As mentioned in this post, there will now be a “live chat” post for each new episode. Feel free to post thoughts before, during and after the episode here. This will be a place for all the discussion on the new episode before the review post goes up.
I’m actually holding off till the second showing of the episode (people will be coming over for that one but not the first) so I’ll check back in in a few hours.
Live chat in the comments section! Have at it!
~Emilia J
P.S. Some final thoughts:
Charlie Rose
There’s been a lot of talk about fires, and smoking near meth-making…will anything come of that tonight?
That conversation with Saul from the preview, I think it’s from before Walt disappears, and will be the teaser.Jesse’s in an underground dungeon in chains and will most likely have a bucket for a toilet. Kinda like Krazy-8 was once in bike-locked to a pole in Jesse’s basement. Circularity, bitch.
April Julia 
There was absolutely *NO WAY* that Jesse could have pushed that heavy steel grate (door) up while hanging by one hand from the top of that cage.
Also, considering how valuable (and dangerous) Jesse was to them, it seems very unlikely that they would not have a padlock on that grate.
And Walt needs to have his head examined. Of course that’s nothing new.
I hope this episode ends better than it’s started
Since the Charlie Rose interview with Gretchen & Elliot was unflattering enough to renew Walt’s motivation to stay on the the lam, now I’m wondering if the M-60 is not just for Jack’s crew…
I thought that too. He was PISSED!
~EJ
Yep… maybe the ricin would be more likely intended for Gretchen and Elliot but I can’t figure out how in the world he’d ever cause them to ingest it. Maybe send them an annonymous birthday cake? Too weird!
LOL! By the way, I was really glad to see Gretchen and Elliot, as opposed to just her. I would kinda like the ricin to be for them.
~EJ
That vial has G&E’s names all over it! Slow and painful… In addition to letting Walt know he’s still a person of interest in the media, that Jesse’s still alive, and provoking him to take action vs. waiting to be found, that scene lessened any sympathy we might feel for G&E after Walt kills them. If there’s a way to get it in their food/drink, Walt will find it. He used to be very close to Gretchen, so he probably knows of some favorite treat or diet staple that he could sneak it into. I could even see him putting it in something like their coffee grounds and being satisfied knowing they’ll ingest it after he’s dead (I’m assuming he dies at the end). I could picture him being happy killing just one of them, since it would mean lifelong grief for the one who lives.
I really didn’t see Heisenberg coming. I thought he was a thoroughly broken Walt in the first flash-forward. Hadn’t considered he could be both. Maybe the poster should read “Remember My Names”?
omg. andrea.
i want todd to be lowered feet first into a barrel of acid. slowly.
Yeah that would be satisfying. Poor Brock :(
~EJ
nomad, i was skeptical of that escape too — but Jesse looked pretty fit and recovered from torture, so maybe he could have pushed the grate up with his feet while hanging on with both hands? a reach, i know, but maybe.
walt has lost his ever lovin’ mind, that’s for sure. there’s going to be a bloodbath. gretchen and elliott, watch your backs. neo-nazis are directly in the cross-hairs, and Walt won’t let Lydia step in and take over his empire. Jesse? idk. Assuming Brock is in the Nazi compound now as well, so that complicates things.
The fact that they didn’t show Jesse actually somehow managing to get out of the cage speaks volumes.
And like I said, considering how important it was to them to keep Jesse in that cage, there’s *no way* they would not have a padlock on it.
I wonder why they do stuff like this* when they could so *easily* come up with a more plausible way for him to escape.
*of course the answer is that they needed an excuse to kill Andrea.
