# Breaking Bad S05E01 "Live Free or Die" OAD 7.15.12



## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

Holy CRAP...Beneke is ALIVE!

"We're done, when I say we're done..."

It's baaaaacccckkkkk....


----------



## betts4 (Dec 27, 2005)

Jesse and the magnet idea was awesome, but the magnet used was even better!

What was the writing under Gus's photo? I couldn't read it.

and just a Wheeee!!!

I finally got my neighbor to sit down and watch episode one with me at about 8pm. He is hooked too.


----------



## Tyrion The Imp (Jul 11, 2012)

Awesome episode.

Walt is a total bad ****ing ass. 

Jessy and his idea was so great, and hell I want to know what the writing was


----------



## bsnelson (Oct 30, 1999)

The writing behind the picture is details for a Cayman Islands bank account. 

Definitely an awesome episode. I'm guessing the "flash forward" at the beginning is probably to episode 8 (the end of "this season") rather than 16. Does anyone remember milestones within the episodes of earlier seasons that told how old he was? It's pretty clear that the opening scene was his 52nd birthday. 

Geeky note: I was a little disappointed with how they depicted the computers being affected by the magnet; they should have just bluescreened or otherwise thrown OS errors, but I understand that laypeople wouldn't be as impressed by that. 

Looking forward to a great "ha' season" 

Brad


----------



## john4200 (Nov 1, 2009)

bsnelson said:


> The writing behind the picture is details for a Cayman Islands bank account.
> 
> ...
> 
> Geeky note: I was a little disappointed with how they depicted the computers being affected by the magnet; they should have just bluescreened or otherwise thrown OS errors, but I understand that laypeople wouldn't be as impressed by that.


Specifically, it said:

BANCSUISSE CAYMAN
ROUTING #37010412
KY077212-11099 [at least 2 more numbers covered]
KY087 [at least two more characters covered]

As for the magnet, that whole thing was ridiculous. I was waiting for Walt to tell Jesse that magnets don't work like that except in the movies.

But I'm not sure what your complaint is. That the LCD screens were affected? LCD screens are affected by magnets, which you can easily verify.

The problem with the magnet scheme is that the strength of the magnetic field falls off very quickly with distance. Even with that large electromagnet, you cannot make things fly across the room like that. There is a reason the junkyards drop the magnet into contact with the car to pick it up, instead of holding it 20 feet over the car and waiting for the car to shoot up to the magnet.

Also, no one concerned about data security erases hard drives by putting them in a strong magnetic field. It just does not work reliably. The standard way of disposing of hard drives is to use an industrial strength shredder.


----------



## gchance (Dec 6, 2002)

john4200 said:


> Also, no one concerned about data security erases hard drives by putting them in a strong magnetic field. It just does not work reliably. The standard way of disposing of hard drives is to use an industrial strength shredder.
> 
> [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yd_O7-rqcHc[/media]


My only beef is that Walt doesn't know that. With the writing in this show, it could easily come back in a few episodes. Then again, it could be dropped and nobody will care but you, because it's so bats**t crazy at that point. 

Welcome back, Breaking Bad! BIH Dish Network!

Greg


----------



## Beryl (Feb 22, 2009)

Bierboy said:


> "We're done, when I say we're done..."


Walter is super arrogant this season and maybe this is setting us up for a powerful and FINAL season.

"Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall" Proverbs 16:18


----------



## Tyrion The Imp (Jul 11, 2012)

Beryl said:


> Walter is super arrogant this season and maybe this is setting us up for a powerful and FINAL season.
> 
> "Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall" Proverbs 16:18


Isn't this the final season?


----------



## Beryl (Feb 22, 2009)

Yes. That is the point. His attitude makes termination (of him and the show) inevitable and satisfying.


----------



## xuxa (Oct 8, 2001)

bsnelson said:


> The writing behind the picture is details for a Cayman Islands bank account.
> 
> Definitely an awesome episode. I'm guessing the "flash forward" at the beginning is probably to episode 8 (the end of "this season") rather than 16. Does anyone remember milestones within the episodes of earlier seasons that told how old he was? It's pretty clear that the opening scene was his 52nd birthday.
> 
> Brad


He was 50 at the start of season one. We are about a year into the story so the flash forward was a year in the 'future'.


----------



## betts4 (Dec 27, 2005)

bsnelson said:


> Geeky note: I was a little disappointed with how they depicted the computers being affected by the magnet; they should have just bluescreened or otherwise thrown OS errors, but I understand that laypeople wouldn't be as impressed by that.
> 
> Looking forward to a great "ha' season"
> 
> Brad


Well, it worked for me. I guess I am not as geeky as I thought I was... 



gchance said:


> My only beef is that Walt doesn't know that. With the writing in this show, it could easily come back in a few episodes. Then again, it could be dropped and nobody will care but you, because it's so bats**t crazy at that point.
> 
> Welcome back, Breaking Bad! BIH Dish Network!
> 
> Greg


Would Walt know that? Is it a chemistry thing or some other science thing? And, to add, Walt is 50 so he may not be as familiar with the science of computers as with the science of the elements. If that makes sense.


----------



## mooseAndSquirrel (Aug 31, 2001)

At a data center conference I attended, somebody presented their research on EMP weapons. A pulse weapon that could fit in a pick up truck would be enough to wipe the evidence room. Now, with the laptop off, I'm not sure if that's the case. 

It was worth it for the junkyard guy and that call-back as well as the truck flipping over.


----------



## kaszeta (Jun 11, 2004)

Yeah, I thought when Jesse mentioned magnets, that Walt would try to make an EMP generator.

No way you could do anything close to that with a junkyard electromagnet, but I'll have to have more than a bit of suspension of disbelief.


----------



## DeDondeEs (Feb 20, 2004)

"I see this thing turning out in many different ways, Miller time isn't one of them"


----------



## bryhamm (Jun 30, 2004)

What did Saul have in the zip lock bag? I couldn't tell, but I am guessing it was the laced cigarette.


----------



## kaszeta (Jun 11, 2004)

bryhamm said:


> What did Saul have in the zip lock bag? I couldn't tell, but I am guessing it was the laced cigarette.


It was a laced cigarette. I'm guessing that was a backup.

ETA: Actually, thinking it over, I realized I've got this backward: That's the original ricin cigarette in the baggy; Saul's tough guy lifted that cigarette from Jesse, while Walt found some other way to poison the kid.


----------



## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

You know, I'm still a little perplexed by Walt poisoning the little boy....I know he did it to incite Jesse to join him in killing Gus....but it seems extreme. There certainly were other ways to do that without jeopardizing the life of an innocent child.


----------



## Tyrion The Imp (Jul 11, 2012)

Bierboy said:


> You know, I'm still a little perplexed by Walt poisoning the little boy....I know he did it to incite Jesse to join him in killing Gus....but it seems extreme. There certainly were other ways to do that without jeopardizing the life of an innocent child.


He's pretty ignorant when it comes to stuff like that. He panicked and was desperate.


----------



## betts4 (Dec 27, 2005)

I liked Walt better as a struggling (and winning) good guy. Him poisoning Brock to get Jesse back on his 'side' bugged me. Really a lot. I wish they had done something else to get them on the same team. It was interesting to see Jesse on his own with Mike and all in season 4, and yet still be loyal to Mr. White, and him to Jesse. But the two of them fighting the bad guys is fun. I loved the curve in season 4 that his wife threw him by using the money for IRS.


----------



## rrrobinsonjr (Nov 26, 2004)

betts4 said:


> Him poisoning Brock to get Jesse back on his 'side' bugged me. Really a lot. I wish they had done something else to get them on the same team.


The whole point of the show is seeing how dark, desperate, power-hungry, and corrupt Walt will become. You should stop watching now.


----------



## betts4 (Dec 27, 2005)

rrrobinsonjr said:


> The whole point of the show is seeing how dark, desperate, power-hungry, and corrupt Walt will become. You should stop watching now.


Yeah, like that is going to happen.  

Okay, I guess I can live with a desperate, dirty and corrupt Walt, I didn't know that was the point, I thought it was more how the good guy falls, gets up again and then falls or is pushed down again and again and again and again - yet still maintains himself.


----------



## Tyrion The Imp (Jul 11, 2012)

I can understand how you feel. I want to still like Walt, but I feel like I'm not anymore...

But of course that's the point


----------



## JoeyJoJo (Sep 29, 2003)

The final scene with Skyler isn't going to do anything to get rid of her fear of him.


----------



## gchance (Dec 6, 2002)

Hey Future-Walt, you might wanna get that cough checked out.

Greg


----------



## TheMerk (Feb 26, 2001)




----------



## DavidTigerFan (Aug 18, 2001)

Just an FYI...the pilot episode is set on Walter White's 50th birthday.


----------



## MikeAndrews (Jan 17, 2002)

bryhamm said:


> What did Saul have in the zip lock bag? I couldn't tell, but I am guessing it was the laced cigarette.





kaszeta said:


> It was a laced cigarette. I'm guessing that was a backup.
> 
> ETA: Actually, thinking it over, I realized I've got this backward: That's the original ricin cigarette in the baggy; Saul's tough guy lifted that cigarette from Jesse, while Walt found some other way to poison the kid.


Yeah. They resolved a lot of last season's cliffhanger resolutions that were merely implied. Walt tossed the Lily of the Valley.

Remember that Saul's gorilla patted down Jesse's jacket when he came to Saul's office. We discussed that when you repeated it there was a bit more action to that. The guy had to surreptitiously extract the ricin cigarette out of the pack in Jesse's jacket. Jesse finds that the poison is gone when the kid gets sick and we're off... The poisoned ciggie was in the bag that Saul gave to Walt, saying "You know he has fingers like hot dogs. He could have killed everyone in the office..."

One of many things: Why didn't Walt ever clean up the kitchen bomb factory earlier? He had a bit of time making the bombing attempts after the first one failed.

The (illegals) working at the laundry saw Walt and Jesse, but I guess we will assume that they are scattered to the winds and certainly won't be talking to cops.

Was that preview scene taking place in Albuquerque? Walt had a New Hampshire driver's license. That's quite a drive from NM. I never saw an old Denny's like that with loose chairs at the counter.

This laptop computer product placement brought to you by Dell. No laptop shatters like a Dell. Many Dell owners got some satisfaction, although they said that Gus's was a Samsung.

What was with that one lane dirt road that Mike and Walt/Jesse were driving on? It's a direct route across the desert into Mexico? Where's the border fence?

We didn't get the impression that Mike had any loyalties other than to who was paying him. He wouldn't care that Gustavo was killed.

Another cliff hanger could-go-anyway scene: At the end you wondered if Heisenberg was going to beat up Skyler.


----------



## TheMerk (Feb 26, 2001)

DavidTigerFan said:


> Just an FYI...the pilot episode is set on Walter White's 50th birthday.


----------



## Tyrion The Imp (Jul 11, 2012)

DavidTigerFan said:


> Just an FYI...the pilot episode is set on Walter White's 50th birthday.


Exactly, so the beginning clip was about 2 years after this whole Pilot.

We have 2 years to cover pretty much.


----------



## MikeAndrews (Jan 17, 2002)

betts4 said:


> I liked Walt better as a struggling (and winning) good guy. Him poisoning Brock to get Jesse back on his 'side' bugged me. Really a lot. I wish they had done something else to get them on the same team. It was interesting to see Jesse on his own with Mike and all in season 4, and yet still be loyal to Mr. White, and him to Jesse. But the two of them fighting the bad guys is fun. I loved the curve in season 4 that his wife threw him by using the money for IRS.





rrrobinsonjr said:


> The whole point of the show is seeing how dark, desperate, power-hungry, and corrupt Walt will become. You should stop watching now.


The main theme that Vince Gilligan had in mind from the start was the guy "Breaking Bad" going from Milquetoast to Brutal Crime Kingpin.

I'd look for Walt to be Tony Montana at the end, maybe losing the family and getting offed in a blaze of gunfire.


----------



## nataylor (Apr 26, 2000)

netringer said:


> Was that preview scene taking place in Albuquerque? Walt had a New Hampshire driver's license. That's quite a drive from NM. I never saw an old Denny's like that with loose chairs at the counter.


Yeah, that was Albuquerque. Here's the Denny's it was shot at: Linky


----------



## gchance (Dec 6, 2002)

netringer said:


> Was that preview scene taking place in Albuquerque? Walt had a New Hampshire driver's license. That's quite a drive from NM. I never saw an old Denny's like that with loose chairs at the counter.





nataylor said:


> Yeah, that was Albuquerque. Here's the Denny's it was shot at: Linky


Weird, I thought the Denny's was in CA. Didn't the waitress say something like, "New Hampshire's a long way from California"?

I only watched it once. 

Greg


----------



## danterner (Mar 4, 2005)

netringer said:


> The main theme that Vince Gilligan had in mind from the start was the guy "Breaking Bad" going from Milquetoast to Brutal Crime Kingpin.
> 
> I'd look for Walt to be Tony Montana at the end, maybe losing the family and getting offed in a blaze of gunfire.


I agree, except I don't think he'll get offed. He'll lose everything, including his family and the meth kingdom he's constructed, but he'll survive and be in full remission because that's more deliciously ironic from a storytelling perspective.

Last year in a BB thread here someone imagined and posted about a final scene that had Walt broken, unable to speak, his family dead, confined to a wheelchair, with the final scene being a nurse coming in to affix a bell. That's brilliant - I'd love that ending.


----------



## nataylor (Apr 26, 2000)

gchance said:


> Weird, I thought the Denny's was in CA. Didn't the waitress say something like, "New Hampshire's a long way from California"?
> 
> I only watched it once.
> 
> Greg


She noticed his license was from New Hampshire. She said that's a long way away. Walt said it was about a 30 hour drive if all you stop for is gas. She asked if he was headed to California. He said no, he was there in that town for business. They never specifically said they were in Albuquerque, but they definitely weren't in California and it was definitely filmed in Albuquerque and not disguised to look like a different location.


----------



## danterner (Mar 4, 2005)

nataylor said:


> She noticed his license was from New Hampshire. She said that's a long way away. Walt said it was about a 30 hour drive if all you stop for is gas. She asked if he was headed to California. He said no, he was there in that town for business. They never specifically said they were in Albuquerque, but they definitely weren't in California and it was definitely filmed in Albuquerque and not disguised to look like a different location.


And Bobby Singer (the gun salesman) met him there. Probably local.


----------



## CharlieW (May 30, 2001)

danterner said:


> Last year in a BB thread here someone imagined and posted about a final scene that had Walt broken, unable to speak, his family dead, confined to a wheelchair, with the final scene being a nurse coming in to affix a bell. That's brilliant - I'd love that ending.


That was me. 

