# Breaking Bad 5.09 "Blood Money" 8/11/2013 **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 11, 2013, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973 "2013-08-11T22:21:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2013, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/161 "2013-08-13T18:15:24Z")
> [@friedo](#): > > [Yes](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=16563229&postcount=40). 🙂 [Judge Chamberlain Haller]Oh… sorry.[/Judge Chamberlain Haller] > [@Stephe96](#): > > Yeah, I just hope Marie’s kleptomania somehow plays a part in the final episodes. Seemed like too much of a character flaw to just drop from the story. At some point they’ll go to get a few million from the storage house only to find out Marie has stolen the money pile and all of the bubble gum air fresheners. ---
**Author:** ![SykoSkotty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c0e974/32.png) [@SykoSkotty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SykoSkotty)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2013, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/162 "2013-08-13T19:54:31Z")
My apologies if this theory has already been posted: I just had a thought while looking through the photos from episode 509. In the flash forward, at Walt’s house, it’s surrounded by chain link fence, and if you’ll notice, the landscaping is completely burned out. Trees are bare, dead leaves everywhere, including the roof of the house, bushes are reduced to sticks. Meanwhile, the neighboring homes all look normal. Green bushes, trees full of leaves…so… Does someone try to make a batch at Walt’s house, and…kaboom?! ---
**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, 2013, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/163 "2013-08-13T19:59:13Z")
> [@SykoSkotty](#): > > My apologies if this theory has already been posted: > > I just had a thought while looking through the photos from episode 509. > > In the flash forward, at Walt’s house, it’s surrounded by chain link fence, and if you’ll notice, the landscaping is completely burned out. Trees are bare, dead leaves everywhere, including the roof of the house, bushes are reduced to sticks. > > Meanwhile, the neighboring homes all look normal. Green bushes, trees full of leaves…so… > > Does someone try to make a batch at Walt’s house, and…kaboom?! I’m about 5 minutes into the podcast and one of the people mentioned that at some point they discussed just having the house not be there, at all. Just an empty lot in where the White house used to stand. The reason they didn’t is because it’s someone’s actual house so they would have to get rid of it with CGI so there wouldn’t have been anything for anyone to interact with. What they did instead gave Walt something to do. I suppose that goes along with your theory, I didn’t notice what you’re talking about, but it makes sense if it’s there. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2013, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/164 "2013-08-13T20:28:00Z")
But it doesn’t look burned out inside. ---
**Author:** ![AuntiePam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2013, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/165 "2013-08-13T20:44:54Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > But it doesn’t look burned out inside. No, it doesn’t. The dead grass and shrubs are probably what happens with abandoned properties in Albuquerque. Hell, it’s happening now in my back yard, after a month with almost no rain. It would have been cool for the house to be gone though. Surely they could have found a vacant lot between a couple of houses? I don’t think we’d remember what Walt’s neighbors’ houses looked like. ---
**Author:** ![Washoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/ecae2f/32.png) [@Washoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Washoe)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2013, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/166 "2013-08-13T20:50:01Z")
> [@SykoSkotty](#): > > In the flash forward, at Walt’s house, it’s surrounded by chain link fence, and if you’ll notice, the landscaping is completely burned out. Trees are bare, dead leaves everywhere, including the roof of the house, bushes are reduced to sticks. It just looks that way from lack of maintenance. Note that all the other deciduous trees in the immediate vicinity are also bare. Some of the shrubbery is dead, some of it isn’t. Nobody’s watering or doing yard maintenance, hence the leaves all over the place and on the roof. Nothing is actually burnt. ---
**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, 2013, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/167 "2013-08-13T21:07:02Z")
> [@AuntiePam](#): > > It would have been cool for the house to be gone though. Surely they could have found a vacant lot between a couple of houses? I don’t think we’d remember what Walt’s neighbors’ houses looked like. Someone marathoning the show would though and people would have made a huge deal about, especially since this show has so few plot holes in it. What they could have done, though, is found an empty lot and CGI the neighbor’s houses back into it. But, again, Walt wouldn’t have been able actually do anything, like retrieve the ricin, or walk around and see what’s left of his old life. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2013, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/168 "2013-08-13T21:10:45Z")