The problem is you want a plausible explanation for every event in a story based on a Chemistry teacher (from Albequerque no less) turned Drug KingPin/Sociopath… Enjoy the show. Writers are the best (and I guarantee you can find the least number of plot holes in BB than in any other TV show)
“The fact that they didn’t show Jesse actually somehow managing to get out of the cage speaks volumes.” I’m not sure about that. There’s quite a lot they haven’t showed us in these last few eps, I’m guessing because of time constraints. As for a padlock, maybe they’d felt more of a need for one if Jesse had been acting defiant, like someone likely to try an escape. But he was injured and docile and they DID put up that pic of Andrea and Brock to dissuade him. Plus he was hand/anklecuffed. If I’m skeptical of anything in that scene, it’s of how easily he unlocked his cuffs. ;) Can you really open them with a paperclip? I’ll have to google this…
I almost forgot… when I saw Jesse making his escape from that cage, I spontaneously started hearing the old “Spiderman” theme song in my head! ;)
Hahahaha.
Weight of the grate on a hinge is 8 pounds or so. But would have made a helluva clang when he pushed it up and it swang over and hit.
Brock would be in state custody the next day and safe.
Major plot hole is ignoring what Huell would have reported that Hank said Walter did. Enough to get a warrant for Skyler’s house. They would have perhaps found the original recording of Walt’s statement (no sign of whether she gave it to sis but they haven’t been having time together). House in real life would be unliveable after a police search relating to dead agents.
VG is breezing by loose ends, not reconciling them.
You can’t really have any idea how much that lid weighs without knowing how big it is or exactly what type of metal tubing it’s made of. But like you, I thought the loud noise it would make when flipped open from the inside was another unrealistic part of that, which is, of course, why they couldn’t show it. They EASILY could have made that more realistic, but for whatever reason, they dropped the ball on this detail. I’m also not sure why they showed him unfolding the paper clip twice. For that matter, I’m not sure why they felt compelled to have them keep Jesse in that outdoor pit either. But the show doesn’t live or die from this flub.
re: “Major plot hole is ignoring Huell…”
Yep, too many loose ends and not enough time to tie them up.
Especially when they waste an entire segment on Marie expressing to her therapist her dark desire to poison a family member. Van Oster would have brought Huell back to the DEA (provided he went along voluntarily) probably before Walt made his last phone call to Skyler.
Meanwhile, Saul has gone into hiding, so Huell won’t get any guidance from him. And where the hell is Kuby during all this?
Without either of those two around to coach him, how long before Huell would certainly tell somebody else what Hank told him (including that Walt killed Jesse)? Not long, I’ll bet. Wonder what happened to Saul’s schedule-shredding gal (what;s her name? Francesca?)
Yes Francesca.
I REALLY wish, more than ever now, that AMC had given them two full seasons instead of these two shorter halves. I read somewhere that it saved them a LOT of money to be able to call both halves Season 5. Something to do w/contracts. They easily had enough material for full thirteen-episode seasons.
~EJ
Yep. I agree. They could easily have done two full 13-episode seasons. Maybe if Sony/AMC execs had fully realized two years ago what a hit this show would be in its “5th” season, they would have gone that route. Or knowing as they have for at least the last two years that that they only had 16 episodes to wrap all of this up, maybe VG should have been more judicious about what was included.
I also think Lydia could go after Skyler. She didn’t seem satisfied with Todd’s assurances, and it sounded like things are headed to trial, so she could get riled up.
~EJ
Yep, I agree, but that depends on if she has any connection with anybody who will do it.
Not enough time remaining to bring in Czech assassins for that job.
Lydia created her own risk by showing up at the car wash. I wonder if she paid cash?
But that said, Skyler has no idea who that woman is. Nobody still alive at the DEA suspects Lydia, and they won’t suspect her unless Jack’s crew didn’t get every copy of Jesse’s video.
creepy creepy creepy Todd, with his shy but proud little grin when Jesse told about him shooting Drew Sharp. That evil boy was PROUD. Didn’t know which way that was going to go for a while — maybe Jack disapproves of offing kids…. thought for a minute Uncle Jack was going to shoot Todd.
No way, child murder doesn’t phase a guy like Uncle Jack.
