Breaking Bad - Recap: Falling Skyler

Even though we're only two weeks into these final eight episodes, showrunner Vince Gilligan has made it clear that he plans on wasting no time in getting right to the downfall of Walter White (Bryan Cranston) and his criminal empire, a plot development that extends to Walt's family. In many respects, this is Breaking Bad at its most harrowing, as the Whites are under siege and are faced with little recourse but to jump head-long into panic mode. Walt tries to talk to Skyler to tell her that Hank (Dean Norris) knows everything, but Hank has already cut Walt off at the pass, arranging a meeting with Skyler at a local diner. What follows is a scene that allows the supporting cast to shine in a way they haven't been given the chance to, as deeply receded into the background as they've been throughout most of season 5.

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Hank believes that Skyler has been forced to keep Walt's secrets under duress, and he tells her as much, assuring her that she doesn't have to be Walt's victim any longer. Hank essentially overplays his hand by laying everything out, explaining the evidence (or rather, the fact that he doesn't really have any at all) and pleading with Skyler to provide concrete details he can use, even offering up a tape recorder to capture the whole conversation. But Skyler is too panicked to believe any of Hank's assurances, asking to see a lawyer when she feels that Hank is getting a bit too legal on her. When Hank tries to dissuade her from calling a lawyer, Skyler flips out and demands to know, in increasingly desperate, mortified tones, if she's under arrest, eventually storming out of the diner altogether after making a scene. Both Anna Gunn and Dean Norris are outstanding, with both actors imbuing their characters with similar beats of desperation, with Hank needing to finally capture the White Whale that is Heisenberg, while Skyler battles to protect her family and her livelihood. It's tremendous, from start to finish, and it only gets more engrossing as the episode rolls on.

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Marie eventually confronts Skyler in disbelief, to ask whether what Hank has told her is true. Skyler cannot refute Hank's assertions, and so Marie starts asking how long she knew about Walt's meth operations. As Marie rattles off dates, it becomes increasingly apparent that Skyler knew that Walt was behind putting Hank in the hospital, among other horrible crimes. Marie slaps the taste out of Skyler's mouth and then storms into the nursery, scoops up baby Holly, and marches toward the front door. Skyler immediately flies off the handle, demanding that Marie hand over her baby. For her part, Marie refuses to allow the child to remain in the home of two criminals. Over the argument, the sound of Holly's horrified cries add to the stress-inducing tension, making for one of the most dramatic and uncomfortable scenes of the series. Eventually, it's Hank who convinces Marie to hand Holly back to her mother, with the rationale being that the Schraders don't really have the evidence to prove their claims against Walt.

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To this end, Marie encourages Hank to get the rest of the DEA involved, to tell them what he knows, but Hank wants all his ducks in a row before he takes it to his colleagues, as he recognizes that once he makes the accusation against Walt, his career will essentially be over. There's no way the DEA will continue to employ an agent who failed to detect that a major drug lord was right under his nose the entire time, in his own family. However, Hank doesn't really have much of a choice but to get Gomie (Steven Michael Quezada) and other agents involved in the investigation. And he picked the perfect time to come forward, as the DEA has picked up a distraught, practically-numb Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul), who was discovered moping on a merry-go-round in a playground by a Samaritan who followed the trail of Jesse's wads of cash. With his guilt slowly eating away at him, Jesse may end up being the linchpin in Hank's case against Walt.

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As for Walt, he spends a sizable portion of the episode doing damage control. After angrily rebuking Saul (Bob Odenkirk) for suggesting they simply have Hank killed, Walt comes up with a plan to bury his money in barrels in the desert. He does this alone, eventually putting all the money below ground and disguising the coordinates as lottery ticket numbers. But the physical act of burying the money takes its toll on Walt, and he collapses on his bathroom floor, at which point Skyler discovers him and nurses him back to consciousness, in a scene that actually portrays them more lovingly than they've been in three seasons now. Having learned from Hank at the diner that her husband's cancer has returned, Skyler keeps vigil at Walt's side. She asks him how Hank could have figured all this out, and Walt admits to his hubris in having made a stupid mistake. He tells Skyler that he plans to make it easy on his family by simply turning himself in, under the condition that Skyler doesn't surrender the money. However, Skyler correctly surmises that if Walt were to turn himself in, she'd have to forfeit the money anyway. And this is the point at which Skyler makes it clear that the preservation of her family is paramount, as she suggests to Walt that he simply keep quiet and not say anything, since Hank doesn't actually have any evidence against him. It's a brazen, daunting play from Skyler, but it's not as if she isn't actually coming from a fairly logical position. This is Skyler's episode, in a lot of ways, and Anna Gunn really displays her MVP qualities in the deft way she illustrates the savvy of a powerful woman backed into a corner.

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Of course, Skyler isn't the only powerful woman in evidence here, as Lydia (Laura Fraser) essentially organizes a coup against Declan (Louis Ferreira), the man responsible for cooking meth that is only 68% pure. Lydia wants to provide her Czech suppliers with a better class of drug, and she suggests bringing Todd (Jesse Plemons) on-board, but Declan isn't exactly receptive to the idea. So, naturally, Lydia brings Todd in anyway, along with his crazy Uncle Jack and a slew of hired thugs to murder Declan and his entire crew. There's something strangely haunting about Lydia asking Todd to navigate her through the maze of corpses, since she's too terrified to actually open her eyes and witness the carnage first-hand. Though there's no way she'd ever have plausible deniability in this scenario, it seems less that she wants to be able to deny having been there, and more that she wants to deny that this level of violence is something that exists, and is something with which she could ever be associated. Laura Fraser once again does solid work with what little she's given, rivaling Betsy Brandt for tertiary MVP this week, as Lydia is such a fully-realized character even in smaller scenes and storylines.

"Buried" further presents the final stretch of Breaking Bad as a show to be reckoned with, particularly with regards to how it handles the progression of both plot and character, without sacrificing pacing or clarity. Few shows on TV have gone as hard as this in its final season, yet Breaking Bad is completely throwing caution to the wind, and the viewers win for that decision.