It might have just been the lighting, but I thought there was blackening as from a fire or explosion in the kitchen area around the dishwasher area. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2013, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/169 "2013-08-13T21:11:59Z")
The house didn’t look burned or destroyed to me. I found myself wondering if it had been seized as evidence and then just abandoned. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2013, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/170 "2013-08-13T21:57:57Z")
Things we know about his 52nd birthday: He told (Jim Beaver) that he isn’t planning to take the gun outside of the city (though of course he’ll lie) He has the ricin (that somehow survived the emptying of the house [and I’m guessing light sockets are a standard place that cops check]) He has no problem with being seen and in fact was almost goading Carol He’s planning to make a stand apparently. I doubt it will be at the house- hard to defend. Any notions where he’ll go? I’m wondering if it’s really his 52nd birthday, though. If I changed my identity, I’m pretty sure my DOB would be the first thing I’d change after my name and SSN, yet his license apparently identified him as being a birthday boy. ---
**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 14, 2013, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/171 "2013-08-14T00:33:39Z")
I’d love to see Jesse end up at a chemistry teacher in the end. Either teaching fellow prisoners or as a High School teacher in witness protection. ---
**Author:** ![Don\_t\_Panic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/don_t_panic/32/398_2.png) [@Don\_t\_Panic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_t_Panic)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2013, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/172 "2013-08-14T00:35:44Z")
I don’t predict many happy endings. As Vince said, “This is Breaking Bad, not Breaking Good”. ---
**Author:** ![Nicest\_of\_the\_Damned](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/8baadc/32.png) [@Nicest\_of\_the\_Damned](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nicest_of_the_Damned)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2013, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/173 "2013-08-14T01:02:13Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > At some point they’ll go to get a few million from the storage house only to find out Marie has stolen the money pile and all of the bubble gum air fresheners. She’d go for the grape, I think! 😃 I keep wondering too how the shoplifting is going to figure in. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2013, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/174 "2013-08-14T01:08:49Z")
I suspect the shoplifting is something they added for flavour early on, when there were fewer characters, that is mostly going to be left dropped…but who knows. I was just now rewatching a bit of the pilot, and musing on how much carnage could have been avoided had Walt just taken off the safety when trying to blow his head off (just before realising the sirens were from fire engines rather than police cars). ---
**Author:** ![Crawlspace](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Crawlspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crawlspace)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2013, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/175 "2013-08-14T01:15:03Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > His conversation with Jesse about Grey Matter sort of finished that topic for me, so I don’t necessarily feel it needs to come up again. . . \ . . . But we never really knew what had happened that resulted in Walt ending up as a school teacher and Gretchen and Elliott ending up super-wealthy. Interesting, I kind of feel the exact opposite. I’m not saying that I’d view the the show as a failure if it doesn’t answer this, but I’d be disappointed. The fact that they’ve danced around the reasons why Walt left Grey Matter so deftly gives me the impression that it was something monumental enough to be a part of his origins story. I mean, he could have been a Nobel Prize winning chemist, instead he’s a meth czar. Why? To put it another way, I think that if it was something mundane they would have explicitly told us already. But instead we get veiled references to an incident on Fourth of July weekend between Walter and Gretchen’s father and brothers that causes Walt to pack his bags and leave her and his research then and there. Even when he’s talking to Jesse about it he stumbles over how to say that something happened and there was a falling out. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2013, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/176 "2013-08-14T01:38:17Z")
Heard some famous song writer interviewed on the radio a few weeks back (sorry, not famous to me and I don’t remember the name) who had an interesting comment pertient to this - part of good story telling is leaving some bits blank enough that the listener (or reader or in this case viewer) gets/has to fill it in for themselves. In this case any details would disappoint I think. The point is to know that his ego was there from the beginning and its ability to drive his choices down maladaptive paths is not some new feature within him. It was contained and constrained within his milquetoast but never not there, just simmered resentfully all that time, taking his diagnosis to reawaken it. The actual event is not as important and would even be a distraction; its purpose is to loosely sketch that background aspect and thereby inform the complex detailed portrait center frame. Likewise the shoplifting served a role: it contrasted the lawbreaking that Marie did, and the lawbreaking Hank did (remember those contraband cigars) with Walt’s. No need for it to do much else (alhough it did - it got Hank owing a favor, which got him involved with Gayle’s murder investigation despite his self-pitying state of mind) ---
**Author:** ![Nicest\_of\_the\_Damned](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/8baadc/32.png) [@Nicest\_of\_the\_Damned](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nicest_of_the_Damned)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2013, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/177 "2013-08-14T01:58:30Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > Heard some famous song writer interviewed on the radio a few weeks back (sorry, not famous to me and I don’t remember the name) who had an interesting comment pertient to this - part of good story telling is leaving some bits blank enough that the listener (or reader or in this case viewer) gets/has to fill it in for themselves. Was it Guy Clark? [http://www.npr.org/2013/07/23/204798806/guy-clark-musics-master-craftsman-on-making-songs-last](http://www.npr.org/2013/07/23/204798806/guy-clark-musics-master-craftsman-on-making-songs-last) > [@](#): > > Likewise the shoplifting served a role: it contrasted the lawbreaking that Marie did, and the lawbreaking Hank did (remember those contraband cigars) with Walt’s. No need for it to do much else (alhough it did - it got Hank owing a favor, which got him involved with Gayle’s murder investigation despite his self-pitying state of mind) I don’t know. I won’t be satisfied unless there is something else. They made too big a deal out of it. Won’t ruin the show for me though. ---
**Author:** ![PSXer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/48db29/32.png) [@PSXer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PSXer)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2013, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/178 "2013-08-14T02:00:56Z")
Maybe it wasn’t really his 52nd birthday but just an elaborate ruse to get free food at Denny’s ---
**Author:** ![LawMonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d6d6ee/32.png) [@LawMonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LawMonkey)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2013, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/179 "2013-08-14T02:22:21Z")
> [@PSXer](#): > > Maybe it wasn’t really his 52nd birthday but just an elaborate ruse to get free food at Denny’s Showing just how far Walter White has fallen! For shame, Walt, for shame! ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2013, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973/180 "2013-08-14T03:28:24Z")
I agree that Marie’s kleptomania seemed like a big deal at one time, but they’ve avoided anything directly to do with it for so long now, that having it play a major role in the resolution would be distracting. As far as Grey Matter goes, I feel the same way as **Martin Hyde**. It too seemed like a big mystery when it was first mentioned, but I feel like I’ve filled in the holes on my own from what we’ve been told and don’t really need to see more. I assume that there was some sort of love triangle, since he and Gretchen had a relationship and she ended up marrying Elliot. I suspect she may have cheated on Walt with Elliot, but that with the two of them together, Walt pretty much had to leave to company or live with the betrayal. Being more-or-less forced out despite being in the right morally would help explain the bitterness and his decision that the only moral concern that makes sense is to do what you can to protect what you have. As for how he ended up teaching high school, it’s worth noting that it’s “Mister White,” not “Doctor White.” I assume he (and possibly the other two) dropped out of grad school to found the company. I’ve read that having a Masters that you received “in passing” as your highest degree can be a kiss of death in some industries, and he’d be intellectually overqualified for any job he could get at that point. I like the idea that he though having summers off would gie him a chance to finish his doctorate, but that it never happened. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/breaking-bad-5-09-blood-money-8-11-2013/665973.md?page=10)