So many times they could kill Jesse but keep him alive, almost unrealistically, and for…?
~EJ
I was glad that they did at least have Jack tell Todd that ‘they already hit the jackpot’ and didn’t need to keep cooking meth. Todd seems to have assumed the greedy mindset that Walt had/is still clinging to, as if no matter how much they have, it’s never enough, and never mind that for them to continue cooking brings all sorts of risks with it (compared to cashing out now). Todd/Jack are almost in the same position Walt was in when he could have cashed out for $5 million.
I think it really is more about Lydia for Todd, and Todd didn’t want to admit it. Greed’s in there too for sure, but I think Lydia is his biggest motivation.
~EJ
Yeah, they made that pretty clear. That’s why I was glad that they had Jack say what he did. and of course, Jack figured out Todd’s main motivation too. That all worked for me.
That decision, along with Jesse’s escape attempt, is what led them to make another decision that I think will be fateful: shooting Andrea. But hey, Todd was as polite as always about it. Yikes!
It’s another example of them showing drug-related deaths spreading farther and farther away from those directly involved in the business. Aside from the victims of the mid-air collision, I guess Drew Sharp was the first. Now Andrea. The other thing is, now both Walt and Jesse have lost someone close to them. And Jr. created the same sense of loss to Walt (without actually dying) by telling what he did in that phone call. So maybe that’s how they’re going to handle that, by Walt’s family absolutely, positively not wanting anything to do with him any more (even when he’s still trying to give them lots of money). Same (maybe even worse) sense of loss for Walt, without any more deaths in the family.
I thought that too, about Jr, huge loss for Walt. Neither of his “sons” wanted his money this season.
~EJ
Which has me thinking he may give it to charity to one-up G & E. Flaw in my theory is that it won’t count unless he can find a way to let G & E know he did it, but if that gets publicized, the government might try to pirate it. While watching them on TV his reaction kept ratcheting up, but when G said the nice Walter White is no longer with us, he was galvanized. Otherwise, he can’t find a way to give it to his family and he is running out of time.
And I’m including the $$ he plans to get from the Jack pack.
Loki, there’s no “reply” button next to your post, so I’m replying here. You said, “While watching them on TV his reaction kept ratcheting up, but when G said the nice Walter White is no longer with us, he was galvanized.” Might it be said that Walt’s in a granite state – of mind? :)
In case anybody else thought the commercial breaks were longer than usual, you weren’t imagining things.
Actual runtimes
Tonight’s episode (S5E15): 53 minutes
Last week’s episode (S5E14): 47 minutes
Previous episode (S5E13): : 46 minutes
Yeah, they’re usually 47.
That first commercial break was super short though. No time to get up for food or drink.
~EJ
Wow! BrBa won best drama at the Emmys and Anna Gunn won best supporting actress! They also won for picture editing for “Gliding Over All.”
~EJ
Since Walt was trying to turn himself in before he saw that Charlie Rose segment on TV,
I think that what I said in the ‘Breaking Bad Season 5 Part 2 Predictions and Detective Work’ thread is about accurate:
“Rose would probably cover Walt’s background with an “unflattering” slant, maybe even interviewing Gretchen & Elliott, who might tell a story about Walt that would infuriate him. Rose might also reveal something that makes Walt realize that Jesse is still alive (Maybe the resurgence of the blue meth? …which Walt would not know about otherwise… ”
This could be a resurgence of the Heisenberg possessiveness about his ‘signature blue meth.’
The only thing is (which has probably already been mentioned) it seems implausible that Walt could know that Blue Meth = Jesse’s still alive. Walt spent months cooking blue meth with Todd, yet he also expects Todd to never be capable of cooking blue meth on his own? How could he turn over a functioning operation to Lydia/Todd/Declan without showing them how to make meth the same way he & Todd had always made it? Todd himself told Lydia that he thought he could get the purity up and the blue color too.
