Round-up: Gotham and Sleepy Hollow

Gotham

Gotham premiered last night, and it was generally well received by critics, particularly in comparison to every other new drama. This makes me think it’s not a great year for dramas, because Gotham suffered from some really sloppy writing overall. First, the introductions of the villains were heavy handed in every case, from the Penguin who did not yet even remotely resemble a penguin, to the Riddler who Harvey responded to with the grating, “If I wanted riddles, I would read the funny pages.” Further, insisting on calling Mario Pepper an innocent who Harvey and Jim would be in trouble for killing was ridiculous, considering the whole “attempt to murder a police officer” basically renders your innocent status kaput.

That said, there’s something unique about a setting where everyone on the police force is crooked except Jim, and the idea of Detective Gordon as a lone crusader for justice. Also, the ending worked for me. The show has a good base, but the writing and in particular the dialogue has to improve for this show to go anywhere.

Sleepy Hollow

At the end of last year, I compared the first season of Sleepy Hollow with the first season of Buffy, where the show can be ridiculous but has a good central grasp of characters. In Season 2, Buffy came back with a character heavy slow moving episode that really detailed what the focus of the show was going to be moving forward. Sleepy Hollow came back with a fast-moving plot heavy premiere that gave almost no one any opportunity to breathe. That was a disappointment, as I don’t watch this show to see the various plot mechanisms.

The early hallucination was clever, as it kind of forced the viewer through the motions of “hallucination…no, time jump…wait, hallucination…HALLUCINATION!” but after that the episode basically became a plot machine. We’ll see whether the show is willing to slow down a little and let the characters bounce off each other and really do their thing.

I’ll check up on these shows occasionally on big episodes, and maybe do a midseason recap for each.

Intro to Breaking Bad Season 1 Reviews

Scott, why are you reviewing Breaking Bad? Hasn't enough been said on it already?

The answer is sort of. One thing that's easy to forget is that Breaking Bad was such a small show in its early going that not a whole lot has been said on the early episodes. In Seasons 1-3, there was nowhere near the amount of analysis on every little scene that there was in the last season. Further, I haven't seen many places really go back and look at what was going on early on in light of what we learned later.

As a result, these reviews are filled with spoilers. I never discourage people from reading along as they watch the show for the first time, because some people (like myself) just don't care that much about getting spoiled, but spoilers are here.

I'm also taking a different angle at the show than most places take. My biggest interest in these reviews is looking at how the show manipulated viewers into being as pro-Walt as they became in the first couple seasons, despite Walt deciding that cooking meth was a good idea, and despite how generally terrible he was to Jesse throughout the series. It was probably the most impressive thing the show did in its run, and while the spectacular acting of Bryan Cranston contributed a lot, the show also made Walt's surroundings such that rooting for Walt was always the best alternative.

So sit back and enjoy, and hopefully I'm able to provide a new perspective on one of the greatest shows of all time.

Breaking Bad 1.01 - Pilot

First impressions are so important. This applies to life, but  I think it applies even more so to our relationships with literary characters. A big goal of literature is to get us to form emotional bonds with the people contained inside, and needs to get that bond formed immediately or risk losing the consumer's interest. Breaking Bad needs you to be sympathetic to Walter White. It needs you to feel that for this pilot to work, and it needs you to feel that for the show to work as a whole. Because once the show gets that sympathy built up, it then conducts an experiment with the viewer. It does whatever it can to try to tear that sympathy down.

We'll monitor closely Walt's behaviour and the intended reactions of the viewer over the course of the season, or entire show if we get there, but in the pilot we are concerned with one thing: how well does it create that sympathy for Walt?

A possible complaint one can have with the set-up of the show is that it is too manipulative. It is not subtle in the slightest to try to portray Walt as a beaten down figure. The benefit of doing this review retrospectively is that I can see how important it is to get this relationship between Walt and the audience formed. The very first we see of him he's pleading with his family as he believes he has seen them for the last time. He's shown as pathetic, possibly in debt, without good health insurance, a pushover. Jesse guesses Walt's age as 10 years older than he actually is, and with that awful caterpillar mustache he looks it. And then comes the kicker. Walt has inoperable lung cancer. That fact forms an instant connection that takes a lot to be broken. When we are introduced to anyone as having cancer, I'm willing to bet we barely ever stop to consider what kind of person they are. They are dying, and that's all there is to it. That person garner's immeasurable sympathy from everyone, no matter what. And it makes it so easy to forgive Walt for his terrible decision to join Jesse and start cooking meth.

That ability to forgive Walt for his original decision is of ultimate importance, here, and the show excels in getting us to do it. We need to have an emotional inlet to this show. If we ditch Walt, if we stop feeling bad for him as he starts to cook, the show is going to fall flat. An external emotionless approach to this show is a much inferior way to watch it. For me, it hooked me like a charm. The show did such a good job making me feel for Walt that even after all he's done I still wanted him to "win" in "Felina <5x16>." I still wanted to him to get the money to his family. I still wanted him to reconcile with Skyler. This all stems from the bond formed in this episode.

The singular focus of this episode works incredibly well for the show as a series, but it also prevents the pilot from being a great episode. The secondary characters are brutally pigeonholed into caricatures. Skyler is the nagging wife, Jesse is the dumb sidekick, Hank is the buffoon brother-in-law, Marie is the awful and blunt sister-in-law. I think there's a bit of intentionality to this, as the show needs to elevate Walt, and an effective way to do that is to deflate everyone around him, but it does make parts of this episode tough. It also hurts any interactions Walt has. The show is great when he's by himself, or even when he's with Jesse, but as soon as Hank or Skyler get prominently involved, it's hard not to cringe. This will get more than rectified over time, but it's a tough bit of characterization to swallow here.

