Showing posts with label AMC. Show all posts
Showing posts with label AMC. Show all posts
She has to die because the climate is getting ruthless, and the Cousins are proving too efficient not to be thrown into direct conflict with the White family again. Average shows (or Lost) would have teased the chase for at least two more episodes, but not Breaking Bad. "Caballo Sin Nombre" brings our impeccable hitmen straight to the most volatile loose end connecting Walt to Heisenberg, and then wastes no time in putting them literally in the man's bedroom -- which is where things get really intriguing.
What if Walt weren't there? Had Saul not enlisted his cleaner, Mike, to bug the White house to monitor Skyler, our disgruntled heroine and Walter Jr. would've surely met a horrible denouement at the end of an absurdly shiny axe. Thankfully, Mike calls a henchman with "something you should know," and passes off the intel to...Gus? It makes sense that the undercover kingpin would have some seriously scary enforcers to counter his saccharine Clark Kent routine, but if he's big enough to reign in the Cousins...then who put them on Walt in the first place?
This show has played with the timeline before, and if we read the events of the past two episodes linearly, then there's clearly another big bad out there gunning for Walt. Yet, if you treat the Cousins' introduction as a flashback in the vein of the plane crash flashforward's from last season, then Gus Frings is one cold motherfucker. Mike knows it, Saul knows it, and Walt should have known you can't just walk away from someone like that. He did imply, after all, that his family was his reason for getting out. In supervillain logic, no family = no problems. Its all about the money with these people, Saul's muttered "I'm jealous" at Jesse's duffel bag of cash proved that. Either possibility would make for good television, but shit could really hit the fan with the latter.
[UPDATE: ok, so while Gus is still cold, the Cousins don't work for him. Rather, they claim the Salamanca cartel, and their business with Walt is far from over. See here:]
Speaking of shits and fans, Jesse finally getting payback against his parents by buying the house they barred him entry to? Priceless. Using Saul to lowball them into paying less than half its market value? Even better. I'm still not quite sure where the "bad guy" lifestyle will take him, but he's embracing it as feverishly as Walt is running from it.
Two episodes in; so far, so good.
Take note, "No Mas" is a great example of how a season should begin: a few teases to get us interested in the drama to come, all of which paying service to the central moral quandary that will push us forward from here out: facing up to who and what you are. Its a dilemma bound for a messy epiphany riddled with plenty of red herrings and the occasional dead body, and of course we were presented two sides of the conflict: Walt, who's running from his problems, and Jesse, who's accepted his fate as "the bad guy." Slap me if I'm putting too much weight on the scene, but the darkly funny moment where Jesse notes Walt's debris-damaged windshield says everything we need to know about their new dynamic: Jesse will out the problem, while Walt will let it fester.
If you want further proof, just rewind to his mini-meltdown in the school gym: trying to absolve himself of guilt, and in doing so comes off to the school as the completely maladjusted nerd he'd always been. to those how know better, it reveals how much he'd been thinking of his role in the tragedy. More specifically, he'd been desperately extrapolating on how that role could be smaller. As the A.V. Club's Donna Bowman puts it, "if Walter can make the experimental apparatus complicated enough, then anything in the world could reasonably be construed as affecting the results." I wont go as far to say there's some form of self-hatred beneath his using logic to sweep his failings under the rug, but there's definitely fear. It hurts to call my boy a coward, but if the boots fit...
Speaking of boots, lets talk about the Cousins: their introduction - exiting the Benz to join a stream of worshipers crawling to a desert altar - was weirdly perfect (and perfectly weird) and left me damn intrigued, but I have to admit that they'd be much cooler had I not seen The Matrix Reloaded, which ruined that trope for me. Everything I liked about the Twins was instantly negated thanks to a) the utterly tacky "ghost" ability, and b) their speech pattern, which got old fast. Thankfully, the Cousins are silent so far, and from the way they took a smoke break after gunning down an entire truckload of migrant workers, they don't seem to take the job too deathly serious - and I love them damn boots. The verdict is still out on whether there will be any lightness to the remainder of their appearances this season.
One of those appearances just has to put them face to face with our new Jesse. The question, then, is if Jesse has accepted his bad guy role, how will he react to the new pressures? Which way does he go from here? I could believably see a rise into Human Torch levels of reckless, self-destructive badassery, but maybe I'm selling Vince Gilligan and company short? Jesse hit that note last season, so maybe he really is changed and at some sense of peace. I missed something the first time I watched his fireside rehab epiphany: midway through the group leader's confession, Jesse looks to the guy on his right, giving him the "are you shitting me" face. Whether he was really thinking a) this is bullshit, get me out of here, b) now I understand and can move on, or c) I guess I'm not that bad, I'd bet that what did click won't leave him curled up in a meth den again.
In final notes, thank you for having Walt confess to Skyler what he really does. The cat-and-mouse game that could keep the two running in circles away from the truth would get old fast, and its honestly beneath this show. Now that the hard part is out in the open, we get to see how the second-toughest lady on television (Dushku, its all you, gurl) gets to work the situation. After being led around by her belly for most of last season, our woman scorned is overdue for a Lady Macbeth-style push to get what she really wants. This is gonna be a great season.