Still, I guess we’ll have to overlook that, because the two points that they seemed to be trying a bit TOO hard to convey in that short Charlie Rose segment (and which seemed to piss Walt off the most) were how Gretchen & Elliott tried to diminish his early contribution to Grey Matter, and the fact that the blue meth has made a resurgence.
It can NOT be an accident that those two snippets of info were conveyed in the few seconds they showed of that Rose interview.
I guess it’s possible that when he was handing off the business to Todd, Walt intentionally left out a step that creates the signature blue color, and that he knows that only Jesse knows that step. Still seems unbelievable though, considering that Walt & Todd had produced blue meth for many months prior to that.
Notice the change in Walt’s facial expression when Elliot says, “We’re talking about a person who was there early on but who had virtually nothing to do with the creation of the company…”
Yep. He’s pissed off now!
I think he was more upset about G&E by far. IIRC he said before that Gray Matter was built on his ideas and research.
Well he knew that Todd/Declan weren’t having an easy time with the cook, b/c of Lydia’s visit. And Todd had struggled with it when he was working with Walt, so I could see that Walt might not have great faith in Todd’s abilities to run a lab on his own. He was even like that w/Jesse back in the day, shocked that Jesse could cook w/o him and be almost as good as him and that was after a lot more time working together.
But has Walt figured out Jesse’s alive from that CR segment? I’m not sure. Maybe he just thinks it’s Todd and Jack and them and seeing that they too were profiting off his “life’s work” only made him want to kill them even more.
So I think he could have put it together but I’m not sure he did. Usually I watch twice on show nights but now that everyone comes over for the encore, I’m only seeing it once on Sundays. Will definitely have to rewatch!
And great job on your predictions!!
~EJ
Emilia, re: “But has Walt figured out Jesse’s alive from that CR segment? I’m not sure. Maybe he just thinks it’s Todd and Jack and them and seeing that they too were profiting off his “life’s work” only made him want to kill them even more.”
Yeah, that’s probably it. The mention of the blue meth that they forcibly wedged into that brief snippet of the Rose interview might have been to re-ignite Walt’s anger at Jack. After all, before Walt left ABQ, he had said he wanted Jack killed for stealing his life’s work. For Jack (the thief of most of Walt’s fortune) to (presumably) be to able to keep making that kind of fortune just adds insult to injury. And in a way, it also resembles what Walt feels that G&E did to him.
So maybe the reason for Todd’s phone call telling Walt about the messy situation with Declan and the new management… was so he would know Todd (and thus, Jack) were now running the meth operation, not Declan.
The main part of that Rose interview consisted of G&E retroactively metaphorically stealing his life’s work one MORE time, after having literally done so (in Walt’s mind) when they did whatever it was that caused Walt to sell out.
With only 53 minutes of program remaining, I bet that they either do a very poor job of explaining why Walt sold his interest in Gray Matter, or (more likely) punt on that altogether.
I guess I could also believe that the mention of the blue meth might not make Walt KNOW that Jesse must still be alive, but it COULD cause him to suspect it, especially considering that by this point Walt is quite willing to jump to conclusions.
So to recap, Jack stole most of Walt’s fortune (same thing he thinks G&E did), then Walt finds out that Jack is apparently making a new fortune using the chemistry process that Walt designed, and now he realizes that MAYBE Jack Welker may have also “welched” on their deal by not killing Jesse. That’s just too much for Walt to handle, and a newly re-invigorated Heisenberg is back one last time.
Hopefully they’ll show us what happened to his barrel of money…
Didn’t look like he had it in that Volvo. ;)
Walt knew the quality was poor first because of Lydia’s visit. Second, Uncle Jack asked for two cooks with Todd to bring him up to speed – instead of Walt’s offer to pay him 3x what he paid for the prison hits – in exchange for killing Jesse. (They settled on one cook.) That told Walt how desperately Todd needed help. The only other person Walt knew who could cook even close to him was Jesse.
