It would be very interesting, considering that we just saw Walt watching Scarface, if he goes down just like Tony Montana in the end.. “Say hello to my little friend” and all, except substituting the M60
(thanks for the link, BTW)
This would still constitute a real speeding up of the action for this show. They’ve done 49 episodes and covered barely a year; now sometime in the next 4 to 12 episodes they’ll go another year into the future.
Well, it doesn’t have to be his real 52nd birthday, just the 52nd anniversary of the birthdate on his phony New Hampshire ID.
I assume that he wouldn’t put his actual birthday on phony ID, but pick something a few months before or after.
That’s a very plausible prediction based on the teaser intro, which is an excellent reason why it is going to be 100% wrong. 
The writers of this show love to misdirect …
I know. What if he made the birth date on the fake ID exactly one year older than he really is. That means that the scene is only a couple of weeks away!
Then he’d better start growing that beard.
Ha! Good point. Um, maybe it’s a fake beard.
Question - I’m new to this great show. I’m curious if it feels sufficiently realistic to you that all the events of the 4 seasons so far have taken place in the span of one calendar year. I can stretch my definition of ‘realistic’ for such a marvelous piece of entertainment, but I’ve been trying to figure out the timeline of events.
I just want to say that 15 years ago my folks had some exterminators at our house (Terminex) - not a big fogging or anything, just spraying while we were home. But anyway, not too long after, our house was burgled. The police did look in to the Terminex guys but it never came of anything.
Now I want to talk to my local police and tell them I have new info on this 15 year old caper - they sold the info!! Of course!
There has been some debate as to whether Walt’s Victor as Icarus speech was meant as a threat to Mike or Jesse. Walt is the real Icarus, although he thinks he is Daedalus. Gus is the real Daedalus.
It does seem strange this has all happened in less than a year especially in regards to Walt 's diagnosis, treatment, and remission, and Jesse’s addiction, rehab, relapse after Gale, and sobering up again thanks to Mike. Jesse met and dated Jane, grieved for her death, then got serious with Brock’s mom too.
In one of the other threads we found out that the last name on his ID is Skyler’s maiden name. There could be quite a number of reasons for that, but I thought this might be a good time to point it out again since it could imply that it’s not fake, but that he changed his name to hers for some reason.
It does feel a little weird to me that Walt has gone from meek, underachieving high-school chemistry teacher to cold-blooded criminal in only one year. The number of episodes doesn’t phase me—the MAS*H series lasted longer than the Korean war—but I’d think it would take at least two years to learn the ways of criminal society well enough to know when you’ve got a strong bargaining position and when you don’t, and what’s persuasive and what isn’t, especially for a social retard like Walt. He doesn’t even interact with the criminals in person very much, so that ought to slow down his learning even further. Then again, this episode’s caviling over legacy pay and mules showed that Walt is still a noob.
Here is a detailed timeline of the first three seasons. I strongly recommend that you not read it until you’ve seen the first three seasons. I also recommend that you not read the previous paragraph.
Going back to the first episode, in what kind of end game would Walt need that kind of weapon? He’s not holed up. He’s moving about freely, if cautiously. Why would he need that kind of firepower?
I don’t know much about guns. Is the gun he had good for shooting at a distance (sniping, for example), or is it good for taking out more than one person, or what?
I agree. Up until now, I have avoided second-guessing the realism of the show, but the fumigation plan is so weird, it’s interfering with my suspension of disbelief.
I think you pegged the main problem right on: too many unknowns to deal with on each cook. Something unexpected always goes wrong when you move, and now they’re moving delicate lab equipment every week. What if they spilled some beer while watching the Three Stooges? What if the tent gets a little hole in it while they’re setting up? Have these guys learned nothing from Gus’s tutelage?
So? TV shows/movies have been doing this since they have existed. Jump cut and slap on the subtitle “5 YEARS LATER” and bam, you’re in the future. The rate of the passage of time is completely unimportant and irrelevant if nothing interesting is happening in that period that the audience needs to see. I don’t get why you guys are so hung up on the timeline.
It’s a .30 caliber belt-fed machine gun. Think door-gunner on a helicopter in Viet Nam. The cartridge is 7.62mm NATO, (military version of the .308 Winchester) i.e. what the M14 rifle fired. While the cartridge has been used in sniper rifles, and any rifle can be used for sniping, the M60 is not a sniper rifle. Effective range is around a thousand yards.
Because they’ve never done that. Not even in the scene where we see him making the purchase of gun and car.
I’m disappointed that Walt continued in the methamphetamine business. I had hoped after he “won”, that he understood that he had a chance to quit crime that few criminals ever get. He could have taken the strength and courage that he acquired in the crime world and put them toward pursuits that would provide for his family and that his family could be proud of. I thought Walt was thoughtful and philosophical enough to do that. He’d be able to appreciate the good things he has, in a way that few people ever can. “Whew! I don’t have to kill people anymore.”
I know that Vince Gilligan has said he wants the theme to be “Mr. Chips turns into Scarface”, but sometimes you have to give up the idea that inspired you and be faithful to what you’ve created. I did not care for the “Scarface” scene in this episode. It came across to me as writerly cleverness—the writers deliberately controlling where they want the story to go instead of discovering where the story actually does go. “See how clever we are, viewers? And see how clever you are, for decoding our secret message?”
Oh well. This isn’t going to stop me from watching, of course.
If you give Walter White an iota of power, he will never let it go. Also, money aside, cooking blue was the best, most accomplished thing Walter had done with his chemistry skills since his falling out with Gray Matter. He was a loser. There’s no way he’ll give up chemistry and become the loser owner of a good car wash.
I’m sure we’ll see what the deal with Gray Matter was this season or next.