Category: review

When I reviewed “Blood Money,” I had concerns about pacing, and what felt, at times, like sloppy story-telling. It was an episode designed to get Walt and Hank into that garage, so that we could open there the next week and the fireworks could really go off, but watching it on its own merits, without its promise followed up for another week, it left me cold.

Last week I reviewed “Granite State,” and all of the same things applied there as well. We had to gloss over a lot and stitch together the fractured storylines. We had to move Walt all the way out to New Hampshire…just so it could end with him coming back.

But like “Blood Money,” “Granite State” paid off. It was worth it. Absolutely all of it was worth it.

I don’t care how clumsy the re-introduction of the Grey Matter stuff was last week, because its payoff was one of the most graceful scenes Breaking Bad has ever done…a victorious exercise in gorgeous tension. Gretchen and Elliot joking and reminiscing and flicking on lights while Walt lurks in the shadows, closes the front door behind them, and admires their framed photographs.

You’ll never catch me defending the Charlie Rose stuff, but I’m absolutely thrilled to say that any roughness around the edges was unquestionably worth it if that’s where it led.

“Felina”…well, I’ll just come out and say it. This is easily going to be one of my favorite episodes. Maybe top 5. It’s impossible that it would be lower than top 10. For as much story as it felt like we were left with last week, the fact is there wasn’t that much.

The money. The Nazis. Jesse. Walt’s fate. And, if we have time, a proper farewell to the family. That’s all we really needed. The “largeness” of the story was always one of Breaking Bad‘s quietly brilliant misdirections. At times it felt downright enormous. But step back (or pull back, as we did at the end of this episode) and it’s really just one man.

It’s one man who did a lot of terrible things in service of some very noble ones, and then later some very selfish ones.

But it’s one man. The camera could have kept going. Beyond the meth lab. Up higher. Revealing the Nazi compound. And higher. Revealing the city of Albequerque. And higher, revealing all of New Mexico. The further we go, the smaller it all looks; the smaller it’s all revealed to be. We expected a larger amount of threads to deal with in the finale, but, really, this is just one guy. One unassuming, unhappy chemistry teacher who manages to look to us, for five seasons, like the largest presence on Earth.

But he’s not.

And he never was.

That bleeding body on the ground is Walter White. He was never actually any larger than he was in that final moment.

I loved “Felina.”

I loved, loved, fucking loved “Felina.”

The comedy of Badger and Skinny Pete* posing as snipers with their laser pointers, the phone call from Marie**, the positively heart-breaking final glimpse of his son before he’s gone forever***, the warm flashback of Jesse making the box he talked about a lifetime ago with his therapist.

Oh, and it caps it all off with a scene that ensures I will cry every damn time I hear “Baby Blue” on the radio. Technically, that might qualify as the episode’s biggest surprise.

I genuinely can’t imagine a better conclusion. Walt managed to go out on his own terms, but without it feeling like a cheat. The entire Nazi arc was justified by the moment Walt tackled Jesse to the ground. We got to watch Todd get slowly strangled to death.

I’m having trouble discussing the episode because I keep lapsing into lists of things I loved about it. I think that’s because I’m just in awe of how well it put a bow on the entire series. Going into this I think everybody was steeling themselves against at least some degree of disappointment. After all, you can’t please everyone.

And I don’t know if “Felina” will please everyone.

But it sure pleased the hell out of me.

As much as I wanted Jesse out of that cage last week, this was the way to do it. Walt passing Jesse the gun was the answer. It was the right way to end this. And the fact that it didn’t end this…that Jesse actually did manage to break the cycle of manipulation that he became aware of back in “Confessions”…that was perfect too. Because now, as much as Jesse would have wanted it…it was really for Walt. They both knew that. And Walt admitted it. Jesse is unchained in more ways than one.

And Walt’s left alone. His family is gone. His legacy is gone. All around him, just as they always have, machinations set into motion long ago keep turning without him. The empty gun never stops strafing. The massage chair comforts a corpse. It’s easy enough to set things into motion; it’s a much bigger job to stop them.

I didn’t think this episode could redeem Walter in my eyes. And I’m not sure that it did. But it gave me a conclusion that didn’t leave me hating him. And that, without exaggeration, is miraculous.