True, but Todd wasn’t cooking the lower quality batches that precipitated Lydia’s visit to the car wash. Walt had handed over the entire operation to Lydia & Declan, and production had been moved to Declan’s junkyard in Arizona (although Walt may not have known the details about that, he did tell Lydia he left her with a viable operation). Maybe Walt thought Todd was still cooking. If so, it’s another part of a loose end they didn’t tie down.
Sometime after Lydia’s visit to the carwash (after Jack’s crew took out Declan’s crew), Todd called Walt and told him (euphemistically) that things had gotten messy, so there was a change in management, and that ‘it’s all good now.’ So, Walt should have known that Todd wasn’t involved in the cook before that, but that call let him know Todd probably was involved after.
Todd also told Lydia that he thought he could bring the purity up, and in fact, purity was improved compared to Declan’s cook.
Besides, high purity was not the only was to get the signature blue color (in the Breaking Bad mythology, that is). When Walt/Jesse/Mike met Declan in the desert, Walt mentioned that Declan’s meth was died blue to ‘ape his product.’
The problem VG created with all this was by coming up with the plot device of the “blue meth” which not only actually would be a less pure product, but is also easy to fake. He would have been a lot better off making Walt’s 99+% pure product the most clear, glass-like meth ever produced, compared to ordinary cloudy meth. Cloudiness due to impurity can be a lot harder to eliminate than a color (which can be added). And the other problem is that illegal drugs like these are always diluted (usually more than once; it’s called being “Stepped On”) by the time they show up at the street level. There are only two reasons for the obsession over very high purity: First, (as Walt said in that desert meeting) higher yield means more finished product from a given amount of difficult-to-obtain Methylamine precurser; and second, a higher purity product makes the most out of each difficult-to-hide shipment headed overseas.
brows.. You’re right.
I forgot that the meeting where Walt asked Jack to kill Jesse meeting came after all that other stuff I just mentioned above. So disregard all that.
Like you said, in that meeting, Jack specifically told Walt that the blue color was an issue. So it’s reasonable to assume that Walt might associate the re-emergence of the blue meth with Jack’s capture of Jesse.
In this case, it wouldn’t actually matter than in the months since Walt went on the lam that Todd COULD have managed to produce a better cook with blue color on his own. All that matters is what Walt believes, based on the last thing he heard about it from Jack.
And Nomad – great job with the predictions!
Two of my favorite parts:
@~13 minutes, Walt (to Saul): “It’s not over until… cough, cough, cough)
@~27 mintutes, Walt finds & puts on the Heisenberg hat, then we hear familiar music as he trudges up the driveway, and then as he reaches the gate, and gets just a little glimpse of the first little part of an 8-mile walk, more coughing as the tempo of that infamous music sloooooows down.
Yes, great moments both!
~EJ
Todd told Lydia the batch was 92%, but he told Jesse it was 96%?
Did enough time elapse for those to be two different batches?
That’s how I read it, two separate batches.
As I watched Walt’s facial expression while he was hearing Gretchen say that the Walter White she knew is no longer alive, I’m starting to wonder if Walt really has that much animosity toward them after all. I don’t see Walt being able to get to them anyway. What’s he going to do… make them put out a retraction of what they told Charlie Rose? That “damage” is already out there, and besides, that pales in comparison to what Walt himself has done.
Maybe Walt has finally realized that about the only way he can provide for his family now is by getting himself killed (or giving himself up). First, Marie told him he should go ahead and die, then Saul suggested that was going to happen soon anyway, then Jr. told him to go ahead and die, ASAP.
But since Walt’s best laid plans are all going awry (he can’t even mail a box full of money, can he?), maybe Walt can’t even manage to get himself killed in a shootout with a gang of neo-nazis, and maybe Jesse does end up killing him. Maybe that’s what Walt wants at that point. If so, I wonder if Jesse will get away with that?