The speech Walt gives about chemistry, and how it's the study of change and transformation is an obvious, but good kickoff to the story Breaking Bad is trying to tell. There's a clever bit of misdirection here that becomes apparent in retrospect though. The change Walt is talking about is not a change within himself, which seems like the obvious foreshadowing, but rather the external changes around him. I firmly believe Walt is the same person when the show begins as when the show ends. But the circumstances he's in, and the people around him, and his external actions as a result of that changes rapidly through the course of the show.

There may not be a better example of that than the scene in the clothing store with Walt Jr. This is such a good scene, as it shows exactly the kind of bravery and even to some degree, ruthlessness Walt is capable of, but keeps him firmly in a sympathetic light. These attempts to run over and demean those he perceives as disempowering him is not a trait that ever goes away. It just rears its head it much uglier forms over the course of the series, such as his disgusting treatment of Gretchen as early as "Peekaboo."

There's other examples of Walt's insecurity, and his spitefulness towards all things that portray him as weak. He rips the Handicap Parking sign off his car mirror because he doesn't want to be seen as handicapped. He downplays his coughing as much as possible, and tries everything he can to prevent himself from going to the hospital. He doesn't tell his family he has terminal lung cancer, just so he doesn't garner that sympathy. Walt wants to be admired, and though he doesn't know it yet, he wants to be feared. This is an interesting contrast to the way the show portrays him and the way it wants viewers to see him. Walt would hate the "Awww...isn't that pathetic middle age man cute?" reaction that he inspires. This aspect of him, the blinding pride he suffers from, is there from the very first episode. It becomes abundantly more clear in "Gray Matter" He is that same man throughout the show. It's his circumstances and relationships that change.

There are two relationships that change significantly over the course of the show, and in both cases, the change is for the worse. The starting point for the relationships is seen in this episode, as well as foreshadowing for how they are going to change. First, there's the obnoxious kid who Walt calls out in the classroom. This boy is supposed to be a proxy for Jesse, and Walt's reaction to him is a mix of superiority and disdain. This is how Walt feels about Jesse throughout the series. There's some foreshadowing in this episode about how the relationship switches, though. Later, when that same kid sees him at the car wash, Walt's the one who is on the ground. This is a preview of the relationship Walt and Jesse have near the end of season 4, when Jesse becomes an essential part of the Fring organization and Walt is on the outs, showing that in all ways that mattered, the student surpassed the master.

The other relationship that changes throughout the series is the relationship between Walt and Skylar. We see that Walt's decision first helps their marriage, a preview that Walt's life of crime is going to introduce more passion into his marriage, as shown by the comparison of the passionate sex scene at the end of the episode compared to the lame birthday handjob scene earlier on. But ultimately, Walt's decision to cook meth will destroy the family. The marriage of Walt and Skylar isn't passionate and isn't inspiring at this stage, but it does appear to be stable and functioning. It's a good environment for their kids to grow up. This quickly switches to passionate and instable very early on, which is not a good tradeoff with kids involved. This will lead to the "divorce" in Season 3, and though Walt moves back in after that, the relationship never recovers.

There are constant directing tricks used to emphasize what the show is trying to do. Breaking Bad routinely has some of the most creative camera angles used in TV. This episode, for instance, has a camera inside a washing machine as Walt tries to dry out money. It has a camera inside and MRI machine looking down at Walt directly followed by a camera looking at the reflection of Walt in a desk. Later in the series, we get a camera imitating the viewpoint of a shovel in one scene, and a Roomba in another. And more subtly, there are constant camera angles looking at Walt (and other characters) from slightly above, or slightly below. The message is clear: we're going to examine Walt from every angle in this series. We're going to look at him as the family man with cancer, as well as the criminal meth cook.

The show also takes pains to be one of the most beautiful shows on TV. The cinematography of the scenery is almost second to none. The show's first scenes are looking at aspects of that quiet and peaceful scenery before we see the RV tearing through. Once again it's Walt that brings the disturbance.

As that disturbance occurs, the lighting and the scenery reflect that. Breaking Bad Season 1 looks nothing like Breaking Bad season 5. The surface lightness of the first two seasons contrast the heaviness of the final season. In terms of aesthetic, I prefer the early seasons. My long-lasting image of Breaking Bad is seeing that RV in the New Mexican desert. But the darkness the direction, lighting and acting switch to completely matches the change in story being told. The externals around Walt do a complete 180, but inside he is exactly the same.

The show presents Walt in the most positive way possible, then asks the viewer to come to terms with who he really is. It is a show of changes, and takes one man and puts him in a sympathetic light, than completely changes his circumstances so the light shining on him becomes unsympathetic. Breaking Bad wants to know how long and how many horrible things it takes to lose sympathy for someone you once had a close connection with. For me, it was a long, long time.

Notes

• Didn't get to talk much about Jesse in the main review, but he has some funny scenes. My favourite: Coming into Crazy8's house wearing the same colours as the dummy the dog is chewing up.
• Walter Jr. is introduced to the show by sitting down for breakfast. There may be a theme establishing.
• Bogdan. Just all things Bogdan.
• Walt's reaction both at the hospital and at the car wash feel like how someone really would react to being diagnosed with cancer
• The Hank/Gomez bet that Gomez actually won, unbeknownst to the two of them
• Walt literally laundering money
• What part of the school year are we in? On the board, there's atomic orbitals (pretty advanced stuff), the speech he gives to the class is like their first day of chemistry, and then Walt gets them to turn to chapter 6 of the textbook.
• Walt's attempted suicide. It didn't really add anything substantial to Walt's character, and it was super contrived that the bullet jammed.

Breaking Bad 1.02 - The Cat's In the Bag

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Breaking Bad 1.03 - ...And the Bag's In the River

This is an episode where taking a retrospective look at the series really comes in handy. We now know with certainty that the murder of Krazy 8 is now the crossing of a moral event horizon for Walt. Before this, Walt is very much restricted by the ideas of right and wrong he had grown up with in his more sheltered lifestyle, but after this he becomes much more pragmatic about his actions. Instead of valuing all human life as equal, he values only the life of the humans he cares about; those within his sphere of influence. That really only includes his extended familly and Jesse. Outside of those people, human life means nothing.

