Br Ba S5 E11: Confessions

After every episode of Breaking Bad, especially in season five, I have been trying to predict the turns the series will take. There will be just enough development in every episode that the story can go a number of plausible ways.

After “Confessions,” I am done trying to make any predictions because the show is smarter than me and I have no idea what will happen next. I was shocked speechless when Walt taped the confession that falsely implicated Hank in the meth business. That monologue was a riveting moment in a season full of them. The man just finds more and more new lows to sink to. The way Walt was able to summon crocodile tears was chilling and disgusting. For a moment there, after Walt said he was going to confess and the show went to commercial, I thought maybe he would do the right thing and actually confess. In contrast to his sincere video confession in the pilot, now it’s more lies on top of lies and the despicable act of framing his brother-in-law. He is a sociopath at this point and there is no turning back.

I was agreeing with Marie that Hank should go to the DEA immediately with the information. The entire thing will be a mess, and it will be the hardest thing he’ll ever have to do, but I think hiding this blackmail would just make it worse. Of course, the problem is that the evidence against Walt and the fake evidence against Hank are circumstantial and either man could be believable as the culprit. There is also the matter of the drug money used to pay Hank’s medical bills. Once again, this series shows that decisions can have enormous consequences down the road.

Either way Hank plays it, the family is destroyed and no dinner at a Mexican restaurant can reconcile the Whites and Schraders. You can’t come back from something like Marie telling Walt he should kill himself and then Walt blackmailing Hank.

Walt continues his manipulations with Jesse but the scales have finally fallen from the latter’s eyes as he warns his former mentor not to “work him.” There was a moment when the two hugged that I thought, “He’s still working you, kid” and I was afraid Jesse would fall for the lies again. I think Jesse is just exhausted and that showed especially in his tremulous relief and tiny note of hope in his voice when he talked about going away to Alaska. For a moment, I did think Walt would shoot Jesse and I think Jesse was right that doing so in the middle of nowhere was Walt’s backup plan. That hug between the two in the desert definitely seemed like a last goodbye before the war starts.

Serendipity in the form of a cigarette pack and pick-pocketed pot finally revealed to Jesse that Walt poisoned Brock and his rage was unholy and thrilling. The flash-forwards show us that he didn’t actually burn down the White house but there are more questions now as to what stopped him and how the confrontation between Pinkman and Mr. White will play out.

I was expecting Jesse to realize Walt poisoned Brock but not so early in the series. There are still five episodes left and so much has happened, yet there’s still the feel that Breaking Bad is building up to something. After the revelations of the first three episodes, I have a feeling the explosion is going to be massive.

Br Ba S5 E10: Buried

So now Mr. and Mrs. White have both been punched or slapped in the face by Mr. and Mrs. Schrader respectively. The main players are choosing their sides.

The scene with Skyler and Marie in the bedroom was hard to watch. Skyler had such a visceral reaction as she allowed herself to realize just how much damage Walt had done and how long she was complicit in it. Walt and Skyler did not directly cause Hank to get shot, true, but I could read Marie’s unspoken accusation. What she didn’t have to say was “You know my husband faces danger from meth dealers and those are the people you’re in bed with? And stayed in bed with even after he ended up in a wheelchair?” I can’t say I blame Marie for slapping her.

The scene that followed, with Marie trying to get Holly out of the house and out of danger, was brutal (a child in peril in fiction always pushes my emotional buttons). It was a terrible foreshadowing that the Whites are involved in some dirty business, they may not be out of it yet, and there’s still a baby in the house.

Hank could have gone about confronting Skyler in a less tone deaf way. He’s disgusted by Walt’s actions but acts as if he’s talking to one of his buddies at the office about nailing a bad guy. “I don’t want the bastard to run out the clock,” he says. That’s still Skyler’s husband and I guess she decided at the end of the day, they’re still husband and wife.