I’m sure some will be hoping that Jesse will end up in Alaska with Brock, but in the real-world that would sure be a stretch.
…or maybe the surprise ending nobody expects is, Walt is unscathed after taking out Jack’s crew with the M-60, but then Marie ops from out of nowhere and offers Walt a purple birthday cake?
Nah, I guess we’ll have to wait for the spoofs on youtube for that. ;)
I was really hoping they’d reveal the vacuum cleaner guy to be Winston Wolf from Pulp Fiction. Oh well, the guy who did play him did a pretty good job.
Also, how heartbreaking was Jesse’s reaction to poor Andrea’s death? I guess that was what VG was referring to in that interview where he said Aaron Paul had a great moment of acting in the second-to-last episode. Ozymandias put me on the floor, and that moment in Granite State was like a swift kick to the gut while I was down. It’ll almost be a relief when the show ends.
Robert Forster was perfect for that role, and he probably cost less than Harvey Keitel, yet still was clearly a nod to Tarantino.
I wonder if Walt manages to make it back to the cabin, or if he had to skedaddle out of there (on foot?) and leave his barrel behind. If not, his money supply just got cut by about 99%.
People in the bar can describe him & what he was wearing, and footprints in the snow leave an easy-to-follow trail. Seems like he’d have to hitch a ride with somebody (“say, you don’t mind if I just take a nap on the back seat, do you? I’m just tired… definitely NOT hiding from somebody or anything like that…” ;)
“say, you don’t mind if I just take a nap on the back seat, do you? I’m just tired… definitely NOT hiding from somebody or anything like that…” LOL!!!
My thoughts in poor english (sorry about that):
– Lydia connected to Grey Matter in some way? Why Gretchen is so sure that Walt is out of the business?
– What bothered Walt and force him to come back? The blue meth circulating again or Elliot saying that he wans’t important to Grey Matter?
– And, lastly, I think that in the next episode we are going to see the story about Walt selling his shares of the company, and the story behind that.
On the other hand, I think is obvius that Jesse will kill Todd, and he will keep the kid.
This blog is awesome :)
re: ‘Why is Gretchen so sure that Walt is out of the business?’
What she’s saying is regardless of whatever may or may not have happened to “Heisenberg,” the ‘sweet, caring (yada, yada) Walter White that she once knew is gone forever.’
I think Walt will buy/rent another vehicle in town, drive back and pick up his barrel (no way he’s leaving it for the Disappearer Man) and head down to the ABQ with retribution on his mind.
Maybe Lydia is going to cruelly squelch Todd’s hopes of romance and he’ll kill her, but I’ve pretty much given up on any other predictions.
I’m still not recovered from Ozymandias. Man. That one took me down.
re: “Maybe Lydia is going to cruelly squelch Todd’s hopes of romance and he’ll kill her,”
It would be nice to see how/why/where they try to take this in the 53 minutes of remaining airtime.
I think all they have time for is that Jack would already have killed Jesse if not for Todd’s crush on Lydia. Jesse is going to do something – maybe during a cook – that contributes to their downfall. Maybe Jesse learned more about chemistry than just how to cook meth (as implausible as that seems).
Speaking about the finale,VG said to remember “woodworking” so I am wondering if that has anything to do with Jesse’s story in S3E9 about how he kept making better and better quality wooden boxes in high school shop class?
One of the other principals said the finale has something to do with the motto on the NH license plate (“Live Free of Die”), so that’s another clue about the bru-ha-ha that we all know is coming. Both Walt and Jesse are no longer free, but Jesse is the one who is least free right now, so I think that especially after what happened to Andrea, Jesse is going to come up with another creative solution to his predicament.
Is anyone else wondering how/why on-the-lam-Walt could end up with the last name “Lambert” (Skyler’s maiden name)?
