I think Hank and Walt are the only ones guaranteed to stay alive upto the series finale. No way Hank dies early next season.

I tend to agree with this, but that's why I threw out the possibility that maybe the ricin is accidentally ingested by someone else, e.g. Holly, Marie, etc.

That would certainly cause Walt to be on the run because then everyone will have turned against him.

I don't think this will actually happen, but would be pretty exciting if it did.

I'm calling it now, there is no way Walt tries to kill Hank.

My theory is they will somehow smoke a ricin cigarette.

I think Walt will. They didn't show him keeping it around (hiding it in the light socket) for nothing -- it will return, and unless Skyler (who is a fan of discreet and not-so-discreet-anymore smoking) gets her hands on it (and dies a Shakespearean tragic death, leaving Walt alone, oh so alone) then Walt will give in and take it himself.

I really have no idea how this series will end but I'm sure Gilligan's plan is a good one and OMG I really can't wait Jesus this hiatus is so brutal.

Hank and Walt will enjoy cigars together, just like the old times. But Hank will be smoking a

Hank is going to have some ricin in the next batch of Shraderbrau.

^ winner

Haha.

Love it. lol

If he is going to wipe with Leaves of Grass he ought to use this imo:

Rewatching Breaking Bad and all the Skylar haters are right. Up to s2e11 and she hasn't begun to cramp Walts drug game yet, so it isn't that. She is just a see you next tuesday, with her constant passive aggressiveness and wanting to be penetrated by Mr. Beneke.

I think you meant to type Benaka.

I just finished powering through 4.5 seasons over the past month. My girlfriend got me into after a bunch of people were raving about it at her work. I cannot believe I went so long without watching it. Its easily the best tv series of all time. The writing is unbelievable. I wanted to power through it again immediately.

That's the point, she's supposed to seem awful so you sympathize with Walt and tolerate his BS. Then you realize *why* she acts the way she does.

Yep. The interesting thing about Walter and Skylar is that their sympathy arcs are asynchronous. The show starts with Walter being sympathetic and Skylar being a drain, but that morphs into Skylar being an empathetic victim and Walter being a sociopathic villain.

The crux of the show keeps being marginalized to Vince Gilligans comment of "Turning Mr. Chips into Scarface", but one of the complexities of the show is that Skylar is the reverse of that transformation. As someone who dismissed and despised Skylar, written and performed, you have to be crazy not to sympathize with her at this point; and, looking back, Anna Gunn is the most underrated actor on the show.

Skylar started out as a drain? You mean once she found out about Walt's business, right?

That depends. You can go all the way back to the first episode's handjob/ebay excursion to come up with things that make Skylar dislikeable. However, her dislikability can be traced back as much to Walt as to Skylar. They have fallen into a rut and while it might make Skylar seem like a bitch, it is as much Walts fault as anyones

No, she was awful from the start. She emasculated Walt, controlled him, was just a bitch to him. You think he is some innocent victim at this point and he's just got this bitch wife who trapped him with a kid or something. Made him give up his dreams. And finally he snaps. This was before anything about the business. This was where she was a bitch to him when he had cancer and wouldn't let him talk without the pillow. There are numerous other examples, but it's been a while since I've seen it. When you look at things through Walt's eyes, she comes across as an awful person. And him a genius who has been screwed over. Of course, as the picture becomes more clear, you see Walt's perspective is so far from reality that you have been mislead the whole time. Although he is not the narrator, he basically has provided the role of an unreliable narrator.

But it turns out that she is the one who is trapped, has basically developed all of these techniques to subdue a monster. This isn't about turning a nobody into Scarface. This was more about turning Scarface into a nobody teacher, then he reverts back to his natural state. Skyler was the only thing that kept him from blowing up sooner. Skyler is strong-willed and controlling only because if she fails to do that, Walt would implode. It looks like he has already imploded several times.

I really like this whole post, except for the idea that Skyler made Walt give up his dreams. If I remember correctly, the various allusions that have been made suggest that Walt was dating Gretchen while at Grey Matter, then they broke up and she got with Elliot, which was what prompted him to sell his share in the company and eventually become a teacher. Somewhere in between, I believe he met Skyler while he was working in a lab and she in a diner nearby.

I think the general idea is more that not being able to have Gretchen changed Walt as a person, and Skyler was the one he settled for once he began that change. Once the meth game brought out his true self, he reverted to type as you suggest - but I don't think there was ever a suggestion that Skyler had a part to play in Walt giving up on life. Indeed, it could be said that Walt's marriage to Skyler is a symptom of the same affliction that caused him to give up his dreams in the first place.

Can you expand on Walt "reverting to his true self"? I never really got this impression. I realized he was bitter and depressed but never got the sense that he was a monster the whole time. I thought the cancer + being in power for once started to change him.

Ya more like he was probably always a wiener who never took any risks and once he gets deep into the meth game and becomes the "best" at something he starts power tripping hard.

Excellent analysis TC.

Remember in the flashback, when they are checking out their home-to-be? He was really cocky, and said something along the lines of "yeah, well, I guess this will do [for now...]" He always thought more of himself, and with Grey Matter blowing up, he fantasized for at least a decade about the wealth he would have had. After bitterly watching Eliot and Gretchen enjoy what he thinks is rightfully his for so long, his delusions of entitlement turn into a dark lust for power once he finds a way to get what he thinks the universe owes him.