I am amazed that a basket case like Lydia voluntarily started working in such a high stress business as the international meth trade. She’s definitely in a world where she doesn’t belong, with her Louboutins descending into the dirty meth lab. She is canny enough to order the massacre of Declan and his partners but can’t bear to look at their bodies. I think Lydia is the wild card in Breaking Bad and may be what will convince Walt to cook again. Either that or the Czechs will get him.

It looks as if Jesse, almost catatonic with guilt, will be the key to this whole unraveling. Now I’m thinking instead of Jesse killing Walt, Walt might be the one to kill Jesse. This makes sense because that’s the one murder Walt could commit that would completely corrupt him in the viewers’ eyes. I had said I didn’t want Jesse to die because he’s such a great character but I have made my piece with his possible death. The show is ending anyway so technically all the characters will die since we won’t see them again.    

Breaking Bad is shaping up to be a true tragedy and I could feel that in the inter-family confrontations this episode. The Whites and the Schraders are in an impossible situation. The hurts have cut too deep for any reconciliation. Skyler and Marie will each lose a sister. Walt may lose his freedom or his life. Hank may lose his career as well as his family. These characters are heading for a disaster that they cannot avoid and it’s becoming clearer by the episode.

I had the most emergent dream

I dreamed I was at some kind of party and there was a fire in the house. I was down the basement and it was slightly hazy with smoke and it was really hot. Nobody else seemed to notice.

When I went to call 911, I kept dialing wrong and getting people who were not 911. A woman let me borrow her cell phone and it looked just like the old cell phone I was using in the dream. I was asking her if I had to dial 9 or 1 before calling 911, like we were in an office.

It’s a recurring theme in my dreams that I have to use some kind of electronic device to prevent an emergency and can’t do it. I will often need to make a call and just can’t dial the numbers correctly and it turns into a big disaster. Or I won’t be able to work the remote control or something.

Last night another recurring theme returned to my dreams: That we need to sell our house and move into an apartment. This time, the apartment was really nice and had a huge deck outside overlooking a river. It was a huge apartment, as big as a house, but I was worried that we were giving up equity by renting instead of buying.

When I showed up at the new apartment, the cats were already there and happy. Steve said they were fine when he brought them over in the car, which should have told me it was a dream because they hate the car. I was glad the landlord let us have cats because I was worried we’d have to give them away (which in reality would of course be a deal breaker).

The apartment was also located in the back of a huge Best Buy. If we wanted to buy a CD or electronics, we could just walk out our front door. So that’s something.

That's What Friends Are For: A Short Play Starring Dionne and Friends

Scene One

Dionne Warwick is in the hospital awaiting gall bladder surgery and it’s not looking good for her. Her longtime friends — Stevie Wonder, Gladys Knight and Elton John — gather around for a final goodbye before Warwick undergoes the knife.

Dionne (in a halting voice full of emotion): And I never thought I’d feel this way … and as far as I’m concerned I'm glad I've got the chance to say … that I do believe I love you.

Gladys begins to cry softly. Elton puts an arm around her shoulder.

Dionne: And if I should ever go away — well then close your eyes and try to feel the way we do today … and then if you can remember, keep smiling. Keep shining, knowing you can always count on me … for sure. That’s what friends are for.

The doctors wheel Dionne into the operating room while the friends wave goodbye.

Scene Two

Dionne’s surgery is successful and she has a new lease on life. Right after her release from the hospital, the four friends go to a bar to celebrate by getting hammered.

Dionne (wasted on her third margarita, standing unsteadily and making a toast): For good times and bad times I’ll be on your side forever more. That’s what friends are for.

The four clink glasses. Dionne slumps back down in her chair.

Stevie: Well, you came and opened me and now there’s so much more I see and so by the way I thank you.

Stevie gives Dionne a big, sloppy hug. The two nearly fall over.

Elton: Whoa! And then for the times when we’re apart — well then close your eyes and know these words are coming from my heart and then if you can remember, oh …

Stevie: Keep smiling. Keep shining, knowing you can always count on me for sure. That’s what friends are for. In good times and bad times I’ll be on your side forever more. Oh, that’s what friends are for.