How does a switch like that flip so quickly? Is this common to all humans, that once they break a certain barrier human life no longer has the same meaning to them? Breaking Bad itself says no. Jesse goes into a downward spiral because of the death of strangers twice. Once, when he had to murder Gale, and once after Todd murders Drew Sharp by following the instructions of Walt and Jesse. There's something special about Walt, something that allows him to take that sociopathic attitude required to be the monster he becomes.

The conversations between Walt and Krazy 8 offer some of the best dialogue Breaking Bad has to offer. The acting is top notch, and it makes me sad we don't get to see more of Krazy 8 after this, as the way Max  Arceniega was able to sell the story of him working in his Dad's shop is extremely compelling stuff. That scene doesn't work unless the audience is being sucked into the story as Walt is, and it adds so much more power to the scene where Walt has to kill Krazy 8.

It is tempting to take that conversation, and the desperation of Walt to trust Krazy 8, as evidence that it was circumstance that drove Walt into the man he became. I don't believe that is the  case, because I believe the reaction after the event is more important than the hesistance to perform. I think many of us would have made the same decision Walt did here. I don't think many of us are capable of what Walt does over the next couple of seasons. Walt wrote on his pros/cons list that he wouldn't be able to live with himself if he killed Krazy 8, but that was a lie he told himself. Walt has no trouble living with himself after this event. Normal people would struggle greatly with killing a man after the fact, breaking hard and fast rules they live their life by. Walt barely struggles at all.

It comes down to this: Walt is a great rationalizer. That's all it takes. It seems crazy that you can be driven from fairly decent family man to mass murderer simply by being able to rationalize, but that is completely true in this case. Walt goes up to reflect on his action, and ultimately decides that mankind is made up of nothing more than matter. He decides there's no intrinsic value to human life, it's just another lifeform on the planet. As he states to Gretchen in the flashback, "There's just chemistry here." Walt is not able to accept that he has done something awful, he is not able to accept anything other than the absolute highest opinion of himself. This is his ultimate downfall in every way. He simply refuses to accept that it was his decision to cook crystal meth that got two men killed, he instead resorts to the nihilistic view of  life and death being meaningless.

And so, a monster is born. Or rather, a monster is revealed. As I've said before, the traits that made Walt into Heisenberg always existed within him, the series simply reveals them in an ugly way. Over-rationalization can be a terrible thing, arrogance can be a terrible thing, and stubbornness can be a terrible thing if they are given the proper channels to reveal themselves. Krazy 8 says twice that his line of work does not suit Walt. He has no idea how wrong about that he is.

From the perspective of the viewer, we are still given every reason to be on Walt's side. The show has done a bit of a clever job to this point glossing over what a terrible decision it is to cook meth as a solution for dealing with your own mortality. From our perspective, Walt has had very few choices to this point. He had to kill Krazy 8 because Krazy 8 was ready to attack him with the plate shard. He's had to lie to Skylar because Skylar just wouldn't understand the burden he is putting on the family with his cancer and he needs to take advantage of his considerable chemistry skills to offset that. He needs to yell at Jesse and demean him because Jesse is a drug addict and an idiot who tells a murderous drug dealer both Walt's name and details about his life.

Related to this, if there's one part of the show I'm not on board with, it's the sabotaging of its secondary characters to make Walt look good. The B-plot in this episode, the misinterpretation of the Schraeder family that Walter Jr. is smoking pot is cringeworthy on quite a few levels. First of all, from a personal standpoint I can't stand to watch plotlines like this. To me scenes like the one in the seedy motel parking lot where Hank is trying to curb Walter Jr. off weed is unbearable. The only way that scene works if it is funny. Maybe my sense of humour is a little out of calibration, but that just wasn't funny. Secondly, this plotline makes both Marie and Skylar look terrible. Marie is nosy, loudmouthed, and a kleptomaniac, where Skylar is controlling. Skylar doesn't even let Walter Jr say "Yo!" Maybe it's trying to connect to Skylar's disdain for  Jesse Pinkman types, but come on! Further, Skylar is easily perceived by the viewer as inconsiderate to Walt. At this point, very early in its run, the show is purposely tearing down it's support characters in the eyes of the viewer to build Walt up. It needs the viewer to stay sympathetic to Walt's plight as long as possible or it loses the viewer's interest. I understand this, I just wish it could have done so in a way that doesn't cause us to dislike all its support characters in the early going.

In my mind, if a show is to be a success it needs solid male and female characters. At this point of the show, it seems incapable of making a good female character. Fortunately, the show goes on to prove that it's problematic treatment of its females was mostly a mirage, and Skylar and Marie get to become way more sympathetic by the end.

This episode presents both the best and worst of season 1. The scenes between Walt and Krazy 8 as well as its aftermath shows some of the best stuff Breaking Bad has to offer. The B plot with Skylar and Marie shows that Breaking Bad still has some distance to go before it can really break barriers and be one of the best shows to ever air on television.

Notes

• Camera work in the opening scene where Walt and Jesse are cleaning the remains of the dissolved body is really cool
• Walt handing the second beer to Krazy 8 rather than rolling it to him is a nice indication that Walt is intentionally deluding himself
• The plate puzzle with the missing piece is one of Breaking Bad's most memorable images
• Why does Krazy 8 reach for his plate shard before he's untied? If you want to make Walt suspicious, that seems like an excellent way to do it.
• No Walt Jr. eating breakfast this time. What a disappointment

Breaking Bad 1.04 - Cancer Man

One of the remarkable things about Breaking Bad is its consistency. "Cancer Man" is probably one of the worst five episodes in the show's run. A lot of the relationships just aren't calibrated quite right yet, and the episode doesn't have enough compelling stuff to really make up for it in the same way that "..And the Bag's In the River" did, or the amount of Walt and Jesse humour that was in "Cat's In the Bag." Yet it isn't remotely a terrible episode of television. There's a lot of things here that lay groundwork for what makes these characters who they are, and some individualized stories that are both tragic and yet fitting at the same time, which echoes throughout the series. "Cancer Man" doesn't rise above its inconsistencies in the way most of the Season 1 episodes do, but it doesn't completely get derailed by them either.

