Breaking Bad 5.09 "Blood Money" 8/11/2013

In theory, sure, but I’m not sure what interest they’d have beyond making sure he wasn’t breaking some kind of non-compete clause. Either way, I think when Walt said “It looks like the one we planted on Gus’ car” was the writer’s way of making it very clear that it was Hank.

Another thought: does Hank’s removing of ‘Leaves of Grass’ leave that key piece of evidence inadmissable? If so, could Marie, a known kleptomaniac, confess to stealing the book, thus allowing Hank to claim he found it in his own house?

Just thinking out loud over here

they think of everything don’t they!! :smack:

If it ever went to court, probably but from the looks of things court is not where its headed.

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.

If anything, the pacing felt very rushed to me (with the notable exception of the flash-forward opening, which was stellar), especially seen in relation to the show as a whole. Boom, there’s the confrontation between Walt and Hank already. Wait, what the heck just happened? I think everybody had expected that to be a much more drawn-out affair.

I’m bracing myself for some flak for this, but honestly, it didn’t feel right to me. It felt too much like what happens on lesser shows or movies when the writers realize that they’re running out of time.

And then later, on “Talking Bad”, when Vince was asked why it happened so soon, he basically said: “Well, we only have seven episodes left”. Um, yeah, Vince, that’s not actually a good reason.

That is relatively normal to me. Growing up my stepfather would go out in the middle of the night and water the front lawn and flowers in JUST (no robe) a t-shirt and whitey-tighties.

Well, now you have! Only reason I mentioned Wire is so many folk seem to bandy these two as the best show ever. Which has always confused me, because I see them as so different.

Wire was such an ensemble, with different characters taking the leads in different seasons, and vastly different “themes” from season to season. Along the lines of Hill Street Blues, NYPD Blue, and other ensemble shows.

Whereas BB really all revolves around Walt. And if you find yourself not really caring what happens to Walt, then you really don’t have as much reason to keep watching.

“Meth, and a bit with a dog, that’s what they want.”

I agree that it’s not a good reason but Vince likes to be a little sly with the audience at times. He knows how this thing is going to end and I can’t wait to see how he gets there.

I was worried that the writers might take the easy route and tease the whole Hank&Walt cat-n-mouse game for a bunch of episodes. That would have driven me nuts. By bringing it to a head in the first episode of the second half tells me that Vince meant it when he said:

And I have no idea where it’s leading from here. Which is as it should be and is the way I want it to be.

The ST discussion was funny in and of itself, but it also served to demonstrate that Jesse is depressed and can’t go back to his normal life. The carwash scene was showing that Walt was not lying about leaving the drug game but the game wasn’t going to leave him alone (Lydia). It was also entertaining because he was acting just like Gus, a major character you wouldn’t know about. The Walt/Hank showdown has been simmering almost the whole series. If anything it seemed like the direct confrontation went faster than most people were expecting because Hank found the book in just the previous episode.

Walt has never been gunshy about traipsing around in his underwear. It was also the dead of night. Is it really that unusual? If I saw a guy getting the mail or the paper like that I wouldn’t think much of it.

Geebus! If they think so far it’s been pusillanimous then this is gonna get ugly - for reals, Yo!

Here’s some random fun stuff from around the intertubes.

Was it the writers who couldn’t wait, or Walt? If Walt thinks he has six months to live, he’s not gonna want to leave a mess for Skylar and the kids. So he has to feel Hank out, see what he knows.

I could have done without the GPS tracker though – it did seem odd that Walt would look for it. The missing book was enough, if Walt is even slightly paranoid. Walt noticed it was missing soon after Hank was in the bathroom. Hank was in the bathroom for a long time and came out acting weird.

Walt might have thought back to all the clues he’d given Hank and finally figured out that Hank’s not as dumb as Walt thought.

But it wasn’t too soon, IMHO. Walt had to know what Hank was thinking, and ASAP.

I’d let her grow my business exponentially.

Thanks for the responses, folk. Enjoy the rest of the show.

Yeah, doctors essentially set the line for an over/under.

I think Walter cooked up the first batch of ricin in S2E1, when the two realized how irrational and violent Tuco could become suddenly. In the next episode Tuco took them out to his little shack in the desert to wait for the Cousins to take them down to Mexico (we were also introduced to Tio, though we wouldn’t actually see the Cousins until S3). Walter dumped the entire batch of ricin into Tuco’s burrito, but Tio knocked it on the floor, shouting “J’accuse!” at Walter (with his eyes).

And that was what happened to the first batch of ricin.

But it introduced us to the poison and the extraction process (from “ricin beans,” as Jesse put it), so that in season 4 Walter just had to produce a vial and say he’d made some more to kill Gus.

:smiley:

Even with the freaky way her nose moves when she talks? Shudder

I get’cha. The Wire had Bunk, Omar, Lester, Marlo, Frank, Ziggy, Bodie, Wallace!, etc. If that show had focused on McNulty like BB does on Walt, I would have bailed, because I cared very little for McNulty.

Something that makes up for it on BB though is catching the connections through the seasons, and being there for Walt’s progression from Mr. Chips to Scarface.

Maybe you’ll be bored someday and try BB again.