I'd still like that ending, but maybe the family wouldn't have to be dead -- perhaps they're alive but have completely disowned Walt after discovering all of the horrible things he's done.


----------



## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

Tyrion The Imp said:


> Exactly, so the beginning clip was about 2 years after this whole Pilot.
> 
> We have 2 years to cover pretty much.


I don't think so; we've already covered a lot of that time through Seasons 1-4....


----------



## Beryl (Feb 22, 2009)

Bierboy said:


> You know, I'm still a little perplexed by Walt poisoning the little boy....I know he did it to incite Jesse to join him in killing Gus....but it seems extreme. There certainly were other ways to do that without jeopardizing the life of an innocent child.


Agreed. But just like he let Jessie's GF die and chose to kill off of the other chemist, he doesn't hesitate to kill others to save himself. Again, this adds more fuel and justification for it ending very badly for Walt.

In the first seasons, I wanted Walt to dump Jessie's ignorant azz but time after time, Jessie demonstrated a greater sense of humanity as compared to Walt.


----------



## nataylor (Apr 26, 2000)

Bierboy said:


> I don't think so; we've already covered a lot of that time through Seasons 1-4....


Here's a timeline that covers through the end of season 3: http://www.vulture.com/2011/07/breaking_bad_calendar.html

That indicates only 31 weeks has passed over those 3 seasons. I think we're way less than 6 months beyond point by the end of season 4.


----------



## Johnny Dancing (Sep 3, 2000)

Bierboy said:


> Holy CRAP...Beneke is ALIVE!


And Beneke was truly terrified of her "I got a wife and kids - I won't say anything". She broke Walt down to a shell of a man before he broke bad, now she chewed up and spit out Beneke.

I think she is really starting to like the idea of all that money.


----------



## DreadPirateRob (Nov 12, 2002)

betts4 said:


> I liked Walt better as a struggling (and winning) good guy. Him poisoning Brock to get Jesse back on his 'side' bugged me. Really a lot. I wish they had done something else to get them on the same team. It was interesting to see Jesse on his own with Mike and all in season 4, and yet still be loyal to Mr. White, and him to Jesse. *But the two of them fighting the bad guys is fun*. I loved the curve in season 4 that his wife threw him by using the money for IRS.


Betts, I don't quite know how to break it to you, but Walt and Jesse _are_ the bad the guys.


----------



## CharlieW (May 30, 2001)

Johnny Dancing said:


> And Beneke was truly terrified of her "I got a wife and kids - I won't say anything".


It was very interesting to see how that scene turned from her being the one terrified of seeing Beneke alive when she first walks in, to him being the one terrified to see her. And then how Skylar realizes that and takes on the role of the bad-ass. Great scene!


----------



## ngsmith (Jan 18, 2002)

What a time for the cable to go out - just after he opened the car trunk. Oh well - it will be repeated next week.


----------



## EvilMidniteBombr (May 25, 2006)

I got the impression that Walt is really starting to behave a lot more like Gus. Both in mannerism and ruthlessness.


----------



## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

sgsmith said:


> What a time for the cable to go out - just after he opened the car trunk. Oh well - it will be repeated next week.


Heck, it's being repeated repeatedly this week 

Plus, it's being streamed online...


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

betts4 said:


> I liked Walt better as a struggling (and winning) good guy. Him poisoning Brock to get Jesse back on his 'side' bugged me. Really a lot. I wish they had done something else to get them on the same team.


As has been said, this is a show about the protagonist turning into a bad guy before our eyes. At some point during the show, the viewer will stop rooting for Walt and realize he has to be stopped. And the interesting part is that for each viewer, that point will be different. For some, it's already happened. For you, it sounds like it happened at the end of S4. For others, it may not have happened yet.

Another interesting thing is when the viewer switches loyalty from Walt to Jesse. At the beginning of the series, Walt was the "hero" and Jesse was the idiot screw up. As Walt has "broken bad," Jesse has largely stayed the same and Walt has now passed Jesse. So it's understandable if the viewer now roots for Jesse over Walter, and that switch will also come at a different place for each viewer.


----------



## danterner (Mar 4, 2005)

I think for me, Jane's death was the turning point where Walt went from antihero to villain. But I still can't help but root for him. It's similar to my feelings regarding Dexter, who has strayed farther from his code each season. Both actors play the character so well (though the writing on Dexter has deteriorated, where Breaking Bad has remained strong throughout).


----------



## DreadPirateRob (Nov 12, 2002)

Objectively I have no problem knowing that Walt is certainly one of the bad guys - in fact, maybe the worst of them - but when I'm watching I keep finding myself rooting for him.


----------



## robojerk (Jun 13, 2006)

I think you/we root for him because we've gone through this journey with him, and experienced his transformation with him.


----------



## Beryl (Feb 22, 2009)

DevdogAZ said:


> As has been said, this is a show about the protagonist turning into a bad guy before our eyes. At some point during the show, the viewer will stop rooting for Walt and realize he has to be stopped. And the interesting part is that for each viewer, that point will be different. For some, it's already happened. For you, it sounds like it happened at the end of S4. For others, it may not have happened yet.
> 
> Another interesting thing is when the viewer switches loyalty from Walt to Jesse. At the beginning of the series, Walt was the "hero" and Jesse was the idiot screw up. As Walt has "broken bad," Jesse has largely stayed the same and Walt has now passed Jesse. So it's understandable if the viewer now roots for Jesse over Walter, and that switch will also come at a different place for each viewer.


Since I only started watching from the reruns, I wasn't aware of this but I do agree.

The turning point for me was later in season 4 when Walt kept ignoring Jessie's cry for help. He should have cashed in that 'rain check' and taken Jessie to drive bumper cars. He watched Jessie sink into deep depression and did nothing. In Season 1, Walt told Jessie to be more agressive and later exploit his killer reputation but hardly supported him when wanted revenge for his friend's murder and later the murder of the child.

Interestingly, Mike and Gus both figured this out before I did.


----------



## thebigmo (Feb 12, 2005)

Concerning the laptop, wouldn't the first thing the authorities have done would be to pull the hard drive to have it analyzed, rendering the magnet project meaningless?


----------



## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

Highest ratings EVER for any BB ep...


----------



## danterner (Mar 4, 2005)

We're all assuming that the "Magnets, Yo!" plan actually worked. That remains to be seen. All we have been told is that the laptop screen was cracked. We didn't hear confirmation that the data on the drive is unrecoverable. For that matter, maybe the authorities did pull the drive and the laptop in storage was driveless.

For the sake of the story, though, I'd guess the plan was a success.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

danterner said:


> We're all assuming that the "Magnets, Yo!" plan actually worked. That remains to be seen. All we have been told is that the laptop screen was cracked. We didn't hear confirmation that the data on the drive is unrecoverable. For that matter, maybe the authorities did pull the drive and the laptop in storage was driveless.
> 
> For the sake of the story, though, I'd guess the plan was a success.


The evidence bag was still sealed. What is the police procedure if they opened the bag and pulled the drive from the laptop? Would they put it back into the same bag? Put it in a new bag and seal it?


----------



## john4200 (Nov 1, 2009)

danterner said:


> We're all assuming that the "Magnets, Yo!" plan actually worked.


We are? How do you figure?


----------



## danterner (Mar 4, 2005)

The royal we, I suppose.


----------



## EvilMidniteBombr (May 25, 2006)

john4200 said:


> We are? How do you figure?


"Because I said so." - Walter White


----------



## danterner (Mar 4, 2005)

For anyone who hasn't seen them in the past, don't forget to check out these sites for a chuckle:

http://www.bettercallsaul.com/
http://www.savewalterwhite.com/


----------



## gchance (Dec 6, 2002)

This discussion brings up another interesting point: does a "bad guy" really consider himself a bad guy? In many cases yes, but in most cases, no. The bad guy doesn't think he's bad, he's just doing what he needs to do. He doesn't see that he's crossed the line, and probably wouldn't even remember those moments such as when he tells Skyler, "I've won." Or when he says to Saul, "We're finished when I say we're finished."

Greg


----------



## photoshopgrl (Nov 22, 2008)

Yay! Finally watched. So so so happy it's back. Just in time since I'm out of new Supernatural to watch!! Sorry for the quote from hell!



danterner said:


> Last year in a BB thread here someone imagined and posted about a final scene that had Walt broken, unable to speak, his family dead, confined to a wheelchair, with the final scene being a nurse coming in to affix a bell. That's brilliant - I'd love that ending.


Oh wow, that would be utterly brilliant. I have had it in my mind that Jesse needed to kill him in the end. But somehow this might be better. Maybe we can watch Jesse go visit him and taunt him like Gus did to Tio.



danterner said:


> And *Bobby Singer* (the gun salesman) met him there. Probably local.


 :up:



DreadPirateRob said:


> Betts, I don't quite know how to break it to you, but Walt and Jesse _are_ the bad the guys.


Indeed!!



danterner said:


> I think for me, Jane's death was the turning point where Walt went from antihero to villain.


I don't think there's anyone that can argue this. This is pretty much exactly when he turned into the villain.



DreadPirateRob said:


> Objectively I have no problem knowing that Walt is certainly one of the bad guys - in fact, maybe the worst of them - but when I'm watching I keep finding myself rooting for him.


I only root for Jesse at this point. Even though he's one of the bad guys, he's a victim of his own stupidity and not a black heart like Walt is becoming.



EvilMidniteBombr said:


> "Because I said so." - Walter White


Nicely done :up:


----------



## DreadPirateRob (Nov 12, 2002)

photoshopgrl said:


> I don't think there's anyone that can argue this. This is pretty much exactly when he turned into the villain.


I think you can argue it just fine. In fact, I think I would argue that poisoning Brock was the point of no return for him. With Jane, she was a junkie who was probably going to die anyway, and he took no affirmative action other than not helping her.

But poisoning a 5 year old just on the off chance it might get your old partner back on your side? That's beyond the pale.


----------



## photoshopgrl (Nov 22, 2008)

DreadPirateRob said:


> I think you can argue it just fine. In fact, I think I would argue that poisoning Brock was the point of no return for him. With Jane, she was a junkie who was probably going to die anyway, and he took no affirmative action other than not helping her.
> 
> But poisoning a 5 year old just on the off chance it might get your old partner back on your side? That's beyond the pale.


Seriously? Think hard because there are _many_ things in between these two that I think define Walt as past the point of no return. Just my opinion.


----------



## betts4 (Dec 27, 2005)

DreadPirateRob said:


> Betts, I don't quite know how to break it to you, but Walt and Jesse _are_ the bad the guys.


 Yeah yeah yeah. I get it.


----------



## vertigo235 (Oct 27, 2000)

Jane was also a ***** who was blackmailing him.


----------



## mrdazzo7 (Jan 8, 2006)

Ted = holy s*** ... I saw the possibility of him being alive after I rewatched Face/Off yesterday--his fall wasn't overly life-ending, and there was a little finger twitch that I had missed the first time around. I assumed he was dead based on the fall and the conversation about it later but when I rewatched the episode there was no confirmation one way or the other. Still, seeing him in the bed like that was f'in dark, man. I love the way that storyline brings Skylar closer to the dark side... I didn't expect Ted's reaction to be fear of Skylar. Awesome.

My favorite thing with this show is as it unfolds you can tell they had planned for so many things all along, like making sure Sklar was established as an accountant early on so she could be brought in later... and the stuff with Beneke cooking his books establishing that he had financial issues, which led to the audit and back-taxes two season later, which led to Sklar having to give him money which prevented Walt from buying the family new identites which led to Walt having to kill Gus... As a writer, I absolutely love that ****. 

RE: Walt poisong Brock...after re-watching the episode and listening to the podcast for Face/Off, I am a little more OK with the plot, even though I still feel it was way too diabolical for the realm of the show (it makes Walt look like an all powerful, moustache twirling Bond villain). But a differnet take on it was that it was a crazy "hail mary" that just happened to work. My only lingering problem, though, is a: the fact that someone lifting ONE CIGARETTE out of a pack that's in someone's pocket is ridiculous--the idea of it being a SPECIFIC cigarette is flat out nonsensical. and B: The idea that Walt could predict that Jessie would connect Brock's symptom's to ricin was dumb to me. He had to get Jessie to Saul's, have him searched/the ricin lifted, have Andrea call him, have him go outside to smoke a cigarette *and* realize the ricin was gone, then have him connect that to Brock's symptoms. It's too much...but anyway.

In the podcast they said Walt isn't as evil as it seems (yet) based solely on the poisoning because he didn't actually poison the kid with the ricin (which he had access too)--he knew Brock would survive the berry poisoning. I was more concerned that he was gonna waste Skylar in that final scene. I never felt sure of what was coming before, forget it now that this is the beginning of the end. 

"How can you be sure it worked?"
"...Because I said so."

Seriously Walt is 100% out of his mind. It's strange watching a show where the lead character is becoming less and less sympathetic. I didn't watch the sopranos but even Tony had something that made you relate to him (from what I hear). TommY Gavin on Rescue Me was a d-bag all around, but he was traumatized by a terrorist attack. Walt is not an "anti-hero" anymore--he's the villain. It's a freakin' blast to watch, but I still need someone to root for and Jessie is kind of a criminal too so I'm rooting for Walt's family. This is one show where I believe the main character should die in the end, full of regret and fear, just because that's kind of what he's gonna deserve by the time this is over. He's not a dying mild-mannered high school teacher doing bad things to provide for his family after he's gone--he's turning full-on evil. Just as Gus deserved what he got, Walt likely will as well, probably at the hands of Jessie.


----------



## Beryl (Feb 22, 2009)

DreadPirateRob said:


> With Jane, she was a junkie who was probably going to die anyway, and he took no affirmative action other than not helping her.


This was my way of thinking also. She was only one regression away from death so his inaction didn't cause me to start rooting for his quick demise. Actually, when Jessie was in the hospital and threatened to bring down Walter if he got caught cooking/selling on his own, I thought that Jessie having an overdose would solve the problem.


----------



## mrdazzo7 (Jan 8, 2006)

On the subject of when Walt crossed from anti-hero to villain... according to the writers (and what some viewers took away from it), him poisoning Brock wasn't necessarily an act of evil so much of an act of complete and total desperation. Walt was about to be killed in the season 3 finale and only wasn't because he had Jessie kill Gale. But throughout every single episode of season 4, he knew he would Gus would eventually make his move. Once that time came, he was completely full of terror that he was done, and also that his entire family was dead. If you remember him frantically running to Saul to get the ID guy's info, then running home and finding the money gone from the crawl space--he knew he was done. 

He didn't poison Brock because he wanted to, he did it out of desperation and fear for his life and the lives of his wife and kids. If you're Walt at that time and the *ONLY* thing that will keep you alive is to convince Jessie to help you kill Gus, you do what you have to do. 