The main thrust for the episode is Walt telling the rest of his extended family that he has cancer. It was an episode that had to happen, and the reactions we got were sort of stock TV character reactions, because the supporting characters haven't really rose above stock TV characters at this point. But the fascinating thing about the episode is not Skylar's or Walter Jr's reaction to the cancer, it is the way Walt treats them given those reactions.

Skylar is made to be quite unappealing to audiences at this point. Her emotion and desperation to try to get Walt the absolute best treatment runs counter to the cold, calculating acceptance that audiences have adjusted to with Walt. And I think that contrast wears on the audience, like hot water shattering cold glass. Walt is clearly annoyed at Skylar's enthusiasm for finding the solution, which makes the audience slightly annoyed. Even I, who you could probably tell at this point has no love for Walt as a person,  was feeling a little put off. Anna Gunn's performance seems like it is on a different show from the performance Walt is giving at this point, and the easily readable and sometimes wearing emotions Skylar carries are just too much of a contrast and too opposed to the character that we are beginning to fall in love with. It's a hurdle the show just never clears with some people when they switch poles and make Skylar the sympathetic one, because too much damage was done to her character in the early going. It's interestesting watching this unfold, but I think that Gilligan and company probably wish they had treated Skylar more delicately in the early going to have the viewer more ready to accept the long game with her character.

The show has sucked the viewer into Walt's stratosphere so much by this point that they can't help but feel what Walt feels about the situation. That's kind of amazing considering the man made a conscious decision to become a criminal just because he was diagnosed with cancer. Ultimately, the show coerces the viewer to take the insane side of the argument and get peeved off by the rational side. Part of this may have been cheating a bit, because Skylar did say some pretty awful things in the last couple of episodes to turn the viewers against her. But still, look at the Skylar-Walt exchange I've put down in the quotes section. In what universe is Walt in the right there? He is willing to basically give up and abandon his family because he doesn't want to be seen as the husband who left his family in debt. Why? Because Walt considers leaving his family in debt as a failure, and if there's one thing that Walt can't abide, it's being a failure.

The pride of Walt is strewn throughout this episode. Walt shows such contempt for getting the best help for his problems. He shows such contempt for Skylar and Marie trying to find the solution that has the best shot at keeping him alive. He doesn't want to only be alive because Marie found him a physician, then he's accepted help from Marie he can never repay. He doesn't want to be fawned over and shown sympathy because that implies his cancer makes him weak in some way. He doesn't want help because that means he has to accept help. It's all so ludicrously macho from such a pathetic man that I'm certain if it wasn't so well hidden in subtext at this point viewers would be fleeing from Walt in droves.

That's one of the brilliant things about Breaking Bad here. All of Walt's considerable faults are in the subtext, not to hide what the show is doing from the viewer, but to disconnect the faults from the viewers emotions. You have to think rationally about Walt to see what a screwed up person he is at this point, and as soon as you  do that, you've disconnected yourself emotionally from things. This weakens a little bit in the next episode, [1x05], where Walt's decision not to accept the money from Grey Matter is much more in your face, but there's enough sympathy garnered for Walt by this point that it's simply a blip on the radar. Breaking Bad entwines you so much with its main character it takes a pry bar to pull you away. They will bring out that pry bar eventually, but it amazes me how much evidence that Walt is a monster has to accumulate before viewers turn against him.

The show could have gone a different way with this and made Walt a much more outright villain from the start, just by putting him in less favourable situations. If we had seen Walt surrounded by drug users in the early going when he was making that decision to cook meth, it would have repulsed viewers on a visual and therefore, emotional level, which is something Breaking Bad wouldn't have been able to get away with. The decision to make Walt sympathetic for as long as possible leads to the show being forced to tread lightly around the inner workings of drug culture. When they do feel they have to touch base with the idea, it leads to something half-hearted like what we got with the B-story of this episode.

Jesse's story in this episode is less well done than Walt's, and contains most of the problems that force this episode down near the bottom in the show's history. It's sort of odd that this show really has nothing to say about drug use and addiction. The episode pays lip service to the idea that drugs can screw you up, but doesn't add anything beyond the basics. We see issues with addiction on a surface level where Jesse suddenly becomes very paranoid as a side effect of his crystal meth use. In retrospect, I'm a actually a little disappointed with the camera work on this scene. For a show that gets so creative later on with camera angles and looking at things from all angles, the Jesse drug use scene is pretty standard fare. This becomes more obvious when compared to the camera work in "Phoenix" when Jesse first tries heroin.

We also see issues with addiction on a deeper level where Jesse has lost all trust of his parents because of the times he's failed them before. To be honest, the story doesn't really accomplish much other than cast Jesse's parents in a bad light, which is either not the intention or not a meaningful development. I suppose an argument could be made that Jesse became the way he became because of his parents suffocating influence, but there's just not enough evidence for it.

The other thing the show tried to do to portray drug culture in this episode was the early scene with Jesse, Krazy 8 and Combo, but the dialogue was off enough that the exchange came off as more hokey than it should have. If a show about drug use can't even sound sincere in its dialogue between drug users, than it's got problems. It's probably to Breaking Bad's credit that it realized what it was good at and what it was poor at, ditched the "drugs are bad" angle and focussed on the moral deterioration angle instead. Other than the divisive episode "Peekaboo," the show pretty well stayed away from showing much of Walt's worse off customers, even once it was no longer a goal to keep Walt's sympathy with the viewer.

