BREAKING BAD S05E12

AN IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF

"Rabid Dog"

In the 10,035 minutes of downtime between weekly 45-minute episodes of Breaking Bad, I occasionally found occasion to get in another few episodes of telly. Over the course of the last week, I've been rewatching Weeds, a little show about a middle-class mom (Mary-Louise Parker) who begins growing weed in order to provide for her family after the death of her husband. Sound semi-familiar?  Though Weeds made its debut on Showtime in 2005, three years before Breaking Bad arrived on AMC, Vince Gilligan, the man behind Walter White, had apparently never heard of Nancy Botwin and her dramedic pot-selling exploits; in fact, if he had Breaking Bad might never have come to light.

Aside from reminding us all to be grateful for Vince Gilligan's limited TV viewing schedule, Weeds has also reiterated, for me, just what a great show BB is. Over the course of eight seasons and 102 episodes, Nancy Botwin lived in three states, had a succession of lovers - major characters disappeared from Weeds without a word of explanation, huge inorganic plot shifts sent the show tumbling off in different directions. There's an air of sensationalism - "Look at me, look at me" - to the whole thing. BB, meanwhile, is compact, focused, content to keep its eye on half a dozen or so key figures and slowly smolder away. Breaking Bad has never felt the need to reinvent itself.

That's perhaps why the last few episodes have seemed so shocking and yet so unbearably tense: we've been building to this point for half a decade now. Walt has laid the track that leads to his own downfall and now - even as he scrabbles to preserve himself and his family - all that's left to do is see how it plays out. This newest episode, "Rabid Dog", opens with Walt returning home to find Jesse's car parked in his driveway. The anguished expression on Walt's face as realization dawns on him is almost impossible not to sympathize with. For all he's done, Walt is still our protagonist: as detached as might have become from his point-of-view, we know how much Jesse still means to him.

 There's also the fact that, for all his intellect, the intimidation he's mastered, Walter White is hardly an an action hero.1 When he scales his garden fence, hiding out behind the table, it all feels faintly ludicrous, like a kid playing at soldiers. The threat, though, is real, as we know, and the tension is exquisite. The atonal chiming and rhythmic thrumming that accompanies Walt as he makes his way through the house, now hostile territory, elevates it to pure dread. The last we saw Jesse he was screaming, incoherent with rage; the carpet is soaked in gasoline. Where has he gone? This home invasion is the closest Walt's other life has come to touching his family. 

The whole episode, written and directed by Sam Catlin2, is beautifully shot and framed as Walt scopes out the rooms, gun drawn. His fear and bravado as he calls Jesse out is palpable. "Rabid Dog", of all the episodes this year so far, makes use of corridors, the back and forth, a sense of claustrophobia, of being exposed. As such, when Walt stows his gun and heads out onto the street through his back garden's hedged gateway, the sudden openness is alarming. Walt's on-his-feet deliberation through what comes next - stowing the gasoline can in his, no, the neighbor's bin; arranging to have the same locks refitted - raises a valuable question: to what extent is Walt's "evil" truly calculated, an innate ruthlessness, and to what extent is it a desperate man on autopilot?

  
Jesse clearly believes the latter, but, as I commented in my review of last week's episode, he's not us. Walt may not be the kindly, frustrated individual he seemed back in S01E01, but is he truly irredeemable? Everything he's done so far has, in one way or another, been to protect him and his family: the deaths of Gale and Gus, of those ten men, even the poisoning of Brock. Even his keeping this new secret is, in a way, protecting them. Could any of us follow the course has has without being corrupted. What "Rabid Dog" shows, if nothing else, is how everyone in the show has been brought to the point where they are, at least, willing to contemplate murder, a fact I'll explore later. 

