I think most people’s outlook around Gray Matter is determined on whether they infer that Walt was screwed over and forced out (under the frequently seen business guise of a “voluntary buyout”) or whether he made a knowing decision to leave early without being forced (or was forced out, but only because he was behaving like, well, Walt).
We really have not been given enough information to understand what really happened. In any event, as someone who routinely works with pissed off shareholders who are “forced” out of companies, and with companies who want to force out disgruntled, disruptive shareholders, I can tell you that it is usually in the eye of the beholder as to whether someone in that situation got screwed even when you do have most of the facts.
The M60 is for Jesse. Walt paid the Nazi’s to kill Jesse, and when they parted ways they agreed that it would happen after they questioned him. Now after the TV interview he knows blue meth is back on the market, meaning Jesse is still alive and cooking.
The ricin is likely for Lydia so that he can close off that part of the organization as well.
Walk has made it perfectly clear that the blue meth is HIS formula, and he will not stand anyone else using or profiting off it without his consent.
I’m not convinced that mention of the blue meth in the interview was enough for him to decide Jesse’s still alive, I think it was just the overall dismissal of his legacy that motivated him into whatever his new course of action is. He already knew the Nazis were still cooking and had his old distribution, so the show mentioning that it’s still turning up wouldn’t be new information.
The M60 is to get the 70 million back to its rightful owner. The ricin is for just in case. The ricin is like when you go out to rumble and slip a dagger in your boot.
Whatever happens, you will be rooting for Walt. He’s up against Nazis, for Christ’s sake. Jessie is going to gas some of them, Walt’s going to shoot the rest. At the end, they’ll both (Walt and Jesse) grudgingly realize they make a great team. Walt will die from cancer. Jesse will take Brock for a little ride in the tank of the gas truck. He’ll have a few barrels of cash.
I don’t see Flynn, Skylar, Holly or Marie making it out alive.
How does Vince Gilligan intend to end the show? All of Walts sins catch up with him, and he suffers an ignominious end, everything he has done crumbled to dust, and can’t even take proper revenge on anyone beyond maybe raise the bodycount (Scarface). Jesse dies. Todd rapes Lydia. Meth Nazis buy a string of Starbucks and retire to Montana where they take over an entire town. Skylar goes to jail. Marie gets caught shoplifting. Huell orders a cinnabon and suddenly realizes it is Saul who is serving him. Vince takes a shower, goes to sleep, and purges Walt from his psyche.
Or, Walt has a plan and blinds them with science one final time. Maybe the end is ignominious, but he gains some measure of revenge/self-respect/atonement. Just going in with guns blazing is simply not Walt. He acts tough but someone usually bitch-slaps him a few times, he whimpers, panics, plots and then he blindsides them. If he is going in with four cases of tracer rounds, it’s to draw attention to himself while some other scheme spins out. Maybe the DVD gets played, he looks like a hero trying to rescue Jesse (“He can’t get away with it again - fuck! He did!”), he’s dead but the hero, his son reconciles himself to his father’s (fake) legacy, Skylar goes with it, maybe Marie gets poisoned just to cover the lose ends (though this seems not to be Walt), or poisons himself but blames Gray Matter for it with his dying breath. Huell still orders that Cinnabon from Saul, and goes turns her sister in for her shoplifting addiction. No idea what happens to the money - maybe Jesse does escape with it.
THANK YOU. This is really irritating me in the discussion. It was established quite a long time ago (contrary to actual chemistry, but whatever, dramatic purposes) that the blue color is a side effect of the process starting from methylamine rather than pseudoephedrine. Furthermore, it was also established that other cooks (Declan’s crew pre-buyout being an example) were dyeing their product blue to try to trick users into buying their inferior product. Even if we assume he got more info from the newspapers than what we saw from the Charlie Rose bit, journalists are not going to get into the nit-picky details of processes and purity that Walt would need to conclude that Jesse is still cooking. The only way he could (and not even would necessarily, just COULD) make that conclusion is if he had some of the product on hand to analyze. Walt has not at all taken Jesse into account in his plans, which is no doubt going to factor into the dramatic showdown.
Didn’t Walt see them drive off with Jesse still alive? Whether he figured out that Jesse is still alive to make meth, I don’t know, but it would seem to me quite likely that his final plans aren’t motivated by Jesse on the off-chance he is still alive.
Yeah, Walt gave a little nod to the Nazis when they asked if they could keep Jesse alive long enough to torture him. Walt also revealed to Jesse the thing about Jesse’s first girlfriend who he (Walt) allowed to die. If Walt’s going to now save Jesse with the gun, we’re going to need a little something plot-wise for it to make sense. Whether Walt can know Jesse is still alive by the report about the blue meth doesn’t really matter so much. What’s more important is that it can’t just be a given that Walt wants Jesse to come out alive.
Walt will lay in the street his whitey-tighties, a blue puddle under his broken body. Fade to black. All you people who said you’d never forgive him will feel guilty as hell.
LOL, I get mixed up with names easily, so this sort of thing is definitely a probability. But I really don’t watch that much TV, except for every now and again I find myself hooked with a show. On some level, I’m feeling grateful BB is winding down.
Today’s Los Angeles Times ran an interview with Vince Gilligan. Nothing really given away so much as insight into the decision making. There was no agenda, no pre-determined damnation or redemption, they didn’t even figure out what they were going to do until a few episodes from the end. So, hopefully, whatever they did decide to do, it flows from and is consistent with the characters.
Rolling Stone magazine has an interesting dialog with various contributors to the show. I found Aaron Paul’s (Jesse) comments most interesting. He mentioned a couple of times that Jesse was a “murderer” (I never thought of him being that way) and talks about how he “wants him to be OK”.
I have an old friend that I’ve known for 40 years (boy, it’s tough to type that). Anyway, I’ve been bugging him via email for the last two years or so to give BB a try, and he’s been pretty indifferent to the whole idea. When AMC announced the marathon, I gave it one final shot, and still got nowhere.
Today he wrote me that his wife started watching the marathon, and got so engrossed she made him order Netflix streaming so she could catch up on the episodes she missed.
