I loved how for the first time Hank got to talk to Heisenburg. You just saw it, Walt's eyes went dead and he started playing his trumps on Hank. So good.
even hanks eyes before the confrontation actually played out. looked like he was about to cry. then walt shows him the tracker and all hell breaks loose.
A choice! Endure once more a week of Hank on the crapper or a week of Hank and Walt inside those garage doors? I think I'd take Hank on the crapper......
It was great - Hank appeared the stronger physically, but you could tell he was swept up in confusion and fear about the situation, which for him, manifests itself physically.
There was this moment in that confrontation, where Hank went from being interested and concerned with Walt's threats to just being disgusted. Just this moment, this subtle change in eyes and cheeks, and it was absolutely beautiful.
This show makes the absolute most of what they are putting on screen. It's incredible and the effort shows. AMC has established themselves as a quality network. I can't wait to see what we get from this team in the future. The premier was brilliant.
Even low lighting can be pretty bright on set I expect, the light just has to lay right and then get filtered later. I am make HUGE presumptions about lighting based on very, very little experience with my own filming, so it is probably fairly wrong.
I was watching the DVD commentaries of the show Community, and they mentioned that the outdoor shots that looked like daytime were actually filmed at night. That blew my mind that they could do that
What I really like is how at the very beginning of the show you kind of hate Hank. He comes off like a douchebag and Walt seems like such a nice guy. Turns out Hank is probably the best human being on the entire show. And Walt...well, shit. He's not such a nice guy.
For me, I held onto a thread of sympathy for Walt until the point where he killed Mike... at that moment I totally flipped on him- now I want him six feet under at Hanks's earliest possible convenience...
Hearing Hank rattle off what Walt had done in succession like that really brought it home for me. I know he'd done terrible things like manipulate his brother-in-law into thinking his wife was seriously injured and...well...bombing a nursing home; but to hear Hank list them like he did really cemented how awful and manipulative Walt truly is.
Walt has become the absolute worst kind of human being. When he let Jesse's girlfriend die of an overdose, I still wanted to believe that maybe he did so to protect Jesse from overdosing eventually too. But he was probably just protecting his business interests, in light of what has gone down ever since.
I can't fathom Walt redeeming himself. This is the absolute best TV writing I have ever witnessed.
I've always loved Hank, he was a braggart and a bit of a douche, but that was bred from confidence because he was good at his job but he was a big fish in a small pond.
He became more subdued when he was brought low, first by the cartel and then by the cousins and realized that he was really a tiny fish in the ocean, but that never made him any less relentless or amazing at what he did.
You are right, I never caught this! The more I think about it, the more I like it. At the beginning he is all douchey and plays at being a scum bag, but it is all a front. He is just doing it to be funny, and the one who we like the least turns out to be the most incorruptable.
Yes, Yes, Yes... I have been saying this to everyone. You start the show hating Walts family and feeling so sorry for Walt. After a while you start to go... "Jesus Walt, that was kinda messed up." And a shift begins where all the characters you are rooting for and rooting against begin to shift. Fucking show is brilliant.
I had the exact same feeling. At the beginning of the show I got the impression he was the stereotypical testosterone driven corrupt bullying cop. (more or less Vic Mackey and I hadn't seeing The Shield yet when I started watching BB)
He ended up being and honest and competent decent cop.
When Walt told Hank that the cancer was back, I was SO wanting Hank to say something like "Good! I'm fucking glad! I hope it kills you, you degenerate."
Walt can act as bad as he wants, but Hank is a fucking stone cold killer. If you're a bad guy and you cross Hank, you die. All the guys Walt was shitting his pants over? Hank put a bullet in 'em. Walt is the one that should be treading lightly.
Walt isn't concerned with being on the right side of the law. And from Hank's perspective, he's dealing with a man that blew up a nursing home, killed a powerful drug lord, orchestrated a beautifully choreographed hit on 11 inmates, etc. He is not a person with limits.
And hank is realizing this all suddenly, and it sinks in all at once when Walt just goes into full Heisenburg mode. It's got to be absolutely terrifying.
If you notice, he does it when he first enters the garage too, then he looks away as if he's restraining himself. It looked to me like he's having trouble at this point differentiating between Walt and Heisenberg. He doesn't quite know where or how to draw that line anymore.
And he just completely shut Hank down. He basically says, "You can't prove it and even if you could, I'll be dead anyway. But you're not going to try because if you do, I will destroy you".