I still sort of liked the Jesse story as kind of a tragic standalone arc. It does hurt that he has no more chances left, his family is so convinced that he's a failure they simply don't believe in his efforts to make things right again. This also does connect a bit to the overall arc of the show, as that Jesse becomes desperate for Walt's approval to replace the approval he never got from his parents. I'm not 100% sure I buy the development with the joint, as judging by the actor Ben Petrie's age the kid at this point is 12. I know there are kids who smoke pot when they're 12, I'm just not sure they are running in circles anywhere close to the circles Jake Pinkman would be running in. Even if you give the show the benefit of the doubt and say there's some older brother envy going on there, it's awfully coincidental the joint is found in the day or so after Jesse moves back in.

I'm contractually obligated to mention the Bluetooth guy. It's certainly a memorable scene when Walt blows his car up, but I don't have much to say about it. We all know how much Walt likes to feel powerful, and this episode really makes him feel impotent for large stretches of it. The explosion also puts the viewer even more on Walt's side because of how much of a jerk that guy is, so that's a bonus.

This isn't a great episode of Breaking Bad, but as you can see by the fact this is my longest review so far, there's still a lot going on here. It is the rare show that still reveals so much about its characters even at its low points, and Breaking Bad is particularly special in this regard.

Notes

·         Operation Icebreaker for a crystal meth operation. Clever, in an obvious way.

·         Walt and Skylar's story of how they met is so good. It also fits particularly well with Walt's general passive aggressiveness.

·         I really hope that picture in Jesse's room was a young Aaron Paul and not a lookalike.

·         "I believe things have a way of working out in the end." Oh, Walt, you're such a liar. I can't think of anyone who lies to their son as much as Walt does over the course of this series in such awful ways.

·         Krazy 8 revealed to be a mole. Got to think that if Walt lets him go, Krazy 8 turns him over and this series goes into brother-in-law vs. brother-in-law hyperdrive quickly.

·         Walt has a living mother? I think it's a major missed opportunity that we never got to see her.

·         The initial scene with the Pinkman family is a wee bit overcooked. Jake's not allowed to play both the piccolo and the oboe? He's wearing an awesomely preppy sweater vest that is only possibly a school uniform?

• Walt: I just think we need to discuss it a little further, that's all.
  Skylar: What is there to discuss? You're going to get the best treatment, and he's the best.
  Walt: Well, there's the money discussion, I think. No, $90,000 out of pocket. Maybe more.
  Skylar: There's a way, Walt. There's financing, there's installment plans. I could always go back to work. Walt, there's always a way.
  Walt: All right, Skylar, say, there is a way. And we spend that money and... Am I supposed to leave you with all that debt? No. Honey...I just don't want emotions ruling us. Maybe treatment isn't the way to go.

Breaking Bad 1.05 - Gray Matter

These middle episodes of season 1, "Gray Matter" and "Cancer Man" feel a bit like they are in a different show than what the rest of Breaking Bad would become. One of the main properties of Breaking Bad as a series, and the main reason I believe most people have it in the discussion of best shows of all time, is its propulsive momentum. There is constantly a sense that something is about to happen, and that can create enormous tension all the time. At its best, Breaking Bad can leave people slack jawed and unable to breathe for minutes at a time, if not for an entire hour.

"Gray Matter" doesn't have that sense of tension. There's no noose hanging over Walt and Jesse's neck like there will be for the rest of the series. As it turns out, that's for the best. This episode turns out to be possibly the most important episode of this season, if not one of the most important in the whole series. Walt turning down the money from Gretchen and Elliot directly leads to him entering back into the meth cooking trade, which will hold its grasp on him for the rest of the series, even when he thinks he's finished with it in Season 3. The episode leaves us with a question that is essential to our knowledge of Walt as a character. Why does Walt do this? Is it because it would make him a charity case? Is it because he is still bitter than Elliot "stole" Gretchen from him? Is it some combination of the two?

My honest opinion is I think that the idea that "Walt doesn't want to accept the money because it would be a charity" is a smokescreen for the real problem. I think Walt would be able to convince himself he has a right to that money based on what he did for that company. One of Walt's defining traits is that he feels entitled. That's why he gets involved with Tuco in the first place in the next episode, he feels like he should be adequately compensated for the amount of brilliance he's putting into the street, and selling through Jesse is not sufficient. That's why he has the guts to raise the price in the explosive scene next episode. Walt almost certainly feels he deserves that money Elliot's offering.

The Gretchen factor is just too much. What the writers are doing a clever job of hiding here is the levels of bitterness that Walt carries. They need to hide it because it's still too early for the sympathizing audience to see too much of Walt's unseemly qualities. He cannot accept help from Elliot and Gretchen because it would require an implicit apology from Walt's part. Accepting Elliot's charity would mean that Walt acknowledges he is still their friend, and offering money is something friends do for one another. Walt cannot bear to forgive them. That's what it comes down to. This is confirmed in "Peekaboo," where Walt once again addresses with Gretchen all the wrongs that he believes she and Elliot had done to him.

This is the man we're dealing with. It takes a while to accept it, but Walt is a sad, bitter, stubborn and proud man who is willing to do anything to get properly recompensed for his talents. If we were introduced to him in any other circumstance we would be repulsed by him. Instead, we are taken in by him and ready to follow him through the mire that he soon gets himself into. In some ways, Walt is a salesman who's trying to sell you his view of the world by obscuring the ugly things about it. And we buy it, until that ugliness is revealed.

A perfect example is his speech in the intervention scene. The intervention scene is the best scene the show has done to this point, partly because it finally makes all the supporting characters likable and agreeable, and partly because of Walt's speech. According to Walt, he doesn't want his last few months to be being a shell of himself because of the cancer treatments, he wants to be able to actually live them, and savour the time he gets with his family. It's a wonderful speech that is hard to argue with while you are listening. He's selling his opinion of things to Skylar and to the viewers, and even after seeing more of who Walt truly is, it is tempting to make the purchase. Sadly though, given the evidence of what we know about Walt, it is just as likely an excuse to not have his life put into the hands of others; it's a way he can have some measure of control over a life he's let get so far away from him.