Keep in mind I'm not saying he did the right thing (obviously), but I'm saying in terms of the character and figuring out exactly when he crossed over into "evil", the argument COULD be made that he hasn't yet, based on the fact that his actions were motivated by survival and not just for the hell of it or to gain market share or something like Gus would have done. 

Personally I'd say that letting Jane die was absolutely the "turning point" down this path... Everyone says "oh she was a drug addict and she blackmailed him" as if that is a legit reason to let someone die in front of you. Him sitting there while she died when he totally had the power to stop it was the first real sign that he is truly turning bad. She was a 22 year old kid with a drug problem, let alone the fact that Jessie was completely in love with her... letting her die was a huge moment in his path. No way around it.


----------



## MikeAndrews (Jan 17, 2002)

thebigmo said:


> Concerning the laptop, wouldn't the first thing the authorities have done would be to pull the hard drive to have it analyzed, rendering the magnet project meaningless?


The "pros" use one of the many computer forensic tools to make the hard drive read-only and clone it without changing one bit on it. That would have happened if the cops or DEA had enough time to get the laptop to a tech.


----------



## MikeAndrews (Jan 17, 2002)

Bierboy said:


> Highest ratings EVER for any BB ep...


Yeah. Funny how the hype has been building now that people can buy/stream DVR (Torrent) the previous episodes and get up to speed on what their friends are raving about.

Ya know - the technology that is the death of Hollywood studios and major media.


----------



## MikeAndrews (Jan 17, 2002)

Ya think that maybe Hank will figure out that Old Tio Hector didn't build bomb hisself from pure venom? There's somebody else out there..."Uncle Hank says somebody got to Mr. Fring first."

We haven't seen if Hank's DEA pals have apologized to him for thinking he was off his rocker.

Also there was this lime green Pontiac Aztec parked out front of the laundry every day...


----------



## justen_m (Jan 15, 2004)

mrdazzo7 said:


> It's strange watching a show where the lead character is becoming less and less sympathetic


Have you watched The Shield? Or Sons of Anarchy? Main characters that do evil things, but with good intentions, mostly.


----------



## TheMerk (Feb 26, 2001)

mrdazzo7 said:


> My only lingering problem, though, is a: the fact that someone lifting ONE CIGARETTE out of a pack that's in someone's pocket is ridiculous--the idea of it being a SPECIFIC cigarette is flat out nonsensical.


Walt knows Jesse's brand of cigarettes.

Walt told Saul to have Huell switch Jesse's pack of cigarettes for another pack.

Simple.


----------



## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

DreadPirateRob said:


> I think you can argue it just fine. In fact, I think I would argue that poisoning Brock was the point of no return for him. With Jane, she was a junkie who was probably going to die anyway, and he took no affirmative action other than not helping her.
> 
> But poisoning a 5 year old just on the off chance it might get your old partner back on your side? That's beyond the pale.


I would agree with this...I don't see Jane's death as the turning point (f there really is any "turning point"). Poisoning a five-year-old is as close to one as I would guess...


----------



## Robin (Dec 6, 2001)

TheMerk said:


> Walt knows Jesse's brand of cigarettes.
> 
> Walt told Saul to have Huell switch Jesse's pack of cigarettes for another pack.
> 
> Simple.


That absolutely did not occur to me. 

Walt did have another choice, he could have gone to the authorities and entered witness protection. He was too proud to let go of his ill-gotten gains.

I don't think it was a stretch that Jessie connected Brock's symptoms to ricin. I thought of it immediately as J they started describing his symptoms. My guess was that he'd stolen a cigarette.


----------



## David Platt (Dec 13, 2001)

This is speculation based on info from a recent EW article, so I'll spoilerize it:



Spoiler



At some point, Walt and Jesse are going to need to start cooking again for financial reasons. But where are they going to do it since their high-tech meth lab is now destroyed. In the interview, Aaron Paul said that they'll setup at a "blue collar" location that has been staring them right in the face the whole time. My bet is that the car wash is their new meth lab.


----------



## getreal (Sep 29, 2003)

TheMerk said:


> Walt knows Jesse's brand of cigarettes.
> 
> Walt told Saul to have Huell switch Jesse's pack of cigarettes for another pack.
> 
> Simple.


Magic trick spoiler alert!!


----------



## betts4 (Dec 27, 2005)

Robin said:


> I don't think it was a stretch that Jessie connected Brock's symptoms to ricin. I thought of it immediately as J they started describing his symptoms. My guess was that he'd stolen a cigarette.


That was my thought also.


----------



## Johnny Dancing (Sep 3, 2000)

Robin said:


> Walt did have another choice, he could have gone to the authorities and entered witness protection. He was too proud to let go of his ill-gotten gains.


Since Walt is one of the Kingpins at the top that the DEA desperately wants I don't see him getting witness protection. His only card would be turning in the Chickenman - who was probably too smart for Walt to have anything on him. Maybe he could bargain down from life to 25 years.

Walt did try give it all up and use his money to buy his family private witness protection but Skylar gave his get out of town cash to Ted so that was not an option.


----------



## cheesesteak (Jul 24, 2003)

I was hoping Saul would go upside Walt's head instead of cowering away. Walt can't fight. If I'm Saul, I'm moseying down to the DA's office and turning Walt in in exchange for immunity.


----------



## MikeAndrews (Jan 17, 2002)

cheesesteak said:


> I was hoping Saul would go upside Walt's head instead of cowering away. Walt can't fight. If I'm Saul, I'm moseying down to the DA's office and turning Walt in in exchange for immunity.


If the ABQ PD or DEA just put a car watching Saul's storefront, they may wonder what this unemployed high school chemistry teacher has to talk to Saul about.


----------



## tiams (Apr 19, 2004)

cheesesteak said:


> If I'm Saul, I'm moseying down to the DA's office and turning Walt in in exchange for immunity.


If attorneys started turning their clients in for their crimes our justice system would collapse.


----------



## nataylor (Apr 26, 2000)

netringer said:


> If the ABQ PD or DEA just put a car watching Saul's storefront, they may wonder what this unemployed high school chemistry teacher has to talk to Saul about.


Easily explainable: Divorce.


----------



## pmyers (Jan 4, 2001)

thebigmo said:


> Concerning the laptop, wouldn't the first thing the authorities have done would be to pull the hard drive to have it analyzed, rendering the magnet project meaningless?


my question is why did it even go into some random evidence room before the detective (Walt's BIL who I can't remember his name) looked at it?


----------



## Warren (Oct 18, 2001)

Maybe we should get Mythbusters on the case to see if the magnet would work. They could test the amount of batterys they had etc.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

netringer said:


> The "pros" use one of the many computer forensic tools to make the hard drive read-only and clone it without changing one bit on it. That would have happened if the cops or DEA had enough time to get the laptop to a tech.





pmyers said:


> my question is why did it even go into some random evidence room before the detective (Walt's BIL who I can't remember his name) looked at it?


Yes, that was my question as well. Why was the laptop being stored in the ABQ PD and not by the DEA? Wouldn't the DEA have jurisdiction over this case, since the burned lab was clearly a meth lab, and since the evidence they seized from Gus' office was directly related to the meth lab. If not the DEA, then at least the FBI, since I'm sure the FBI would be all over a case of a big drug kingpin being blown up in a nursing home. I can't imagine that the feds would allow the local cops to control any of the evidence.


netringer said:


> We haven't seen if Hank's DEA pals have apologized to him for thinking he was off his rocker.


While they were searching the remains of the Super Lab, didn't his buddy say something to the effect of, "Go ahead, I know you want to say 'I told you so.'"


justen_m said:


> Have you watched The Shield? Or Sons of Anarchy? Main characters that do evil things, but with good intentions, mostly.


Yes, but weren't those characters doing evil things from the beginning of the show? That's the difference with this show. Walt started off as just an average, normal guy who then digressed to where he is now. Watching that digression is what makes this show so interesting and different. 


TheMerk said:


> Walt knows Jesse's brand of cigarettes.
> 
> Walt told Saul to have Huell switch Jesse's pack of cigarettes for another pack.
> 
> Simple.


So why was Saul only giving Walt back the one cigarette rather than the whole pack? I think that if Huell had simply switched packs, Saul would hand Walt the whole pack that was lifted. Also, in order for your version to work, Huell would have to know how many cigarettes were gone from Jesse's pack so Jesse wouldn't realize the pack had been switched. Based on what we know, it's much more likely that Huell simply lifted the one cigarette that was facing the other direction, then returned the pack to Jesse's pocket. That way, Jesse thinks Brock took the Ricin cigarette, and that's why Saul is only giving Walt back one single cigarette.


----------



## BK89 (Oct 11, 2005)

I agree, that's why Saul mentioned Huell has fingers like sausages. Because he had to pick out the individual "lucky" cig from the pack.


----------



## mostman (Jul 16, 2000)

Can someone remind me how Walt actually poisoned the boy? As in, what was the delivery method. I can't seem to remember if they ever told us that.


----------



## DreadPirateRob (Nov 12, 2002)

DevdogAZ said:


> Yes, that was my question as well. Why was the laptop being stored in the ABQ PD and not by the DEA? Wouldn't the DEA have jurisdiction over this case, since the burned lab was clearly a meth lab, and since the evidence they seized from Gus' office was directly related to the meth lab. If not the DEA, then at least the FBI, since I'm sure the FBI would be all over a case of a big drug kingpin being blown up in a nursing home. I can't imagine that the feds would allow the local cops to control any of the evidence.


But the DEA wouldn't be handling the murder investigation, right? That would seem far afield of their jurisdiction. At best, this would be a joint effort. The computer wasn't found at the meth lab, so there would be nothing overtly tying it to the DEA investigation until it was examined, which it hadn't been yet (apparently).


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

DreadPirateRob said:


> But the DEA wouldn't be handling the murder investigation, right? That would seem far afield of their jurisdiction. At best, this would be a joint effort. The computer wasn't found at the meth lab, so there would be nothing overtly tying it to the DEA investigation until it was examined, which it hadn't been yet (apparently).


Which is why I added the extra sentence or two about the FBI. I think that given the fact that the murder is clearly drug related, I think the FBI and DEA would take over this case and none of that evidence would be sent to the Albuquerque PD.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

The entire laptop/magnet/evidence room sub-plot fell flat for me. Surely, someone as meticulous as Gus Fring would be using some version of very high encryption on his laptop and/or any hard drives used to store the videos. And now that he's dead, assuming he doesn't have a password written down anywhere, that notebook/hard drive is good as blank. 

He could have used something like TrueCrypt which allows not only virtually unbreakable encryption, but also the ability to hide a bootable system partition inside another. It's called Plausible deniability -- the computer would boot up, and you can enter one password for the blank OS, and a different password to load the hidden/sensitive partition. Even if Gus was alive and forced to turn over the password, all he would have to do is turn over the "blank" OS password and deny all knowledge of a hidden partition. Without the secure password, there's no way to even detect there is a second partition on the HD. 

I'm sure Gus would have used something like this, or stronger. I'm surprised that Mike would not know this. 

Although the magnet truck did make good (but totally fake) TV.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

mostman said:


> Can someone remind me how Walt actually poisoned the boy? As in, what was the delivery method. I can't seem to remember if they ever told us that.


This is what Alan Sepinwall said in his recap:



Alan Sepinwall said:


> * The scene at Saul's office also belatedly explains what Vince Gilligan told me at the end of last season about Huell lifting the ricin cigarette when he frisked Jesse, but doesn't get into how Walt got the poison to Brock. I wonder if that's something the show will ever bother to explain, or if it's a rare instance of them not showing us all the steps of something.


----------



## DreadPirateRob (Nov 12, 2002)

Hank said:


> The entire laptop/magnet/evidence room sub-plot fell flat for me. Surely, someone as meticulous as Gus Fring would be using some version of very high encryption on his laptop and/or any hard drives used to store the videos. And now that he's dead, assuming he doesn't have a password written down anywhere, that notebook/hard drive is good as blank.
> 
> He could have used something like TrueCrypt which allows not only virtually unbreakable encryption, but also the ability to hide a bootable system partition inside another. It's called Plausible deniability -- the computer would boot up, and you can enter one password for the blank OS, and a different password to load the hidden/sensitive partition. Even if Gus was alive and forced to turn over the password, all he would have to do is turn over the "blank" OS password and deny all knowledge of a hidden partition. Without the secure password, there's no way to even detect there is a second partition on the HD.
> 
> ...


A couple of things:

1) We don't know that Gus didn't have any of those things. All we know is what Walt knows/guesses. This storyline just started. It's far from being over.

2) Mike was a good soldier - that's it. Gus didn't tell him anything he didn't need to know.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

Hank said:


> The entire laptop/magnet/evidence room sub-plot fell flat for me. Surely, someone as meticulous as Gus Fring would be using some version of very high encryption on his laptop and/or any hard drives used to store the videos. And now that he's dead, assuming he doesn't have a password written down anywhere, that notebook/hard drive is good as blank.
> 
> He could have used something like TrueCrypt which allows not only virtually unbreakable encryption, but also the ability to hide a bootable system partition inside another. It's called Plausible deniability -- the computer would boot up, and you can enter one password for the blank OS, and a different password to load the hidden/sensitive partition. Even if Gus was alive and forced to turn over the password, all he would have to do is turn over the "blank" OS password and deny all knowledge of a hidden partition. Without the secure password, there's no way to even detect there is a second partition on the HD.
> 
> ...


None of that matters. Walt would never have simply accepted that. He would have wanted to make sure the hard drive was completely erased, regardless of whether Gus was using encryption or not. It would have been nice for Mike to make a comment about that and then Walt to blow him off, but I don't think Walt would have simply said, "Oh great, we don't have to worry about it."

But at the same time, I'm not sure Gus would have trusted Mike (or anyone else) with information about his computer security, so I'm not even sure it would make sense for Mike to know that.


----------



## Beryl (Feb 22, 2009)

Hank said:


> The entire laptop/magnet/evidence room sub-plot fell flat for me. Surely, someone as meticulous as Gus Fring would be using some version of very high encryption on his laptop and/or any hard drives used to store the videos. And now that he's dead, assuming he doesn't have a password written down anywhere, that notebook/hard drive is good as blank.


this is a good point. He was knew how to 'hide in plain sight' and wouldn't have allowed his system to be compromised.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

DreadPirateRob said:


> A couple of things:
> 
> 1) We don't know that Gus didn't have any of those things. All we know is what Walt knows/guesses. This storyline just started. It's far from being over.
> 
> 2) Mike was a good soldier - that's it. Gus didn't tell him anything he didn't need to know.





