Breaking Bad: Season 5 Summer Premiere

In the pilot episode of Breaking Bad, Walter White (Bryan Cranston), the nebbish high school chemistry teacher, explains basic chemistry and life in the simplest of terms: growth, decay, transformation. Over the next 54 episodes we see the growth, decay, and transformation of Walter White as he uses a terminal cancer diagnosis as a catalyst to fully realize the demons that have lurked inside of him for so long.

By the time we get to “Blood Money,” the midseason premiere that picks up right where we left off, with Hank (Dean Norris) wrapping his mind around the idea that his brother-in-law—the captain of the chess team to Hank’s game-winning quarterback—is the elusive Heisenberg, Walter is back to where he started at the beginning of the series. After promising Skyler (Anna Gunn) that he was quitting the meth business, he is once again playing the part of the average middle class schlub, working hard at the family business and getting home in time for dinner. After almost two years of murder, deceit, and countless acts that revealed a chilling moral vacancy, Walter White is playing the role that he mastered for so long: the content family man.

The last time we were shown the White house in its barest form was a flashback sequence in the first half of season five, when Walter and Skyler were considering making the modest home their own. They were full of hope and optimism, a gifted chemist and his pregnant wife ready for life. “Blood Money” once again shows us a White house completely stripped of any couches, pictures, and everything else that makes a house a home, only this time, it’s in the near-distant future and the home is painted with graffiti, most notably the living room wall, which sports a spray painted “Heisenberg” in big, block letters. With a full head of hair and a cold, dead expression, Walter White, the one whom we last saw in the season five premiere buying machine guns and carrying a fake New Hampshire license, walks into his former home to retrieve his vial of ricin. We don’t know what he plans to use the poison for and it’s not immediately important. What we do know is that in the time that spans from Hank figuring out Walter’s secret to now, Walter, whether he likes it or not, has received the fame and recognition he always thought he deserved.

If we didn’t have the cold opening to tell us that Walter would eventually retreat back to his sociopathic ways by the time the bacon shapes “52,” it becomes painstakingly clear by the end of “Blood Money,” a pedal-to-the-medal, guns-blazing hour of television. The writers only have so much time left to bring closure to the story, and they waste none of it here. Much of the forward action takes place in Hank’s discovery of Walter and Walter’s discovery of Hank, but we also check in on Jesse (Aaron Paul), who continues to be crushed by his own morality. The money given to him for his part in Walter’s operation only serves as a constant reminder of all of that was done in order to obtain it, and he would rather drive around dispensing it through his window like the town’s most generous, morbid paperboy than spend a cent. Jesse shows us what this lifestyle can do to the emotional wellbeing of a person when they’re not blessed, or cursed, with the emotional detachability of a Heisenberg.

Hank, after almost killing himself and Marie (Betsy Brandt) during a vehicular panic attack, spends the hour processing his haunting new information and figuring out exactly what it means. A lot has happened to Hank since the name Heisenberg came into his life and the more he digs into the past the more he realizes how much damage Walter has caused. Walter, in a plot point that may serve the story just a bit too easily, discovers very quickly that his copy of Leaves of Grass has disappeared from his bathroom, and once he finds the tracking device under his car, there’s no question. Hank knows.

Breaking Bad is notorious for producing some of the most well-crafted action sequences on television (Hank vs. The Twins, Gus walking straight toward the gun barrels of the Cartel snipers, the hospital explosion that ended season four), but what really makes Breaking Bad stand tall amongst other shows that use loud, noise-filled sequences to compensate for a lack of quality writing are the long, expertly-written scenes between two characters in a small space. The final scene of the premiere, when Hank and Walter come face to face in the Schraders’ garage, is nothing short of great theater. We’re privy to the knowledge that each man knows the other’s secret, and it’s only a matter of time before the floodgates open and all hell breaks loose.

The moment that Walt walks into the garage, tension is high and the audience feels it. The innocuous discussion of car wash business and the quality of potato salad is merely noise, something for the audience to hear while we watch their body language. This is a chess match between two Grandmasters mentally calculating their move five steps down the road. The conversation, anchored by two incredible, subtle performances, would’ve been a satisfying enough way to kick off the beginning of the end, but as Walter turns to exit the garage, pausing for a moment before hitting the driveway, we get a crystal clear glimpse into the psyche of this formerly scared, passive man who always chose flight over fight. The Walter we now know doesn’t let anyone, even for a moment, get the upper hand on him. As Mike (Jonathan Banks) so perfectly stated seconds before dying in the first half of season five, pride is Walter’s tragic flaw. Walter knows that the second he leaves that garage he is a servant to Hank’s next move. Walking back into the garage and confronting Hank is not the smartest plan, but it’s simply the only route that Walter’s ego will allow him to take. The aggressively manipulative angle that he chooses to employ in the confrontation gives Hank the first chance to look into the eyes of Heisenberg. Hank, confounded by the pure evil standing two inches away, claims he doesn’t even know who Walter really is. “Tread lightly,” is the advice Walter offers, effectively throwing down the gauntlet and letting Hank know exactly whom he is dealing with.

The last seven episodes of Breaking Bad are expected to answer a lot of questions. How will Hank proceed? Will Walt succumb to Lydia’s (Laura Fraser) pleas and go back to work? What the hell is Walter going to use a machine gun for in nine months? We can’t be sure that Breaking Bad will tie up every loose end and answer every question, but if the premiere is any indication, we’re in for one hell of a last stretch to the finish line.