Jesse finally wants to take some measure of control over his life as well. I was hard on the storyline with Jesse and his parents in the previous episode, but it is important for the change in enacts in Jesse. He doesn't want to let his life go to waste, he wants to be more like the son his parents want him to be. That leads to him seeking a job; trying to get himself cleaned up and make a career for himself. Sadly, he gives up all too easily. If Jesse could persevere and really try to make a legitimate life for himself there would be a chance of success, and certainly he would end up better in the long run than the path he takes. Unfortunately, Badger shows up at exactly the wrong time praising his meth cooking acumen, and it's too easy for Jesse to get trapped into thinking that's all he's good for.

It's all very tragic, because the Jesse we see in this episode is no doubt different from the Jesse we started with. He's driven, he is concerned with demonstrating the same quality in his cooking that Walt had. These traits that he starts to demonstrate are exactly what Walt is able to manipulate. He becomes Walt's dog throughout the series, constantly seeking approval and almost never getting it. The same traits that would help him in a legitimate business environment crush him in this partnership.

"Gray Matter" seems like an episode out of a different show, but it is nonetheless a great episode, establishing the direction the series is going to go from this point forward. It establishes Jesse's new direction as the driven partner trying to be good at something and trying to succeed in life, and it presents Walt as what he is more clearly that any episode to this point: bitter, regretful and domineering. It finally establishes the supporting characters as likable people rather than simply Walt's obstacles. If an episode can do all that as well as "Gray Matter" does, tension is not required.

Notes

·        The look on Skylar's face when she first sees Gretchen tells us all we need to know about her feelings of Walt and Gretchen's relationship

·        The helicopter move Badger uses while advertising comes back when he's fighting Jesse in a hilarious manner

·        Badger also fires his crossbow at Jesse's departing RV, which works about as well as you would expect it to

·        The talking pillow

·        Hank's constant sport metaphors in trying to relay his feelings to Walt. I actually think the baseball metaphor is really an accurate analysis of the situation.

·       You'd think Skylar would have a better idea after all their years of marriage the kind of techniques that will work with Walt and the kind that won't. Setting up interventions and trying to get help from others are two things guaranteed to get Walt's hackles rising.

Breaking Bad 1.06 - A Crazy Handful of Nothin'

An explosion occurs in this episode. I'm not talking about the piece of fulminated mercury that Walt threw to the ground causing Tuco's the windows of Tuco's office to shatter. I'm talking about the sudden change we get from Walt. Walt's decision to go from mild-mannered chemistry teacher to crystal meth cook is so abrupt a left turn it definitely doesn't fall into the car rusting category of chemical change. This is the equivalent of fulminated mercury hitting the ground.

Nothing changed in the composition of the fulminated mercury in Walt's hand that caused it to explode. It had the same molecular structure when it hit the ground as it did when it was in Walt's hand. It needed a catalyst, in this case hitting the ground hard, to detonate. This is true of Walt. Nothing changed about Walt to cause him to become Heisenberg. He simply needed to hit rock bottom with enough force to bring that internal energy he had within him out. Walt changes rapidly throughout the series, and particularly in this episode. But it's the change he always had within him, the monster he always had inside of him that shows itself. There's nothing new about the Walt that appears, it's the same atoms. They've just changed arrangement. As Walt likes to say, it's just basic chemistry.

The pre-credits sequence for this episode is unbelievably good. It shows how naive Walt is about what it takes to make money in an illegal business. He doesn't yet understand that when you are dealing with people who are willing to break the law via trafficking drugs, they are also willing to break the law via homicide. To survive with people who play that game, you need to be able to play that game as well. That is always the difference between Walt and Jesse. Jesse can't run with the big guns because he has enough of a conscience that he can't commit the offenses you need to be willing to commit. He doesn't have the same chemical composition that Walt does, there's no catalyst that is going to make Jesse explode into the same type of criminal Walt can be. Jesse gets beaten near the point of death this episode because he tries to play by the rules with people who do not play by the rules. Walt is the one who's willing to go the extra distance, be willing to kill if required. That is why Walt comes out on top time and time again throughout the series.

There's a reason explosions are feared, though. The amount of collateral damage that occurs from a big enough explosion can be devastating. That is what this episode shows, and what Breaking Bad's message is as a whole. It doesn't just show the change that Walt undergoes, it also shows the amount of damage that is done by that change.

Hugo is the first to take a fall for Walt's actions. The kindly janitor who was willing to clean up Walt's mess and offer a stick of gum is undone by the discovery of stolen equipment in the science lab at Walt's school. I don't need to spell out the consequences for Hugo. Not only does he lose his job, not only does he have to spend more time in prison, he is going to find it very difficult to get a job when he gets out. Worse, he's a disgrace to those in the school who hired him, as parents such as Skylar don't look beyond "previous criminal record" and "joint smoking" when they evaluate him. The judgment passed down on Hugo by Hank and Skylar at the poker scene is terrible, but not unrealistic conclusions for any person to arrive at given the information they had.

The other piece of damage is Jesse. This is the second time Jesse's been beaten badly in the series, and he has at least two more beatings still to come, in "One Minute" and "Ozymandias," not to mention the psychological impacts of his time with Walter. In this case, he's pushed into a situation he's not at all adept by Walt's greed and sense of entitlement. $2600 dollars a day (or week, it's not very clear) is apparently not enough for Walt, despite the fact it sometimes can take time to grow a new business. There's no patience here, and Walt shows unnecessary desperation in trying to make deals with dangerous criminal enterprises. Despite Walt's ultimatum at the beginning, he just cannot stand by and let Jesse do his job. He has to interfere.