I guess that’s all I have to say, as “Baby Blue” goes. Walter White spent over a year building up a hell of his own creation, and he didn’t really deserve to escape that. But the others he dragged into that hell certainly did, and he did the best he could do, which was release as many of them as he could. Through death, through freedom, through financial security. He did what he had to do, and it cost him his life.

But whatever was going through his mind in those final seconds, as he caressed the machinery in the meth lab while the police closed in on him, I’m sure it was worth it. Those few, small moments at the very end of his life during which he could reflect on the relative good he managed to do. It’s a far cry from all the chaos and tragedy he caused that he’s had to reflect on since the pilot.

He could have gone out in a blaze of glory, but he chose a path that led to the fatal shot coming without fanfare. No dying breaths, no final monologues, no time for goodbye. He was here, and now he’s not here. He went out in a blaze of self-sacrifice instead, choosing for the first time in what felt like ages not to be selfish.

He doesn’t keep Skyler any longer than he promised. He lets his son pass without knowing he was there. He sets Jesse free, and he understands when Jesse says he won’t kill him.

He’s letting go.

He’s letting himself let go.

And maybe that’s what the whole show was about. Mike alluded to it earlier this season…if Walter had just kept his mouth shut and did as he was told he would have been fine. Instead he had to shake things up. Every time Walter takes command of the situation, he only — ultimately — makes things worse. He had his moments of triumph, and that’s what would give him the confidence to seize control again. But it was always just a larger snowball, a bigger boulder, a scarier figure looming in the shadows. Any triumph was illusory. He was only constructing a more complicated coffin.

In “Felina,” he lets go. And he dies a happier man than he ever could have otherwise. If only he had let go earlier…

Anyway, thank you to everybody out there who stuck around and read these reviews. It’s been a great eight weeks, and I appreciate that you chose to spend them with me. This was a great show, on that we can all agree, and if we disagreed here and there — or everywhere — on the specifics, I’m just glad to know that so many great commenters and readers chose to spend their time reading my drivel, and giving me their much-better-articulated thoughts in response.

And I hope you stick around. Until then…

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* I knew some kind of reveal was coming (what with Walter being just a bit too jovial about the whole thing…we’ve seen him when he’s about to take a life, and he’s not nearly that chipper) but I was hoping it would be Kuby and Huell. Not that Badger and Skinny Pete were unwelcome sights…but man I’m going to miss Kuby and Huell.

** Which, by the by, is the right way to dump exposition right into the show without it feeling forced. Of course Marie’s worried. Of course Marie would talk too much. Of course Marie would get just enough wrong in the way of detail that it still works as comedy. This is why the “he just so happens to be sitting here while someone changes the channels” crap last week felt sloppy. The show is better than that, and this is the proof.

*** I’m tearing up just thinking about that. Jesus Christ was this a brilliant, brilliant episode of television.

While not officially referred to as one, “Granite State” is the first half of a two-part series finale. It has to be, because as a stand-alone episode it doesn’t really accomplish much.

That’s not to say that nothing happens, but it is to draw the distinction between “movement” and “accomplishment.” “Granite State” consists almost entirely of the former, and that’s okay. It may well mean that the latter comes next week. There sure is a heck of a lot left to resolve, though, and that’s what worries me.

Speaking of movement, I’m already ahead of myself, so I’ll double back a bit.

The reason I say this episode doesn’t work quite as well as a standalone is that we’re in a new place. Or, rather, a hell of a lot of new places. Walt’s new identity, Marie’s life without Hank, Junior’s knowledge of his father’s doings, Skyler’s dealings with the police and the Nazis, Jesse’s slavery…everything’s new. This is certainly the Breaking Bad we’ve been following for five seasons, but it’s also, pretty clearly, a new situation, emblemized not only by the fact that Walt obtained a new identity at the end of “Ozymandias,” but by the fact that Saul is quite literally cycled out of Walter’s life now in favor of a new character in a similar — but not identical — role.

This isn’t Mr. White visiting his lawyer for advice…this is Mr. Lambert being visited by his deleter* for basic sustenance.