Intriguingly, Gilligan initially intended to kill off Jesse at the end of the first season, to immediately show the cost of Walt's new career plan, only for a shorter episode run (caused by the WGA strike) to curtail this. Their relationship, however, has become such an integral part of the show3, it's impossible to imagine a Breaking Bad where Jesse hadn't arrived at this point. The car outside the White household is the second one he's abandoned in the space of three episodes; while then he was hollow, now Jesse is filled with vengeful purpose. As Walt enters the master bedroom and the camera tracks backwards along the corridor, we can almost imagine Jesse in hiding, about to stove Walt's head in. Walt's journey through his house goes a long way to setting up this horrific new dynamic.

 

It's enough now that Walt believes that Jesse might consider going after Walt Jr., telling Huell to stop by the high school and check up on his son. Though Walt never fully entertains this idea - the whole exercise is purely cautionary - it's easy to forget that Brock was Jesse's "son". We listen in as Walt leaves Jesse another voicemail, yet another voicemail, one of so many he's left him over the course of the show. While those other messages may have been left to scold and harangue and remind, now, for the first time, as Walt thanks him for changing his mind, Jesse has the power. Again, we can't know to what extent Walt wants to fix his relationship with Jesse, as opposed to simply control the situation; assuming that some humanity yet remains, "both" is perhaps the likeliest answer.

With the gasoline having seeped into the foundation4, Walt has no choice but to come up with another reason, another excuse, for the smell. Having soaked his clothes in gasoline in the backyard - Walt seems to have been rocking that "gun in undies" look since the pilot - he comes up with another lie, a complex sequence of events to explain it. Even as Walt's talking them through the "pump malfunction", though, it's clear that neither Skyler, or, for the first time, Junior, believe him. It would be semi-plausible were it not for the number of "incidents" that have predominated Walt's life in recent years and his need to have them believe, to flesh out every detail, to oversell it, leads Junior to the obvious conclusion: Walt's cancer made him pass out again in his gasoline-soaked clothes.

 

Ironically, this isn't far from what happened to him back in "Buried", collapsing in the bathroom after spending a day and night in the desert. Even if he is far of the mark this time, it's nice to see the writer's showing Junior a little more respect as a character, giving him some purpose beyond eating and/or talking about breakfast. Even as Junior is panicking, vulnerable, Walt is adjusting his story - maybe he got "a little swimmy" - just to make it plausible. After the home invasion, Walt wants his family out of their, wants them safe, so the gasoline contamination provides an excuse to move into a hotel for a few days.5 Skyler's clearly fed up with the lies, but plays along. For now.

We pick up with Walt in Saul's car. Saul is beat-up, self-pitying, bitter: "deep down [Jesse] loves me". It seems that he and the gang have looked everywhere for Jesse, from his parent's house to The Crystal Palace, the nickname for a roach motel Jesse occupied back in Season 1. We also learn, through Kuby's wiretap, that Skinny Pete is apparently a Babylon 5 fan. Who'd-a thought it?! One thing's clear: Jesse missed his first and only chance with Saul's guy last episode. He's here to stay. No wonder that, having recently taking a beating from him, Saul's in favor of dealing with Jesse's status as the proverbial bad penny. Walt thinks he can rationalize with Jesse, simply explain why he did what he did; Saul, amoral sleaze though he is, has a better grasp on the the reality of situation.

His suggestion that "put Jesse down", couched in terms of an Old Yeller analogy, makes sense. He may be the first person to point out that, for a man willing to have a "nuanced discussion on the virtues of child poisoning", it's utterly arbitrary to draw the line at a deadbeat drug addict, but... In any case, Walt doesn't want to hear it. His seething retort that Saul is just "full of colorful metaphors" is the most menacing we've seen Walt since, say, "Say My Name": this is Walt as Heisenberg, Walt as The Godfather, not playing a role but actually genuinely frightening. Saul, his consigliere, has floated an idea that Walt doesn't want to hear and Walt lets him know in no uncertain terms.6  

 

Done menacing in the shadows, Walt stops by the ice-box on the way back to the hotel room, presumably his cover for the meeting.7 While Walt patronizes her with another lie and a suggestion that she should take a bath, Skyler is about done with his "pump malfunction bullshit". She calls Walt out, forces to explain, which he does, in broad strokes. While Walt pointedly doesn't elaborate on that thing he did do - other than to say it was necessary - he's careful not to present Jesse as a threat, but rather as just a guy with personal issues, emotional issues, a history of drug abuse. Jesse has, of course, all of those things, but maybe, for once, Walt is discounting the danger here.

