Hey everyone! Ronnie Brown here again with my thoughts on the next episode of Breaking Bad, called "Buried." Just like last week, here's your spoiler alert.
Another week, another outstanding hour of television on AMC, with an episode of Breaking Bad that kept the plot moving very nicely. One of the things I love about this show is that even the less action-packed episodes are often just as interesting and exciting to watch as the bloodbaths (even though this one featured an off screen bloodbath, but more on that later).
After the great "tread lightly" ending last week, once Walt left Hank's house, he realized he needed to cover his tracks and immediately tried calling Skyler, only to find Hank beat him to it. During Skyler and Hank's meeting, I honestly expected her to give Hank SOMETHING, so I was pleasantly surprised when she gave him nothing and fled.
All that Walt knew was that Skyler went to Hank; he had no idea that she refused to talk, so assuming the worst, he went to Saul. ("I'll send you to Belize.") Finding out that the only physical evidence that Skyler could lead Hank to was the storage unit full of money, Walt decided to bury it (hence the episode title), but not before Huell and Kuby channeled Scrooge McDuck. The lottery ticket disguising the coordinates was yet another quite clever idea on Walt's part, and despite how careful he's being now, I'm sure that'll be back to bite him in the ass at some point.
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| Channeling Scrooge McDuck |
While Walt was out digging, Hank and Marie paid Skyler a visit at home, and in one of the best scenes in the episode, Marie realized just how much Skyler knew, but what sent her over the edge was finding out that Skyler knew about Walt's double life before Hank was shot. I loved the parallel of Hank punching Walt last week and Marie slapping Skyler this week. The show is clearly wasting no time; Marie is fully aware of everything and chillingly tells Hank "You have to get him." Now the Schraders are united to bring Walt down and the Whites are united to, as Skyler puts it, "stay quiet" until Walt's cancer eventually kills him so that their problems disappear. The tease for next week's episode on Talking Bad showed an image of Walt and Skyler at a restaurant table with two empty chairs, so clearly the four of them are going to talk and hug it out at the end, right...? RIGHT?
Another thing I love about this show is how most of the time the predictions you make are wrong. Last week when Walt mentioned leaving behind a "viable operation," I assumed Todd was the cook since he was Walt's partner for awhile and knew what to do. To my surprise, Declan had his own guy after giving Todd a chance and firing him. Lydia begged him to give Todd another chance and he refused. So goodbye Declan. Hearing the gunfire and seeing shells drop down into that buried bus meth lab around Lydia was great, as was the sea of bodies taken out by Todd's uncle and his prison connections. How this is going to affect Walt still remains to be seen, but needless to say it will not be good, especially if Todd turns those connections against Walt to try to rope him back into cooking.
Which leaves us with Jesse. The poor guy has just completely shut down; he barely spoke in "Blood Money" and had absolutely no lines this week. It just shows how compelling the show is that I didn't even notice until after I watched the episode that Jesse, the other main character, only appeared at the very beginning and very end. After his Paperboy-style money adventure last week, the police had him in custody and naturally Hank rushed over as soon as he found out. When it cut to black after Hank walked into the interrogation room, everyone I watched it with and I all let our outrage be known, which also shows how compelling the damn show really is. With next week's episode being called "Confessions," I feel like Hank will finally get some real facts from Jesse, and I'm excited and terrified to see what happens. The next six days cannot go by quickly enough.
Another minor thing to mention that I found pretty interesting is a story device the show hasn't really used before. From the end of "Gliding Over All" to now, everything has been continuous. "Blood Money" picked up immediately where "Gliding Over All" left off, as did "Buried" this week and I'm sure "Confessions" will do next week. Obviously that can't last if the show is going to catch up to those flash forward teaser scenes, but I hope they keep that up for as long as possible because it makes this feel less like a season of television and more like one big story.
Anyway, I've rambled on enough. Feel free to sound off in the comments because, as you can see, I can talk about this show forever and I'd love to hear from you! As long as you don't get sent to Belize, I'll see you all next week!