It’s a different show. Or I guess I should say a different story. Which makes “Granite State,” for all it does right, feel unflatteringly like “Blood Money” to me. A lot of setup, a lot of maneuvering. Some great moments. Some indelible images. But it exists not for its own sake…it exists for the sake of getting all the pawns into the right place for the start of next week’s episode.

It also doesn’t really help that so much is left unresolved at this point. We have about 45 minutes left of the grand story to tell, but it doesn’t feel like we’re any closer to the end than we were a few weeks back. Hank’s story, of course, is over, so I guess we’re mathematically closer to having the loose ends tied up, but that’s it.

The simple rock-and-a-hard-place situation Skyler suddenly finds herself in could have been good for a season-long arc. Now whatever happens will happen fast, and that’ll be the end of it. Walt Jr. processing his emotions** should structurally come at about this point, but it’s fending for screen time with everything else that’s going on, so you get him called to the principal’s office and that’ll have to do. The break-in at Marie’s house is conveyed by a speeding vehicle and a shot of the destruction. Even Saul’s departure gets one (admittedly great) single scene, and the logistics behind deleting his identity are glossed over simply because we’re almost finished here so, please, everyone, let’s hurry up.***

I want to like “Granite State” a lot more than I do. Maybe it would have done them better to open with Walt a month or so into his exile, because following the process just makes it apparent how many holes there are. Jump ahead in time and we’ll assume things, because we have to. Allow us to watch you at work, though, and we’ll know when there are pieces missing.

This is all — do I really even need to say this? — without having seen “Felina.” I could eat my words, and I look forward to doing so. Maybe viewed through the lens of the final episode, “Granite State” will reveal itself as a work of brilliance. At the very least, I’m sure it’ll work better simply because we’ll have a stronger sense of what the place-setting was in aid of. For now, though? It feels less like Breaking Bad and more like a series of skits about these characters, arranged like an FAQ.

If the Nazis know about the tape in Hank’s house, won’t they go and get it?
Yes. They will go and get it.

Even though Walt tried to distance Skyler from his crimes with last week’s phone call, won’t the police still try to get to him through her?
Yes. The police are trying to get to him through her.

Is Jesse still in the cage?
Good question. Yes, Jesse is still in the cage.

How is Walt Jr. handling all of this?
Here is a scene to show you how he’s handling all of this.

It just seemed a bit…rigid. And for a storyline that’s so obviously in flux, that’s bizarre and disappointing.

Don’t get me wrong…a lot of what it did worked, but it failed to cohere. Walt’s last ditch effort to rope Saul into his revenge, the snowy isolation of New Hampshire, the conversation with his son, the IV dangling from a deer antler…this is all great stuff. The ingredients are there, and they’re all mixed together, but nobody turned on the stove. And it culminates in what is probably the clumsiest bit of expository desperation Breaking Bad has ever resorted to: The Charlie Rose Show.

I like Charlie Rose. Awesome guy. It’s nice to see him here. And it’s nice to see him interviewing two characters from the early years of the show. I fault none of them…but I do fault the writing, which had Jessica Hecht (last seen in my single favorite episode) discussing the Heisenberg character as though she’s reading from somebody’s half-baked but well-intentioned YouTube comment on a “WALT IS A BADASS!!!!” compilation video.

End in the middle of a shootout, and I’ll trust you to make good on it. End on one character metatextualizing another and I’m not going to be quite as confident. That was sloppy.

I did like a few of the misleads in this episode — from thinking Uncle Jack was angry that Todd never told him about the boy all the way through making it seem like Louis was going to be a character that served an actual purpose — but for all the shuffling and shifting around, I’m left a bit cold.

There are some nice thematic callbacks to the grander scheme of things, reminding us that as detached as “Granite State” feels it’s still part of the same show. Such as Skyler phasing in and out during her discussion with the DEA, and Andrea joining the likes of Hugo, Gale, Gomez, Ted, and Jane’s dad on the list of good people steamrolled by the momentum of Somebody Else’s Evil.

I also liked how Jesse’s escape toyed with us. We’ve seen him gradually become more and more valuable and intelligent as an ally, to the point that he was outthinking both Walt and Mike earlier this season. The magnets…the train robbery…the conviction that Lydia didn’t betray them. Those were all Jesse. He was the cooler, leveler head…and he prevailed.

