…and a little bit of 12
I know, I know. I’m an asshole. I missed a week to share my thoughts you were so impatiently waiting on to hear (sarcasm). This is why this isn’t a recap column. One, there’s enough of those on the internet already; and two, there’s not a single recap that comes close actually watching the show, so best I can do is pontificate as what I think is going on, but as Vince Gilligan continues to show, even that endeavor is borderline useless. I’ll offer my thoughts on the episode, but I’m beginning to realize I have no idea where this is going. But here’s my best shot at making some sense of it.
Gomez only has himself to blame:
How does Vince Gilligan keep doing this? Each episode ends crazier than the last. There were a lot of great moments in this episode but a lot of my thoughts revolve around this final scene. Not my first thought, but maybe my most puzzling is the one question I can’t get out of my head: why the fuck is Gomez here. At this point the stakes are high for everyone involved. Everyone, except Gomez. I can’t decide if this makes him better than the rest or dumber. Walt obviously wants to keep the money and not get caught, Jesse wants revenge on his old puppet master, Hank needs to now solve this case definitively or else he might actually take the fall, Skyler has her kids to worry about and what Walt getting caught could do to them, and Marie has a similar motive in that her family depends on Hank not taking the fall for these crimes. But what is Officer Gomez’s motive here. The only thing I see is an extremely loyal friend. If that is the case then, his loyalty has put himself in 2 very bad situations. The first is the insane shoot out. When step back for a moment and you think about, especially when you realize he’s probably going to die, why on earth is he here. On the one hand Gomez is a crime fighting cop, and so he’s here helping solve a crime, but on the other hand, this all could be solved a lot easier if things were made clear to rest of the DEA and he had back up helping out. So if he was really just for justice, he would just tell Hank, “look if you didn’t do it, which we know you didn’t, we’ll get the evidence needed to put him behind bars.” Gomez only puts up a small fight in episode 12 after the interrogation of Jesse. Hank has a vendetta for the crime he’s been trying to solve for over a year now that almost took his life and ability to walk. Jesse needs to put an end to Walt before Walt puts an end to him. But Gomez is the only one who’s here on his own fruition, which not only put him in danger of losing his life (he will), but also something diabolically much bigger. Which I’m about to get to.
How genius is Walt?:
That’s the question you have to constantly ask yourself when watching this show. How smart do we trust Walt to be. Which is what I keep wondering about when I think about the final scene in the desert from the last episode. We know he calls off the white supremacists and we know he “lead” them to where the money is (I’m still not certain he lead them there, meaning I don’t know how ahead of the game Walt is, he might have a dummy stash). But there’s also one other thing we know about Walt. He’s never without a plan. So when Walt came out with his hands up seemingly giving up, I only had one question. What does he have up his sleeve. Here’s the part where you click away from this article if you don’t like theoretical spoilers. Basically I don’t buy Walt “giving up”. There’s no way he’s caving in just cause they found him and his stash in the same place. He’s been in much worse situations with much less to work with and has tried to weasel his way out. So to me he must’ve made come up with something on the fly, and something that wouldn’t lead to Hank getting killed. I’m purely hypothesizing but I think Walt called the cops. Think about it. No one knows Hank and Gomez are investigating this and no one knows that they are in the desert. If Walt calls it in, it easily could implicate Hank as being the kingpin as he is obviously where the stash is, and Walt has already tailor made his alibi as being simply Hanks lackey. This would also explain Walt ending up in Vermont as some sort of witness protection situation as his license plate seemed to suggest in the flash forward. And with that I think the cops are still going to show up and now with the white supremacists there it just seems like some sort of drug war being interrupted. That’s my theory, even though it probably will end up being wrong.
Walt Jr. and my high hopes:
I can’t be the only one that loved the scene in the car wash with Walt Jr. behind the register. His pure excitement at Saul Goodman showing up to his family’s car wash. It was pure TV magic. This scene really showed how this show runs deep with talent. The actor playing Saul plays it so well you wonder if he has personal experience to feed off. The coyness to which he pays for his car wash from Skyler while subtly signaling for help was brilliant. and is there any better line in the episode than this: “Don’t drink and drive, but if you do. Call me.” But Walt Jr.’s innocence in this scene is played up really well and gets me thinking. It’s the one thing Walt Sr. wants to protect at all cost. His son’s innocence. He’s done everything he can to keep him in the dark. And it’s that line of thinking that makes me wonder if we’re headed for a “Road to Perdition” type of ending. If you haven’t seen that movie, please watch it now, and if you have you get where I’m heading with this. It’s the one thing Vince Gilligan hasn’t tainted yet on this show. Everyone else’s hands are dirty or at least have seen the dirt. It’s the one shred of goodness left in this whole fiasco of a life. Somewhere down the stretch I foresee this ending with Walt Sr. making the ultimate sacrifice to shield his son from the world outside. Somehow that seems like it would be fitting.
That’s it for this week. Only 3 more hours left of heart attack inducing drama. Hope you have aspirin ready. See you next week.
About Matt Cargile
Matt Cargile is the Editor in Chief of rookerville.com. He also works in finance, but refuses to read any news printed on pink paper. He is a child at heart with adult means. His childhood dream was to either become a magician or the leader of the next great empire and somehow both these things make complete sense. He's contradictory in nature, but is always consistent.
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