Walt lies when he responds to Skyler's question as to whether Jesse ever hurt anyone - there's not forgetting about Gale - but that lie is more of an omission in how it reflects on Walt: Jesse has only ever hurt, only ever killed, for Walt, to protect him. On some level, it's arguable that Walt realizes how he's used Jesse, turned him into a tool; that Walt's guilt and desire to protect Jesse is borne of an appreciation for how complicit he's made Jesse. Walt might not have meant to - he might have started with him needing Jesse as an assistant cook and guide to the meth world - but this is the effect he's wrought. Skyler, meanwhile, is determined to read their whole conversation euphemistically.

Unlike Walt, Skyler has no investment in Jesse's well-being. All she know Jesse as is Walt's one-time pupil and former accomplice, some with whom she once sat through an awkward dinner. She remembers the conversation that ended with Walt's iconic "I am the one who knocks!", but now the wolf - the proverbial rabid dog - is at their door8 and she has no time for mercy. Walt is quick to remind her that "this is a person", but, as Skyler weakly points out, "what's one more?". Skyler is lost and hopeless: her listlessness in "Confessions" has transformed into a nihilistic embrace of the evil they've committed. As Walt tries to make a case for it all being "a big overreaction", Skyler is ready to commit murder. She has, in fact, become Walt's Lady Macbeth; again, at his hand.

The episode now flashes back to Jesse, drugged-up and furious, in the process of torching the house. The fact that it's Hank who stops him is a genuine surprise. Jesse, burning magazine in hand, is more than ready to spill his guts; as Hank says, "Walt's a bastard, the secret's out". Still, Hank's willing to shoot Jesse, to shoot his best chance of putting Walt away, in order to protect, what? His nemesis' empty home? Aaron Paul's performance in this scene rivals anything else he's done on the show: his agonized yell that Walt "can't keep getting away with it!" is heartbreaking. After all he's been through, Jesse just wants to live in a moral, structured world, a world where the bad guys pay for their sins. Hank's promise to help him burn Walt down is the closest Jesse is going to get.

By the time Hank gets him back in the car, Jesse's almost catatonic again. When Hank takes a moment to secure Jesse's seatbelt, it's almost touching before you remember that, in essence, Hank is just securing his leverage. Their departure, moments before Walt arrive(s/d) home is a tad melodramatic, though it certainly ups the stakes: what would have happened if Walt had found Jesse in his house, or indeed, if Jesse had got the drop on him? Hank wants Jesse to be a DEA witness, but Jesse can't exactly imagine himself holed up in Washington waiting for trial. After all, Walt has shown a somewhat zero-tolerance approach to rats, finks, and other assorted jaybirds.

Marie, meanwhile, is in therapy, not eating, not sleeping, looking up untraceable poisons online. She's spun her shrink a yarn about betrayal by a "close family friend" and she's sticking to it.8 Her therapist is understandably concerned: last week Marie was upset about a change in parking rules at her work, now she has a deadly substance all picked out. While it's unlikely Marie would ever act on this - it all seems more like cathartic fantasizing - it's a sign of how deep her loathing of Walt goes. As such, when she gets home to find Hank advocating she take a trip to the spa for a few days, bags packed and everything, and is led to Jesse Pinkman asleep in the spare room, all Marie asks is if it'd be bad for Walt. While perhaps not his deadliest enemy, Walt certainly has another vengeful foe in his sister-in-law.

Hank is willing to let Jesse hole up at his rather than risk losing him in the system - likely as not, he thinks, to Walt's assassins - and he's even let Gomie in on his secret.9 While Hank comes across Walt's voicemail message and convinces Jesse to make a confession tape of his own - no lawyer, no promise of immunity nothing; even the same focus pull from Walt's piece to camera - Walt is poolside at the hotel. Indoors and palatial, complete with water feature, the scope and grandness of his surroundings are definitely redolent of Tony Montana's Miami mansion; even if Walt, unlike Scarface, is only there transitively. This, as always, is Walt as his most contemplative.