The dynamic between Walt and Jesse is absolutely toxic. Walt keeps Jesse around through his combination of confidence and disappointment. There's two scenes in this episode really close together. In the first, Walt comes out of the RV coughing up a storm and convinces Jesse that he's a good enough cook to finish the batch. This is huge for the new approval seeking version of Jesse, as it shows him he is good for something and entangles him in Walt's web even more. The next time they're together, Walt is tearing into Jesse for not selling enough of the meth, which is frankly something Walt knows pretty much nothing about. This causes Jesse to feel like he needs to do better to be successful, and ultimately results him falling flat on his face. This cycle continues over and over again. The biggest examples are Walt calling Jesse's meth as good as his in "One Minute" to keying off the fight in "Bug" where he tears into Jesse for not slipping Gus the ricin and assuring him he's going to screw up and end up dead in Mexico without Walt. It's really sad that Jesse doesn't realize how little he needs Walt sooner and escapes before he becomes permanently damaged by the relationship.

As terrible as the Walt explosion (Waltsplosion? No?) is, it sure is satisfying to see. Even on rewatch, even after having the majority of your sympathy towards Walt sapped, it's hard not to stand up and cheer when he says, "this isn't meth" and blows up the piece of mercury right in front of them. Choosing between cheering for Tuco to clean Walt's clock and cheering for Walt to get the better of Tuco, you take Walt every time. The series is so good at generating tension and adrenaline, and the mercury scene is a really good example of that. It is both great and terrible to see Walt coming into his own and using his knowledge of chemistry to get the one up on all the experienced drug dealers.

Walt turning into a drug dealer is so sudden a turn and so momentous, it becomes impossible to keep others from getting caught up in the blast. From Hugo to Jesse to Gale to eventually Hank, Walt's building of a drug empire will leave many casualties in its wake. A Crazy Handful of Nothin' is our first glimpse of that, and while we felt sorry for Jesse and Hugo in this episode, well, we ain't seen nothin' yet.

Notes

·        As noted in previous reviews, anything causing Jesse to look less like an idiot is appreciated in this point in the show. Him figuring out Walt has cancer by connecting him to his aunt falls nicely into that category.

·        Breaking Bad sure likes its montages, and the Jesse dealing montage in this episode in this episode is a good one . We even get a Combo sighting!

·        "Yo man, I'm Skinny Pete!" I have no idea why, but this line always cracks me up in combination with the pose he gives the camera.

·        Food for thought: Was Walt bluffing with the bag of fulminated mercury? It doesn't seem like it, and this isn't really the show that plays with its viewers in that way, but it would connect nicely with Walt bluffing out Hank and the title of this episode.

·       Walter Jr breakfast update: He likes pineapples.

·        Tuco is a little too much of a cartoon. I understand why the show felt he would be an appropriate villain at this point, but he's not one of Breaking Bad's better characters by a long shot.

·        As much as I love the pre-credits sequence, it's the third in media res opening in 6 episodes. Breaking Bad eventually will get more creative with its opening sequences, particularly with the Mexican music video.

Breaking Bad Review 1.07 - A No Rough Stuff Type Deal

The structure of Breaking Bad seasons usually call for pretty explosive season finales. In two instances, the second and fourth season finales, that explosion is a literal one. Depending on whether you feel "Gliding Over All" is a season finale or not, this is definitely the calmest of the finales Breaking Bad does. It's fair to say the lack of any real resolution found in this finale is a direct result of the writer's strike that happened in early 2008. But just because this episode does not play like a season finale doesn't mean it doesn't  conclude an important arc. The season is all about the process of Walt breaking bad. By the time this episode rolls around, Walt is hooked on crime and danger now, and there is no going back from the life he's chosen at this point. He occasionally wobbles, but the confrontation with Tuco at the end of the previous episode has woken a compulsion within him, and he's unable to escape the situation he's put himself in from this point forward.

"A No-Rough-Stuff-Type Deal" is interested in exploring that compulsion Walt has, and how he's able to reconcile it to himself and to others. The newfound addiction to danger is present right from the pre-credits sequence. He's getting off on the fear of being caught, pleasing his wife where anyone may be able to take notice. He has sex with her in the back of a car, in a place where anyone may be able to peek through the window. It's the thrill of danger, the thrill that's present in the risk of being caught. And it's so clear throughout the episode how new this thrill is to Walt and how little he is able to control his compulsion to feed it.

The public fooling around with his wife is harmless enough, but continually pushing the envelope with Tuco is not. First, Walt has the guts to get paid the full amount for his meth even though he's well short of what is promised. Then, he ups what he and Jesse are willing to provide per week without even knowing whether he'd be able to get his hands on the material to mass produce in those sort of quantities. Then, rather than taking the easy road and paying some people off to steal the methylamine for him, he devises a plan to put himself and Jesse in danger instead. His ability to escape danger with his brilliance gives him such a high that he can't help but put himself in worse and worse situations, and if not for the wake-up call at the end of the episode, where Tuco shows just how dangerous he truly is, the result almost certainly would him biting off more than he can chew.

It's a compulsion, and it parallels the kleptomania Marie has. I'm not 100% sure I liked the Marie story this episode, or found it a necessary storyline to parallel what was going on with Walt, but I'm not going to complain about any attempts to flesh out the secondary characters at this point. The part of this storyline that stands out to me is how unapologetic Marie is about her problem. Skylar's caught her red-handed here, and yet she continues to act cool, and she continues to lie and treat her problem as nothing. The reason for this is she probably doesn't even think about it as a problem. She doesn't need Skylar to bug her about this because it's harmless. The jewelry store probably is swimming in money, and one missing tiara won't hurt anyone. Rationalization almost always comes with strong compulsions, and is probably the main reason many people with addiction problems  don't get the help they need. These people can't help themselves, so rather than see themselves as broken they minimize the impact of what they do.

That's what we see with Walt as well in this episode. Twice in the episode he tries to cryptically rationalize his new criminal lifestyle. First, he tells Hank the lines of legality are arbitrary and inconsistent, that they can change at any time. Hank properly calls him out on that, and saying he sounds a lot like the criminals he put behind bars. Then, he does a strange defense of Marie for Skylar, saying that sometimes you have to cross lines if family is involved. This becomes Walt's catchphrase going forward, that he entered the meth cooking life for his family. We know this to be a rationalization, a lie Walt tells himself, a lie Walt knows is false. Walt is in the meth cooking life because he became addicted to the thrill of danger. At multiple points throughout the series, Walt is in a place where he can sit back and (fairly) safely make good money. But he does not, he pushes the envelope further. He needs the threats on his life, and he needs to be able to show that he's smart enough to overcome them.