Ed (vacuum cleaner repair guy) is so careful that he makes Walt ride over 2,000 miles in an empty propane tank, but he lets Walt choose the same last name as his wife’s maiden name? Walt probably would not have any choice of the name anyway, if Ed is doing a truly professional job (using an identity that already exists in the records somewhere). Even if Ed is creating a brand new identity out of thin air, there is *NO WAY* this guy would even consider using Skyler’s maiden name. He also mentions that Skyler has gone back to using her maiden name (although that is months later). I’m pretty sure that a guy like this would never do what he does without checking into the backgrounds of all family members, so it seems pretty likely he had to know what Skyler’s maiden name was when he created Walt’s new identity.
I sure hope there will be a good reason why VG chose to have Walt use that name, but it seems like they only did that (as well as having him re-arrange his bacon at the Dennys) to fake us out into thinking Skyler was already dead by that point, or to show us how much Walt wanted to express his continuing love for/solidarity with Skyler (as in, ‘Well, she no longer wants to be known as Mrs. White, hmmm? OK, then I’LL be MR. LAMBERT!’)
Unbelievable! And as far as we can tell at this point, it was un-necessary, too.
FYI: http://insidetv.ew.com/2013/09/23/breaking-bad-granite-state-writer/
Was bringing Gretchen and Elliott back always part of the plan?
Peter Gould: “It’s tricky. I can’t say too much because … the story’s not over yet. And there’s a lot of story yet to come in the next episode. I’ll tell you one thing: It was so thrilling to get Gretchen and Elliott back into the story…”
Hmmmm…
If there’s “a lot of story yet to come in the next episode” they’re going to have to tell it pretty fast.
I’m still wondering if they are going to connect Gray Matter’s meteoric success to illegal drugs… Maybe not Walt’s Blue meth, but maybe some other form, maybe prescription drugs, and try to set up a metaphor between what Walt did (illegally) and G&E’s even larger fortune which was acquired legally. I could even believe that they could connect that why Walt sold his interest in Gray Matter…
The thing is, I’m not sure what Gray Matter actually does. It seems to be a research company more than a pharmaceutical company. Maybe Gray Matter’s research helped pharmaceutical companies produce drugs that are widely abused?
VG has taken a few swings at all sorts of things, the most major of which is the US health care system leaving people like Walt (and Hank) in a severe bind, through no fault of their own.
So maybe we’re going to see Gray Matter somehow implicated as contributing to that probkem somehow? The most likely way being that G&E acquired a lot more than $80M doing something that contributed to a prescription drug abuse problem that’s even bigger than Walt’s Blue Meth.
I just realized something: All that stuff that was made public about Walt-the-meth-kingpin in this episode…
HOW does anyone investigating this case know any of that? The only people who DO know are not in custody, and they aren’t talking to the Feds. The creators of this show have committed the mistake of assuming all the characters in the show know what the viewers know, when in fact, most of them not only have no way to prove this, they really don’t have any way to confirm any suspicions they might have.
Skyler doesn’t actually know most of the specific details that were made public, and of course she’d be saying as little as possible. This also brings up another question: How could Skyler have told Jr. “EVERYthing” when she herself didn’t really know that much about what Walt did? The only side of it she ever saw was the huge stacks of money coming in? As averse as she was to Jr. finding out, there’s no way she would have so easily fessed up, no matter how much she wanted to get it all off her chest, not without confirmation that she was really, really, really going to HAVE to tell Jr. Far more likely that Skyler would have told Marie the same thing she told her the last time Marie got all snippily high & mighty with her: “SHUT UP, SHUT UP, SHUT UP” (and also to get out before she Skyler called the cops).
Walt’s phone call to Skyler earned her a partial pass, but he also didn’t specifically implicate himself in anything (and he wasn’t under oath, either).
Jesse’s last phone call to Walt was undoubtedly recorded by the same system they showed in the previous episode: an audio recorder in the car; the same bullet-riddled SUV that was towed away by Jack’s truck. That recording is gone.