DevdogAZ said:


> None of that matters. Walt would never have simply accepted that. He would have wanted to make sure the hard drive was completely erased, regardless of whether Gus was using encryption or not. It would have been nice for Mike to make a comment about that and then Walt to blow him off, but I don't think Walt would have simply said, "Oh great, we don't have to worry about it."
> 
> But at the same time, I'm not sure Gus would have trusted Mike (or anyone else) with information about his computer security, so I'm not even sure it would make sense for Mike to know that.


Right, those are all obvious things... my point is the *entire plot line* should not have existed. It's weak and as already pointed out, not all that scientifically or technologically accurate. They could have found some other plot device to keep up the tension and the fact that they all had to work together to accomplish some task or they're all toast. So far the writing and "real life" situations have been, for the most part, believable. But come on, driving a huge magnet truck next to the evidence room, which *just happens* to be on the other side of an easily accessible way in the parking garage? That's almost as hinky as hiring a hacker to wait for the police to turn on the computer, then remotely connect to it, and then erase all contents in front of the police's eyes. Come on, it is *possible*, right?


----------



## CharlieW (May 30, 2001)

DevdogAZ said:


> This is what Alan Sepinwall said in his recap:


Sepinwall's insights regarding this show are always spot on.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

Hank said:


> Right, those are all obvious things... my point is the *entire plot line* should not have existed. It's weak and as already pointed out, not all that scientifically or technologically accurate. They could have found some other plot device to keep up the tension and the fact that they all had to work together to accomplish some task or they're all toast. So far the writing and "real life" situations have been, for the most part, believable. But come on, driving a huge magnet truck next to the evidence room, which *just happens* to be on the other side of an easily accessible way in the parking garage? That's almost as hinky as hiring a hacker to wait for the police to turn on the computer, then remotely connect to it, and then erase all contents in front of the police's eyes. Come on, it is *possible*, right?


But I think you missed the point. It's extremely likely that Gus had air-tight encryption. But Walt isn't going to rely on that. He's not going to bet his freedom and his life on the assumption that Gus' security is unbreakable. He's going to take whatever efforts he can to erase the contents of the drive to protect himself. You may have a problem with the magnet approach. I can understand that. But I think it would be extremely out of character for Walt not to do something.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

DevdogAZ said:


> But I think you missed the point. It's extremely likely that Gus had air-tight encryption. But Walt isn't going to rely on that. He's not going to bet his freedom and his life on the assumption that Gus' security is unbreakable. He's going to take whatever efforts he can to erase the contents of the drive to protect himself. You may have a problem with the magnet approach. I can understand that. But I think it would be extremely out of character for Walt not to do something.


Please re-read my post... I'm saying the entire camera-video plot is bogus.. not what Walt, etc would/should/could do about the videos. I'm saying find some OTHER thing to accomplish the same thing, without all the plot holes.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

Hank said:


> Please re-read my post... I'm saying the entire camera-video plot is bogus.. not what Walt, etc would/should/could do about the videos. I'm saying find some OTHER thing to accomplish the same thing, without all the plot holes.


Why? Gus recorded what happend in the Super Lab. Walt and Jesse knew this. It's perfectly reasonable for Walt to suddenly realize that his face existed on a video of the Super Lab somewhere and to want to figure out where that video is and how to erase that video. It doesn't matter whether erasing it was necessary. It matters that Walt wouldn't rest until he was sure of it.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

Ugh..







again, they could have found something else ENTIRELY DIFFERENT without all the logical and plot holes. FORGET ABOUT THE GOD DAMN VIDEOS... there are plenty of other more believable plot devices they could have manufactured and used, without these holes and problems.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

Hank said:


> Ugh..
> 
> 
> 
> ...


So you think that if Walt hadn't remembered the cameras and that hadn't been central to the episode in this plot, that the fans of the show wouldn't have begun wondering whether all the footage from the cameras was stored somewhere in Gus' house or office and that the DEA might find it while investigating Gus' death?

I suppose it's possible the writers could have addressed it by simply having Hank say a line about, "we recovered a computer from Fring's office, but there was nothing on the hard drive." or something like that. But something that simple would never have satisfied the fans, and more importantly, Walt would never rest knowing those videos might exist somewhere.

In fact, I think they should have gone into it in even more depth, because the likelihood that Gus stored hundreds of hours of video on his laptop is pretty remote. Either he didn't keep the video longer than a day or two, or he had a server somewhere that kept everything archived and he only accessed it through his laptop. So maybe there's still a computer somewhere with the video files, and I can't imagine Walt just being OK with that.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

I'm done trying to explain it. I've explained it three times already. I'm out.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

Hank said:


> I'm done trying to explain it. I've explained it three times already. I'm out.


I'm really not trying to argue with you. I'm just trying to understand how, in your mind, they should have proceeded with the show without addressing the existence of the videos.


----------



## getreal (Sep 29, 2003)

Hank said:


> I'm done trying to explain it. I've explained it three times already. I'm out.


"Out" as in "Anderson Cooper out"? 

Personally, I loved how they dealt with the video storyline. It's done. They were all destroyed. Now the story moves forward from there. Forget about over-analyzing and nit-picking.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

DevdogAZ said:


> I'm really not trying to argue with you. I'm just trying to understand how, in your mind, they should have proceeded with the show without addressing the existence of the videos.


And there could be video cameras at the gas station across the street that captured Walt's car.. there could be (legal) employees of the laundry that get questioned when they show up for work the next day, there could be tire tracks/marks Walt's car left behind (from corrosive chemicals) when leaving the laundry, there could be some personal effects in that side room that maybe didn't get burned, there could be so many OTHER THINGS besides the video footage. The only reason Gus's video footage is being discussed is because the writers wrote it in -- they could have left it out and nobody would have thought "lets think of ALL THE POSSIBLE PLOT DEVICES the writers LEFT OUT". If the writers never wrote in the problem with the videos, it would be a non-point. But now that they did, I'm saying they did a REALLY POOR JOB with it. Really poor, way below what I have come to expect form BB. I'm sure the writes could come up with a dozen more foibles that serve the same purpose. What about video cameras at the nursing home that may have captured Walt going into the room to plant the bomb? What I'm saying is having the videos is a fine foible, but the huge magnet truck, and the "convenient" location of the evidence room is just too much for me to believe. The writers could have made it much more difficult AND believable.



getreal said:


> Personally, I loved how they dealt with the video storyline. It's done. They were all destroyed. Now the story moves forward from there. Forget about over-analyzing and nit-picking.


What if Gus uploaded the videos to "the cloud"... then it doesn't matter what happens to the physical notebook. What if Gus used a remote terminal into a machine somewhere else (like the laundry) to watch the videos? That's where they would be stored, not on his local notebook (if they were stored at all -- Gus being Gus would likely not save anything).

I thought I said "I'm out"???


----------



## robojerk (Jun 13, 2006)

I agree with Hank, that the videos probably were encrypted with Truecrypt or something and the whole plot was done for nothing.

However! Walter White is a chemistry nerd, not a computer nerd (like some of us here). DevdovAZ is right that Walter would have made damn sure that there was no evidence of him cooking meth. From his point of view he had too much to possibly lose by doing nothing. I'll admit the science behind it was pretty weak, but there is enough truth behind it to make it _plausible_.


----------



## robojerk (Jun 13, 2006)

Hank said:


> What if Gus uploaded the videos to "the cloud"... then it doesn't matter what happens to the physical notebook. What if Gus used a remote terminal into a machine somewhere else (like the laundry) to watch the videos? That's where they would be stored, not on his local notebook (if they were stored at all -- Gus being Gus would likely not save anything).


I doubt Gus is that stupid to upload the video to a cloud storage solution. With the money he was making he probably has data center in the dessert somewhere hosting his own private cloud, where once again everything is heavily encrypted. He may even own a call center in ABQ somewhere using encrypted SIP over the phones.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

robojerk said:


> I doubt Gus is that stupid to upload the video to a cloud storage solution. With the money he was making he probably has data center in the dessert somewhere hosting his own private cloud, where once again everything is heavily encrypted. He may even own a call center in ABQ somewhere using encrypted SIP over the phones.


Of course! Yes, nobody in the crew is a computer nerd to know this stuff, but having the videos on the notebook, easily accessible, is the LEAST likely possibility.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

But also, unlike police or retail stores, Gus has no reason to store the videos once watched. They were for his own personal consumption -- it's not like he would need to keep any of them for evidence. Yes, there might even be temporary video stored of Walt and Jesse trashing the superlab (Gus's laptop was closed, and appeared to be "off"). So was it even recording anything? There are just too many holes.


----------



## robojerk (Jun 13, 2006)

Possible video evidence of you cooking meth, witnessing murder, covering it up?
WWWWD?


----------



## Test (Dec 8, 2004)

robojerk said:


> Possible video evidence of you cooking meth, witnessing murder, covering it up?
> *WWWWD?*


Who Wouldn't Want Walter Dead?

About all the video/magnet/evidence room talk. This was also an easy way to add a new plot point; the info behind the picture.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

Hank said:


> And there could be video cameras at the gas station across the street that captured Walt's car.. there could be (legal) employees of the laundry that get questioned when they show up for work the next day, there could be tire tracks/marks Walt's car left behind (from corrosive chemicals) when leaving the laundry, there could be some personal effects in that side room that maybe didn't get burned, there could be so many OTHER THINGS besides the video footage. *The only reason Gus's video footage is being discussed is because the writers wrote it in -- they could have left it out and nobody would have thought "lets think of ALL THE POSSIBLE PLOT DEVICES the writers LEFT OUT". If the writers never wrote in the problem with the videos, it would be a non-point.* But now that they did, I'm saying they did a REALLY POOR JOB with it. Really poor, way below what I have come to expect form BB. I'm sure the writes could come up with a dozen more foibles that serve the same purpose. What about video cameras at the nursing home that may have captured Walt going into the room to plant the bomb? What I'm saying is having the videos is a fine foible, but the huge magnet truck, and the "convenient" location of the evidence room is just too much for me to believe. The writers could have made it much more difficult AND believable.


Do you really believe that the viewers of this show would not have brought up the cameras and the possibility that there was video stored somewhere showing Walt and Jesse cooking, killing people, and destroying the lab? We've seen the cameras multiple times. We know Gus watched them off site. It was only a matter of time before that plot point had to be dealt with in some way.



robojerk said:


> Possible video evidence of you cooking meth, witnessing murder, covering it up?
> WWWWD?


Don't forget that Walt and Jesse actually killed two guys that came down the service elevator, so not only did they cook meth and witness a murder, but they committed murder themselves.

Hank's being way too literal on that fact that Gus wouldn't have stored the videos, or wouldn't have stored them on his laptop, or they would have been encrypted, or they weren't recorded because the laptop was off, or couldn't be erased by a magnet because it was a solid state drive, etc. The bottom line is that Walt didn't know whether the videos were stored on the laptop, but he wanted to make sure that if there were videos on the laptop, those videos would become unrecoverable.

For those of us who know a little something about computers, Hank is right that it would have been more satisfying if there had been some other storage device other than a laptop. It would have been more satisfying if there had been a better way to destroy the hard drive than just using a magnet. But none of that changes the fact that Walt never would have rested until he knew the videos were destroyed (whether the videos actually needed to be destroyed or not).


----------



## john4200 (Nov 1, 2009)

I think Hank's point was that it was poor writing to make a big plot point of the computer at all. I certainly think it was. They could have just had Walt get to the laptop before the police in a 30 second scene, then spend their time writing something that actually made sense instead of the absurd magnet fiasco.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

DevdogAZ said:


> Do you really believe that the viewers of this show would not have brought up the cameras and the possibility that there was video stored somewhere showing Walt and Jesse cooking, killing people, and destroying the lab? We've seen the cameras multiple times. We know Gus watched them off site. It was only a matter of time before that plot point had to be dealt with in some way.


Of course we'll never know, but I think the fans/viewers follow the writers' lead... if they didn't make a big deal of the videos and notebook, I don't think many fans would fabricate that on their own. And of course, that just becomes FanFic, and not the actual show.



DevdogAZ said:


> Walt didn't know whether the videos were stored on the laptop, but he wanted to make sure that if there were videos on the laptop, those videos would become unrecoverable.


But as demonstrated, and we're sure the writers know this, but *just* destroying the notebook, I'd say, had a 10% chance of *actually* destroying the evidence (if it existed or was recoverable in the first place). And just for argument sake, suppose the evidence either didn't exist on the notebook, or did and was encrypted in some strong fashion, Walt, Jesse, and Mike took a HUGE risk with the Super-Duper-Magic-Magnet truck (think of all the witnesses at the junk yard), and that they're driving right into the police station, and nearly got caught red handed... it was a HUGE risk, for very little (if any) actual return.

It's just bad writing. I've seen better from them. Pretty much everything else.


----------



## robojerk (Jun 13, 2006)

Since hindsight is very popular now thanks to Newsroom, here's how they could have fixed it to make everyone happy.


> Mike tells Walter and Jessee that the video was stored at a secure site (not the laptop) and they go find Gus's IT guy. The IT guy tells them that the Gus used a TOR proxy to connect to an https encrypted website that required a difficult password to view the video. The secure site is hidden in another industrial type facility like where the meth lab was, but is guarded by people still loyal to Gus and or the Mexican cartel. He describes the storage controllers to be near a wall (3 ft). The exterior of the wall is unguarded. Jesse mentions the magnet idea and the rest unfolds similar to the same. The magnetic field would have been strong enough to reach at least 5 feet, and not the 20 or 30 like shown on the show. It would have been way more plausible, and shown how very cautious Gus Fring was.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

Hank said:


> But as demonstrated, and we're sure the writers know this, but *just* destroying the notebook, I'd say, had a 10% chance of *actually* destroying the evidence (if it existed or was recoverable in the first place). And just for argument sake, suppose the evidence either didn't exist on the notebook, or did and was encrypted in some strong fashion, Walt, Jesse, and Mike took a HUGE risk with the Super-Duper-Magic-Magnet truck (think of all the witnesses at the junk yard), and that they're driving right into the police station, and nearly got caught red handed... it was a HUGE risk, for very little (if any) actual return.
> 
> It's just bad writing. I've seen better from them. Pretty much everything else.


I'll agree that the whole magnet thing was a joke. It has a miniscule chance of actually destroying the evidence, and the laptop likely wasn't the real storage place for the evidence anyway. On that, I'll agree with you.

But I think they had to address the existence of the camera footage somehow, since that was an ongoing plot point. Fans would have complained that the writers overlooked something very obvious if they hadn't at least brought it up.

I'd rather have them affirmatively address it the way they did, even if it was riddled with plot holes, than to have Walt be so careless that he doesn't even think about the fact that the videos might be out there.