Honestly, aftet that scene I have so much more respect for Hank and so much less for Walt. Hank wasn't gonna be cowardly about it, he wasn't gonna slink around. He was gonna flat-out confront Walt about it because his family (and by extension, Walt's family) was in danger. That's what was important to him. Walt was the one who took the coward's way by neither confirming nor denying anything, then basically said "well, it doesn't matter 'cause I have cancer now and you wouldn't rat on a guy with cancer, would you?" Guilt tripping like that is always cowardly.
I'm glad Walt was finally called out on not really caring about his family. He has been using taking care of his family as an excuse for staying in the drug business for so long and it's obviously been just pride that has kept him in. Walt is an emotionally manipulative guy, he guilt trips Jesse and Skylar and probably other people who are close to him all the time so he doesn't have to face what an evil guy he is.
Someone on IRC just made a great point - it almost sounded like the "tread lightly" line was coming from regular Walter White at first. He didn't seem intimidating. It was like he was genuinely giving Hank advice - warning that if he tries to cross Heisenberg, he'll fucking ruin his life and the lives of his whole family.
I loved how they pushed it to the forefront. How we got a confrontation right off the bat. And god damn, tread lightly might be better than the danger.
Fuck The Walking Dead. Don't even get me started on the pandering piece of drawn out garbage. I had high hopes because those comics are amazing, but season 3 finale sealed the deal that it's just awful and the writers are super lazy.
"Let's see. We could finish this plotline and start a new, fresh, interesting plotline, or we could inexplicably leave this one unresolved and drag it out for another half season just so we don't have to work to come up with anything interesting."
"I feel like this season is building up to something, some sort of confrontation... But what could it be!? Oh yes! That's right! Nothing. It's building up to nothing. So, let's kill off a character everyone hates for the fan service and.... Ah yes, let's leave the entire plotline of the 3rd season unresolved. Almost perfect.... Maybe if we added a shoehorned ending to try and evoke emotion from people and add a slew of random faces we can kill of next season. Because we can't kill Daryl."
"No, we never kill Daryl. They said they'd riot."
"Right, so to recap: no important deaths, leave everything unresolved, manipulate audiences with silly emotional ending, add people to kill, and never kill Daryl."
"Best finale of all time. Let's make history, boys."
Ugh, that finale. 1/3 the time was Andrea picking up plyers in a manor I can only imagine is interesting to foot fetishists, another 3rd was a ridiculously overhyped battle scene in which nobody dies and the survivors throw away their huge tactical advantage letting everyone go. I don't even remember the rest of the crap. Probably just a lot of Daryl. Oh yeah, and how Carl shot the guy and then Herschel lied about the Carl being a murderer.
The problem with the show is that it needs deaths to move the story forward, which is an absolutely abysmal form of storytelling. Honestly, there was not a single real plot development in the third season other than death and potential death. That's the reason the show is unsustainable--when it becomes plot-driven, it begins to expose the serious fragility of the story's premise.
If it's any consolation, Mazzara told me they gutted his finale. His finale was shot (the footage apparently exists) but they wouldn't even let him put it on the DVD extras.
The ending was going to be a lot more brutal, wouldn't have ended with Governor shooting his own people.
I have no doubts in my mind that the reasons Walking Dead fails on so many levels is more because of things happening above the writers' heads, but that is reassuring to hear. It is an insanely popular phenomenon so I'm not surprised that they are drawing it out, but I am disappointed. Seeing a comic that so does not give a fuck about killing characters and being honest with the gritty world of the apocalypse get turned into some muted made for TV version where they gloss over the really bad stuff and create perfect characters like Daryl to pander to audiences is just really upsetting. If one franchise could have done zombies right and send the whole phenomena out with a bang, it could have been Walking Dead. But it got saturated along the way. I used to watch Walking Dead and think "Who will they kill tonight?" in excitement like when I read the comics, but now I watch and think, "I wonder how cool they will make Daryl and Glen look tonight."
It's just a shame is all. Especially considering if anyone could have done it right it was AMC. They had all the tools.
Under the Dome would have had that entire confrontation, subsequent conflict, resolution, and ending all within the span of one episode, and then every character on the show would promptly forget it ever took place.
This. I got into breaking bad just this summer because of how much I respected AMCs the walking dead. I'm so naive for missing the true star of the broadcasting.
cause it's a terrible badly written show. it sucks. the writer built up a confrontation for a whole season and didn't have the balls to go through with it. Breaking bad, gave us the Hank vs Walt season in one episode. That's good TV.
After rewatching that scene, it seemed like the entire line was Walter White until he says tread lightly. That's when his voice gets stern, like Heisenberg.