It's all well and good when you are putting yourself in danger, rock climbing without harnesses on your own, but bringing others into it is crossing a line. The amount of danger Walt puts Jesse in within this episode is astonishing. The fact that Jesse is still sticking around and still letting it happen is a result of the hypnotic hold Walt has on him. Shortly after Walt gives Jesse the shopping list to make the meth with, he does his best job of instilling confidence. "You can do this!" he tells him, and it's probably one of the first times anyone has shown any confidence in Jesse. It's true and sad that Jesse is Walt's dog throughout the series, constantly begging for whatever little crumbs of approval he can get and constantly getting slapped instead. The partnership is terrible for Jesse and great for Walt on all counts, yet it gives Jesse that feeling of competence he can't get anywhere else.  Jesse is trapped by his compulsion to seek approval, the same way as Walt, and the same way as Marie.

I feel terrible for Skylar this episode. She's getting lied to from two directions, one she's fully aware of and one she's not. In a clever bit of foreshadowing, Marie's lie traps her in a place where she has to go along with the scam and lie to the authorities in order to save face and get herself out of a bad situation. She's still pretty blind to what Walt is doing, though his sudden interest in Eastern healing methods probably should have had her suspicious. That does not sound like the scientifically minded Walt in the slightest and she probably should have known that. Walt's reaction to Marie's stealing was awfully suspicious as well. Skylar's no dummy, and she'll figure things out eventually, but it's another lesson how hard it is to look past "CANCER!" and see the problems that Walt has at this point.

The best scene in this episode is without a doubt the scene with the video camera. The family we see in the video camera is irrevocably shaken by the events of the series. This is almost like a "before" picture, and the "after" isn't pretty. That view of Hank and Marie so cheery is going to really hurt those looking at the video in the future. And Walt's speech at the end seems inspiring at the time, and the acting is fantastic, with Walt knowing that he's probably not going to be around to get the know the girl who will be watching this video years down the line. It would be tempting for Bryan Cranston to overplay the scene, have tears building up and his voice faltering as he delivers the message. Instead, he underplays it, instead remaining calm on the exterior when you know there's a struggle going on inside of him. It is heartbreaking to watch this scene knowing how it's going to look years down the line. Instead of being the inspiring words of a dying man knowing he's not going to be there for his daughter, it will be lying words from a villain. Walt ends up with nothing at the end of this series, not his name, not his innocence, and certainly not his family's goodwill.

Though the finale of Season 1 offers us no plot resolutions at all, it does complete the arc of Walt's entrance into the world of cooking meth. At this point Walt is addicted to the thrill of danger and the ability to feel like the brilliant chemist he once was. The next step in his journey is to learn how to be a criminal, and it will be much more costly than he thinks.

Notes

·         The first appearance of the porkpie hat! For that alone, this is an incredibly momentous episode.

·         "Yeah, science!"

·         The wonders of hindsight: You get to look at Walt and Jesse trying to carry the can of methylamine and all you can think of is the DEA's incredulous expressions in a later episode. Why didn't they just roll it? Walt and Jesse do figure out they have to roll the can later in the episode, as they roll it down the stairs. A little too quickly.

·         I love the scene in the Open House where one of the potential buyers complains about the smell, and the real estate agent has some air freshener in hand ready to spray.

·          Tuco is undoubtedly cartoonish, but the scene where he beats the guy to death for absolutely nothing wraps so far into the cartoonish side it passes back into brilliant again. There's off the wall, and then there's being 100% committed to off the wall.

·         Walt and Jesse wear sunglasses in the final scene to try to make them seem like cool customers. It's a nice contrast when they have to react to a man getting beaten to death while wearing those sunglasses. They were not so cool then.

·         The part with the parents reacting to the stolen lab equipment in the cold open is not good at all. First, there's more piling on Hugo, which served its purpose in the last episode, at this point it is overkill. Apparently there is no parent there smart enough to realize stories about LSD in Canada have nothing to do with the subject matter at hand. It's a cliched and wearing portrayal of parents in a show that should know better.

·         Breaking Bad is going to always struggle with plot contrivances, it's just a matter of how much you can turn off your sensitivity to them. The Open House being the same day as Walt and Jesse's big cook doesn't derail the episode in a way we may see in the future, but it is sort of groanworthy.

What Is This Place?

Welcome to Other Scott's TV Blog!

For today, this is going to be the location where I dump some Season 1 episode by episode Breaking Bad reviews. The plan is to see what sort of reception I get to them before moving on to other seasons. It's quite a bit of work, so I don't want to jump into it without knowing that at least a few people are willing to read them.

In more general terms, I've thought of getting something together to post my thoughts for a while now. For me, writing things down is a good way to collect my thoughts on things. For the most part, if a show is interesting to me I'll usually do season retrospectives. It will mostly be for current shows, but there may be some old shows on there. Be warned, I move through old shows extremely slowly. So if I post on Sopranos Season 5 next week, you may be waiting a while to hear anything on season 6.

I may also do short bullet point posts on shows currently airing while in season. For instance, my first non Breaking Bad post will probably be Tuesday, where I'll sum up the series premiere of Gotham and the 2nd season premiere of Sleepy Hollow.

There may be other stuff too, even non TV related. I don't expect you'll see much about movies here, as I typically don't have much to say about them. There may be occasional sports posts where I get angry at the hive mind of the media. There may also be posts on religion, so be warned about that.

So, since I'm not sure how to work this blogger thing, this will probably be the last post you read. So, where I would normally say "Hope you enjoy my Breaking Bad reviews" I'll say, "Hope you enjoyed my Breaking Bad reviews!"

-Scott