They all do a shot of 151 rum. Elton vomits onto the table. Moved by her friends’ love, as well as blind drunk, Gladys stands on the table to speak.

Gladys: Oh, keep smiling. Keep shining, knowing you can always count on me for sure. That’s what friends are for. For good times and bad times I’ll be on your side forever more.

Gladys falls over, breaking a chair. Dionne picks her up.

Gladys: That’s what friends are for.

Elton (screaming): Keep smiling! Keep shining! Knowing you can always count on me — oh for sure. Cause I’ll tell ya …

All: That’s what friends are for.

Elton raises his arm in a toast and accidentally knocks over a passing waiter. A dozen glasses full of booze shatter, spraying liquor everywhere. The police arrive to take all four friends to the drunk tank.

Scene Three

Dionne, Gladys, Stevie and Elton are drying out in the local jail. They are in adjacent cells that meet at one corner. Each reaches out to touch hands through the bars where the cells meet.

Elton: For good times and for bad times.

All: I’ll be on your side forever more.

Dionne: That’s what friends are for.

Stevie (still drunk): Ha-ha! That's what friends are for. Ha-ha-ha! Yeah!

A guard walks in with a bottle of Advil and gestures if anyone needs any.

Dionne: I’ll need for sure.

Stevie: I will need for sure.

Elton: I will need for sure.

Dionne: That’s what friends are for. Keep smiling. Keep shining.

Br Ba S5 E9: Blood Money

It just got real.

The cat and mouse game begins to come to an end as Hank catches on to Walt’s meth business. I was expecting that cathartic punch to happen a few episodes later but it makes sense that Hank would be too furious to hold back. Those endless seconds when the garage door was closing were as tense and electric as anything on Breaking Bad.

In his rage, Hank brought up some plot points I forgot about: Walt was the one who placed the fake call saying Marie was in the hospital, ultimately leading to a world of hurt for Hank. There are all sorts of betrayals coming to light now — betrayals that may seem small in the grand scheme of the last few seasons but that hit much harder when family is involved.

Walt tries to talk his way out of it, of course, immediately bringing up his recrudesced cancer. When that doesn’t work, he threatens Hank that he better “tread lightly.” I will be fascinated to see where this goes now that Walt is finally, blatantly turning on his family.

As choked with rage as Hank was, I think when Jesse finally finds out about Walt’s betrayals, the explosion will be much bigger. “Blood Money” saw Jesse mourning the loss of Mike, who was becoming his mentor, and realizing that Walt, to whom he looked up even if he couldn’t admit it, was responsible for his death.

I feel like Walt is a full-on sociopath at this point, given the chillingly casual way he lies to Jesse about Mike’s fate. “I need you to believe me,” he says, a statement loaded with meaning. Walt not only needs his erstwhile partner to believe in him to escape any legal consequences, he needs to delude himself that he has not yet been completely corrupted. Jesse and Walt are a study in contrast at this point. Jesse is guilty enough to give away $2.5 million to the family of Drew Sharp but Walt describes the kid’s death and disposal of his body as something that is merely regrettable, in the most passive and clinical language he can muster.

Forget the past, Walt says. He should know better. He should know this has all been a series of chemical reactions that nobody can stop and there will be consequences.

Meanwhile, in the near future, the White home has been boarded up and kids are skateboarding in the empty pool. It was a tantalizing flash forward and I found myself scanning the scene for any clues to fill in the gaps. I am guessing, from the “Heisenberg” spray-painted on the wall, that Walt got the infamy he desired in the form of kids idolizing him as a folk hero.

Whatever happens, it’s clear that the pesky ricin cigarette will play a part in the ending. The question is: Where do the flash forwards fit in among the last seven episodes? What gets the White family to that point and where do they go after that?

Br Ba

Are any other Breaking Bad fans not only salivating with excitement over the last eight episodes but also a little nervous? I just want the show to have the spectacular ending it deserves. This show is just about the best thing I’ve ever seen on TV, with characters as potent as the blue meth, and even though I have faith in Vince Gilligan and company on the finale, I am just thinking “Oh God don’t screw this up.”

