selenak

Only one more episode before the mid season hiatus. A curse upon hiati. Also, I have to say, this show inspires the professional reviewers to get creative with their pop culture allusion. Last week's episode inspired Salon to muse "The Stockholm Syndrome envelops us, just as the Pete Best Syndrome envelopes Walter" (which made me look at the fired drummer of the Beatles with new eyes, so that now I'm wondering whether his frustration of having been sacked at the verge of fame has led him to a secret career as a criminal decades later) while The New Yorker quipped: "Call him Macmeth: he’s stepped in blood so far, etc.". Meanwhile, courtesy of

jesuswasbatman I have come up with a new candidate for the increasingly popular guessing game of how and/or by whom Walter White will meet his end.

It wouldn't be my favourite ending; I'm still wavering between "Skyler poisons him with his own ricin" and "Jesse goes to the DEA, and he and Walt (for however long Walt's life after the return of the cancer will last, which isn't much) end up in prison" as far as favourite endings are concerned. However, back when I rethorically asked what was up with all the Jesse James references the show makes this season, KdS pointed towards Robert Ford, i.e. a younger member of James' gang who did it for the fame and the money. Now the motivation doesn't fit Jesse, though the younger guy, intially hero worshipping role would have. However. You know who'd make the perfect Robert Ford? Todd, the latest candidate to be told by Walter Whilte, still a teacher to his bones, to "apply yourself". Todd who shot a child without hesitation because he'd been told no one was allowed to know about the robbery, who imitates Jesse's mode of adressing Walt as "Mr. White", who is all modesty, decrying his stupidity and not wanting any money until he has learned the art of cooking meth.

It would be a very post modern western type of irony if Walt wouldn't be brought down by Skyler and Jesse, both of whom once upon a time loved and were loved by him, but by a bland newbie punk.

Also by his own hubris in any case, of course. In this episode alone, he not only makes the mistake of telling his new business partners that there is another person who can cook the fabled blue meth as pure as he can (all in the service of manipulating Jesse, which as it turns out doesn't work anymore), thereby creating exactly the same situation he was in with Gus, but doesn't seem to consider when starting to teach Todd how to cook that the only reason he and Jesse were at various points able to survive as a duo was because neither of them was willing to cook if the other died. Todd? Wouldn't have a problem with this, once he knows how.

Okay, now to the main storyline of the episode, which was Mike's demise. As opposed to plot developments like Walt letting Jane die or poisoning Brock which were shocks, this deed had been telegraphed for a long time and was completely expected. Even more so with all the Mike scenes in this episode. What hadn't been telegraphed, though, was the way it happened and was filmed, which was a startling contrast/counterpoint to the teaser scene. Said teaser scene was a classic standard Western standoff in the desert, all bright desert and darkly clad men, and Walt got to play his favourite Heisenberg-is-a-badass role. By contrast, Mike's death happens at an idyllic river side amidst lush green grass and trees and glistening water, Walt, though he was planning to do it when coming there, still is nervous and needs the emotional trigger of an insult to go through with it, almost bungles it as if he was the school teacher from the first season, the shot itself happens through a car glass and we hardly see it, and Mike's death takes place in quiet stillness, sitting at the river, while Walt is at a rare loss of words and poses and just standing and flapping around almost helplessly.

Of course, things went wrong for Walt long before that. He did the same denial thing every time Jesse brought up that he would leave that he did with Skyler earlier in s3 and again this season (where it served him so well - not) until he just couldn't avoid reality anymore. I was proud of both Jesse and the show here. Of Jesse because it seems he did wise up more long term, won't be emotionally blackmailed anymore, and of the show because it lets make Walter the assholish but still entirely true point that if Jesse really is quitting the business for moral/ethical reasons, he shouldn't want any of the money they earned. (By producing poison for people, it can't be said often enough.) Yes, Walt says it as a last ditch ploy to keep Jesse (and go, Jesse, for not letting himself blackmailed into staying that way, either), but it is nonetheless true. Which is, btw, and I probably said this before, why I can't imagine the show letting Jesse end up living a safe and happy life in Mexico (or whereever) with his drug money when it wraps up.

I didn't have to wait even an episode for my wish for more Jesse and Skyler scenes to be fulfilled! Thank you, show. This one was with nearly no dialogue but such a lot of significant looks. After last week, people were wondering whether or not Jesse knew that Skyler knew about the meth (I thought that had been clear, but never mind, I've still come across reviews where the reviewer thought Jesse didn't know and just thought Skyler was pissed off at Walt for not-drug related reasons), but when he sees her again this episode when he and Walt bring the methalymine to the car wash, the question should be settled. Mind you, I think he's still a bit shocked, but not by the fact she knows but by Walt now actively involving her (not just via money laundering, but via storing the drug components), which plays on the seasonal theme of poisoned family spaces. What I also thought all the looks exchanged between Jesse and Skyler, especially after Walt tells her to leave, signalled was that they now both realize they're both hostages to Walt. My tiny tiny hope for an alliance continues to grow.

Meanwhile, at DEA headquarters: Hank's inner detective strikes again even while he's ordered to shut down the surveillance on Mike, as he figures out the lawyer of the nine prisoners is the key and thus finds the money used to pay off the prisoners post haste. And sans money, Gus Fring's old manager is now willing to talk.

Okay, things I (being unspoiled, thank God) think will happen in the finale:

- Walt lies and tells Jesse and Saul he delivered the bag and Mike got away. Theoretically, it's a reasonably safe lie because Mike told them they'd never hear from them again. In practice, if Walt doesn't use his patented body dissolvement method on Mike, the cops might still find his body, and as soon as Jesse hears that, he'll know Walt killed him (actually I think Jesse will suspect that anyway)

- Hank will get a witness statement incriminating Jesse (but not yet Walt) and will move to arrest him

- however, just before they can do that, Declan will move in to grab Jesse as his cook slave

- which is why he doesn't need Walt anymore and will send someone to take him out, and I'm very afraid of Junior-recently-returned-to-Flynn now

- because if Junior dies (or even just ends up in the hospital in critical condition, as Hank did mid s3), this also will remove one of the two holds Walt has over Skyler, and baby Holly as opposed to Jr./Flynn is too young to remember Walt, so I think in that case Skyler might go for broke and either go to the police or try to kill Walt

- and all these events combined will cause Walt to go on the run, with the news from the doctor arriving (via phone call, just before he throws the phone in question away or something like that) that the cancer is back as the very last scene before we go into hiatus.