I was rewatching S2 and ended my current episode to watch the new one I recorded due to Lost. Uncanny how I stopped watching right at the beginning of the bar scene to watch the new one. IT'S FAITH YO.

That rehab place in s2 looked sick. How much does it cost to get in there? Think about how awesome it'd be to walk around in robes with no responsibilities and never feeling judged due to addicts starring at you. Looks fun.

i think you can do the same thing at the nuthouse

Speaking of re-watching, I haven't done a ton of that with this series for whatever reason, but I was bored the other day so I went back and watched S1E1. And along the line of character motivations, and speaking to the criticism I still see from time to time about wifey's actions, the final scene layed the groundwork pretty well I think.

Walt learned he had terminal cancer, just got back from his 1st cookout session with Jesse in the desert, killed some bad guys, crashed the RV, thought he was getting busted, etc...all the lights are out, and he crawls into bed...

Zkeyelaarr: [back to Walt] "Where were you?"
Walt: [laying on his back, staring at the ceiling] "....."
Zkeyelaarr: [rolls on to her back, so she can look at him while she talks] "Walt...I don't know what's been going on with you lately..."
Walt: "Nothing I'm, I'm...fine."
Zkeyelaarr: "...but whatever it is, I'll tell you this...I DO NOT like it when you don't talk to me. The worst that you can do is shut me out."
Walt: "....."

Then he starts kissing her, rolls her to her original position facing away from him, and he ****s her from behind...without saying a word. Obviously telling her nothing.

That was probably in no way helpful, but it is interesting to go through this again. I'll have to make a point to watch more of the old episodes when I get time.

So what do the smart people think that the fly represented for Walt? His guilt/conscience? It represents how his life has become contaminated. He's lost his family, his motivation for cooking in the first place (that he's admitted to himself anyway, he still hasn't really acknowledged that he likes being bad). The fly that cannot be caught is the itch he can't scratch (as we see another one at his home later)?

the fly is tuco reincarnated

Alright, did some reading...

...The story Walter tells himself to justify Jane's death, for which he's equally responsible by a mortal sin of omission, is more convoluted. And in "Fly," Walter pinpoints that moment as the one where his answers became untenable to himself. "Jesse, I'm sorry," he nearly whispers as he clings to the ladder from which Jesse is pursuing that ugly fat fly, as dangerously as Walter ever did. "I'm sorry about Jane ... I mean, I'm very sorry." Jesse takes it as an expression of sympathy, but Walter means it as a request for forgiveness. It was wrong, he's admitting. It went too far. It destroyed everything...

Walter knows when the perfect time for him to die would have been: watching the documentary about elephants, listening to Skyler sing "Hush, little baby, don't say a word ..." on the nursery monitor. The moment before he made up the going-out-for-diapers excuse to go drinking, where he met Jane's father, where he decided to go back to Jesse's house. "I should never have left home, I should never have gone to your place," he ruminates, coming very near a confession. Yet he can't quite take responsibility; he has to put the unlikely events that followed in statistical perspective, just as he did at the school assembly with the plane crash: "Think of the odds! Once I tried to calculate them, but they're astronomical."

Enjoyed the odds talk, thought others would too given that this is a poker forum (plus there's been a lot of talk about how unlikely these events have been, and how conveniently everything some of the plot points have connected). Clearly they're going for the "Butterfly Effect" thing, as they stated. It's also nice cover, for what could otherwise he criticized as lazy writing. More odds talk:

"There must exist certain words in a certain specific order that would explain all this."

I could be wrong, but I think he meant this in a way to explain the whole to wifey where she could live with it. If the odds would just allow for him to put the right words in the right order so that she could buy his rationalization, but he's come to realize that his rationalizations are bull****. He met his target, but he's still cooking. Meanwhile he's lost everything, and the collateral damage continues to pile up. Wifey realizes this, and blames Walt for what happened to Hank. If he can't get his family back, he has no reason to live.

Should be interesting to see where they take it from here. Either Walt is going to want out, or accept his role as the "bad guy" like Jesse. But outside forces (Gus) seem likely to contaminate the situation, once they catch Jesse's skimming.

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next episode better be damn good

now i'm looking forward to the show so i can read those recaps.

I'm still trying to figure out if the scene where Jesse went to get something to bust the door open and went from bigger weapon to bigger weapon was an homage to Pulp Fiction or not.

it was definitely a homage to pulp fiction.

I definitely got the pulp fiction vibe as well while watching that scene. I thought this episode started slow and once I realized the whole episode was gonna be about killing a fly I was pissed. However, after jesse gave walt the sleeping pills, I think it really picked up steam and turned out to be a great episode. Sure it wasn't filled with "action", but between really learning more about these characters motivations and the tension of whether or not walt would confess to jesse i thought this episode really delivered. Walt's speech about the perfect moment was gold and helped explain his erratic actions as of late. IMO this was a great "calm before the storm episode" cause I think ****'s about to get crazy!

Agree, the episode started slow, but overall I liked it.

I loved the part where Jesse puts the gas mask over his head making him look just like a fly. Fantastic filming.

Has Walt's cancer spread to his brain like Jesse' story seems to insinuate?

In the end, Walt warns Jesse and Jesse refuses to heed the warning. I wouldn't be surprised if Jesse bites the dust this season, or if Walt eventually comes to his aid and they both are in deep deep ****. (Not that they aren't already)

Was reading a review that suggested they went with this episode this week, as there was no point wasting a hugely dramatic episode on the weekend that Lost finished as it could be just "lost" in the publicity mill surrounding Lost.

72,
A large purpose of the fly is to represent his obsessiveness. At the end of the episode when we see the fly we realize he will always have this natural obsession where he needs to deal with things even if it is horribly irrational.

I didn't mind the Fly episode...however, NEED MORE SAUL!

More likely explanation of this episode: random existential tangent, totally out of step with the rest of the series, or an hour full of symbolism and subtle plot development? Definitely the latter. Walt figured out that the only explanation of the lower yield was Jesse, and now that he knows what Gus is capable of, he absolutely knows Jesse is about to die. Hence, he makes amends for killing his Gf. At the end of the episode, there's still a fly in Walt's bedroom, sitting on the red blinking light on the smoke alarm. Jesse is the fly, and the real contaminant in the lab.

If they need to do another "bottle show" they should do one from Saul's perspective, showing his day at the office.

Btw, Walt's father-son relationship with Jessie isn't the result of Walt having genuine affection for Jessie, it's just another manifestation of Walt's self-destructive streak. Walt has a real son that he uses as leverage over Skeyelar but otherwise doesn't have much use for.

You are so dumb. Stick to watching family guy.

haha ya saul makes every episode better

they could do an entire spinoff show of saul. in fact, this could be one of the best shows ever imo

They did a 9 minute clip of this on the bettercallsaul website, its not very good.

To be fair, that was probably written by an intern

Sounds good to me

first time posting this season, as I'm finally caught up.

The first 15 minutes I was like, wtf is this.

After the episode was over I was like, wow.


Sure it doesn't move the plot along much, other than Jesse stealing and Walt knowing. But the way it was shot, the tension just kept building up, and the actors did a really great job of acting. I wouldnt want every episode to be like this, but I think this episode will stand on it's own.

I was wondering how long it would take for the word "bottle" to come up for this episode.

It seems like most of the complaints are based on the expectations people have for this show, rather than the quality of the episode itself.