There are a number of ways this could end so it would be emotionally satisfying. I think Walter White does need to die or face some kind of severe comeuppance. It would be true to the spirit of Breaking Bad, as the show itself is chemistry and has always shown the cause and effect of each character’s actions and his death would give the show a full measure of tragedy. I’m not sure if it would be better for Walter’s fate to be going down in a blaze or glory or an ignominious end or if the cancer returns but he cannot escape unscathed.

Bryan Cranston’s acting performance has been so titanic over the last five seasons that it’s tempting to want to see Walt live, just because he’s such a fantastically drawn character, but he’s such an irredeemable bastard at this point that he needs to end. His meth dealing long ago crossed from wanting to provide for his family to feeding his sociopathic narcissism. The man bombed a nursing home, let Jane choke on her own vomit and die so she wouldn’t blackmail him, poisoned Brock to manipulate Jesse, murdered Mike in a fit of rage and ego, ordered the deaths of Mike’s guys in prison, etc. That’s just what he’s done directly. Indirectly, he’s caused a plane crash and tacitly approved of the show’s most pitch-black moment — the murder of that kid during the train robbery and subsequently dissolving his body and bike in acid.

The most poetic way for this to end is for Jesse to kill Walt after finding out Walt was behind Jane’s death and Brock’s poisoning. The latter was an especially cold-blooded act on Walt’s part. It was heartbreaking to watch Jesse break down and blame himself, falsely believing he was the cause of the boy’s poisoning. No matter how it ends, they cannot kill Jesse. They cannot. Aaron Paul has been fantastic with this character. He turned what could have been a one-dimensional piece of riff raff to someone in deep moral conflict, the unexpected relative conscience of the show.

Skyler might get some kind of punishment since she’s been complicit in the meth dealing but I don’t want to see her dead. Yes, she has her own bad qualities but these pale in comparison to those of her husband. The show is clearly painting his treatment of her as abusive, illustrated in the jaw-dropping scene in the bedroom in the “Fifty-One” episode when Skyler tries to leave him and Walt has a threat to counter every one of her potential actions. This exchange, of course, ended with Skyler telling Walt she’s waiting “for the cancer to come back” and passively-aggressively smoking in the house, ashing into his coffee cup.

I hope the Schraders make it out alive. Hank has won me over in the last few seasons, going from a blowhard to an admirably tenacious cop. Marie is a bit of a wack job but in the scene where she was so good in taking care of baby Holly, I realized what a decent person she is. When Hank was hurt, she helped his rehab and endured his moods without complaint and took in the White children when their parents’ marriage was on the rocks. I’m wondering if there was some foreshadowing when Skyler mentioned how good Hank and Marie were with the kids, as if they will end up with custody after something terrible happens to Walt and Skyler.

There is also the matter of Chekov’s ricin cigarette. It’s still sitting behind that electrical outlet cover, waiting to be smoked.

I’m joining the critical bandwagon and will start doing reviews of each of the last eight episodes of Breaking Bad. They will be scattershot musings and hopefully I’ll have some kind of insight to add. Just don’t expect them on Monday morning because we will be watching on demand Monday night as the show comes on after dusk on Sunday and we are in bed.

The next eight weeks will be like Christmas morning over and over again.

Apropos of Nothing

I’m going to cop a big, self-righteous attitude that I’m boycotting Russian vodka. This will work until people realize that I’ve always boycotted every vodka from every country because I can’t stand vodka. I love convenient boycotts wherein I don’t use the product anyway. However, if Scotland ever cracks down on gay people, I’m screwed.

Whoever operates, the crawl, at the bottom of the screen, on Action News, in the morning, really needs, to lay off, the, commas.

Add my mind to the collateral damage of the python escaping the pet store and attacking those two kids. Now I have to avoid the sight of snakes on the slideshow of Yahoo and other websites I go to. Thanks for the nightmares. That is another reason I hate pet stores: I know there are snakes in there so I never wander around too much.

