Breaking Bad 5.07 ‘Say My Name’ Recap

For everyone who felt that the dynamic trio of Walter, Jesse, and Mike felt like a bit of a stop-gap between what happened last year and what things will really be like with Walter in charge, well this is the episode for you. Mike and Jesse remain determined to get out while Walter tries to start a new enterprise that will be bigger than anything anyone’s imagined for his type of business. Elsewhere, Hank struggles with trying to finally fully close the Heisenberg case all to the detriment of his blossoming administrative career.

Following last week’s cliffhanger of Walt stealing the methylamine and hiding it before Mike could sell it off we open the episode up on a desert meet with the proposed buyers. Mike lets Walt run his little tough-guy song and dance as he goes about changing the terms of the deal. There will be no sale, but instead Walt will fold this crew into his operation–having them act as his distribution since Mike is intent on retiring. At first, the crew is rightfully skeptical of this stranger coming in and calling the shots but soon they learn who they’re dealing with as they realize this is the somewhat legendary Heisenberg in the flesh. Apparently the crew has been trying to pass off their own shoddy product as the blue stuff by dying it so Walter convinces them it’s in their best interest to just get the good stuff from him directly.

After the meet wraps up, Mike makes good on his promise and, well, leaves. He and Jesse both commit to being out of the operation much to Walt’s chagrin. He tries to pitch to Jesse the idea of helping him clean things up and start over, but he’s not really jumping at the chance to do so. It’s a little sad thinking of how alone Jesse will be now when we see him try to continue his friendship with Mike. But out means out which means done with all of it so sadly Jesse will probably wind up as completely alone as Walt at the end of everything. If he lives that long. Before he leaves Mike gives Jesse the best possible piece of advice and by the end of the episode it’s one that you just hope he’ll listen to: Kid, just look out for yourself.

Jesse does help Walter with the methylamine which is being housed at the car wash. Really, Mike should have thought to look there, but from his attitude at the meet it’s clear he’s intent on Walter making and dealing with whatever mess he wants to make from now on. Letting Walter run amuck is really the worst thing anyone can do right now since so much has already happened that it’s all just one big web everyone’s wrapped up in no matter what they do. They’re all doomed characters and so many don’t realize it yet.

Mike is off preparing for his retirement as he gets his lawyer, Dan Wachsberger, to do the routine money delivery–cash for the families of the nine men in prison and a substantial sum to be put away for his granddaughter Kaylee when she turns eighteen. All the focus on the process makes you think that something is definitely going to go wrong because of it and you wouldn’t be wrong. Mike also gets rid of anything damning he can think of when he overhears that a search warrant has just been approved on him.

While Mike is preparing for his future so is Walt as he prepares to cook a new batch. Jesse strolls in and Walt thinks everything’s going to be better than fine since it’s all ‘their’ operation now. There’s no intention on Jesse’s behalf to participate so the two get into the kind of intense character clash that wins people awards. Do you hear that Emmy committee? Aaron Paul is going to get another of your trophies after his performance in this scene. There was this mixture of hurt, of rage, and of pure disillusionment in the reactions to absolutely anything Walt had to say. It was amazing to watch him really confront Walt to show what he’s become because of all this.

Not one to take any sort of judgment of his deeds or himself lying down, Walt fights back by chipping away at Jesse’s self-control issues, his past with substance abuse, and the fact that other than this what else has he ever been truly great at in his life? When all of his attempts at appealing to Jesse’s ego fail miserably all he has left is to threaten that he won’t get his money if he just leaves. It was a vicious scene and it would have been the best in the episode if not for the final one.One great thing that comes out of Jesse and Walt’s big showdown is something that I think many of you were expecting since day one: Todd becomes ‘the new Jesse’ as Walt teaches him the cook. Why wouldn’t he be the perfect replacement for what Walt needs now? This is a guy who is eager, willing to learn, and he already proved that he will do whatever it takes to protect the business no matter how morally bankrupt it is.

After the cook, Walt goes about getting the surveillance devices out of Hank’s office. It’s still funny that Hank is so uncomfortable with a guy showing off his emotions too openly that it again gets him eager to leave the office. However, even though Walt managed to get rid of everything I think it was a huge mistake for him to show up at that time since he was the only non-DEA person to know that they finally had someone (the lawyer Mike used to move the money who was busted by Gomez) willing to flip on Mike.

In a panic, Walt gets in contact with Mike to tell him they’re coming for him. Jonathan Banks had some great moments in this scene as he watched the cops come to surround  him in such a way that he couldn’t get Kaylee without being spotted. He slips away and after a brief speakerphone conversation with Saul, Jesse, and Walt he gets them to go grab the ‘go-bag’ he left hidden in an abandoned car when he was handling his retirement affairs earlier on. Jesse wants to be the one to get it for him but Mike refuses to let the kid get himself back in and instead agrees to let Walt do it. Perhaps he was hoping if the cops did show up that they could take him down too.

Walt retrieves the duffel bag that’s filled with cash, passports, and a gun before racing off to where Mike’s hiding out down by the water. There’s a tense exchange between them that seemingly ends with them being bitter but fine enough until Walter snaps at Mike. This causes Mike to say what absolutely anyone at home has been screaming since the Fring thing went down like it did. Walt didn’t know his place and now everyone’s beyond screwed. He also refuses to tell Walt the names of any of the nine men in prison, and it’s too much for Walt to take. All these people keep putting him down, ignoring him (Skyler who didn’t do much this episode besides drink wine and sulk), and disobeying him without anyone being a tiny bit grateful. He truly believes in his egotistical heart of hearts that he did everyone a favor by getting rid of Fring so instead of letting Mike drive away he charges back to him and fires the gun that had been tucked away in Mike’s go bag. It wasn’t a perfect shot as Mike realized the gun was gone and tried to flee but it did the trick well enough as Mike crashed his car then stumbled out to die out by the stream.

Banks has really been such a wonderful part of Breaking Bad and with how things are going it’s surprising that he managed to last as long as he did on the show. Not to mention the whole thing further served to display just how ghastly Walt’s pride and ego really are as in Mike’s dying moments all he can do is speak out loud about how sorry he is to have done it…because he realized he could have just gotten the names of the nine inmates out of Lydia. Whoops! Mike did get a bit of a last hurrah though as he told Walter to ‘Shut the —- up. Let me die in peace.’ We’ll miss Mike and his gruff no-nonsense ways but his is a fate that it wouldn’t be shocking for so many of the remaining characters to meet before the end of the series.