Breaking Bad ‘Live Free Or Die’: The Universal Sign For Keys

Breaking Bad is back – at least for the next eight weeks, until it goes on another year-long hiatus before returning for its final eight, already super-hyped episodes sometime in 2013. And as the fifth season begins, so does a lowered bar of expectations – at least, in my mind – that always seems to garner undeserved universal acclaim.

Now before everyone jumps down my throat, let me say this: the plight of Walter White’s morality is one of the most compelling things we’ve seen on television recently, a demented modern Western with some truly cinematic camera direction. And I’ll give Vince Gilligan credit: the man knows how to craft a story from beginning to end in the most gut-wrenchingly dramatic ways possible. But Breaking Bad is a very flawed television show, full of cardboard characters (most notably Marie and Walt Jr.), and increasingly bad writing for anyone outside of Walt and Jesse.

Being the show’s core, it’s what makes the show watchable: at this point, I don’t care how Walter ends up in Denny’s, without his family, hanging on to his life by a mere thread. I just want to see what happens when Jesse realizes what he got into two years ago when he was stopped by his old chemistry teacher and offered a job.

In many ways, ‘Live Free or Die’ isnt’ concerned with the bigger questions on the show, teasing us with concepts and ideas, hinting at what is to come in the next eight weeks with a whole lot of setting up and checking in. It opens with another flash-forward, with a bearded Walter (with a head full of hair), sitting in a Denny’s, writing ’52’ in his breakfast. He’s wearing black rimmed glasses (black = without soul, conscience… basically, pure evil), and waiting to complete a transaction for a massive machine gun.

We’ll find out what that’s for soon enough; what I found compelling in that scene – and the one that followed it, showing Walt cleaning up the evidence from his house – were the upward shots of opening trunks with Walt’s face looking down on the camera. Even though things are ‘opening up’ for Walt with Gus out of the way, he’s still in as much of a box as he was in before – and don’t forget the angle reminding us again that Walter is now an evil, shadow-casting man.

I can buy Walter’s pride in his victory over Gus – “Aren’t you at least relieved that I’m alive?” he asks Skylar, in snarky fashion – but the unbridled confidence in himself that follows is where the problems begin for Walter right now. The DEA is sniffing around, he finds out about Skylar cooking books for the still-alive Ted Beneke (who we last saw with Godfather oranges all over him), and he’s facing yet another improbable situation, and now Walter is full-on Heisenberg, no longer considering any sort of angle to anything (like he’s done for the last four seasons), but jumping into plans to destroy evidence with the blind faith of an unbridled psychotic.

Yes, he’s ballsy, and beyond egotistical, but statements like “Because I said so?” feel like loaded pieces of dialogue designed to infer a false sense of faith and security in himself that I just don’t buy into. He doesn’t even stop to reflect on what he’s just done by killing the head of a drug organization – which Mike happily reminds him of – and he’s already onto season 5’s first impossible-but-easy-to-solve situation of the season.

Did anyone really believe they’d fail, and get locked up in the premiere? Bad might be able to shock us at times, but he’s never going to go as far as to actually surprise us with something (except for things like “Surprise! Hank shows up and shoots Tuco for some random reason!” or “Surprise! Walt poisons Brock, and we don’t even really know how he did it!”) . Sure, the evidence may or may not be destroyed – more of that slow-building tension, and smartly done here – but did we really think those cops would find them in the car? Of course not, because they had just broken into the place that Mike had explicitly stated over and over was impossible to get into.

And another question: why would Mike meekly go along with the plan? He hates Walter, is infinitely disappointing in Jesse, and really has no reason to hang out in town except to act out a plan to keep those tapes from being found. So he says fuck it, I could just disappear somewhere, or hang out with two dicks who killed my boss and fucked up my life for a good year plus. For some it’s a hard choice, for Mike, it’s a few bitchy lines of dialogue and lots of scrunchy-eyed, I’m thinking face.

There were a number of moments I enjoyed, however, but thematically, it was too light in subtle areas and loud in obvious places (WALT IS HIGH ON POWER… MIKE IS PISSED…. SKYLAR MAKES BLANK FACE WHEN NERVOUS/ANXIOUS). Worst of all, the best character on the show is left to do mostly nothing but blindly defend the guy whose face is still bruised from his fists. Jesse has NOTHING to do in this episode but defend Walt at any costs, drive the truck, and dish out some hilarious lines about magnets – complete with physical demonstration.

Those dark moments of comedy were really the best of the episode, from long moments like Saul’s office scene, or Skylar’s “Good” response to the cyborg version of Beneke. There are dramatic threads that hold some interest in the beginning of the season, and as always, those are tied to the cat and mouse game between Hank & Walt, Walt & Jesse’s relationship, and Mike’s interpretations of human hand signals and meanings. But like much of last season, Breaking Bad is still an inconsistent piece of work, visually arresting and endlessly entertaining, but still a deeply flawed show.

Grade: B

Other thoughts/observations:

– Really can’t stand Skylar’s character and how it’s been written in the last two seasons. The Ted Beneke story line has had one good moment (“I fucked Ted”) and surrounded it with a whole lot of unnecessary bullshit. Like Walt said, if Saul had used even a single iota of anything remotely connected to common sense, the whole IRS trying to get at your paycheck’s would never happen. Why Skylar has to completely lack the ability to make intelligent decisions is one of the show’s most annoying aspects. That being said, her reaction to Walt’s hug and “I forgive you” comment was a great finish to the episode.

– An episode without Marie is always worth a slight grade increase.

– “YEEEAAHH BIITCCH…. MAGNETS!!”

– Where the fuck do you sign up for a Cayman back account? I’ve been trying since I saw it in The Firm at age 10.

– second funniest character: Gomez. Guy is a riot.

– Walt has his hair, but is taking his pills. Welcome back, big C.

– it’s only a matter of time before the cartels move in, correct? Will Walt decide between them as business partners, or give everyone the middle finger and shoot machine guns at ’em?

– I didn’t need the shitty, unbelievable explanation of Saul’s role in Walt’s poisoning plan. There’s a whole lot more to that story, and how that got pulled off, and if you’re not going to show it to us, have the balls to walk away from it and move on.

– something about Hank. He’s on the trail, and he’s walking. Yay.

– Mr. Heckles lives, and works in an auto yard. Make of that what you will.

What did you think of ‘Live Free or Die’? Feel free to leave your thoughts/comments below, and we’ll see you next Sunday!