Skinny Pete and Badger do have some idea about specifics, and they are known associates of Jesse (so they would be contacted), but they were also out of the scheme of things for quite a while. Their last involvement was in procuring the large cases (that ironically were marked “Vamanos Pest” only because that was free, something that in the real world would never happen) and they probably remember that. But Vamanos Pest has been out of the loop for a while too. Since they moonlighted as burglars, maybe they squeezed them for more info? How much do they really know? Not much.
Presumably, Jack’s crew gathered up every copy of both Jesse’s video and Walt’s fake confession video. But maybe they left one behind because a disk is shown lying on the floor when the two DEA agents charge into Marie’s house? Of course, Marie could tell them selected parts of what she saw on Walt’s fake confession video, but without the actual video, that doesn’t go anywhere. As the grieving widow who expressed a desire to poison somebody (if that ever surfaces), her credibility is not that great without some type of corroborating evidence.
Maybe Hank had some type of flow chart or other documents left behind in his garage, stuff that Jack’s crew didn’t know they needed to recover? If so, the DEA guys would certainly find it, because two of them must remember that they delivered many file folders of case records to Hank’s garage. The primary piece of evidence that allowed Hank to piece it all together, the “Leaves of Grass” book with Gale’s inscription would not mean diddly-squat to other investigators, and there’s also no clear chain-of-custody. Where did that book come from? Nobody else will know, much less be able to prove (on the basis of initials “W.W” – come on! No way!) Hank knew that even he couldn’t build a case from that.
Gomez & Hank’s cell phone tracking data might have led authorities to their bodies. Or maybe they’re still missing, and just presumed dead. If so, and if Walt’s confession video ever surfaces (e.g.: that disk on the floor at Marie’s house, whereas Jesse’s video was on SD card), that could provide an interesting conundrum for investigators: Did did Walt kill Hank, or did Hank kill Walt?
All of this adds up to a huge plot hole that will likely be left unfilled.
They could easily have shed some light on exactly WHAT evidence the DEA has to implicate Walter White in crimes so widespread that Skyler & the kids have lost everything.
As it stands now, the Feds have taken down Skyler & the kids for Walt’s crimes that are known only to viewers of the show. I know that asset forfeiture laws allows the Feds to take whatever they want, from whomever they want, almost without any reason. But they still have to have something linking the property to drug crimes, and AFAIK, they do not have any evidence of that.
The source of the funding for the car wash would be a subject for IRS investigation that would play out over many months if not years, but not their house.
Even if Jack’s crew didn’t manage to recover Jesse’s confession video
So I’m thinking that the ultimate irony here might be that if Walt had just done what Jack forcefully suggested to him, and acted like nothing happened, instead of creating that crazy incident with Skyler,
…things might have gone a lot better for him.
Hello all :) Trying to get into VG’s head, I have a pretty wild guess of my own.
Walt turned 100% Heisenberg when he saw E&G on the TV. He no longer cares about providing for his family. He will blackmail Gray Matter’s owners with the help of a pre-paid phone or a similar method, in an attempt to force them to publically credit his role in the company. He then goes to fetch the ricin before going to the Nazis. Walt now MacGyver-rigs some car-mount for the machine gun so he’d be able to operate it by himself from the Volvo.
Todd or Jack (or both) are killed and then Walt discovers Jesse. Jesse has no intention of forgiving him, steals the ricin from Walt and puts it to use on Walt! Jesse will then live the rest of his life as an outlaw, without the chance to love another person or affect their lives.
Possible…rebels have made a few of those in Syria, using a PS3 controller. The outlandish predictions are likely to be the ones that score. I think he will wipe out the Jack Pack, get all the money, and give it to a charity to one-up G&E and prove the nice guy is still around. Before that’s done, Lydia will have Jack Pack kill Sky, and Jr. may be collateral damage. Jesse will be saved and convert to ally.