Mike’s an interesting foil for Walt, because while he’s exceptionally street-smart, he’s not really an intellectual match for Heisenberg – at heart, he’s not really an ideas man. He lacks the taste for the theatrical that leads Walt to pull a roach-killing-cum-meth-cooking-travelling roadshow out of his pork-pie Heisenberg hat after some more conventional avenues were exhausted.Or were they? Walt did seemed to be nit-picking with some of the issues he had with Saul’s potential cooking venues, and Saul’s frustration at him (“You can’t head to CostCo and pick up a couple of de-humidifiers?”) seemed well justified – although there was a nice moment where his sheepish attempts to sell the Lazer Bowl venue to Walt and Jesse, where the fateful plan to dispatch Gale was feverishly hatched by the three of them, was unceremoniously shot down.
In the end, Walt’s plan worked out just fine, as they have had a habit of doing recently, and also resulted in a gorgeously directed cooking sequence so woozily seductive that it almost makes the meth business attractive enough to make the the bike-lock stranglings and box-cutter throat slicings all worth it. Despite that, all the smoke and mirrors still seemed a little unnecessary, when the other venues remain probably a little less risky overall.
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Perhaps the truth is they just weren’t sexy enough for this current iteration of Walt/Heisenberg; a complex, cheeky magic trick on the other hand, that can simultaneously makes him feel clever while giving a fuck-you to both the cops and Gus (who didn’t think of it first), is a no-brainer. Turns out Walt’s still trying to outsmart the chicken man, even after the crude cosmetic surgery he administered via C4 a few weeks ago. Everything he does now has to be even more fiendish, more brilliant than Gus managed – apparently, just killing the guy isn’t enough for Walt.
And it isn’t enough for Mike either, who isn’t afraid to unload some uncomfortable truths to Walt at the most inopportune time – while a huge pile of cash is on the table.
But as of “Hazard Pay,” I’m not so sure that matters anymore. Walt increasingly seems capable of sinking to depths that Mike and Jesse (Aaron Paul) are not. In which case, maybe it’s not the most prudent, cautious criminal who will best be able to step into the Jesse James role? Maybe it’s the guy with no soul?
In the cold open, Mike (Jonathan Banks) is visiting prisons in order to meet with each of his “guys,” reaffirm their loyalty, and put their minds at ease. After last week’s debacle with Lydia and how effectively she was able to turn one of Mike’s own men against him, it’s not hard to see why Mike would be cautious. Of course, Mike is among the most thorough men on the show, to the point that I wonder if it wasn’t his personality that rubbed off on Gustavo Fring and made him the fastidious, detail-oriented man he had been. Through these prison meetings, and really throughout the episode, we come to a more intimate understanding of Mike’s code. The only thing the man seems to treasure more than his granddaughter is loyalty. Keep your mouth shut, and you’ll be “made whole,” as Mike puts it. It’s his principle of compensating a good soldier for services rendered in perpetuity. We saw last week what happens when an associate forgets his loyalty.
In the end, Walt’s plan worked out just fine, as they have had a habit of doing recently, and also resulted in a gorgeously directed cooking sequence so woozily seductive that it almost makes the meth business attractive enough to make the the bike-lock stranglings and box-cutter throat slicings all worth it. Despite that, all the smoke and mirrors still seemed a little unnecessary, when the other venues remain probably a little less risky overall.
Click Here Watch Full Episode
Perhaps the truth is they just weren’t sexy enough for this current iteration of Walt/Heisenberg; a complex, cheeky magic trick on the other hand, that can simultaneously makes him feel clever while giving a fuck-you to both the cops and Gus (who didn’t think of it first), is a no-brainer. Turns out Walt’s still trying to outsmart the chicken man, even after the crude cosmetic surgery he administered via C4 a few weeks ago. Everything he does now has to be even more fiendish, more brilliant than Gus managed – apparently, just killing the guy isn’t enough for Walt.
And it isn’t enough for Mike either, who isn’t afraid to unload some uncomfortable truths to Walt at the most inopportune time – while a huge pile of cash is on the table.
But as of “Hazard Pay,” I’m not so sure that matters anymore. Walt increasingly seems capable of sinking to depths that Mike and Jesse (Aaron Paul) are not. In which case, maybe it’s not the most prudent, cautious criminal who will best be able to step into the Jesse James role? Maybe it’s the guy with no soul?
In the cold open, Mike (Jonathan Banks) is visiting prisons in order to meet with each of his “guys,” reaffirm their loyalty, and put their minds at ease. After last week’s debacle with Lydia and how effectively she was able to turn one of Mike’s own men against him, it’s not hard to see why Mike would be cautious. Of course, Mike is among the most thorough men on the show, to the point that I wonder if it wasn’t his personality that rubbed off on Gustavo Fring and made him the fastidious, detail-oriented man he had been. Through these prison meetings, and really throughout the episode, we come to a more intimate understanding of Mike’s code. The only thing the man seems to treasure more than his granddaughter is loyalty. Keep your mouth shut, and you’ll be “made whole,” as Mike puts it. It’s his principle of compensating a good soldier for services rendered in perpetuity. We saw last week what happens when an associate forgets his loyalty.
