Shall we anticipate the FIFTH SEASON of the AMC series "Breaking Bad"? I think I may.

Maybe, but I can't think of any left-field alternatives for who the gun is for. Cops? Madrigal? Mexican mafia? Gus's Chilean connections? It seems unlikely that any new player is thrown into the game with only two episodes left.

yeah - but just because we know who the players are doesn't mean we know how it will play out - I'm not saying it might be Walt vs. aliens or something. When we knew the enemy was Gus Frind, it didn't feel like we knew too much to keep it interesting - why would it be less tense now when there are 3 or 4 different factors closing in on Walt and his family? Almost every character other than Walt, including members of his family, could be willing to kill Walt at this point.

if they ever make a charles whitman biopic know who i'd be casting:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/16/Whitman1963.jpg

Am I the only one who was thinking, now that Hank's dead, maybe Walt's fake DVD "confession" could come back into the picture?

It felt to me like Marie telling Skylar to give her all the copies of the fake confession was the show's way of tying that point up.

was hank already dead at that point?

The more I think about the episode the more I realize how key Hank's statement about Walt being smart but completely unable to see the obvious is to the entire series. Somehow he's mostly been able to turn around his blunders or at least cover them up but the entire period after season three has been him unable to do so without huge collateral damage or murder.

xp Yeah, but pretty sure Marie still thought Hank was booking Walt at the office.

Yeah I was thinking more along the lines of, well, Hank can't defend himself against those accusations now but I agree, I think that is wrapped up, especially after Walt's tapped phone call to Sky.

I felt it more like marie making a big deal about the movie showed her clear-minded concerns and making sure things panned out for the best meanwhile all was already lost

Wow, Charles Whitman looks like my dad circa 1962

conrad yeah, that too.

Jesse embraces white nationalism, orchestrates coup to become Head Meth Nazi, has final battle royale with Walt.

Walt wakes up in bed with Jane Kaczmarek, tells her of his crazy dream where he was a high school teacher-turned meth manufacturer in Albuquerque

http://www.vulture.com/2013/09/rian-johnson-moira-walley-beckett-breaking-bad-ozymandius-interview.html

I’ve seen different reactions to Walt’s phone call to Skyler. Some say it was all a ploy to save her from prosecution; others says that it was real and he was railing at her. Does the debate surprise you?
Walley-Beckett: I personally feel like it wasn’t open to interpretation. I would hope that people got that it was an absolute ploy on Walt’s part. It is the family-man part of Walt playing the part of Heisenberg to exonerate Skyler. I was hoping that the process of the lie and the subterfuge would be clear and that viewers would be with Skyler in their understanding. When we first hear Walt, we think he’s gone full Heisenberg. It’s outrageous and horrible and abusive what he’s saying! But then we start to put the pieces together as Skyler does, and I was hoping people would sort of be traveling that journey with her.

it's funny, watching it a second time, there's a beat in Cranston's performance (maybe i imagined it) that almost seems like he's realizing in the midst of his rant that he can exonerate Sklar and then shifts gears a bit.

So this is a dam?

http://i.snag.gy/f8XPZ.jpg

Desert engineering is crazy.

http://i.snag.gy/a6SPh.jpg

it's funny, watching it a second time, there's a beat in Cranston's performance (maybe i imagined it) that almost seems like he's realizing in the midst of his rant that he can exonerate Sklar and then shifts gears a bit.

― ryan, Tuesday, September 17, 2013 11:34 AM (14 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah. & i think there's a couple of lines that are concrete stuff - doesn't he say, twice, it had nothing to do with you!, like almost underlined, at some point, beyond the flow of the conversation.

Important follow up bit in that vulture interview

At the same time, he's venting old Walt's real frustrations.
Walley-Beckett: Yeah, in the writing of it and the breaking of it we talk a lot about the line between truth and fiction. There are things in there that are truth, but it’s all subterfuge. It’s a very fine line.

Really liked this take from Emily Nussbaum (also the idea that Todd is a "Team Walt" representative)

But what was truly fascinating about that phone call was that if it was trolling the Bad Fan, it was also trolling me: the sort of feminist-minded sucker who took the speech at face value, for nearly an hour, until I suddenly realized, in a flash of clarity, that it was a fake-out for the police. (Skyler realized long before I did.) Once my analytical skills flared back into being, I was stunned by the moment’s effectiveness. I mean, on one level, that speech was just what it looked like: Walt venting every toxic feeling he’d ever had about his wife. On another level, it was the opposite: it was Walt pretending to be an abusive husband, as a gift to Skyler. It was an apology to her, as well as an attempt to get her off the hook legally, to honor Holly saying “Mama.” Walt’s language was pretty much a PowerPoint presentation of abuser behavior, designed to make Skyler’s case in court proceedings. And yet it still had the sting of catharsis, letting Walt say what he felt: that Skyler is a whiner, a nag, a drag, responsible for anything that happened to her. Like the Bad Fans who roam the Internet (and even some Good Fans, who can make a more reasonable case for disliking Skyler), he relishes calling her a bitch.