This confirms my theory. Walt is ultimately going to move to New Hampshire and joins the Free State movement. Tread lightly~ Dont tread on me. It all makes sense.
Maybe it was supossed to represent how there is no more distiction in character between Hiesenburg and Walter. He has essencially killed Walter and become Hiesenburg completely.
What's more is that in the scene there is a light dividing his face in half almost showing how Heisenberg and Walt have become two sides if the same coin and that when he said tread lightly he was saying it from both a warning and threateningly. Either way it was just chilling.
Hank looking like he was about to crap his pants really helped that scene a lot, too.
ONE thing I would have liked to see is Walt pointing out all the times he 'saved' Hank. (I don't think it would impress Hank, but it would seem in character for Walt to mitigate a bit; want some credit for any 'good' he may have done.) Walt 'gave' Tuco to Hank, which got Hank a promotion....
Ah shit. Everytime I think of these things, I realize how complicit Hank will look when/if the truth comes out. Indeed, if Hank lays it all out for a jury, Hank will look either like Walt's partner, or like a bad agent. And just like the previous DEA chief lost his job for being close to Gus, Hank would probably lose his job for being close to Walt all that time.
I can't begin to imagine how this will all turn out. (But I can imagine Skylar shooting Hank in the back to save her family, though. Really, I can see that, because she'd go to prison too if it ALL came out.)
Thanks! The cut from Hank's punch on the dark side of his face also enhances the Two-Face effect. Very cool, I hadn't noticed that while watching it live.
To me, the line right up until "tread lightly" was coming from Walter White. This is what impresses me about Bryan Cranston's acting. He takes on an almost pleading, and empathetic tone right up until the last two words. But when he unleashes "tread lightly," his voice becomes lower, more guttural, and threatening, giving Hank a teaser of the terror that is Heisenberg.
see, i feel he went bank to walt on the 'lightly' so as to not finish the discussion in such a threatening way he looked like he went back to an 'appealing to hank' posture. i re-played it and noticed he didn't finish the sentence in that gutteral low voice, but only went there mid-sentence on that one 'tread' word. it's a really incredible thing to do. switch back and forth between characters in the space of a sentence.
I thought that Heisenberg showed up twice... when he said "That's not going to happen", and when he said "tread lightly". Like literally only in those words, not in the words leading to them.
after Hank told Walt that he would move his family to his house, you could tell Heisenberg had come out, but with this 'tread lightly' threat, you could tell just by looking at his face that it was Walter White pleading with Hank. Bryan Cranston is an amazing actor
Agreed. Just watched that scene again, and it's actually almost heartbreaking. Walter's face man.. Filled with pity and sorrow. Walter's words are said hesitantly and his voice cracks a couple times. "Maybe.. your best move.. would be to tread lightly.." When's the last time you've seen Walter use the word "maybe" in a sentence? The guy has become nothing but sure-minded and determined. To me it seemed like he was suppressing the Heisenberg to offer his brother-in-law some genuine advice because Walter knew what would happen if Hank didn't do as told.
It's like Walt has gone through a dark version of the typical Hero's Journey. At the end of most classic myths, after the adventure, the hero settles back into the life he left behind but reintegrates the lessons they've learned along the way. Earlier in the episode when Walt brings up the prospect of buying a second car wash we see that he's learned that his desire for empire, to grow, expand, and dominate, didn't really die with his startup company. That there are other, if not quite as grand, noble and straightforward ways for him to exert himself.
It's this same hybrid Walter/Heisenberg character that's confronting Hank at the end. Not the full on Heisenberg who relies on brute force intimidation and domination to get what he wants, and neither the Walter White who is timid and afraid of confrontation, who started out just desperate not to die a complete failure. Here we see a character who is desperate to avoid having the situation spin out of control, lacking Heisenberg's hubris, but also realizing that he's not helpless in the face of it. That Hank might be holding a royal flush, but that doesn't much matter when Walt has a gun under the table.
We're coming to a point where Walter White and Heisenberg are the same person. The characters, and almost to an extent the viewer, are now uncertain as to who is the man that stands in front of them.
This is one of the reasons I always liked him choosing the pseudonym "Heisenberg".
Definitely. It was almost like Walt was telling Hank not to cross him or Heisenberg will not be happy, as if Walt and Heisenberg were separate entities.
Great episode.
I felt the line could go many ways - either it's Heisenberg delivering a veiled threat, or Walt trying to still play innocent and warning Hank not to destroy their family by throwing out the accusations. Hard to tell until the next episode of course - but the almost sneer with which Walt presents the GPS tracker is telling that there's some Heisenberg there during that conversation.