----------



## john4200 (Nov 1, 2009)

DevdogAZ said:


> But I think they had to address the existence of the camera footage somehow, since that was an ongoing plot point. Fans would have complained that the writers overlooked something very obvious if they hadn't at least brought it up.


As I said before, it could have easily been addressed with a 30 second scene where Walt gets the laptop before the police get there.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

john4200 said:


> As I said before, it could have easily been addressed with a 30 second scene where Walt gets the laptop before the police get there.


Yes, of course there were other ways to address it. I suggested one earlier as well. My only point is that it had to be addressed in some way. They couldn't just ignore the potential existence of the videos and expect that viewers wouldn't remember that there were cameras in the Super Lab.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

DevdogAZ said:


> But I think they had to address the existence of the camera footage somehow, since that was an ongoing plot point. Fans would have complained that the writers overlooked something very obvious if they hadn't at least brought it up.


I would assert that the video footage in the previous seasons was not a major plot point, and was just there to allow Gus to oversee an untrustworthy Walt and add tension and paranoia. And since it wasn't a big plot point (IMHO), "overlooking it" would not be a big deal. But in S5E1 they could have just captured the notebook from Gus's office before the cops got there, accidentally knocked over the photo with the bank account info, which the cops then find. There -- we've saved 30 minutes of wasted Magnet-Truck time.


----------



## getreal (Sep 29, 2003)

This whole magnet brouhaha nitpickery is comparable to the long-winded argument about the former owner of the carwash and how he was going to expose the Whites. At this point it is just an exercise in mental masturbation (master-debation). Let it go, guys. 

The storyline made the episode entertaining to the 99% of us who just want to go along with the ingenuity and cartoonish ridiculousness of it all. It was very entertaining!

It's more comparable to Wile E. Coyote ordering a giant Acme magnet through mail order. The minute he drops the order in a mailbox, the truck is delivered a second later to that very mailbox.

Awesome!!  :up::up:


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

getreal said:


> The storyline made the episode entertaining to the 99% of us who just want to go along with the ingenuity and cartoonish ridiculousness of it all. It was very entertaining!


Totally agree with this. Despite the potential plot holes, I found the episode very entertaining.


----------



## Fassade (Apr 8, 2004)

Hank said:


> But as demonstrated, and we're sure the writers know this, but *just* destroying the notebook, I'd say, had a 10% chance of *actually* destroying the evidence (if it existed or was recoverable in the first place).


What is worse for Walt is that for that 10% chance, he also destroyed any chance he might have had in tracking down the footage before the authorities do. As close-to-impossible as it would have been, the best play would have been to recover the laptop and use that to trace the actual location(s) of the footage. As it stands now, the DEA may stumble across the footage by some other means (by finding and raiding Gus' presumed offsite data center), whereas Walt will now never know.

A computer-savvy person might understand this, but but it may just be that 51-year old Walt is bad with computers, and it will come back to bite him. Or it may be that the writers felt they had more story to tell, and simply needed to dispose of this relatively minor point as believably as they could and move on.

Either way, I enjoyed the episode.


----------



## jamesl (Jul 12, 2012)

Fassade said:


> What is worse for Walt is that for that 10% chance, he also destroyed any chance he might have had in tracking down the footage before the authorities do. As close-to-impossible as it would have been, the best play would have been to recover the laptop and use that to trace the actual location(s) of the footage.


what was on the laptop was the actual footage

he said the cameras fed into the laptop
so the cameras just recorded straight to the laptop's harddrive, just like TiVo


----------



## john4200 (Nov 1, 2009)

getreal said:


> The storyline made the episode entertaining to the 99% of us who just want to go along with the ingenuity and cartoonish ridiculousness of it all.


Actually, the magnet fiasco made the story ridiculous to the 63.7% of the viewing public (I can make up BS statistics, too!) that have half a clue about how magnets work (not to mention, good storylines).


----------



## jamesl (Jul 12, 2012)

john4200 said:


> Actually, the magnet fiasco made the story ridiculous to the 63.7% of the viewing public (I can make up BS statistics, too!) that have half a clue about how magnets work (not to mention, good storylines).


yeah, but remember, he had them wired in parallel to up the amperage


----------



## mostman (Jul 16, 2000)

Wow. This is a Lost thread now. I think those were ashes around the cabin. Who wants to disagree?

Oh. And by the way. Team GAUNT all the way!


----------



## thebigmo (Feb 12, 2005)

Nothing to do with the show, really, but what was with making us wait until the first commercial break of that absolutely, ridiculous, load of crap, unwatchable whatever it was that came on after Breaking Bad to see next week's previews?


----------



## Mikeyis4dcats (Oct 2, 2003)

ALL commercially available encryption is defeatable by the federal government. That is a requirement of sale and export. Now, would the DEA be able to have the drives decrypted for such an investigation, I don't know.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

Mikeyis4dcats said:


> ALL commercially available encryption is defeatable by the federal government. That is a requirement of sale and export. Now, would the DEA be able to have the drives decrypted for such an investigation, I don't know.


If that's true, then that's one more reason why the plot in this episode made sense (although I'll agree they could have done it better).


----------



## nataylor (Apr 26, 2000)

Mikeyis4dcats said:


> ALL commercially available encryption is defeatable by the federal government. That is a requirement of sale and export.


All encryption is defeatable. But some is secure enough that the federal government lacks the resources to defeat it in a reasonable amount of time. There is no requirement that a back door be built into encryption systems.


----------



## brianric (Aug 29, 2002)

DevdogAZ said:


> or couldn't be erased by a magnet because it was a solid state drive, etc.


A magnet powerful enough to disturb the electrons in flash would be powerful enough to suck the iron out of your blood cells - Bill Frank, executive director of the CompactFlash Association.


----------



## john4200 (Nov 1, 2009)

jamesl said:


> yeah, but remember, he had them wired in parallel to up the amperage


Ah, I forgot. Okay, then!


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

Mikeyis4dcats said:


> ALL commercially available encryption is defeatable by the federal government. That is a requirement of sale and export. Now, would the DEA be able to have the drives decrypted for such an investigation, I don't know.


Who says Gus was using "commercially" available encryption software?

http://www.truecrypt.org/faq



> *I forgot my password  is there any way ('backdoor') to recover the files from my TrueCrypt volume?*
> 
> We have not implemented any 'backdoor' in TrueCrypt (and will never implement any even if asked to do so by a government agency), because it would defeat the purpose of the software. TrueCrypt does not allow decryption of data without knowing the correct password or key. We cannot recover your data because we do not know and cannot determine the password you chose or the key you generated using TrueCrypt. The only way to recover your files is to try to "crack" the password or the key, *but it could take thousands or millions of years (depending on the length and quality of the password or keyfiles, on the software/hardware performance, algorithms, and other factors).* If you find this hard to believe, consider the fact that even the FBI was not able to decrypt a TrueCrypt volume after a year of trying.


----------



## mooseAndSquirrel (Aug 31, 2001)

getreal said:


> This whole magnet brouhaha nitpickery is comparable to the long-winded argument about the former owner of the carwash and how he was going to expose the Whites. At this point it is just an exercise in mental masturbation (master-debation). Let it go, guys.
> 
> The storyline made the episode entertaining to the 99% of us who just want to go along with the ingenuity and cartoonish ridiculousness of it all. It was very entertaining!
> 
> ...


Yep. How some of these posters can enjoy watching a show and then so nitpick it is amazing. The point of the show is to be entertaining. We got to see Mike return, be the badass, the junkyard guy with the long face, the idea coming from Jesse. We got to see evidence sliding around the room (but why didn't the police badges rip of their shirts??? Ayayay, who cares!). We got comic relief on the truck tipping over.

I for one loved this episode. The whole season is going to be Hank drawing closer and closer, and this is a great first step.


----------



## rrrobinsonjr (Nov 26, 2004)

thebigmo said:


> Nothing to do with the show, really, but what was with making us wait until the first commercial break of that absolutely, ridiculous, load of crap, unwatchable whatever it was that came on after Breaking Bad to see next week's previews?


I hope that was a one-week only deal....completely annoying. You're not going to con me into watching that crap.

And I feel sorry for Dish people. No Breaking Bad, Walking Dead, Hell on Wheels or Mad Men. That sucks.


----------



## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

Hank said:


> Ugh..
> 
> 
> 
> ...


 You can always quit watching...


----------



## rrrobinsonjr (Nov 26, 2004)

Bierboy said:


> You can always quit watching...


I agree. My advice would be to also not watch Dexter. He wouldn't make it through one episode without his head exploding.


----------



## betts4 (Dec 27, 2005)

mooseAndSquirrel said:


> Yep. How some of these posters can enjoy watching a show and then so nitpick it is amazing. The point of the show is to be entertaining. We got to see Mike return, be the badass, the junkyard guy with the long face, the idea coming from Jesse. We got to see evidence sliding around the room (but why didn't the police badges rip of their shirts??? Ayayay, who cares!). We got comic relief on the truck tipping over.
> 
> I for one loved this episode. The whole season is going to be Hank drawing closer and closer, and this is a great first step.


Ditto and ditto!!! It was fun in a breaking bad way!


----------



## Anubys (Jul 16, 2004)

Since I did a marathon watching of seasons 1-4 the past few weeks (first time watcher), 2 *trivial *things really stood out for me:

1. Isn't NM really hot? why is everyone always wearing jackets?
2. Any parallels drawn between the actress playing Skyler and Lea Remeny?


----------



## nataylor (Apr 26, 2000)

Anubys said:


> 1. Isn't NM really hot? why is everyone always wearing jackets?


Albuquerque has a pretty mild climate. According to weather.com, average highs only exceed 80° 4 months out of the year. And being in the desert, the overnight lows can be pretty low. For instance, yesterday the high was 95°, but the low was 70° and the average for the day was 80°. For 2011, the average temperature for the year was only 58.7°. Compare that to my weather station here in Houston, where our average was 71.9° for 2011. I see the average temperature for 2011 for a weather station where you are in Fairfax Station, VA is 56.4°, just slightly lower than Albuquerque.


----------



## Hoffer (Jun 1, 2001)

I thought the magnet thing was fun. People think to much about TV shows and movies. If you just turn your brain off, you'll enjoy things a lot more.


----------



## pmyers (Jan 4, 2001)

mostman said:


> ...Oh. And by the way. Team GAUNT all the way!


well played! I always love that "comeback"! It doesn't work as well in real life as it does here though!


----------



## kaszeta (Jun 11, 2004)

nataylor said:


> Albuquerque has a pretty mild climate.


Yeah, while Albuquerque is in the desert, it's also at almost 5000' elevation, which greatly moderates the climate.


----------



## robojerk (Jun 13, 2006)

Hoffer said:


> If you just turn your brain off, you'll enjoy things a lot more.


I hate that line of thinking. My brain does lots of things, and it allows me to discuss the show and wonder where they're going with things. Even though I enjoyed the magnet scene, I still knew it was impossible because my brain told me so..


----------



## Robin (Dec 6, 2001)

Anubys said:


> 2. Any parallels drawn between the actress playing Skyler and Lea Remeny?


I watched the entire series in the last few months and I think I've read every thread here about it. I've been really surprised this hasn't come up!

Personally I found her distractingly skinny in the first couple of seasons. The extra weight seems a lot more realistic for her character.

She's still thin, her face just isn't so gaunt now.


----------



## justen_m (Jan 15, 2004)

Boise is pretty close to the climate they live in. Last week, we had a couple days hit 108F. The weather is totally believable, IME. High desert here. Aboot 3000' altitude.


----------



## betts4 (Dec 27, 2005)

Anubys said:


> Since I did a marathon watching of seasons 1-4 the past few weeks (first time watcher), 2 *trivial *things really stood out for me:
> 
> 1. Isn't NM really hot? why is everyone always wearing jackets?
> 2. Any parallels drawn between the actress playing Skyler and Lea Remeny?





Robin said:


> I watched the entire series in the last few months and I think I've read every thread here about it. I've been really surprised this hasn't come up!
> 
> Personally I found her distractingly skinny in the first couple of seasons. The extra weight seems a lot more realistic for her character.
> 
> She's still thin, her face just isn't so gaunt now.


Thank you! I was wondering why no one mentioned either but boy did she seem to get puffy in season four.


----------



## Anubys (Jul 16, 2004)

betts4 said:


> Thank you! I was wondering why no one mentioned either but boy did she seem to get puffy in season four.


that's really it. Season 4 made me think something was wrong with her. But she's back to normal now.


----------



## MikeAndrews (Jan 17, 2002)

mostman said:


> Can someone remind me how Walt actually poisoned the boy? As in, what was the delivery method. I can't seem to remember if they ever told us that.


Saul's assistant shredded a copy of the school lunch schedule. Walt got to the kid's lunch somehow.


----------



## gchance (Dec 6, 2002)

Here I go.

Some of us enjoy a show by watching it without much thought other than "this is cool". Still others of us enjoy not only watching a show, but thinking critically about it, then discussing it.

TCF is full of some of the greatest critical thinkers I've encountered online. I've never understood the logic of "only watch TV, don't think about it". I'm an intelligent human being (at least, I think I am most of the time), and shutting off my intelligence to enjoy a TV show doesn't work. That's why I watch shows like Breaking Bad and Lost, and avoid things like Jersey Shore.

So back to our primary subject, is it possible that Mike really doesn't know everything Gus did? I always got the impression that Mike was nothing more than Gus's muscle and really didn't know all the inner workings of the operation. No, I think it's more likely that Walt doesn't really know computer & security technology all that well, and Mike only knows what he saw.

This WILL bite them in the ass.

Greg


----------



## gchance (Dec 6, 2002)

betts4 said:


> Thank you! I was wondering why no one mentioned either but boy did she seem to get puffy in season four.





Anubys said:


> that's really it. Season 4 made me think something was wrong with her. But she's back to normal now.


Didn't she have a baby in real life, just as the Skylar character did?

Greg


----------



## Robin (Dec 6, 2001)

Anubys said:


> that's really it. Season 4 made me think something was wrong with her. But she's back to normal now.


I checked IMDB at the time to see if she was pregnant but my recollection is that she wasn't.


----------



## gchance (Dec 6, 2002)

Robin said:


> I checked IMDB at the time to see if she was pregnant but my recollection is that she wasn't.


I just looked myself, lots of interviews with her about the pregnancy suit.  So there we go.

Greg


----------



## Beryl (Feb 22, 2009)

gchance said:


> Here I go.
> 
> Some of us enjoy a show by watching it without much thought other than "this is cool". Still others of us enjoy not only watching a show, but thinking critically about it, then discussing it.


