Episode Report Card Joe R: A- | 10 USERS: A+ YOU GRADE IT Partners
By Joe R | Season 4 | Episode 8 | Aired on 09.04.2011
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.Gus is brought in to talk to Hank, Perd, and the D.E.A., and when he delivers a plausible-sounding reason for his fingerprints to have been in Gale's apartment -- Gus's story of Gale being the recipient of chemistry scholarship Gus set up is so plausible as to likely be true -- everybody but Hank believes him. Hank in particular is interested in the fact that Gus's records in Chile before he came to Mexico are completely unavailable.
But with alarm bells going off in Gus's head, Hank decides to continue the investigation as a lone wolf. He takes Walt on an unexpected trip to Pollos Hermanos, where he asks Walt to plant a tracking device on Gus's car. Walt shits a brick, obviously, but when he wanders into the restaurant, not only does he get the shock of a lifetime when Gus meets him at the register, but Gus also tells him to go ahead and plant the device.
So now Walt is freaking out, and he goes to the place he normally goes to freak out: Jesse's house. Walt's (rather dubious) idea is that Jesse needs to kill Gus NOW, but Jesse's still holding back about his recent opportunity to do just that. Jesse would much rather have Hank and Gus take care of each other, but Walt reminds him that if Hank takes Gus down, it'll lead him right to them. So Jesse once again agrees to kill Gus, should he ever get the chance again, which he probably won't, because he certainly has not seen Gus since the diner, nosirree. Only when Jesse leaves the room, Walt checks a text message on Jesse's phone and sees it's from Mike, rescheduling the meeting they have with "The Boss." Lord knows where Walt's paranoia is going to take him from here.
Finally, Gus takes a meeting with our old, immobilized pal Tio Salamanca, where we enter an extended flashback to Mexico, where Tio is a still-thriving Hector Salamanca, Juan Bolsa is still alive, and Manny from Scarface is the head of the cartel. They're all meeting with a youthful Gus and his Pollo Hermano, Max. Actual brothers? Business partners? Something more? The vagueness is as delicious as Max's famous chicken recipe. Of course, Gus and Max are also selling a little meth, which displeases Don Manny. Gus tries to assure him that he was only trying to get the Don's attention, so they could partner up. Meth is the drug of the future, you know. Ultimately, Don Manny knows this, but he simply cannot allow someone to deal drugs under his nose and get away with it. After a fakeout where it looks like Gus the businessman will die, it's Max the cook (and chemist -- hello, window into Gus's soul) who gets his brains blown out, right in front of his partner/brother/secret-lover(?) Gus. And that's how Gustavo Fring, Trembling Businessman became Gustavo Fring, Ruthless Drug Lord. Mexico in the '80s sounds like a bummer, you guys.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!This week's cold open takes us on a journey back to Season 3. The episode ("I See You") when Gus brazenly walked into the hospital full of DEA agents holding a vigil for Hank, and announced to Walter in hushed tones that he's known all along that Hank was Walt's brother-in-law. Hell, the show is playing the whole scene back again, why not dip into last season's recap:
Walt gets up and says he should walk Gus out. He catches up with him in the lobby. He asks to speak with him, under the pretense of concerned family member and generous benefactor. But the entire Albuquerque police force is still milling around in the background, giving this pointedly low-key conversation one hell of an edge. "You knew?" Walt confirms. "You knew my brother-in-law was a DEA agent?" Gus is all, "Yeah, I perform very basic background checks, moron." "He is not a problem for us or our business," Walt assures him, though I would expect Gus would be the ultimate judge of that. Walt then asks if Gus showing up tonight is supposed to be a message to him. "I'm supporting my community," is all he'll say. "I hide in plain sight, just like you." Walt then begs -- actually begs -- Gus to explain this whole shooting to him. It's been a theme all season, but hearing Walt say it out loud like that -- "I don't understand it; I don't know what it means." -- really brings home just how much is going on that he has NO IDEA about. "I fear for my family," Walt says. Gus says he's sure they'll be fine. "The assassin that survived is gravely ill. It's doubtful he'll live. Now thank me, and shake my hand." Walt does as he's told. As Gus leaves, the lobby full of cops start rhubarbing like crazy and flocking upstairs. What's the commotion?
The commotion, of course, was Leonel Salamanca dying from the poison that Mike secretly slipped into his IV. Undetectable. For the betterment of everybody. Does this plan sound familiar? Maybe Jesse can take out Gus and take after Mike after all.
Anyway, the scene that we didn't get last year was when Gus left the hospital and paid a visit to our old, slobbery pal Tio. That's Don Hector Salamanca, if you feel like showing him the formal usted-form respect. Tio's watching the news report that says his nephews are now dead, and when Gus arrives, he tells him that it was likely Juan Bolsa who tipped off Hank, for some reason that Gus isn't even going to bother to conjure up. Because remember how Gus arranged for the fédérales to storm Juan Bolsa's compound and shoot him dead? That. Tio is still wearing his ever-present mast of defiant disgust, but in his eyes you can see something like defeat. He then begins to rage, or however much he can rage from inside his stroke-addled prison of a body. Gus simply pats him on the leg and says he just thought he should know what's happened. Then: "This is what comes of blood-for-blood, Hector. Sangre por sangre." And then we get a shot of something we haven't seen before: a closeup on crystalline turquoise water that becomes clouded with blood. You know, I thought this season was lacking a certain faceless-portent-of-creeping-doom quality.