Granted, it doesn’t take much in the way of intelligence to stack up a bunch of crap and hope it reaches the top, but that’s okay. Because we want to read all of these things together. We want to see Jesse get out of the pit, and we want it to feel earned. We can read these things as foreshadowing so that it does…all we need is for Jesse to make it.

And, for a little while, it seems like he might. But there’s a fence. And he’s dragged right back down.

Which is a bit what it felt like to watch “Granite State.” For a little while, it feels like it just might climb out of the hole it’s dug. But it doesn’t, and we end on an even lower point. It’s up to “Felina” to get us out.

I am confident that it will. Just don’t ask me how, or why it needed a lead-in so uncharacteristically graceless in order to do it.

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* Did anyone feel like it was just a bit of a stretch that this happened, by the way? I always got the sense that this character would take your money, furnish you with some new docs, and disavow all knowledge forever. If you fucked up after that, oh well; it’s in his best interest to leave no connections, for just such an occasion. He did make a few comments to the effect that Walt was a special case, but I couldn’t really buy that as an explanation. He’s a special case, yes, but he’s special in the way that you’d want to get him out of your life even more quickly, and you certainly wouldn’t want to be establishing lasting links with the man.

** It sure was nice to see some “forgotten” characters back again though, I have to admit. Carmen, Gretchen and Elliott were welcome faces, even if they were wedged into an already overstuffed episode.

*** Seriously? I know the idea is to show that this deleter guy is Mike-like in his ability to GSD — or get shit done, as they say — but Goodman’s a regional celebrity with a mountain of active clients and active employees on his payroll. Not to mention shifty business associates that relied on him and aren’t going to be happy that he skipped town. And everyone’s somehow supposed to forget about him in a couple of days? Nebraska’s not the moon, and the kinds of people Goodman deals with are the kinds of people who would be perfectly happy to make the trip. These are steps that the show used to relish exploring, but now it feels like we’re just skipping things.

Years ago, around the time the Watchmen movie came out, I was speaking with a friend of mine. He said he didn’t like how obviously the film framed Ozymandias as a villain; in my friend’s opinion, the graphic novel left that much open for interpretation.

Yes, the character was indeed responsible for the loss of many lives. But ultimately, my friend argued, it was worth it. He did it for the right reasons, and there was a substantial net benefit to the carnage. There was, at least arguably, a justifiable ends to the means.

And throughout season five of Breaking Bad — both halves — I’ve seen people defending Walter for the same reason. Of course we can criticize his methods…but isn’t he doing these things for the right reason?

After “Ozymandias,” I think somebody would have to work pretty hard to defend any aspect of Walter White’s character. This was comic book Ozymandias sliding into silver screen Ozymandias*, right before our eyes.

We might have been able to make those arguments before. It was ultimately for his family. He was loyal to Jesse. If there was any way to minimize the violence, he would.

…but not anymore. Walter is a villain. There is no debating it. And perhaps you’ll be disappointed for the same reason my friend was disappointed. I can sympathize, if that’s the case; it’s always more satisfying to be able to explore shades of grey for ourselves than it is to have the world broken into blacks and whites.

Oh well. These aren’t our rules. We’re not entitled to anything. We crave things that we can’t have.

“To’hajiilee” ended where it did because if it had continued even one second further, we would have known. We would have known there was no hope. Like Grandpa Joe in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory deciding not to tell Charlie that the final golden ticket has been found, the show needed to let us have just one more dream.

The cold open of “Ozymandias” makes the distinction as clear, cold, and inarguable as it needs to be. We get a flashback to the afternoon of Walt and Jesse’s very first cook. Back to when we could sympathize with Breaking Bad‘s main character. Back to when Jesse was not broken and could still function as comic relief. Back to when there was a future to look forward to…whether that was financial stability for the Whites, or something as simple as a pizza with the family after a long day.

But it fades. As it must. And it’s replaced by the direct and fatal result of those seeds planted with the best of intentions: Steve Gomez dead on the ground. Hank about to be shot through the head. And Walt brainlessly bargaining his money away for nothing.

