Last week, things seemed to be going pretty bad for Walter White, though some of it was his fault due to his drunken bragging at the dinner table with Hank, Marie, Skyler, and Walt, Jr. in attendance. This week, in an episode entitled "Cornered," things get even worse for old Walt, and for his employers as well.
Walt and Skyler
Well, it looks like you can kiss any chance of Walt and Skyler reconciling goodbye. After falling back in bed together last week, and subsequent plans to have Walt move back in the house, Walt and Skyler are on poor terms by the end of this episode. Skyler has astutely read into Walt's drunken musings over dinner, and she even correctly parses the true meaning of Walt's phone message. After Walt snaps at her, she disappears for much of the episode. She's so fed up in fact that she even tosses a coin at the Four Corners (the point in the United Staes that marks the place where four states -- New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, Arizona -- come together) as a first step to making a fresh start, or so it would seem. However, instead of listening to the coin and fleeing to Colorado, she decides to stay in New Mexico. Whose benefit her actions were for I do not know, but now Walt isn't moving in, and Skyler is putting her foot down, even if it means telling Walter Jr. that he has to take his brand new expensive car back. I'll be curious to see whether or not things get better or worse for these two. My guess is worse.
Walt and Jesse
Walt and Jesse aren't doing any better than Walt and Skyler. While Skyler was the one making smart observations regarding Walt, it is Walt who puts the pieces together here. He even posits that the robbery Jesse thwarted was staged. However, Walt being Walt, he states his theory in the most arrogant way possible, and in my favorite moment of the episode he states, "This whole thing, all of this, it's all about me!" Naturally, this makes Jesse angry, since he's finally feeling wanted and useful to Gus, though he shows some perspective of his own. Like with Walt and Skyler, I expect this relationship to get worse before it gets better.
Jesse and Mike
All that being said, Jesse has actually showed himself to be useful to Mike. Now that he's sobering up (and showing the side effects), he's pretty sharp mentally, and even comes up with a fairly good idea on how to handle a couple of meth heads instead of just staking the place out. Granted, without Mike's help he may have gotten a shotgun blast to the face, but he had to feel that Mike would have his back at some point. The digging a hole bit as a means to infiltrate the house was quite funny as well. Also, the shotgun-wielding meth head appeared to have been played by Damon Herriman, who plays Dewey Crowe on Justified. He somehow managed to find a character to play who is even more pathetic than Dewey, which is quite the accomplishment. As for Jesse, even Gus had some nice words for him, although it may all still be a part of his plan.
The Cartel Strikes
Earlier this season, we saw a Los Pollos Hermanos truck attacked by the cartel, but Mike managed to wipe them out. This week, the cartel returned the favor. Of course, Mike wasn't in the truck this time around, replaced by a couple of guys we've never seen before. Having learned their lesson, the cartel decides to suffocate the gunmen with carbon monoxide and then they steal Gus' meth and give it to the aforementioned meth heads, albeit with a message intended for Gus, so they must have presumed he'd find his stash eventually. Gus doesn't want a war, but could things be headed that way? Will Walt find himself in the crosshairs? Will Jesse? Maybe this is what the season is building to. That could be outstanding.
Hank, Marie, or Saul did not appear in this week's episode, but I expect to see more of them in the future, especially Hank. He's still hot on Heisenberg's trail, of course, and he did find a significant clue leading him toward Los Pollos Hermanos last week. That, plus watching where things are headed for Walt, should mean more interesting episodes from Breaking Bad this season, to say the least.
The "I'm the one who knocks" scene with Walt and Skyler is easily one of the best scenes on one of the best television shows of all time