Walt Junior may be worried about losing his dad, but Walt, after all he's been through, is determined: “You think I came all this way to let something as silly as lung cancer take me down?" After all, what is Breaking Bad about if not man railing against his limitations - money, society, death even. When Walt Junior hugs his father, it's hard not to recall Walt's recent embrace with Jesse: he may have let down his surrogate son, but perhaps he can still be a good dad to Walt Jr. With that in mind, however, the ultimate irony of Breaking Bad may well be about a man who risks everything, ostensibly for the sake of his family, only to lose the one thing that matters most to him. More on that later.

After an awkward encounter with Marie - remember that time Walt had Saul tell Hank she'd been in an accident? - Jesse seems to have just about evened out. He knows it's just his word against Walt's - as Hank later clarifies, "the word of a meth head against Mr. Rogers with a lung tumor" - but Hank just wants to get it down on film, understandable given Walt's recent use of a camera as a weapon. On camera but out of our sight, Jesse lays it all out, all the way through to Vamos Pest Control and the disappearance of Drew Sharp. For all Jesse's "stories that'll make your toes curl", they have no proof, and, as Jesse says, Walt's not even in business anymore: their chance to catch him in the act is over.

Fortunately for Hank, Walt wants to meet with Jesse at the civic plaza. Walt's placation over the phone is perfectly modulated (honestly or not), telling Jesse that his life in his hands. The irony is that, unbeknownst to Walt, this is more true than he knows. Jesse doesn't want to talk, but Hank wants Jesse to let him: all he has to do is wear a plan. Jesse's horrified skepticism at this - "Your plan is his plan?" - is somewhat merited: however paranoid is talk of snipers and Georgi Markov-style assassination maybe, it's hard to believe he doesn't remember Walt's plan to off Gus using ricin. Hank, however, tragically, tells Jesse that Walt cares for him, citing Walt's paying for Jesse's rehab, his murder of those drug dealers who threatened him, his making Jesse a 50/50 partner. 

Though it's a small moment, these few lines are hugely revealing in terms of Walt's character. Hank may be trying to manipulate Jesse, but he's right: for all Jesse's talk of "Mr. White" - always the honorific - as The Devil, he is, after all, just a guy and a guy with feelings. Walt has created the legend of himself as a monster, this legend of Heisenberg, and ultimately it may cost him everything. He may be smarter and luckier than almost everyone, but he's not invulnerable. Walt's desire to be remembered - indeed, it forms the tagline for this final half season - has built him into something he's not, something he can never live up to. Our dislike for Walt is well-earned, but his hubris is costing him.

Hank, meanwhile, is willing to sacrifice Jesse as a pawn, to let him be killed to get what they need on Walt. After Walt's videotape gambit, Hank's beginning to act analytically too, to view the whole thing as a game of chess. He knows the caliber of the man he's playing against, but, in order to beat him, Hank will have to stoop to Walt's level. He'll call Jesse "partner", slap him on the back, and send him out to die. For all Hank said, too, Jesse is a kid. We feel his fear as Jesse crosses the plaza, viewing everyone who passes as a potential killer out to get him. His POV is hazy, as though he's on the verge of passing out, and, being suddenly out in the open, exposed, the effect on us is positively agoraphobic. 

Even as Jesse is hyper-aware, Walt, sat on a bench, is seemingly oblivious. He's vulnerable, passive. The camera catches them, high up, at either end of the frame: Jesse, perhaps, as a pawn on one end, Walt kingly on the other. A pawn might be able to take a king, but the prospect has to be terrifying. As such, its understandable that Jesse, rather than risk a face-to-face meeting, resorts to threats down a telephone. When Jesse tells Walt he's coming after him, that he's going to get him where he really lives, we feel his trepidation: this kid who he's gone to bat for time and time again has become a pressing physical threat. As for the hulking bald guy Jesse took for a would-be killer, he's just a guy out with his kid. Walt's luck has finally turned on him, perhaps to everyone's destruction.

