I See You
Hank is rushed to hospital and Walt lies to Gus so he can join the family in their vigil. Unfortunately, Walt learns that he cannot keep secrets from his new boss.
This is not a flawless episode, but momentum finally seems to be building again after the slow start to the season. We see little of Hank in this installment, a smart decision that builds tension for the audience and gives Marie time to express her anger and distress. Betsy Brandt gets the spotlight for once and she does very well with the attention.
This decision leads to one of my favourite conversations in Breaking Bad. The family are eating in the hospital cafeteria and Marie is hyper-focusing on how clean the cutlery is. Walt recognises that his sister-in-law is trying to divert her anxiety into something she can control and tries to reassure her, sharing how he felt when he had his lobectomy.1 Walter shows vulnerability, admitting that he was afraid of dying and telling Marie “I’m not half the man your husband is.” This exchange reminds me of the intervention scene in Gray Matter (Series 1, Episode 5), one of Walt’s finest moments, and I don’t think that is a coincidence. We are being reminded that our protagonist is still capable of empathy and humility, despite all the horrible things he has done.
That said, the most enjoyable part of the episode for me was Walt trying to be duplicitous and being completely outmanoeuvred by Gus. He could have told the truth and said that he couldn’t meet this week’s quota because he had to attend to a family emergency – if Gus objected, Walt could have argued that leaving the hospital would have aroused too much suspicion. Instead, he lies and blames Gale for the delay. This is either a very stupid or a very arrogant decision from Walter – he knows that he has been surveilled without his knowledge at least once before.2 Of course, Gus knows that Hank was attacked and we get a wonderful reaction shot from Giancarlo Esposito, just brimming with contempt.
Gus decides to pay a visit to the hospital, in part to provide a distraction so Mike can kill the remaining Salamanca cousin but also to teach Walt a lesson. Walter has grown accustomed to thinking of himself as Gus’ equal, and that illusion is now torn away from him. Gus hasn’t only cultivated a relationship with the DEA to protect him from suspicion; he has also uncovered a great deal of personal information about Walt that he could use as leverage, a strategy that Walter hadn’t even considered.
Gus does not punish Walt for lying to him, but his presence at the hospital is enough. Walt is reminded that he is not collaborating with Gus – he is subservient to him, and there may be consequences if he puts his own needs (or Jesse’s well-being) above the two hundred pounds of methamphetamine he promised to deliver every week.
Odds and Ends
- Aaron Paul doesn’t have much to do in this episode so we get multiple scenes of Jesse mucking about in the laboratory. This irritates me because the writers still aren’t using their time effectively. If we had to give Jesse this much attention, he could have been questioning his decision to work with Walter again – that might have been interesting to watch.
- I absolutely love the look that Skyler gives Walt when (almost out of habit) he starts lying to her about who he was speaking with on the hospital’s courtesy phone.
- The Mexican criminal dragging himself across the hospital floor to reach Walter could be considered a callback to their introduction in No Más (Series 3, Episode 1) – crawling towards a Santa Muerte shrine, seeking her aid in their quest to avenge Tuco.
- Gus tells Walter that “I hide in plain sight”, a reference to a stage direction in the script for Mandala (Series 2, Episode 11) that Esposito used as the basis for his performance.
- It hasn’t been explained particularly well by the show but before Gus started working with Walt, most of the crystal meth he sold was imported into the United States from Mexico. Building the laboratory and provoking the DEA to clamp down on the border is part of a wider strategy to weaken the cartel and advance Gus’ own interests.
Kafkaesque
A shaken Walter seeks reassurance from Gus that he and his family are safe. Meanwhile, Skyler decides to use Walt’s drug money to pay for Hank’s medical care.
This is another decent episode, although the script feels like it needed a few more drafts. All the scenes centering on Walt are fine, but Skyler and Jesse sometimes behave in ways that seem ill-fitting with their character. I know that this is just my personal opinion, but it holds the episode back for me and it could have so easily been remedied.
For example, Jesse has one of his finest scenes when he tells a support group about his woodworking class in high school. A teacher named Mr. Pike challenged Jesse to apply himself and he rose to the occasion, creating a wooden box that he was truly proud of.3 We are reminded that Jesse has a talent for art and the revelation that he traded that box for an ounce of weed is a beautiful metaphor for what drug addiction can take from us. Unfortunately, this is followed up by a sequence where Jesse tries to advertise blue meth to the other addicts in the group, and the difference in tone and quality between these scenes is staggering. I know that in No Más (Season 3, Episode 1) Jesse declared that “I’m the bad guy” but the writers never properly developed that plot point. Jesse should not hurt other people if he can help it, and that includes selling drugs to people trying to stay sober.
I also take issue with how Skyler acts during her final conversation with Marie. I understand what the show is going for – Skyler thinks that Walt is culpable in the attack on Hank and using drug money to pay for healthcare is the lesser of two evils. The problem is that the monologue she gives to Marie sounds really rehearsed. I have no doubt that Anna Gunn was told to speak slowly and deliberately so we could tell that this was something Skyler had been planning for some time, but it just sounds like she is lying.
This doesn’t spoil the episode for me – Marie is so desperate that she isn’t going to ask that many questions – but it feels like with a little more care and attention, this could have been better. That’s kind of the theme of Season 3 for me – things aren’t quite working as they should, and it’s been a while since I watched an episode that I thought was truly great. It’s rather unfortunate then that the next installment is maybe the most controversial in the entire history of the show…
Odds and Ends
- I enjoyed the Los Pollos Hermanos advert in the opening teaser. It would be great if Breaking Bad did more of these vignettes – the drug ballad in Negro y Azul (Series 2, Episode 7) is the only other example I can think of.
- Walter works out that Gus was involved with Hank’s shooting and meets him to secure an open-ended contract that guarantees his family’s safety. As he drives away from the meeting, Walt closes his eyes at the wheel and nearly collides with an oncoming truck. I interpreted this as an impulsive suicide attempt, driven by Walt’s lack of control over his own life.4
- This is the last appearance of Ted Beneke for a while. Skyler isn’t particularly sympathetic when she sends him away, but the show has told us repeatedly that she isn’t in love with Ted – he was always going to get his heart broken.
- While cleaning the lab, Walt notices a speck of dirt on a silver tank. The speck makes it look like Walt’s reflection has a spot on the forehead, possibly a reference to the “Mark of Cain” but it also looks like a bullet wound – neither is a positive omen for the future.
- One reviewer pointed out that while this episode is about Hank’s insurer focusing on money instead of providing the best possible care, the show overall lacks a strong critique of the American healthcare system. I get the sense that the writers prefer to focus on interpersonal drama and avoid social commentary, but I think it was possible to do both. Breaking Bad is willing to interrogate the problems of addiction and drug cartels, so why not comment on other aspects of society?
Spoilers
- In the next episode, Walt will tell Jesse that he has lived too long and missed the “perfect moment” to die, which would support my interpretation that Walt was trying to kill himself when he drove into oncoming traffic.
- In Felina (Series 5, Episode 16), Jesse daydreams about lovingly creating a wooden box before being jolted back to his grim reality as an enslaved meth cook.
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