# Breaking Bad 5.04 "Fifty-One" Aug. 5, 2012 **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 6, 2012, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576 "2012-08-06T02:10:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2012, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/181 "2012-08-09T01:52:48Z")
> [@davidm](#): > > Remember Jr. trying to score some beer with his friends? What if they decide to try to score something harder? Now that would be interesting. Junior getting hooked on the Blue. ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2012, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/182 "2012-08-09T01:58:05Z")
> [@Tarwater](#): > > Your father’s involvement in the drug trade necessitated blowing shit up at a nursing home? Well, what the fuck Dad? Yeah sure but Walt is currently so arrogant he doesn’t see it that way. I’m sure he is utterly convinced that Walt Jr would approve if only he knew the truth of what he has had to do. And I’m not so sure Walt Jr would be repelled, hes clearly open to being bought off “if you’re going to buy me, buy me off properly”. Presumably if Walt told Walt Jr about where the money comes from, he’d be free to give a lot more to walt jr, behind skylers back. Walt Jr would take the money and be bought. ---
**Author:** ![Erdosain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/erdosain/32/7284_2.png) [@Erdosain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Erdosain)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2012, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/183 "2012-08-09T03:44:24Z")
One thing that jumped out at me as a possible error: Jesse was picking up a barrel of methylamine from Lydia, right? But the barrel was clearly marked with a graphic of a bee on it. In the episode where Jesse goes to Mexico, doesn’t he tell Gus (in a whispered aside) that he gets his phenylacetic acid from the barrel with the bee on it? Looking at Wikipedia, it says that phenylacetic acid is a controlled substance in the US, due to its meth-making capabilities, but says nothing of the same about methylamine. In fact, it sounds (just from the Wiki site) like methylamine is a pretty common chemical. Am I confused about the barrel with the bee? Does the show play fast and loose with the chemistry to simplify the show for the home viewer? ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2012, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/184 "2012-08-09T04:20:50Z")
> [@Erdosain](#): > > In the episode where Jesse goes to Mexico, doesn’t he tell Gus (in a whispered aside) that he gets his phenylacetic acid from the barrel with the bee on it? Thats the logo of Golden moth Chemical: > **[Golden Moth Chemical](https://breakingbad.fandom.com/wiki/Golden_Moth_Chemical)** > > Golden Moth Chemical is an industrial chemical manufacturing company based in Albuquerque and owned by Chinese businessman Duane Chow. Golden Moth Chemical was a chemical supplier for Gustavo Fring's organization, primarily... At that time “the barrel with the golden bee” was phenylacetic acid. Seems like Golden Moth can supply more than one chemical. ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2012, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/185 "2012-08-09T04:31:47Z")
missed edit window, also Methylamine is DEA listed as a controlled precursor. See here: > **[DEA list of chemicals](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DEA_list_of_chemicals)** > > The United States Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) maintains lists regarding the classification of illicit drugs (see DEA Schedules). It also maintains List I of chemicals and List II of chemicals, which contain chemicals that are used to manufacture the controlled substances/illicit drugs. The list is designated within the Controlled Substances Act but can be modified by the U.S. Attorney General as illegal manufacturing practices change. > Although the list is controlled by the Attorney Ge... ---
**Author:** ![Erdosain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/erdosain/32/7284_2.png) [@Erdosain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Erdosain)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2012, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/186 "2012-08-09T04:35:06Z")
> [@coremelt](#): > > Thats the logo of Golden moth Chemical: > [Golden Moth Chemical | Breaking Bad Wiki | Fandom](http://breakingbad.wikia.com/wiki/Golden_Moth_Chemical) > > At that time “the barrel with the golden bee” was phenylacetic acid. Seems like Golden Moth can supply more than one chemical. Ahh, thank you. I didn’t realize the bee was a corporate logo. That makes a lot more sense than just a random bee graphic on a barrel of chemicals. ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2012, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/187 "2012-08-09T13:30:01Z")
> [@Erdosain](#): > > Am I confused about the barrel with the bee? Does the show play fast and loose with the chemistry to simplify the show for the home viewer? Although it appears methylamine is a genuine meth precursor, I read or heard somewhere that they purposely mess up the chemistry so they don’t end up teaching people how to make meth. ---