All of the bodies. All of the blood. All of the carnage and the treachery and the deceit. The innocent and not so innocent lives caught in the crossfire. Gale. Mike. Gus. Drew Sharp. Jane. They were all inside of those barrels. And Walt traded them away. For nothing. Hank is dead. As it had to be.

And just as I was able to feel sorry for Walter toward the end of the last episode, for the first time in what feels like ages, I was able to feel for him again here…bargaining with the only thing he has left, and losing it all. When Walter fell to the ground my heart fell with him. Hank could not be spared. Of course he couldn’t. We hoped anyway. And then he was gone.

And as solid as the contrast between the cold open and the action of the episode, we saw how Walter handled his next problem: he turned in Jesse Pinkman, consented to his torture, and then plunged and twisted an unnecessary blade into the boy’s heart.

No more excuses, folks.

This isn’t Heisenberg. This is Walter White.

I think everybody has their own idea of when Walt finally became irredeemable. Fittingly enough, a very common one is the moment he let Jane die. Bryan Cranston himself seems to think it happened in the very first episode, simply because he allowed himself to become something he wasn’t. For me, I’d say it’s when he killed Mike. Not because Mike was a saint or a hero, but simply because of the context of the killing: Mike was no kind of threat. Mike was on his way to a new life, to ride out the rest of his days as a quiet old man in a place where nobody could hurt him. Any other time Walt killed, there was some justification…sturdy or not…that it was that, or be killed himself. But in the case of Mike, he was just being a dick.

And, of course, there are those who continued to feel that Walt was redeemable. That there was no moment that permanently shifted him into the realm of being hopelessly lost.

I wonder if any of those remain after seeing what he did to Jesse. I wonder how any of those could remain after seeing what he did to Jesse.

He knew — exactly as we knew — what would happen when he nodded to Uncle Jack. He knew — exactly as we knew — where Jesse was going, and what was going to happen. He knew — exactly as we knew — what finally confessing about Jane would do to the boy. And he doesn’t just let it happen…he makes it happen. The scarred and disfigured Jesse Pinkman, manacled and terrified in an underground cell…Walt did that. And he did it deliberately.

“Ozymandias” was difficult to watch. I started working my way back through Breaking Bad when this half season began, and it’s amazing how much the show changes as it goes on, without ever actually losing (or even substantially altering) its identity. The worst of Walt was present from the start…it was just easier to overlook in the face of his more realistic goals, his identifiable concern for his family, and the basic comedy inherent in his situation. After all, he’s a chemistry teacher who teams up with a former student to cook meth. That’s a can’t-miss premise…and sure enough, it didn’t miss. Hank’s body, buried in To’hajiilee, will attest to that. This is where it all had to go.

And that’s okay. “Ozymandias” was supposed to be difficult to watch. That’s the point. There was something there to make everybody wince. The death of Gomez. The death of Hank. Walt turning Jesse in. Jesse’s face. The photograph of Andrea. Marie’s assurance that Walt had been captured. Marie learning that Hank was dead. Skyler learning that Hank was dead. Walt Jr. learning that his father was a drug dealer. The abduction of Holly. The knife.

And all of this — all of it — follows on directly from the previous episode. Marie visiting the carwash? Yep, that’s the same shift that just featured the Saul and Junior double act. Hank’s brains being blown all over the desert sand? Yep, that’s the same plan that followed on from the comical interrogation of Huell. That’s why “To’hajiilee” broke where it did. This is another chapter…tightly related to what came before, but completely, totally, brutally distinct.

As my uncle used to say…it’s all fun and games until somebody loses an eye.

I’m also genuinely in awe of just how callously the episode handled the death of a major character like Hank. That is to say…it just kept going.

No beautiful shot of the violence, no slow motion collapse…no gentle pop song to give us pause. Just a bullet, and then it’s time to dig up the money. It was made more painful simply because we didn’t have time to dwell. We wanted to go back…

…but there is no going back.

Just further into the future.

I hope you got your laughs in last week. I hope you enjoyed that brief flash of happier times that opened the episode. And I hope Jesse Pinkman got a good, long last look at those birds.

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* Yes, I’m aware that the Watchmen Ozymandias isn’t what’s being referenced here. I just thought it was an interesting parallel. And I’m still kinda reeling SO SUE ME