So this. I don't post much about these flaws but I see them all of the time and just giggle inside. My dad taught me to do this as a kid and I never got scared watching "horror flicks". I also enjoy re-watching "Independence Day" despite Mack Truck size holes.



Robin said:


> Personally I found her distractingly skinny in the first couple of seasons. The extra weight seems a lot more realistic for her character.
> 
> She's still thin, her face just isn't so gaunt now.


At the beginning of Season 3 (or was it S4?), I almost went to IMDB.COM to verify that it was the same actress. She then commented about her new haircut and I thought _"Ah, that is what is different about her!"_


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

mooseAndSquirrel said:


> Yep. How some of these posters can enjoy watching a show and then so nitpick it is amazing. The point of the show is to be entertaining. We got to see Mike return, be the badass, the junkyard guy with the long face, the idea coming from Jesse. We got to see evidence sliding around the room (but why didn't the police badges rip of their shirts??? Ayayay, who cares!). We got comic relief on the truck tipping over.


First of all, what I posted is *not* "nitpicking".. it was commenting on a plot device that took up half the entire episode. That's not a nitpick. A nitpick would be saying something like "That truck is from the 80's, and no way the suspension could support the shear weight of the magnet, let alone 3 dozen car batteries without leaning to one side and bottoming out -- it would be undrivable." That's a nit-pick. My complaint was about the ENTIRE MAGNET TRUCK plot device. It was stupid, weak, and mechanically and technologically incorrect. This is NOT what I've come to expect from BB -- a series that took extreme measures to replicate what a *real* super meth lab would look like and how it would function.

I watch BB specifically because it *is* a "thinking" show -- you get inside WW's mind and want to THINK like he does (or at least we try to). If I wanted to just watch garbage and NOT THINK about it, I'd watch any reality TV show.

So don't tell me how to watch a show -- I can think or not, that's MY CHOICE on how to enjoy the show. If you want to sit there and be brain-dead and not think about these things, then fine -- turn your brain to mush. I, OTOH, will continue to THINK about this show like I've always done.



Bierboy said:


> You can always quit watching...


That was not my complaint. For the first time in BB history, they presented a major episode plot line that was pure crap. They could have done better, and not just hope the viewers give them a pass on the comic nature of the foible.



rrrobinsonjr said:


> I agree. My advice would be to also not watch Dexter. He wouldn't make it through one episode without his head exploding.


I've watched Dexter from the start, and the two shows don't even compare. Dexter stared out as a comic-like TV show, and doesn't assume it's actually "real life." It's enjoyable, but I don't try to think about the show like I do with BB. But again, that's MY CHOICE how I CHOOSE to enjoy different shows.


----------



## tiams (Apr 19, 2004)

Hank said:


> First of all, what I posted is *not* "nitpicking".. it was commenting on a plot device that took up half the entire episode. That's not a nitpick. A nitpick would be saying something like "That truck is from the 80's, and no way the suspension could support the shear weight of the magnet, let alone 3 dozen car batteries without leaning to one side and bottoming out -- it would be undrivable." That's a nit-pick. My complaint was about the ENTIRE MAGNET TRUCK plot device. It was stupid, weak, and mechanically and technologically incorrect. This is NOT what I've come to expect from BB -- a series that took extreme measures to replicate what a *real* super meth lab would look like and how it would function.
> 
> I watch BB specifically because it *is* a "thinking" show -- you get inside WW's mind and want to THINK like he does (or at least we try to). If I wanted to just watch garbage and NOT THINK about it, I'd watch any reality TV show.
> 
> ...


You over-thinking it is keeping you from enjoying it. And you are spending a lot of energy on this. It's just a TV show, not a documentary. TV is escapist entertainment. If you want everything to be factual then pick up a nonfiction book. There were no plot holes, that's good enough for me.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

tiams said:


> You over-thinking it is keeping you from enjoying it. And you are spending a lot of energy on this. It's just a TV show, not a documentary. TV is escapist entertainment. If you want everything to be factual then pick up a nonfiction book. There were no plot holes, that's good enough for me.


I'm *enjoying* it just fine, TYVM. The problem is this is a disappointing turn from the writers who previously wouldn't make a gaff like this. What's next, WW jumping a shark?


----------



## Oldandslow (Nov 8, 2002)

I understand completely what Hank is saying. As a retired electronics teacher, I have developed an "on and off switch" in my brain that I can use to turn on and off critical thinking. I had to turn it "off" at the "magnet in the truck." The strength of a magnet is inversely proportional to the distance from the magnet. That means that at ten feet from the building, that magnet in the truck would have done diddly squat to items in the room! He supposedly controlled the DC magnet with an AC rheostat. The mass of iron/steel in the room would have had to have been greater than the mass of the truck to raise the truck up off its wheels. This could go on and on. Needless to say, I enjoyed the episode immensely, with my switch turned "off."

P.S. How many times have we heard sound in outer space when rocket motors fire? There is no sound in outer space, but there IS in TV shows and the movies!


----------



## Gerryex (Apr 24, 2004)

Oldandslow said:


> I understand completely what Hank is saying. As a retired electronics teacher, I have developed an "on and off switch"
> . . .
> 
> Needless to say, I enjoyed the episode immensely, with my switch turned "off".
> ...


:up::up::up:


----------



## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

Robin said:


> ....She's still thin, her face just isn't so gaunt now.


I think her face is goth...


----------



## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

Hank said:


> ...For the first time in BB history, they presented a major episode plot line that was pure crap. They could have done better, and not just hope the viewers give them a pass on the comic nature of the foible. ...


Someone needs a hug....


----------



## kaszeta (Jun 11, 2004)

I use a lot of massive rare earth magnets at work, and realized the vendor that I buy from (K+J) has a nice blog entry on erasing hard drives with magnets:

http://www.kjmagnetics.com/blog.asp?p=hard-drive-destruction

In short, several thousand gauss applied to the exterior of the drive didn't have a significant effect on the drive. The electromagnet you'd need to create an equivalent field ~50' from the van? Massive.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

kaszeta said:


> I use a lot of massive rare earth magnets at work, and realized the vendor that I buy from (K+J) has a nice blog entry on erasing hard drives with magnets:
> 
> http://www.kjmagnetics.com/blog.asp?p=hard-drive-destruction
> 
> In short, several thousand gauss applied to the exterior of the drive didn't have a significant effect on the drive. * The electromagnet you'd need to create an equivalent field ~50' from the van? Massive.*


And I'm sure it would tear the van apart before it would begin to do anything to the contents of the evidence room.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

Oldandslow said:


> He supposedly controlled the DC magnet with an AC rheostat.


I did notice that too, but I gave that one a pass (that's in the "nitpick" realm).

Wait until the cops start sniffing around ABQ junk yards looking for a missing magnet. And/or someone looking for a replacement.


----------



## danterner (Mar 4, 2005)

Oldandslow said:


> P.S. How many times have we heard sound in outer space when rocket motors fire? There is no sound in outer space, but there IS in TV shows and the movies!


BSG was pretty good about having silent space scenes. Or was it Firefly that did that? I can't recall. One of them.

And Babylon5 was pretty good about zero-G maneuvering (i.e. having spaceships that don't bank and turn like planes).

But nobody really gets it completely 100% right. And the reason why is because 100% completely right doesn't necessarily equal 100% completely entertaining. It's more entertaining for the viewer to hear the spaceship engines roar than it is to see it happen soundlessly. Even if that's not how it would happen in real life. Just like it's more entertaining to see the truck tilt over, even if that wouldn't really happen too. Creative license, yo! I'm with you, Oldandslow - keeping the switch "off" is the best way to enjoy the show. But I also understand the frustration of the other posters, because in the past it hasn't been as necessary to flip that switch for this show. Having said that, this was just Episode 1, and the writers have built up a huge amount of goodwill with me -- I'm willing to overlook the need to flip the switch in this instance.


----------



## DavidTigerFan (Aug 18, 2001)

Just FYI, magnetic fields drop off roughly with the cube of the distance. That is, if you had some incredibly powerful magnet that could lift 1000 pounds from one foot away, it could only lift 8 lbs from 5 feet and 1 lb from ten feet.


----------



## nataylor (Apr 26, 2000)

Oldandslow said:


> I understand completely what Hank is saying. As a retired electronics teacher, I have developed an "on and off switch" in my brain that I can use to turn on and off critical thinking. I had to turn it "off" at the "magnet in the truck." The strength of a magnet is inversely proportional to the distance from the magnet. That means that at ten feet from the building, that magnet in the truck would have done diddly squat to items in the room!


Assume the magnet can lift 4000lbs when in contact with an item. Now assume you double that (since the strength of an electromagnet is directly proportional to current going through it). What force would it exert on an object 10 feet away? I honestly don't know how to begin to calculate that.



Oldandslow said:


> The mass of iron/steel in the room would have had to have been greater than the mass of the truck to raise the truck up off its wheels.


What about rebar in the concrete? Then the force could be pulling against the wall, not just the mass of the material in the evidence room.


----------



## nataylor (Apr 26, 2000)

DavidTigerFan said:


> Just FYI, magnetic fields drop off roughly with the cube of the distance. That is, if you had some incredibly powerful magnet that could lift 1000 pounds from one foot away, it could only lift 8 lbs from 5 feet and 1 lb from ten feet.


So an 8000lbs-capable magnet could exert 8 lbs of force at 10 feet. And once stuff starts to move towards the magnet, it's just going to keep accelerating towards it as the strength then increases at an exponential rate.

8lbs of force, perpendicular to gravity, seems like enough to get some items moving.


----------



## kaszeta (Jun 11, 2004)

For even more fun...

My old Dell Latitude D620 laptop plus a 4" x 2" x 2" N52 grade neodymium magnet with 14,800 Gauss field applied directly the the area of the case outside the hard drive results in....

1. Slightly louder spindle noise coming from the hard drive (I suspect I'm pretty massively torquing the spindle bearings). Boots and runs with no problems.
2. About 100 lbs of force to get the magnet back off of the laptop.

If work approves a photo release, I'll post a pic.


----------



## nataylor (Apr 26, 2000)

I've destroyed a hard drive with a 1-inch cube grade N52 magnet. Moved it back and forth over the case where the drive is while it running. Machine locked up, was unbootable afterwards (and you could hear parts rattling around when you shook it).


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

nataylor said:


> So an 8000lbs-capable magnet could exert 8 lbs of force at 10 feet. And once stuff starts to move towards the magnet, it's just going to keep accelerating towards it as the strength then increases at an exponential rate.
> 
> 8lbs of force, perpendicular to gravity, seems like enough to get some items moving.


But don't forget the two-foot thick concrete wall between the magnet and the "stuff."


----------



## nataylor (Apr 26, 2000)

DevdogAZ said:


> But don't forget the two-foot thick concrete wall between the magnet and the "stuff."


That just increases the distance. Concrete wouldn't do anything to "shield" the force.


----------



## getreal (Sep 29, 2003)

nataylor said:


> I've destroyed a hard drive with a 1-inch cube grade N52 magnet. Moved it back and forth over the case where the drive is while it running. Machine locked up, was unbootable afterwards (and you could hear parts rattling around when you shook it).


Did you remember to back up all the porn to an external HD first? 

The typical television/movie tropes which annoy me are the loud "TCHK-TCHK" sound effects used everytime a firearm appears in a scene.

Another is the sound effects used for every thing that happens on a computer screen, as well as the zooming animations and gigantic "DOWNLOADING" lettering and bars (with SFX).

Everybody types at lightning speed while standing or stooped awkwardly over a computer keyboard, and nobody uses a mouse.

Then there is the ridiculous idea that awful, low-rez digital images can be refined and clarified until you can make out a clear license plate from a reflection off the eyeball of a person who is also reflected off a rear-view mirror while driving a dusty moving vehicle on a distant highway.

And gravity on spaceships, including tiny escape pods.

BB is all about escaping unrealistic close calls with murderous drug cartels and the police.

I find myself laughing regularly at Walter White's awkward movements, whether it is escaping detection by cops by climbing over his own fence and then awkwardly falling over the other side, or breaking into Saul's office while the secretary is busy shredding documents, then bumping his head while trying to crawl out the bottom of the smashed glass door to get her extortion money. LOL!


----------



## john4200 (Nov 1, 2009)

nataylor said:


> I've destroyed a hard drive with a 1-inch cube grade N52 magnet. Moved it back and forth over the case where the drive is while it running. Machine locked up, was unbootable afterwards (and you could hear parts rattling around when you shook it).


It is very unlikely you actually scrambled all the bits on the drive platters (especially the bits on the "inside" surfaces, like the top of the bottom platter and the bottom of the top platter). More likely you created some mechanical damage.

If the drive is not operating -- the platters are not spinning and the heads are parked -- then your chances of erasing the entire contents of a modern hard drive are nil. I'd be surprised if you even managed to scramble anything at all on, say, a 500GB 2.5" laptop hard drive.


----------



## nataylor (Apr 26, 2000)

john4200 said:


> It is very unlikely you actually scrambled all the bits on the drive platters (especially the bits on the "inside" surfaces, like the top of the bottom platter and the bottom of the top platter). More likely you created some mechanical damage.
> 
> If the drive is not operating -- the platters are not spinning and the heads are parked -- then your chances of erasing the entire contents of a modern hard drive are nil. I'd be surprised if you even managed to scramble anything at all on, say, a 500GB 2.5" laptop hard drive.


Seems degaussers used to destroy hard drives are around 6000 gauss. Like Kaszeta said, his magnet has a 14,800 gauss field (mine would have been less, but I bet still greater than 6,000).


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

nataylor said:


> That just increases the distance. Concrete wouldn't do anything to "shield" the force.


So you're saying that if you put a 6,000 lb piece of metal on the ground and put a 2,000 lb piece of concrete on top of if (2 ft. thick), and then took a magnet that could pick up 8,000 lbs and lowered it down on top of the concrete, it would still pick up the metal/concrete?


----------



## nataylor (Apr 26, 2000)

DevdogAZ said:


> So you're saying that if you put a 6,000 lb piece of metal on the ground and put a 2,000 lb piece of concrete on top of if (2 ft. thick), and then took a magnet that could pick up 8,000 lbs and lowered it down on top of the concrete, it would still pick up the metal/concrete?


If the magnet was capable of lifting 8,000lbs at 2 feet, sure.


----------



## john4200 (Nov 1, 2009)

nataylor said:


> Seems degaussers used to destroy hard drives are around 6000 gauss. Like Kaszeta said, his magnet has a 14,800 gauss field (mine would have been less, but I bet still greater than 6,000).


I'm not sure what you are talking about. I'm not aware of any security conscious people that use magnetic fields to securely erase modern hard drives. It is just not reliable. Maybe if you took the hard drive apart and put every platter (both sides) right in the strongest point of the magnetic field (moving every point of the platter surface through the field if the magnet is smaller than the platter), you might have a chance of scrambling it securely. But even then it is questionable with modern hard drives which require quite a strong field in order to change the bits.