**Author:** ![Bytegeist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/9dc877/32.png) [@Bytegeist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bytegeist)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2012, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/188 "2012-08-10T14:45:30Z")
> [@Revtim](#): > > … I read or heard somewhere that they purposely mess up the chemistry so they don’t end up teaching people how to make meth. And if you _do_ follow the recipe shown in Breaking Bad, what do you get? The surprising answer: Zima ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2012, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/189 "2012-08-10T15:13:21Z")
> [@Revtim](#): > > Although it appears methylamine is a genuine meth precursor, I read or heard somewhere that they purposely mess up the chemistry so they don’t end up teaching people how to make meth. I believe on the podcast they’ve said that they strive to make sure that what they do say on the show is correct, but they leave enough steps out to make sure the show isn’t just one giant lesson on how to make the world’s best meth. ---
**Author:** ![Rigamarole](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/77aa72/32.png) [@Rigamarole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rigamarole)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2012, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/190 "2012-08-10T17:47:43Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > I believe on the podcast they’ve said that they strive to make sure that what they do say on the show is correct, but they leave enough steps out to make sure the show isn’t just one giant lesson on how to make the world’s best meth. Not like you can’t Google it and have 20 meth recipes in 5 seconds. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2012, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/191 "2012-08-10T17:49:38Z")
> [@Rigamarole](#): > > Not like you can’t Google it and have 20 meth recipes in 5 seconds. But Chrysler probably doesn’t give the people that wrote those websites 2 Chargers and 3 300s for their effort. ---
**Author:** ![jrepka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee59a6/32.png) [@jrepka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jrepka)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2012, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/192 "2012-08-10T21:44:11Z")
> [@Erdosain](#): > > Looking at Wikipedia, it says that phenylacetic acid is a controlled substance in the US, due to its meth-making capabilities, but says nothing of the same about methylamine. In fact, it sounds (just from the Wiki site) like methylamine is a pretty common chemical. Phenylacetic acid is a precursor to the production of phenylacetone. The phenylacetone is reacted with methylamine in a reducing environment (the aluminum foil flakes are a pretty good aid to reduction, I expect). This method of cooking is much more involved than the method originally used in the show, which used pseudoephedrine as the primary precursor. Because of their use in the manufacturing of meth, _all of these chemicals_ are on the DEA restricted list. I imagine that pseudoephedrine, because it is a common cold medicine, is watched more closely (purchasing is sometimes slightly more involved than going through airport security). The precursors used by Walt and Jesse are slightly simpler chemically and, in a few cases, can be manufactured from more readily available materials – though this requires additional steps, time and equipment. Though the chemicals are difficult to obtain in the US, another barrier to large scale production here is that a reasonably-sized lab in the states can be detected by its exhaust fumes, by its energy consumption, and by the fact that a larger support and security staff creates additional costs and loose ends. ---
**Author:** ![Frostillicus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Frostillicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frostillicus)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2012, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/193 "2012-08-12T19:38:39Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > I’m kind of wondering (and maybe this is just a plot hole) why she just doesn’t kill him. Get herself a black market gun. Follow him around some day and just pop a hole in him at some random location. Restaurant, driving down the street, whatever. Maybe the cops will call it random violence, maybe she’ll get him in a lab and they’ll put everything together and figure it’s drug related, but he’ll be out of the picture. > Would she go to jail if she could convince everyone that he’d forced her to launder the money under some sort of threat (jail, violence)? If she popped him in some random location, they likely wouldn’t even find out about it since they wouldn’t comb through the finances and it’s not like he has “Make Meth” on his “To Do” list. Because not everyone has the capacity to kill another person? ---
**Author:** ![Erdosain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/erdosain/32/7284_2.png) [@Erdosain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Erdosain)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2012, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/194 "2012-08-12T21:00:45Z")
> [@Frostillicus](#): > > Because not everyone has the capacity to kill another person? Yes, this. Skyler was freaked out enough by what happened to Ted, and that was accidental and totally justified. Committing cold-blooded murder on the father of your children? That’s huge. 99.9% of people don’t have that in them. I know they’ve gotten away from this a little as the show has progressed, but one of the things that impressed me is how realistic and weighty they make the killings. Killing Gale really messed Jesse up. Killing Krazy 8 with the bike lock was awful and difficult. Letting Jane die and the plane crash weighed on Walt till he had a mini-breakdown. Walt thinks he’s a capo now, but the only characters who seem to kill without any ill-effects are dead-eyed Mike and Reacharound Gus. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/195 "2012-08-13T05:07:50Z")
Great episode (I didn’t get to watch until Saturday). I loved the pool scene on a couple of levels: while Skyler later suggested it was calculated as an excuse to get the kids out of the house, I also got a sense that she was desperate to get away from Walt’s lying, from his reminder that she was involved in his recovery and that her support for him led to _this_, from the fact that he’s roped her into the crime so deeply. And I really loved Walt swooping in like some kind of incubus to pull her out of the silent, peaceful pool before the sudden cut to commercial. The use of the color blue was also great. The bedroom scene was a turning point for the series and in a way I was not sure what to make of Skyler during that scene. She seemed less than up for the challenge. She commended Walt’s ability to lie and scheme, which he must have loved, of course, but she also significantly overestimated his skill with all of that stuff. Later she correctly noted his misleading rhetoric about Gus. However she was brilliant in delivering that kicker about waiting for his cancer to come back. I think it is vanishingly unlikely that Walt would kill Skyler. He does love her, but maybe even more than that, killing her would be an admission that he was wrong about being able to change her mind. He needs to convince her that he’s done the right thing at least according to a certain logic- that family justifies everything. She did not buy that during the bedroom scene and killing her would be an acknowledgement of total failure and a challenge to his own reasoning. ---
**Author:** ![Pitchmeister](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pitchmeister/32/3459_2.png) [@Pitchmeister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pitchmeister)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/196 "2012-08-13T07:26:05Z")
I was really glad Skyler finally snapped. I wanted to slap her so bad for the first 30 minutes. I don’t know why, but her behavior made me feel really aggressive. As much as I love Lydia, her German was very painful to behold. I sincerely hope they don’t have her speak it much more often, I almost couln’t understand what she was supposed to be saying. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 11:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/197 "2012-08-13T11:21:43Z")
Well, her German is probably not supposed to be great. i don’t see a problem with that. ---
**Author:** ![Tangent](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tangent/32/3098_2.png) [@Tangent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tangent)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/198 "2012-08-13T16:29:42Z")
Incidentally, according to the show’s podcast the actress who plays Lydia (Laura Fraser) has a very thick Scottish brogue when speaking in her normal voice. ---
**Author:** ![Tangent](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tangent/32/3098_2.png) [@Tangent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tangent)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/199 "2012-08-13T16:34:32Z")
And, holy shit, looking over her IMDB page I see that she was the hot blacksmith in _ **A Knight’s Tale** _! ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576/200 "2012-08-13T16:53:35Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > Well, her German is probably not supposed to be great. i don’t see a problem with that. IIRC from last week’s podcast she studied German at some point in her life so she’s at least familiar with it (and maybe she can speak it), but for her to learn it for the show she was given the lines she needed on tape with an American accent. Done by someone, I believe, that doesn’t natively speak English or German. Her German isn’t supposed to be perfect, it’s supposed to sound like an American that learned it as a second language. Possible even an American that picked it up after college just to get ahead in the business world. If they wanted someone to speak perfect German they would have found someone to speak perfect German. OTOH, to MY ears, she could have been speaking gibberish and I wouldn’t have been able to tell as long as it sounded vaguely German-y. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-04-fifty-one-aug-5-2012/630576.md?page=11)