Breaking Bad – Is Walter’s stay of execution short-lived?

From last week’s episode, I noticed quite a few people were wondering about the “pollos” text message and what that meant. A quick little translation search and you could see it meant “chickens” in Spanish, but is also part of the name of Gustavo’s restaurant, “Los Pollos Hermanos.” In seeing Gustavo at the chicken farm for his little meeting, it was pretty clear why the Salamanca cousins knew what that text message meant.

What became very clear early on in this episode is just how much deep shit Walter is in. The “pollos” text message merely bought Walt a little time, as we saw how extremely pissed off Don Salamanca is and how twitchy Tuco’s cousins are. I do wonder, though, what Gustavo’s true intentions are in keeping Walter alive. Is it just because of his great, blue glass, or is it because he feels something for the man?

Here’s where we could see a glimmer of where Walter may be heading in his road to drug lordship. Could it be that Gustavo sees in Walter something of himself, when he was first starting out? Obviously they both very much admire professionalism and order, so they share that. Gustavo has found out how to hide his true profession, right in broad daylight, by running a chicken restaurant. Walter tried to hide his drug work behind the veil of high school chemistry teacher. Sounds to me they have a bit in common.

Now, about the twitchy Salamanca boys. What are Walter’s options for getting away from them avenging their cousin’s death? Well, the Salamancas could be killed somehow, but would that stop yet more family from seeing out Walt? Walt could go into hiding, but that would mean leaving the state and his family behind. I can’t imagine any sort of business with the drugs would get them off his ass, so his options aren’t looking so good right now.

I said last season that Skyler was going to mess around with her boss, so it wasn’t all that big of a surprise to see it happen in this episode. It actually served several purposes for her: 1) she succeeded in disconnecting herself from Walter’s hold on her, in trying to kid them all that they led a normal family life, 2) she forced Walter to stop kidding himself that things could go back to normal, and 3) she got laid.

The question now is, will Walter try to sweep that under the rug, will he admit defeat and move on, or will he go ballistic? I’m going with a mix of the sweeping and the ballistic. After pouring out to her about his motivation for what he did, she still just does not care. Is anyone else getting sick of how she treats Walter, or am I sympathizing with the wrong person here?

Jesse’s story is still slowly forming, and as some of us suspected, it looks like he’d love to just separate himself from Walter and get to work on his own. He doesn’t seem to have it out for Walter completely just yet, but something made Jesse get into the cooking mobile without him. In calling his dead girlfriend’s voicemail over and over, was that his attempt at getting over her more quickly or showing us that he just can’t bring himself to ever forget?

Lastly, I’m wondering what’s up with Hank and his aggression issues. Was it because of what happened in the desert? He comes across as a rather laid-back sorta guy most times, especially when around the Whites. Was this to show us that, should Walter’s doings ever get back to Hank, Walter’s in for a good beating before he’d be put in the slammer?

Clacked by Keith McDuffee
on Apr 04, 2010 @ 23:00 EST5EDT