But if the platters are not disassembled, that right there will stop you getting a reliable scrambling on the inner sides of the platters, since the top and bottom of each platter have magnetic shielding between them so that when the drive writes on one side the magnetic field does not penetrate to mess up the other side.

In case it is not well known, note that most modern hard drives have 2 or more platters for storing data, and they use both sides of the platters.


----------



## nataylor (Apr 26, 2000)

Here's an example of a hard drive degausser:

http://www.veritysystems.com/degaussers/V91max.asp










Here's one that handles up to 3TB drives:

http://www.veritysystems.com/degaussers/datagone.asp


----------



## john4200 (Nov 1, 2009)

nataylor said:


> Here's one that handles up to 3TB drives:
> 
> http://www.veritysystems.com/degaussers/datagone.asp


Thanks for the link. That is interesting. They say they are "high energy pulse degaussers", which I assume means it is not just a steady-state magnetic field that does the erasing. I've never heard of anyone using them, but they claim to make "NSA approved" models, so it seems they must be effective.

But to bring this back on topic, the magnetic field in the show was apparently a steady-state field produced by an electromagnet powered by DC batteries. So if it takes a "high energy magnetic pulse" at close range (those degaussers look like boxes only a few feet in size) to erase a hard drive, then Walt's device isn't going to cut it.

I guess Walt should have bought one of those "SDD masters", modified it to run on batteries and activate on a time delay, removed the shielding, and thrown it through a pawn shop window so it would get placed in evidence next to Gus' computer. Updated version of The Big Easy.


----------



## mrdazzo7 (Jan 8, 2006)

What's funny about the magnet thing is that they discussed at length in the podcast for this episode--apparently there was an AMC exec with a background in electrical engineering (or something) who advised them on all the aspects of it. From what Vince Gilligan was saying, that guy corrected them on a bunch of stuff ("no you'd need 21 batteries to achieve that effect", etc) so it seems like there really was a lot of thought put into it by someone who knows that stuff. According to the crew, anyway.

I agree that the entire storyline was kind of stupid but based on how they discussed it, I think that was the point--it's a cartoonish, over-the-top caper. I have no problem accepting their method of what they did because this is a TV show and while I absolutely think things are better when they're realistic, I personally had no problem accepting the creative license in this case JUST relative to the magnet idea. That's just me.

What I didn't like about it was that it made no logical sense that APD had the laptop in the first place--if that's the complaint, then I'll totally agree that it's bad writing. I was fine with the idea that Walt and Jesse needed to team up with Mike in some way, and having to erase the security footage makes total sense. Gus was a prolific leader and to say he didn't keep recordings doesn't really make sense--he can't watch the screens 24 hours a day, of course it would record. Even if it looped over itself every 24 hours, that's all the cops would need. But Gus = control freak, he totally had footage.

I don't even think it's a total stretch to think that the place Gus physically stored that information was on his laptop, which Mike said he kept with him all the time... Again, control freak, so he wants to know where that data is (as opposed to some site he doesn't have constant visibility to). I can buy this for the convenience of the story.

Where the writing is weak here is the idea that it would go into an APD evidence locker. I didn't get that. Hank and the DEA have been on this case for over a year, Hank in particular almost lost his life over it, and here they have access to this guys laptop, and no one even turns it on first, they just immediately put it in some random place.

That story element REEKED of stuff "24" used to pull all the time that drove me nuts... Anytime a character had information, instead of screaming it from the rooftops for anyone who would listen, they'd be like "I know who has the bomb, meet me at this location in 30 minutes and I'll tell you!" or even worse, someoen would have a recording of something important and instead of playing it, would call a meeting so they could play it for everyone at once, giving anyone who needed it time to come in and erase it, forcing the story to go on.

With TV shows, I have a much higher tolerance for things being portrayed in a less-than-realistic technical fashion than I do for story elements that are clearly done for no reason other than "we needed to fill this time with something so we needed characters to behave in ways that make absolutely no logical sense". I feel like if the writing there was as on point as it usually is, Hank would have had that laptop at the DEA within minutes, given the potential wealth of information it could have.

Keep in mind, we have no idea if the thing even worked, all we know is that Walt _thinks _it worked. There was nothing in the episode that conclusively said the hard drive was wiped/unretrievable.

BTW if you're a fan of the show (and who isn't) I fully recommend listening to the podcasts each week--they're like an hour long of Vince Gilligan and crew discussing all aspects of each episode, it really is great.


----------



## mooseAndSquirrel (Aug 31, 2001)

Sorry to have a non-magnet, non-encryption post...

One of the things I love about this show is the quality of the acting, shown especially by simple facial expressions. When Walt at the end tells Skyler, "I forgive you" her face is a masterly bit of acting. So many emotions flit across her face... Fear, confusion, a WTF, a kind of triumph.


----------



## danterner (Mar 4, 2005)

mrdazzo7 said:


> Keep in mind, we have no idea if the thing even worked, all we know is that Walt thinks it worked. There was nothing in the episode that conclusively said the hard drive was wiped/unretrievable.


We don't? How do you figure?


----------



## vertigo235 (Oct 27, 2000)

mooseAndSquirrel said:


> Sorry to have a non-magnet, non-encryption post...
> 
> One of the things I love about this show is the quality of the acting, shown especially by simple facial expressions. When Walt at the end tells Skyler, "I forgive you" her face is a masterly bit of acting. So many emotions flit across her face... Fear, confusion, a WTF, a kind of triumph.


But Walt said so!!


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

mrdazzo7 said:


> Keep in mind, we have no idea if the thing even worked, all we know is that Walt _thinks _it worked. There was nothing in the episode that conclusively said the hard drive was wiped/unretrievable.


"Because I said so."

Walter White


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

Actually, one nit that I'd like to pick is the part where Mike went up and sprayed the camera outside the gate to prevent it from seeing the truck drive through the gate. How could he know that there wasn't someone inside the PD watching the screen at that very moment? Seems like if you were to do something like that, you'd spray the camera and then wait several minutes to see if anyone comes out to check before you then start taking apart the keypad and actually entering the lot.


----------



## Mikeyis4dcats (Oct 2, 2003)

nataylor said:


> All encryption is defeatable. But some is secure enough that the federal government lacks the resources to defeat it in a reasonable amount of time. There is no requirement that a back door be built into encryption systems.


Huh, I stand corrected. This was proposed in the late 90s, and last I knew it was being pushed into la, but I see it was reversed after outcry.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

danterner said:


> > Originally Posted by mrdazzo7
> >
> > Keep in mind, we have no idea if the thing even worked, all we know is that Walt thinks it worked. There was nothing in the episode that conclusively said the hard drive was wiped/unretrievable.
> 
> ...


Only the case/screen was broken, and there's no guarantee/evidence that the hard drive was erased/corrupted. In fact, there's a good chance it is intact. But Walt wouldn't know any of that, only the police and the audience does.

And to address the above comments, Walt assumes the laptop is still in the evidence room. The DEA or FBI could have come and gotten it during the time the shark was being jumped Super-Magnet-Truck was being constructed (about a day, I'd guess), which I agree, is much more likely (but obviously it wasn't, but Walt doesn't know that either).

A much more believable scenario would be Walt asking Hank about the investigation, and finding out through social engineering where the notebook is. Once it's in Hank's office, Walt would have had a much better chance at ensuring it's destruction.


----------



## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

Hank said:


> ...The DEA or FBI could have come and gotten it during the time the shark was being jumped....


I assume from your not-so-subtle comment here that you believe this show has jumped the shark. That being the case, please stop watching the show and stop posting in this season's threads...


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

Geeze -- it was a joke... [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B65mtE2TN1w[/media]


----------



## David Platt (Dec 13, 2001)

Hank said:


> Only the case/screen was broken, and there's no guarantee/evidence that the hard drive was erased/corrupted. In fact, there's a good chance it is intact. But Walt wouldn't know any of that, only the police and the audience does.


There was also the shot of all of the computers in the room outside of the evidence room where the cop was working-- all of those computers died, and they were further away from the magnet than the laptop. I think we can safely infer from that the laptop hard drive was wiped.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

David Platt said:


> There was also the shot of all of the computers in the room outside of the evidence room where the cop was working-- all of those computers died, and they were further away from the magnet than the laptop. I think we can safely infer from that the laptop hard drive was wiped.


Two things -- first of all, we don't know they "died"... we only know they were "affected" from the screen blanking out. (I think there was only one computer at the desk that we saw). Second, those computer(s) were all on where the mag field would likely have a greater affect to a spinning hard disk (mostly mechanically, not magnetically). Third, even if these computers that were on "died", it is likely a temporary affect corrupting the running OS/memory, etc.

Just because the case and screen were broken it is a huge assumption that the hard drive was erased (in the real world, anyway).


----------



## mooseAndSquirrel (Aug 31, 2001)

TCF Hank and BB Hank have this in common - they damned sure don't let go.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

"They're MINERALS!"


----------



## gchance (Dec 6, 2002)

Did you guys see Giancarlo Esposito's up for an Emmy for Best Supporting Actor? Of course, he's up against Aaron Paul, but still. 

Greg


----------



## MrGreg (May 2, 2003)

mooseAndSquirrel said:


> TCF Hank and BB Hank have this in common - they damned sure don't let go.


Yeah, but he's right. There's no guarantee that the HD was erased. It's quite possible the EM field was strong enough to affect volatile memory on a running machine (which would muck up the display) but not strong enough to affect disk storage. And the physical impact might make the HD inoperable, but not unrecoverable. The laptop they tested with in the junk yard, did they follow up and confirm if the hard drive was wiped?

And even if it was, data recovery tools are pretty amazing now. There is a reason the DOD protocols for wiping disks include many passes of writing random data. A hard disk isn't as simple as storing a 1 or 0. There is residual charge that can be recovered with the right tools, and I'm sure the DEA would make use of any tools possible to try to recover whatever's on that disk.

That said, I do believe Gus would use strong encryption, which would making destroying the disk an unnecessary step, anyway.


----------



## rrrobinsonjr (Nov 26, 2004)

UGH. I'm done reading this thread.


----------



## Beryl (Feb 22, 2009)

gchance said:


> Did you guys see Giancarlo Esposito's up for an Emmy for Best Supporting Actor? Of course, he's up against Aaron Paul, but still.
> 
> Greg


Very cool. I read that fans of the show feared him at an airport but timidly asked for his autograph.

His acting in 'Salud' was absolutely chilling. SMH when watching him prepare to barf in the bathroom. He had so little time to rid himself of poison but didn't want to soil his knees. Maybe Gus needed that mental comfort to be more effective.


----------



## tiams (Apr 19, 2004)

rrrobinsonjr said:


> UGH. I'm done reading this thread.


Me too. It has become very tiresome. I'm out till the next episode.


----------



## MikeAndrews (Jan 17, 2002)

mooseAndSquirrel said:


> Sorry to have a non-magnet, non-encryption post...
> 
> One of the things I love about this show is the quality of the acting, shown especially by simple facial expressions. When Walt at the end tells Skyler, "I forgive you" her face is a masterly bit of acting. So many emotions flit across her face... Fear, confusion, a WTF, a kind of triumph.


Breaking Bad has a lot of that. On top is Mark Margolis playing Tio Hector Salamanca, delivering emotion only through facial expressions. Brian Cranston said Mark is a fine, fine actor. Of course, Cranston is no slouch as an actor here, either.

Mark deserved an Emmy, big time.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

*Breaking Batman*


----------



## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

tiams said:


> Me too. It has become very tiresome. I'm out till the next episode.


Ditto...and my ignore list has grown...


----------



## mrdazzo7 (Jan 8, 2006)

netringer said:


> Breaking bad has a lot of that. On top is Mark Margolis playing Tio Hector Salamanca, delivering emotion only through facial expressions. Brian Cranston said Mark a fine, fine actor. Of course, Cranston is no slouch as an actor here, either.
> 
> Mark deserved an Emmy, big time.


I just typed out a whole paragraph about how ridiculous it is that he wasn't nominated, then went to check the list so I could compare his performance to the ones that were, and there's his name, hahah. Not sure how I missed that this morning. He totally deserves it. I think the biggest way to gauge an actor's talent is how far from themselves the character is, and that guy nailed it.

I say the same thing about Cranston...you see him in interviews and hear about what he's like on the set, etc, and there's not a trace of Walter White anywhere, but when the cameras are rolling and he _is _Walt, he completely embodies that guy on every level. Same thing w/ the guy who plays Gus--seems like the nicest, most regular dude around, but as the character he's so convincing that you think he is that guy. All teh acting on this show is top notch, but I think those two are the ones that are furthest from themselves, with Jessie not far behind.


----------



## Supfreak26 (Dec 12, 2003)

Bierboy said:


> Ditto...and my ignore list has grown...


Ignoring people because of this thread? Wow.

Loved that BB is back. Definitely my favorite show right now


----------



## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

Supfreak26 said:


> Ignoring people because of this thread?...


Yep, read it closely and it'll be clearly evident.


----------



## BitbyBlit (Aug 25, 2001)

mrdazzo7 said:


> With TV shows, I have a much higher tolerance for things being portrayed in a less-than-realistic technical fashion than I do for story elements that are clearly done for no reason other than "we needed to fill this time with something so we needed characters to behave in ways that make absolutely no logical sense". I feel like if the writing there was as on point as it usually is, Hank would have had that laptop at the DEA within minutes, given the potential wealth of information it could have.


Same here. I thought the most unrealistic thing in the magnet storyline wasn't the magnet, but how people acted. If you are living in a world where people can drive up next to a building with an electromagnetic field that can destroy data, you don't put a hard drive for one of the biggest drug-related cases in a room at the edge of a building.

I would think copying the data and/or storing hard drives in more secure locations would be something that would be standard procedure, particularly for a high-profile case like this one. Although, to be fair, we don't know that they didn't do something like that yet.

But if they didn't, then it seems like the characters were written to act artificially dumber than normal simply to enable the data to be destroyed.

The realism of the characters is far more important to me than technical, legal, and geographical realism. If the characters don't act realistically even within the context of the artificial rules set up in their own world, then that's when the story starts to fall apart. The destination becomes more important than the journey, and the characters act only to move the plot toward a certain goal, and not because of who they are as individuals.

Good actors will make you forget that they aren't the characters they play, but good writers will make you forget that the characters are being played.

All that being said, the only reason this stood out to me was because of the extremely high quality of writing so far. In most other shows, this type of thing wouldn't have seemed so bad. But because of how good the writing has been, I was surprised that they took this route.

