AMC
Like interior design genius Smelly Ploppen on Dragons’ Den and Skyler exhorting the witless Walter Jnr to parrot “have an A1 day!” Lydia knows the importance of branding. In her power meeting with Todd the baby killer, Nazi Uncle Jack and Roadkill McGee she tells them that, while 76% purity is an improvement, the meth is not its usual signature blue and her buyers expect continuity. Todd, clearly cuntstruck by Lydia, assures her he will do everything in his infanticidal power to get both the colour and quality up to speed. They share a moment as Lydia wonders exactly how much ricin it would take to eliminate Todd, his uncle and wipe the entire gene pool of their rat jism DNA off the face of the fucking Earth. As he dreamily watches the absurdly pretty object of his desire walk away Todd’s ringtone (Thomas Dolby’s She Blinded Me with Science) alerts us to Walt’s call from the last episode. Jesse Stinkman has got to go. They set up a meeting.
They share a moment as Lydia wonders exactly how much ricin it would take to eliminate Todd, his uncle and wipe the entire gene pool of their rat jism DNA off the face of the fucking Earth.
Back among the good guys we learn that Jesse‘s big idea is to pressure Huell. It’s not the second law of thermodynamics but it’s all they’ve got so they go with it. After taking Huell to a safe house Hank tells him he’s next on Walt’s hit list but fat boy isn’t buying it. He changes his tune though after he’s shown a mocked up a photo of Jesse with his brains blown out.¹ All of a sudden you can’t stop the gross tub of shit blabbing. Don’t anyone introduce Huell to Instagram filters – it’ll blow his head clean off. He tells them all about the 7 barrels full of cash and although he doesn’t know the location the Jesse-Hank-Gomez axis of dweeble believe they have a way to get right to it.
That’s if Jesse survives the day. At the cordial arrange-a-killing meeting Nazi Uncle Jack names his price: teach Todd the baby killer the cooking ways of Heisenberg. They want it pure and they want it blue, just like their Aryan Slav brothers like it. With an eyeroll and a sigh Walt agrees to one cook and that is agreeable to the baby killing racists. Although Walt can’t get a 10-20 on Jesse he knows how to flush him out: a visit to Andrea and Brock. At Walt’s concerned request Andrea leaves a message for Jesse. It’s the smart move but with Hank having wire on Jesse’s phone it doesn’t pay off. Dammit Chloe!
It gets worse. Saul tells Walt that Huell is missing. The cogs began to turn. Four billion cogitations a second rip through his brilliant mind, every possible permutation of random happenstance that could be the definitive explanation of what the fuck is going on. A multimedia text settles it for him. It’s another mockup photo, this time of the cash barrels in the desert. A phone call from Jesse quickly follows. I’ll spare you the fruity language but the gist is “Say old buddy you’re a genius, could you solve this riddle for me? What’s green, comes in 7 barrels and is about to go up in flames?” Walt’s fairly sure he knows this one.
He drives like Dick Dastardly to the location as Jesse describes burning 10 grand a minute until he gets there. They reminisce over the phone on the journey and it’s understandably testy. Under the building pressure Walt make some notable mistakes. He talks about the murders he committed, breaks the speed limit and drives without due care or attention. He’s lucky to get there in one piece but when he does he realises he’s been duped. As he sees a car approach he calls in Uncle Jack to finish Jesse. When he realises it’s Hank and Gomez with him he calls it off. It’s all hopeless. He surrenders.
They arrest Walter and Hank reads him his rights. He calls Marie to tell her the good news. He tells her he loves her, the universal storytelling signal that he is about to die. She loves him too. But wait, who’s that coming over the horizon with an army of gun toting white supremacists? That’s not Uncle Jack is it? Oh but it is. Well this could be tricky.
As Walt furiously tries to abort the mission, handcuffed and locked inside Hank’s vehicle, a Mexican stand-off ensues between Gomez and Hank and The Aryan Nation (who, it should be pointed out, don’t really like Mexicans and aren’t crazy about stand-offs). The Feds are outnumbered roughly 10 to 1. Uncle Jack likes those odds and as we fade to black with the shootout in full swing there are no casualties but this is not The A-Team.
I just don’t see this ending well.
The verdict: White Power!
Marks out of 10: 9
¹ At first he’s all “Jesse had a brain?”