For all that, when Jesse tells a pissed-off Hank that he has a plan, it's hard to imagine what that might be. A teary, coughing Walt places a phone call to Todd from his car, saying he has another job for Todd's uncle, but it's hard to see how that plays into Jesse's plan. Unless Jesse's plan is to force Walt back into the business, to force his hand, to make him strike out against Jesse. If there's anyone Jesse must hate almost as much as Walt, it's child-murderer Todd Alquist; now that Hank knows about what happened to Drew Sharp, maybe Jesse's trying to wrap them up all together. In any case, the arrival of men with blood on their boots to Albuquerque, New Mexico, can't be good for anyone.12

With rabid dog Jesse Pinkman allied with Hank and plotting Walt's downfall and Walt having called in his attack dogs11, the end is certainly nigh. Four episodes down, four more to go, and anything could happen. If, as I believe, Breaking Bad is working towards making Walt a touch more sympathetic again, first they have to destroy his legend. To destroy the legend of Walter White, of Heisenberg and the empire he built, he has to lose everything. This man who endeavored not to meet his death as he had lived his life, meek and mild, who raged against the dying of the light and became a villain, will be leaving us within a month, leaving us the poorer for his absence.13

Above is the promo for next weeks episode, "To'hajiilee", which, I've learned, is the name of an Indian reservation in New Mexico. Might that be, out in the desert, where Walt buried his money14? Might someone - or something - be about to go literally "off the reservation"? That would certainly start off Walt's disintegration, the loss of the money he had Skyler swear to protect at any cost. After all, "Ozymandias" is coming: an episode named for a poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley, an ironic piece about the works of a mighty emperor lying in ruins. The pedestal may well read, "My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: / Look on my work, ye Mighty, and despair!", but what comfort is that now to Ozymandias? Walt has broken bad - he's broken; in time, all the pieces must blow away.
 

1 Walt's man of action credentials are more convincing in the flash-forwards - perhaps its the fatalism or the full head of hair. What might have happened to..?

2 Catlin also wrote Crawl Space last season; you'll remember it as the episode that featured that terrifying, hysterical laughter.

3 The whole thing sort of started out as a Walter White/Jesse Pinkman My Fair Lady of meth.

4 Foundations soaked in gasoline: a metaphor for Walt's whole life as it stands. All it would take is a  single match. Who do you think will drop it?

5 After all, it's not like the Whites can just stay round Hank and Marie's anymore. That's make for a very awkward breakfasts: "Pass the syrup, Junior, and by the way your dad's a drug-dealing, murderous scumbag."?

6 The cinematography in this scene - the shadows, the white jacket, the shot through car windshield - all sort of recall 'Drive', which also featured Bryan Cranston.

7 The ice box bit is this episodes' second POV object shot after the drain snake. This is beginning to become a bit of a gimmick, unless Gilligan's setting us up for a shock later...

8 What if Walt or someone else had been in the house? This could all have ended very differently...

9 With all Marie's talk about being "so wrong about someone", her mention of "that movie", her desperation over the kids under that roof... it's not unlikely the therapist is going to assume she's talking codedly about child abuse. If that were the case, we might be seeing a visit to the White family home from social services. That would make for a bit of a weird detour.

10 It would have been nice to see Hank explain to Gomie that his nebbish brother-in-law is, in fact, a ruthless drug kingpin. We've got to assume a full on-screen disclosure of Walt's sins will be coming shortly.

11 And Skyler being (understandably) a bit of a bitch. Sorry...

12 Hopefully this won't turn out to be another Cousins situation AKA that time that Hank got shot. 

13 "I felt a great disturbance in the Programming Schedule, as if millions of TiVos cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced." 

14 The place the money is buried is the same place, I've realized, where Walt cooked with Jesse in the pilot (just check out the rock formations). Once again, Breaking Bad always comes back to its roots.