I was actually thinking they would go the route that Hank suggested of having Walt trying to get to the laptop through Hank:



Hank said:


> A much more believable scenario would be Walt asking Hank about the investigation, and finding out through social engineering where the notebook is. Once it's in Hank's office, Walt would have had a much better chance at ensuring it's destruction.


Nontheless, I still greatly enjoyed the episode, and am glad it is back. The show might not be perfect, but there's never been a show that has come closer.


----------



## Supfreak26 (Dec 12, 2003)

Bierboy said:


> Yep, read it closely and it'll be clearly evident.


Sorry. Still dont get it. I've been involved in some much crazier debates over more serious issues than a TV show and I've never put anyone on ignore. It would take blatent harassment for me to do so but it's never come to that.

So who peed in your Cheerios?


----------



## cheesesteak (Jul 24, 2003)

I'm not fretting over the effectiveness of the magnetmobile. It's a tv show. They all have "stretch your imagination" moments. I do wonder why it tipped over, though.


----------



## mooseAndSquirrel (Aug 31, 2001)

Supfreak26 said:


> Sorry. Still dont get it. I've been involved in some much crazier debates over more serious issues than a TV show and I've never put anyone on ignore. It would take blatent harassment for me to do so but it's never come to that.
> 
> So who peed in your Cheerios?


While I haven't ignored anybody, in defense of those that have, the sidetrack discussion was extremely tedious. The same geek points were made dozens of times. At least Goth/Gaunt had some humor factor.

Anyway, love this show. I'm glad they have a firm end that they can drive to. I am also looking forward to the return of Homeland, another exceptionally well-acted drama.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

cheesesteak said:


> I'm not fretting over the effectiveness of the magnetmobile. It's a tv show. They all have "stretch your imagination" moments. I do wonder why it tipped over, though.


I'm going with someone else's assertion in this thread that the rebar in the concrete caused it to tip over, something I didn't originally realize, but that part actually makes more sense than all the items in the evidence room slamming into the wall.


----------



## MikeAndrews (Jan 17, 2002)

How about Jim Beaver? Getting enough work? He gets to be in Deadwood, John From Cincinnati, Justified, SuperNatural, and Breaking Bad. Too bad he can't get cast in good shows.


----------



## mrdazzo7 (Jan 8, 2006)

I keep forgetting--does Jessie know that Walt was there when Jane died? I think it came out during the "Bug" episode when it was just the two of them in the lab for the whole hour, but I can't remember if it _did _come out, or if I was mad that it _didn't_ come out...

I'm curious now because that was a hugely critical moment in Jessie's life since he blamed himself, and if it hasn't been revealed yet then it will likely make his inevitable confrontation with Walt that much more intense. I'm usually good with this stuff but I seriously can't remember at all.


----------



## mike_k (Sep 20, 2005)

mrdazzo7 said:


> I keep forgetting--does Jessie know that Walt was there when Jane died? I think it came out during the "Bug" episode when it was just the two of them in the lab for the whole hour, but I can't remember if it _did _come out, or if I was mad that it _didn't_ come out...
> 
> I'm curious now because that was a hugely critical moment in Jessie's life since he blamed himself, and if it hasn't been revealed yet then it will likely make his inevitable confrontation with Walt that much more intense. I'm usually good with this stuff but I seriously can't remember at all.


Jesse doesn't know. Walt didn't tell him.


----------



## Robin (Dec 6, 2001)

I think Walt let slip he came over that night, but not that he watched her die.


----------



## mike_k (Sep 20, 2005)

Robin said:


> I think Walt let slip he came over that night, but not that he watched her die.


Yeah, Jesse knew he came over earlier - that was the night Walt dropped off Jesse's cash, but I don't think Walt ever went so far to say that he came back later - or at least wasn't clear about it.


----------



## MikeAndrews (Jan 17, 2002)

mike_k said:


> Yeah, Jesse knew he came over earlier - that was the night Walt dropped off Jesse's cash, but I don't think Walt ever went so far to say that he came back later - or at least wasn't clear about it.


Didn't Walt break in the back door...Oh, wait...that was when he needed the stash to deliver to Gus.


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

BitbyBlit said:


> Same here. I thought the most unrealistic thing in the magnet storyline wasn't the magnet, but how people acted. If you are living in a world where people can drive up next to a building with an electromagnetic field that can destroy data, you don't put a hard drive for one of the biggest drug-related cases in a room at the edge of a building.
> 
> I would think copying the data and/or storing hard drives in more secure locations would be something that would be standard procedure, particularly for a high-profile case like this one. Although, to be fair, we don't know that they didn't do something like that yet.
> 
> But if they didn't, then it seems like the characters were written to act artificially dumber than normal simply to enable the data to be destroyed.


Are you suggesting that it's completely unbelieveable that the evidence room at a police department has an exterior wall? I would hope it's not super common, but I doubt it's unheard of.

And I suspect that the rooms are designed and the police are prepared for people to attempt to break in and steal evidence, but I'll bet it's not that common (before last Sunday) for someone to break into a gated police lot with a giant electromagnet just to try and erase a hard drive that might be inside the evidence room.

If you're suggesting that the laptop should have been with the FBI or DEA, I'll agree with that. But if it was standard procedure for the evidence to go to the local PD first, and that's how their evidence room is laid out, I have no problem with them sticking the laptop in that room until someone had the time to analyze it.


mike_k said:


> Jesse doesn't know. Walt didn't tell him.


That's what made "Fly" so great. The tension was so thick you could cut it with a knife, and Walt was right on the verge of telling Jesse, and you thought he might, and you're screaming at the TV for him to shut up, and then something intervenes at the last second.


----------



## mike_k (Sep 20, 2005)

DevdogAZ said:


> That's what made "Fly" so great. The tension was so thick you could cut it with a knife, and Walt was right on the verge of telling Jesse, and you thought he might, and you're screaming at the TV for him to shut up, and then something intervenes at the last second.


Exactly this. Walt's talking to Jesse, trying to figure out when the "perfect moment" (to die) was. He decides that the night Jane dies was that moment, the he shouldn't have come over that night (he meant the second time, but Jesse didn't know that).


----------



## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

mooseAndSquirrel said:


> While I haven't ignored anybody, in defense of those that have, the sidetrack discussion was extremely tedious. The same geek points were made dozens of times....


Thank you.


----------



## BitbyBlit (Aug 25, 2001)

DevdogAZ said:


> Are you suggesting that it's completely unbelieveable that the evidence room at a police department has an exterior wall? I would hope it's not super common, but I doubt it's unheard of.
> 
> And I suspect that the rooms are designed and the police are prepared for people to attempt to break in and steal evidence, but I'll bet it's not that common (before last Sunday) for someone to break into a gated police lot with a giant electromagnet just to try and erase a hard drive that might be inside the evidence room.
> 
> If you're suggesting that the laptop should have been with the FBI or DEA, I'll agree with that. But if it was standard procedure for the evidence to go to the local PD first, and that's how their evidence room is laid out, I have no problem with them sticking the laptop in that room until someone had the time to analyze it.


Basically what I'm saying is that the evidence should have been much harder to destroy than it was. They cheapened the destruction of the evidence by having it put in a place where it was not well protected. I'm sure Jessie was not the first person to think of using a giant magnet to destroy hard drive evidence, so if what Walt and Jessie did was possible, I would think that it would be something that would have been considered when deciding how to store electronic evidence.

The problem is the writers mixed our world's standards with their world's physics. They gave us a situation that seemed challenging by the possibilities available to us in our world, but then cheapened the response by inventing new rules that rendered the challenge meaningless. If it was that easy to destroy electronic evidence in our world, I highly doubt we would be storing evidence in the same way.


----------



## KungFuCow (May 6, 2004)

BitbyBlit said:


> Basically what I'm saying is that the evidence should have been much harder to destroy than it was. They cheapened the destruction of the evidence by having it put in a place where it was not well protected. I'm sure Jessie was not the first person to think of using a giant magnet to destroy hard drive evidence, so if what Walt and Jessie did was possible, I would think that it would be something that would have been considered when deciding how to store electronic evidence.
> 
> The problem is the writers mixed our world's standards with their world's physics. They gave us a situation that seemed challenging by the possibilities available to us in our world, but then cheapened the response by inventing new rules that rendered the challenge meaningless. If it was that easy to destroy electronic evidence in our world, I highly doubt we would be storing evidence in the same way.


Its probably not realistic to cook meth in an RV either but that didnt stop the writers.. or construct a super meth lab under a laundromat without people knowing about it..

Its TV.. for real, give it a rest. If you cant handle the liberties the writers take with this show, watch something else.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

KungFuCow said:


> Its probably not realistic to cook meth in an RV either but that didnt stop the writers.. or construct a super meth lab under a laundromat without people knowing about it..


Both of those are very real scenarios -- read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methamphetamine#Production_and_distribution


----------



## DevdogAZ (Apr 16, 2003)

BitbyBlit said:


> Basically what I'm saying is that the evidence should have been much harder to destroy than it was. They cheapened the destruction of the evidence by having it put in a place where it was not well protected. I'm sure Jessie was not the first person to think of using a giant magnet to destroy hard drive evidence, so if what Walt and Jessie did was possible, I would think that it would be something that would have been considered when deciding how to store electronic evidence.
> 
> The problem is the writers mixed our world's standards with their world's physics. They gave us a situation that seemed challenging by the possibilities available to us in our world, but then cheapened the response by inventing new rules that rendered the challenge meaningless. If it was that easy to destroy electronic evidence in our world, I highly doubt we would be storing evidence in the same way.


So if a police station was built more than 20 years ago (probably most of them), and the evidence room wasn't built to protect against drug kingpins with giant electromagnets, you're saying it's unrealistic that electronic evidence would be stored there?

Sure, it seemed relatively easy in this show, but that's because the magnet trick was written to work when in actuality it wouldn't work at all. But the fact that the electronic evidence was stored in an existing evidence room? I don't think that's unrealistic at all. The reason it wouldn't work in the real world is because you couldn't make a magnet powerful enough to both be portable and strong enough to do what happened in this episode.

While we're at it, how much power do those tow-behind construction generators put out. Wouldn't it have been more plausible for Walt to use one of those than to rig up a whole bunch of car batteries?


----------



## danterner (Mar 4, 2005)

I'm just glad the S4 finale thread didn't devolve into a discussion of whether it is actually possible for someone with injuries like those Gus sustained to walk away and do a tie-adjust before falling down. Some entertaining moments should just be accepted at face value (so to speak).


----------



## KungFuCow (May 6, 2004)

Hank said:


> Both of those are very real scenarios -- read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methamphetamine#Production_and_distribution


Making meth in your backseat using the shake method is a whole lot different than a complete rolling scientific lab. And if someone dug a hole big enough underground for a "superlab" like those guys had, Google Earth or one of the other information gathering agencies would surely have caught a picture of it, the equipment being moved in or SOMETHING.

You can nit pick stuff to death. Its a TV show Get over it and move on.


----------



## BitbyBlit (Aug 25, 2001)

KungFuCow said:


> Its probably not realistic to cook meth in an RV either but that didnt stop the writers.. or construct a super meth lab under a laundromat without people knowing about it..
> 
> Its TV.. for real, give it a rest. If you cant handle the liberties the writers take with this show, watch something else.


Again, I wasn't bothered by the realism of the magnet being able to destroy the data.

What bothered me was that they painted a picture of the laptop being in a location that was incredibly difficult to get to, but then got around that difficulty by introducing a vulnerability as if nobody in the history of the world had ever thought to destroy hard drive evidence with a magnet.

It would be as if they had written the story so that once a day somebody would take the evidence from the super secure room, and drive around with it in the open bed of a pickup truck for 10 minutes. And that was the vulnerability that Walt and Jessie exploited to destroy the evidence.

The solution to destroying the evidence was not based on the ingenuity of Walt and Jessie so much as the poor techniques used to handle the evidence.

These writers have historically been good about not making people act artificially dumber simply to allow for a certain situation to happen. I've been extremely impressed with how realistic they've made Walt and Jessie commit dark actions, while still being able to reasonably justify them to themselves. It's too bad they couldn't have been the ones to write Anakin Skywalker's descent to the Dark Side.

So this particular storyline seemed out of character for them. That's why it stood out to me. It didn't make me not like the show, or even not like the episode. I just wish they would have gone a different route.

But this is the only time in the history of the entire series that I wished they would have done something different.



DevdogAZ said:


> So if a police station was built more than 20 years ago (probably most of them), and the evidence room wasn't built to protect against drug kingpins with giant electromagnets, you're saying it's unrealistic that electronic evidence would be stored there?


Yes, particularly for high profile cases. If the police station didn't have a good place to protect their electronic evidence, then the evidence should have been stored somewhere else.


----------



## mooseAndSquirrel (Aug 31, 2001)

Can't wait for the next episode! That way, this thread can die.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

KungFuCow said:


> Making meth in your backseat using the shake method is a whole lot different than a complete rolling scientific lab. And if someone dug a hole big enough underground for a "superlab" like those guys had, Google Earth or one of the other information gathering agencies would surely have caught a picture of it, the equipment being moved in or SOMETHING.
> 
> You can nit pick stuff to death. Its a TV show Get over it and move on.


Making meth in RVs is a pretty well known method. As far as the super lab, ever hear of a basement? And even if they did build it previously, what's the problem with a private company building a structure on their own property? Oh, I forgot -- that happens EVERY DAY. So what if google earth had photos? You think the DEA/FBI is going to scrutinize every single big hole in the ground? Are you serious?


----------



## BitbyBlit (Aug 25, 2001)

mooseAndSquirrel said:


> Can't wait for the next episode! That way, this thread can die.


We'll probably find out in the next episode that Walt's "I know it worked" plan didn't actually work, and it was only his egomania that made him think it would. So all my concerns will be moot.


----------



## Hank (May 31, 2000)

BitbyBlit said:


> But this is the only time in the history of the entire series that I wished they would have done something different.


This. +1 :up:

The writers set their own bar very high, and for the first time, they dropped below the bar, and it was painfully obvious. I'm a big fan of the show as anyone, but when the writers let us down like that, it's unexpected. Let's just hope it doesn't happen again.


----------



## steverm2 (May 10, 2005)

mooseAndSquirrel said:


> Can't wait for the next episode! That way, this thread can die.


Betcha it shows up there too.


----------



## jmcdon00 (Jul 26, 2012)

Great discussion. I too was very skeptical about the magnet actually being possible, and like others I have to say it's not possible. 
I don't have any problem with the security of the evidence room, or that the computer would be there. It is simply that I don't believe the magnetic force would have been enough to do what it did in the show. 
As someone else stated it would be a great mythbusters episode.


----------