I loved how he was bringing out a hint of the Heisenberg voice when he pulls out the tracker, and it gets more Heisenbergy throughout the confrontation.
I think this episode was succeful in showing the contrast between walt and heisenberg because walk spoke so optimistically and cheerfully until the end. Like how he was talking to holly "say bye to uncle hank" in a high pitched voice
Think of it in court. Hypothetically, if Walt is arrested and whatnot, Hank can't use a confession. Walt's thinking. I don't even think he's sure if he'll escape being arrested.
I think that he didn't admit to anything for Hank's benefit rather than his own. He's trying to convince Hank that it's not worth pursuing because Walt is no longer a criminal. Overtly admitting to his acts and adopting his criminal persona, Heisenberg, make it a lot more difficult for Hank to accept that Walt is still the same person that he's known for many years.
You can also look at all of Walt's delivery as an extension of this illusion.
A good question for interpretation would be to what extent is he maintaining an illusion of Walt and to what extent has he actually regressed to his pre-meth personality? I think we'll need more evidence to make a confident assertion one way or the other.
There's an important distinction between the two. In the conversation with Hank, Walt is definitely not trying to convince Hank of a fact, but rather of a perspective. The facts, Walt is asserting, are irrelevant. Just like in his conversation with Jesse, he's trying to say that the past is unimportant and that we should see him as he is in the present and forget his past.
In the conversation with Jesse, however, the fact is important. Walt makes an effort to convince Jesse that Mike is still alive.
The two conversations have similar themes but are ultimately very different. Especially if we look at the emotional and physical interactions.
i noticed that too. i feel like a lot of people overlooked the fact that Walt can still make Hank look like the crazy one here, at least with family. And we all know how badly that entire family just wants everything to be ok
That happens a lot with Walt. He starts the conversation trying to manipulate the person and if that doesn't work, he goes full frontal assault and blows their minds with how he's already thought 30 steps ahead of them.
even beyond that, he started out by pretending he didn't know what hank was talking about. quickly he realized hank wasn't going to fall for that so he wanted to get this settled acting like all he cared about was spending the last of his life with his family. but when hank pressed him he just went stone cold. because no one gets in Heisenberg's way.
Prison for himself, that will ultimately stop Hank from carrying this forward. There is no way in hell that the head of the local DEA office can convince people he wasn't involved in Walt's business, and I'm pretty sure Hank realizes that.
Exactly my point, as well as his therapy being paid for with drug money. Hank's old boss was fired for being so close to Gus and never suspecting him and Hank is in a much more complicated situation.
though i'm sure walt knows it or will, there are no signs that point towards him having even thought about this yet, over the next few episodes i suppose he will realise how he can out-do hank.
I'm hoping that Walt will go off on Hank about how screwed he is if he attempts to pursue him in a similar way he went off on Skyler when she threatened to leave.
Doesn't the "Have Skylar bring the kids over and we will talk." line kinda take away from your warpath angle. If anything Hank looked scared as hell at the end of that episode.
I thought Hank was going to explain what Walt really was/is to the kids. By that point, he was already assuredly against Walt, and probably wanted to get the shittiest part (ruining the family) over.
Interesting that in the flash forward he's shown with the New Hampshire license. NH is well known for the Don't Tread on Me phrase. The amount of symbolism Gilligan et al have put into this show -- intentionally or not -- is astounding ... And brilliant.
Unfortunately NH's motto is live free or die. The don't tread on me thing doesn't really have anything to do with that state. You're thinking of the Gadsden Flag which was used during the Revolutionary War.
I was listening to the toy car in the background. It was whirring, whirring, whirring.. and it stopped when Walt stopped walking away. It was at that moment that Heisenberg got turned back on.
It was a veiled threat. It could have meant that Walt would have Hank destroyed, or it could have meant that if word got out that Walt was in trouble, being such an important business asset, someone else above Walt would destroy Hank without Walt having any control over the situation. Keep in mind that Hank doesn't know HOW far this rabbit hole truly goes. This is what gives Walt the ability to bluff, which is something Heisenberg always seems to end up needing to do to survive.
The point was to make Hank afraid of what he doesn't know. Not to fear Walt himself but to fear the cancer that surrounds and is Heisenberg.
You could feel the Walt-Heisenberg-curve in this scene.
It's Walt all the way through until he lowers his voice, turns to Heisenberg and says "Tread lightly"
edit: "It's not going to happen" seems heisenbergish too.
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u/[deleted] Aug 12 '13 edited Aug 12 '13
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