moving day is Tuesday. Walt pulls a suuper O RLY face, bristling at the notion that Skyler not only made up his mind for him, but set a date. "Tuesday, is it?" he asks. How about that." He then looks at the mug Junior's drinking out of. It's a Beneke mug. An "I fucked Ted" Beneke mug. Oh, that'll do wonders for Walt's mood.
Walt shows up at the lab and hears pounding noises from down in the pit. And despite the fact that that can rarely be good, it turns out to be Jesse! Breaking up the sheets of "ice" (street term!). He's also acting like the day's craziness ain't no thang. Walt's all "WTF?! Why aren't you as traumatized by yesterday as I was?" Jesse explains the pickups and the guarding, to which Walter responds with a level of incredulity that must seem pretty obnoxious to Jesse. "You guarded Mike? Is this a joke?" Now it's Jesse's turn to bristle -- he took care of business with that guy with the shotgun all right? Nothing gets to me more than Jesse trying to prove his worth to Walt. Jesse then sneers that Walt should get to work and they need to hurry up, because I'm meeting Mike this afternoon: "Guess I have two jobs now." Jesse defiantly earbuds up, proving that even if Mike's given him a will to live, he can still effectively shut Walter out. So there's this rift now, which is very possibly what Gus had in mind all along when he sent Mike and Jesse out on their little vision quest. And just when Walt was expressing paternal concern for the kid, too.
Meanwhile, at El Pollo Knockoffo, Gus is taking out the trash (uh, literally, in this case), and he sees Mike parked in the lot. He slides into the car and asks if there were any injuries last night. Mike says only minor one, and it overall went according to plan. Gus will reimburse damage to Mike's vehicle. Ah, so Shotgun was a total setup. "Questions?" Gus asks. "More than a few, yeah," Mike half-laughs. "But I know better than to ask." Just like Gus wanted, Mike says, "The kid's a hero." As Gus leaves the car, Mike still looks like he's having way more thoughts than a man in his position should.
That night at Hank and Marie's, Walt's already pouting over his glass of (undoubtedly cheap) wine. Between his wounded pride at Skyler's moving-day usurping, and getting snubbed by Jesse, he's in a mood to stew in his own juices. Meanwhile, Skyler talks about the car wash like she owns the place (...which she does). Marie thinks they should put Holly on the sign, "like the Gerber baby." Oh, Marie. I love you and I love your purple placemats. I love how this was the week that Marie's obsession with purple finally reached critical mass. Walt finishes his wine and heads to the kitchen to open another bottle. He's filled with hilarious rage and has no place to put it, so it looks like he'll swallow it with some vino. In the kitchen, he pours himself a glass and drinks it alone. Well, his bitterness is company enough. He pours another, but Hank calls "Nick the Greek" out on his anti-social behavior. Back in the dining room, Marie and Junior haggle over whether "Nick the Greek" is offensive. Skyler wants the subject changed, so Junior suggests an update on "the case of the crazy singing guy." (Skyler: "That sounds like an Encyclopedia Brown story.") Hank explains about Gale the 5-star meth chef. The Eric Ripert of crank! He waxes poetic about Gale's genius as the camera stays on Walt's face as he gets angrier and angrier.
Finally, Walt, clearly drunk, interrupts and takes exception to Hank calling Gale a "genius." Here is Walter White as his smallest, his most petty, and his most self-destructive. At the end of the day, what's it all worth if he can't be the smartest guy in the room? Dead or alive. After HIS careful examination of the notebook, see, it's totally clear to him that "all this brilliance is just simple rote copying ... probably of someone else's work." Have a drink, Walt. You're clearly earning it. Hank is crestfallen by Walt popping his bubble, but Walt persists. "This genius of yours," he semi-slurs into his glass, "maybe he's still out there?" CLASSIC WALT, that asshole. Skyler's face could melt glass right now. Walt takes a pissy, triumphant swig.
The morning, Hank's out of his bedroom -- good news, Walt, you provided motivation! He's back into the Gale file, of course. Marie (and her lavender reusable grocery bags, God love her) returns home, and when she offers to make coffee, Hank is actually gracious about it! Miracle of miracles. He looks at evidence photos of the crime scene and twigs to one. Marie asks what's up, and Hank explains: Gale's eating habits were almost exclusively organic, fair-trade, vegan, hippie stuff. So why does he have a Pollos wrapper with a code of some kind written on it? Hey, Walt, this one's on YOU.
Joe R really likes Skyler's new haircut, but not as much as Jesse's. He can be reached for lavish praise and nothing but at joseph.reid21@gmail.com.
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