Breaking Bad - Season 5

[Agent Richard07]

Walt & Co. got the operation up and running quickly, but I don't know that cooking in fumigated homes is the way to go. Wouldn't someone notice that this company is taking a little extra time with fumigation? And good call with the nanny cam. I didn't think of that. That's pretty risky right there. What if they don't find them?

Also, what was Walt trying to say to Jesse at the end?

[Joe Washington]

I think Walt is realizing that he needs to up his game as a drug lord and start asserting his dominance like Gus did with Victor. Gus might have been his enemy but Walt sees there are things he can learn from the way Gus handled things.

I know Jesse is fighting to keep the peace between Walt and Mike for the sake of business and his fondness for Mike but I think at the end of the episode, after what Walt told him, Jesse sees that he may have to choose between Walt and Mike when the time comes.

[CaptainCanada]

Agent Richard07 wrote:

---

Also, what was Walt trying to say to Jesse at the end?

He was meditating on trying to get rid of Mike.

[Temis the Vorta]

The house fumigation gambit is inventive but pretty implausible. It opens up too many risks. They found one nanny cam, but who's to say there aren't more? What happens when they fumigate the house of some paranoid nut job who has his whole house wired up? What if the cops are already onto the burglary scam and are luring the fumigators into a sting operating set up in a house, unawares they are about to catch much larger fish?

Hmm, I wonder. The writers made a big deal about how the fumigators are burglars, but that detail has no purpose in the story. yet.

And how long could that burglary scam go unnoticed anyway? if my house were burgled, my first thought would be to think about who had the keys, especially if they weren't someone I'd been hiring for a long time, like a maid service. some one shot thing like a fumigator...a couple complaints to the cops, and they're the target of an investigation.

[davejames]

You know, as awesome as the writing on this show is, the one thing I still have trouble buying is that this is all happening over the course of one year.

Are we really supposed to believe all these crazy, insane things have happened to these guys in only that amount of time? From boiling those people in the bathtub to blowing up Tuco, all the RV stuff, the plane crash, the entire Gus Fring saga, Hank's shooting, Jesse's downward drug spiral, the killing of Gale, the magnet caper, and of course whatever else is still to happen this season...

I can maybe accept all that happening over the course of 2 or 3 years (maybe), but one year seems to be stretching plausibility QUITE a bit.

Hell, Hank's recovery alone seems like it should have taken at least one year. And are we really supposed to believe Walt goes from that clueless, wimpy schoolteacher to a gritty, hardcore drug kingpin in only one year as well?

[Mojochi]

davejames wrote:

---

You know, as awesome as the writing on this show is, the one thing I still have trouble buying is that this is all happening over the course of one year.

I thought it was 2 years. The 1st scene of the pilot is his 50th birthday party, & the 1st scene, (flashforward) of season 5 is his 52 birthday, which we can presume is roughly near the end of events

[Count Zero]

Yes, but this episode marks approximately one year because Walt's upcoming 51st birthday is mentioned.

[Robert Maxwell]

Watched this last night. Great episode. Walt coldly manipulates everyone around him.

I was also watching some past episodes, doing a bit of a gradual rewatch to pick up on things from the earlier seasons.

I used to think Walt was basically a good, upstanding guy who, when faced with the prospect of his imminent death, decided to toss away society's rules and make money his own way. He professed to be doing it for his family, and he was surrounded by total scumbags (Tuco and his boys, etc.), so you could see the logic in it and even be a bit sympathetic.

But I was watching those early season 2 episodes, and I realized Walt was always a scumbag, he was just better at hiding it and "playing nice." For instance, when he listened to Jesse's story about how Spooge's head got crushed with an ATM, it's obvious Jesse is really broken up about it. What is Walt's reaction? He doesn't care, except insofar as it might lead back to him. No empathy for Jesse's trauma, nothing.

Walt just uses and manipulates everyone around him. He builds up his webs of lies and goes nuts whenever something threatens to expose him. Witness Gretchen trying desperately to get to the bottom of what's wrong with Walt, and he can't help but seethe with hate because she could easily expose his lies to Skyler.

If he's changed much at all through the course of the show, it's in becoming a more consummate liar.

This show is so great.

[stj]

The fumigation business is indeed risky, as pointed out. Also, and more importantly for Walt's pocketbook, there is a limit to how much they can cook. What will they do in the holidays? Nobody gets their house fumigated in the holidays.

Yes, Walt's already thinking about ditching Mike, for no good reason, just touchy ego. Also, it gives the plot somewhere to go.

The time frame is just silly. Ignore it as best you can. If you can't, you'll have to stop watching I suppose.

[davejames]

Robert Maxwell wrote:

---

But I was watching those early season 2 episodes, and I realized Walt was always a scumbag, he was just better at hiding it and "playing nice."

I don't know if "scumbag" is really the right word, but he was always a pretty weak and weasely guy, with a massive inferiority complex that pretty much rules his entire life. The difference is now he actually has some power to do something about it.

But I still suspect in the end, when the cops are coming for him, all that bravado will go out the window and he'll just revert to the same scared, blubbering mess we saw when he thought Gus was going to kill him. Because that's ultimately who he is.

[Roger Wilco]

Robert Maxwell wrote:

---

Watched this last night. Great episode. Walt coldly manipulates everyone around him.

As good as he is at manipulating people, he's completely failing with Skyler. Their relationship seems to be dead for good, imo, I don't see any way of them reconciling. In fact I have a sneaking feeling, that it's only a matter of time before Walt rapes her, if the writers want to go there... Maybe that's how Walt will lose the last shred of his humanity in the end.

[davejames]

I thought the end of the previous episode implied that he WAS about to have sex with her against her will. At least that's how it appeared to me...

[Robert Maxwell]

Roger Wilco wrote:

---

As good as he is at manipulating people, he's completely failing with Skyler. Their relationship seems to be dead for good, imo, I don't see any way of them reconciling. In fact I have a sneaking feeling, that it's only a matter of time before Walt rapes her, if the writers want to go there... Maybe that's how Walt will lose the last shred of his humanity in the end.

One of the interesting dynamics of this show is that I think Skylar has a few advantages over Walt. Where he is ambitious and rash, she is calm and patient. Walt is never thinking very far ahead, while Skylar's always playing the long game and looking way down the road. Working together, Walt's drug empire would probably be unstoppable. But he's too power-hungry, controlling, and ruled by his own ego to tolerate an equal partner.

davejames wrote:

---

I thought the end of the previous episode implied that he WAS about to have sex with her against her will. At least that's how it appeared to me...

That's what I thought, too. It was also in the subtext of him saying that he was moving back in, as in, "I am in charge here and there is nothing you can do about it, because I've killed people, and I'll kill you, too, if I have to." How do you say "no" to a man you know has cold-bloodedly murdered people? You don't.

[TheGodBen]

Yeah, that scene freaked me out, to the point that I had a dream that night that I was Walt, I hit Skyler, she ran away, and I tried to track her down and bring her back.

[InklingStar]

davejames wrote:

---

I thought the end of the previous episode implied that he WAS about to have sex with her against her will. At least that's how it appeared to me...

In the Insider podcast for that episode, Vince Gilligan pointed out that they initially filmed it much more explicitly but cut it down for time.