“He’s so clean he must be dirty.”
After coming up with nothing thanks to the bug Walt placed on Gus’ car, Hank does some more digging and uncovers one of Gus’ depots. Walt calls Mike and warns him which pulls Jesse into the mix to clean it all up. Jesse and Mike have a bit of banter where Jesse lays out the logistics of not killing neither Walt nor Hank. Mike’s reaction would be very telling later in the latest episode of Breaking Bad, ‘Bug.’
While exiting the depot, Mike, Jesse, and a gunman are sniped from afar with the gunman getting one right in the head. Jesse’s pause is a very telling moment for the character. His mental state this whole season has been one of self-abuse mixed with cynicism and anger. Seeing the blood splattered across the back end of the semi seems to shock Jesse in a way nothing previously has. At the same time, he seems to want the sniper to find him and if not for Mike’s intervention, he may have taken his head clean off. This bit of business I think had a lot of subtext in it: Mike intervening and saving Jesse from his own actions.
Then along comes Gus in a great scene that I don’t want to ruin with specifics. All of the uncertainty Gus exhibited in the previous two episodes is momentarily washed away in one grand act
Skyler lets Walt know that they’re close to actually turning a profit and what was once supposed to be simply a front could turn into a legitimate business and Walt wouldn’t need to cook anymore. Her happiness comes crashing down when Ted shows up and lets her know the IRS is auditing him and his cooked books. Ted doesn’t get what her fear really is, which is that the IRS will snoop enough to catch her and Walt.
Gus’ “balls out in your face” move earlier in the episode is called into question as he seems to give into the Cartel’s demands. He informs Jesse that he is sending him to Mexico to show them how to cook Walt’s formula. This makes Walt unnecessary now, however Jesse’s fear now is that he’ll be taken out for not being able to duplicate Walt’s formula. When he has Walt over for advice, Walt asks Jesse if he’d seen Gus which Jesse says no to. Walt throws Hank’s bug at him and tells him he knows the truth. The conversation devolves into a full on fist fight which Jesse easily gets the upper hand in.
‘Big’ has some solid moments and definitely laid the groundwork for future episodes, especially with Skyler’s IRS issues and Jesse’s pending cooking issues. It is not, however, one of the top episodes this season.
Overall, within the context of Breaking Bad season 4, it falls a little flat. Jesse is still pretty solid and I really like the stress on Skyler’s plate now. Every time Walt talks to Hank on the phone, I just want to stab myself in the ears.
– James Zappie