Now, that’s all at the Walt level, inside the story. At the fan-response level, though, the scene also had two sides. There was the part that was directed at the Bad Fan who hates Skyler, and who has written entire posts on Reddit indistinguishable from what Walt said, and who now got his own language shoved back in his face, labelled “abuser-talk.” And there was the part that was designed to sucker the Prissy Progressive Fan (me) who was all too eager to see Skyler as a pure victim, not merely of abusive Walt, but also of the Bad Fan. Vince Gilligan, you cunning bastard, I am confused and delighted. In one way, this scene was “Breaking Bad” having it both ways; in another way, it was the best kind of text, evading the simple read, as emotionally labile as I felt an hour after watching it.

nussbaum link http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/culture/2013/09/last-nights-breaking-bad-that-mindbending-phone-call.html

So this just occurred to me: much like we (and Walt) had grown convinced of Walt's ability to squirm out of any tight spot until Hank's death turned that particular tide, we've also been conditioned to believe that Walt is always going to rescue Jesse when he's in a tight spot. Because that's what he's done in the past. Which is why so many people (including myself) can't seem to let go of the idea of Walt returning to ABQ with heavy weaponry to release Jesse from bondage, even though that scenario doesn't really make sense anymore given what's gone down between the two of them. Jesse's arc this season has been all about getting out from under the manipulative wing of Mr. White and finding some degree of agency. If he's to be freed, he'll be the one doing the freeing.

xpost it was one of the best-crafted scenes I've ever seen on TV I think, the whole thing just unenveloping so succinctly

my guess is that if they go for any kind of conventionally satisfying ending it'll be a la western motifs like in The Searchers--Walt on the outside of some version of domesticity or "home" while his family press on with a normal life. i hope they upend that expectation though!

Been thinking that the BFG 9000 that Walt bought maybe isn't the best for assaulting the nazis, being wildly difficult to control and all.

tho maybe he'll mount it onto an armored Winnebago and get Jr/Skyler/Saul/Hewell to drive him into the compound to fuck 'em up.

A comment from the Nussbaum post:

The phone call also exonerates Skyler in Marie's eyes. She can now forgive Skyler as a scared, battered woman instead of the willing abettor she believed her to be after she helped Walt blackmail Hank with the fake confessional video.

There's a certain satisfaction in things panning out in a more or less predictable manner from now on.

it says something about how this show has people tying themselves in knots that anyone thinks that the next two episodes are going to be "more or less predictable"

my fave moment this episode was walt jr turning on walt—feel like i've been wondering for ages how he was gonna react once he found out the truth inevitably and of course that's how it went

A comment from the Nussbaum post:

The phone call also exonerates Skyler in Marie's eyes. She can now forgive Skyler as a scared, battered woman instead of the willing abettor she believed her to be after she helped Walt blackmail Hank with the fake confessional video.

― first I think it's time I kick a little verse! (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, September 17, 2013 3:15 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Marie was primed to believe this, too, per the conversation in Skyler's office when she said something to the effect of "I don't know what he did to you but it's over now."

ya for sure—i actually super liked the idea of them having some sort of rapprochement

even if its based on lies

so it turns out Skyler's the unwitting slave in the eyes of Marie and possibly the law, while Jesse really is.

Jesse's arc this season has been all about getting out from under the manipulative wing of Mr. White and finding some degree of agency. If he's to be freed, he'll be the one doing the freeing.

― Coke Opus (Old Lunch), Tuesday, September 17, 2013 3:03 PM (18 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I like this a lot.

Got to say, respect to Walter Jr for managing to take his knife wielding maniac dad down like that.

he hadn't even had breakfast yet either

I think Skyler's gonna get off scot free and that she'll have to live with the knowledge that she also has a dark side that could've led her down the same path as Walt. I was thinking that her encouragement of Jesse's murder felt a little out of left field until I remembered her willingness to cook Ted's books and the threatening/crippling visit to Ted that she instigated and her ongoing complicity in Walt's deeds when, right from the start, she could've gone straight to Hank with what she knew. She was a pawn to some degree but she certainly made her share of conscious bad decisions.

WALT AND SKYLER BOTH STARTED BREAKING BAD WHEN THEY DID ILLEGAL COOKING DO U SEE

Yeah, my heart really swelled with Flynn's behaviour in this episode: has a clear vision/moral fibre that both of his parents lack.

Related: the moralist in me is pretty unhappy with the way Skyler seems skidding toward exoneration. She "deserves" a greater punishment than her son. (Obv this "deserving" is [and should remain] irrelevant, plot-wise, but they're the sort of feelings I can't help but project onto what's happening.)

also:

http://cdn0.sbnation.com/imported_assets/1808995/E60ZhXV.gif

also croosh: was hank's death the first/only time we really see walt showing remorse? the first death that's TRULY hit him?

Some of those people on the planes almost hit him.

jane's death hit him pretty hard. not that it made a difference.

maybe the first one that really changes his life forever because it is so close him - I think he felt bad about gale and jane and crazy eight at the times

Related: the moralist in me is pretty unhappy with the way Skyler seems skidding toward exoneration

I doubt the moralist in you will be disappointed for too long.

jane's death hit him pretty hard. not that it made a difference.

Maybe not Jane's death itself but he was definitely freaked out by the plane crash.

didn't get a chance to watch until today

Jesus fucking Christ

hi aero!

I still haven't seen it – gotta wait until next Sunday.

No, I don't care about spoilers.

xxxxp I think it was the first death that really got him. It was also maybe the first time that he has tried to manipulate someone into acting a certain way and completely failed with no other recourse?

I've been watching these a day late and having a visceral reaction, then scrolling through the thread to see the reactions others had as it aired, is kind of a jarring view on the linearity of time

Matt Yglesias: why do they still have answering machines?

tbf if I cared about anybody who called on our land line, I would get an answering machine so as not to have to pay for voicemail.

But it's only robocalls and Jesse when I don't answer my work or cell phone or email or text or ILX.