We saw The Conjuring and it was good but didn’t scare me at all. I think I great idea for a book or movie would be the aftermath of possession. How do you know the person won’t relapse? How do you know the demon isn’t still inside and just playing possum? How can you trust that your mother won’t try to kill  you again like she did in the creepy basement when Bathsheba possessed her?

I have to laugh when white people think it’s unfair that they can’t use the N-word but black people can. Yeah, racial double standards are a real bitch, aren’t they?

When I was on my business trip, I had one of the morning shows on as background while getting ready and this woman was singing a medley in the style of other singers. She did Celine Dion and some other people and they were fine. Then she did Tina Turner and it came off like some exaggerated parody. Why would someone make fun of Tina Turner? I don’t know if the woman intended it that was but it came off as mean-spirited.

Do I have to care about Dave Grohl and the Foo Fighters? Yeah, yeah, they were in Nirvana. But I just don’t care.

It’s really odd how I almost look forward to the end of summer because we don’t go away til the weekend after Labor Day. The action used to be in July or August and now it’s all about September. Going away that week was fun last year. The water is warm and there were no crowds or traffic. It was a little chillier on the deck at night but very pleasant. Once you graduate from school, there’s no reason for the summer to end the first Monday in September. I had a quiet summer anyway. After the wedding and honeymoon, I don’t have much more vacation time anyway.

On My Own: A Short Play Starring Patti LaBelle and Michael McDonald

Scene One

Patti LaBelle lies alone in a bed that suddenly feels too big for her. Several tear-stained tissues lay on the quilt. An overturned photo frame sits on the nightstand. Rain is falling softly on a large picture window.

Patti: So many times you said it was forever. Said our love would always be true. Something in my heart always knew I'd be lying here beside you on my own.

Patti rolls over and runs her hand over the empty half of the bed that once held Michael McDonald.

Patti: On my own. On my own.

Scene Two

In his apartment, Michael McDonald sits at a desk while trying to pay his bills. The desk is strewn with paperwork and a bottle of Jack Daniels.

Michael: So many promises never should be spoken. Now I know what loving you cost. Now we're up to talking divorce and we weren't even married.

Michael looks wistfully out the window at the rain that continues to fall.

Scene Three

Some time later, Patti appears in the hallway outside Michael’s apartment. She stares at the door, debating whether to knock.

Patti: On my own once again now. One more time by myself.

Patti knocks on the door and Michael answers. He resists the urge to kiss her but instead sighs sadly and lets her in. She takes off her raincoat.

Patti: No one said it was easy.

Michael: But it once was so easy.

Michael turns away from her sadly. Patti walks over to him and confronts him.

Patti: Well, I believe in love.

Michael: I believe in love.

Patti: Now here I stand. I wonder why?

Michael walks away from her and slumps back down at his desk.

Michael: I wonder why …  

Patti: WHOO! I'm on my own. Why did it end this way? This wasn't how it was supposed to be.

Patti notices a framed photo of the couple from a trip to Bermuda. She and Michael were so happy then, with a future so full of promise. She runs a finger lightly across his photographed cheek.

Patti: I wish that we could do it all again.

Michael: So many times I know I should have told you. Losing you it cut like a knife. You walked out and there went my life. (He does a shot of Jack.) I don't want to live without you on my own.

Patti: This wasn't how it was supposed to end. I wish that we could do it all again. I never dreamed I'd spend one night alone.

The two approach each other and stand with their faces inches apart.

Patti and Michael: By myself!

Michael: I've got to find where I belong again. I've got to learn to be strong again. I never dreamed I'd spend one night alone by myself.

Patti: By myself. WHOO! I've got to find out what was mine again.

Michael: My heart is saying that it's my time again.

Patti (putting on her raincoat): And I have faith that I will shine again. I have faith in me.

Patti gives Michael a sad smile and walks out the door with her head held high. Michael stares at the door for several seconds. The apartment suddenly seems too big, too lonely and with too many ghosts. He still smells her perfume.

Michael: I have faith in me …

Curtain