Breaking Bad Season 5 Episode 1 Recap: Live free or Die

Holy Freakin’ Magnets Batman! I think that this is definitely the right way to kick off a new season of Breaking Bad. Walt is no longer the naive chemistry teacher he had been when we began this crazy journey.  If you have not been watching this series maybe this premise will entice you to catch up, quickly!

The main character is Mr. Walter White (Bryan Cranston) a high school chemistry teacher who is diagnosed with an advanced stage of lung cancer. His mounting hospital costs and impending demise lead him to change careers. He drops general chemistry for the more lucrative career of methamphetamine production. Since he has a well rounded understanding of chemistry he makes a superior strain and with the help of his street smart assistant Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul) becomes a major player in the drug scene.

Episode 1 recap after the jump:

We start out some months after last season’s finale, the way we can tell is that Walt has a full head of hair and has that bad-ass stare going on. He meets with Bobby Singer random redneck in the bathroom to purchase a big fuckin’ gun. Then we flashback to last season’s aftermath.

Walt and Jesse are tying up the loose ends from last season’s explosive finale. Gustavo Fring (Giancarlo Esposito) is dead and his meth empire has been demolished… well that is all but his surveillance footage of the production which includes the surviving team members.

Jesse and Walt go to find Mike Ehrmantraut (Jonathan Banks) who was Gus’ right hand man. He explains that all the footage was saved onto Gus’ laptop. Great so they just need to find and destroy the files right? Nothing is ever that easy. The DEA quickly swarmed all of Gus’ businesses and took everything important into evidence.

Walt hides all the evidence on his end (bomb making equipment and his lily of the valley which was used to poison Jesse’s girlfriend’s kid ensuring Jesse’s compliance and loyalty).  Walt decides to brainstorm with Mike and Jesse to figure out what their options are. Mike wants to get the hell out of dodge, but Walt is determined to cover their tracks. Jesse being fed up with Walt and Mike’s bickering blurts out the idea of using a magnet to destroy the last bit of evidence.

On the home-front, Skylar is cleaning up her own mess when she finds out that her IRS issue from last season is not quite over. Her former boss Ted Beneke has woken from his coma. Saul Goodman alerts Skylar and tells her to keep quiet when the police eventually come to talk to her. As we have learned though, Skylar is not really the passive kind of person. She goes to visit Ted in the hospital and he is looking truly pathetic; sporting a full back and neck brace. He admits that his injuries were his own fault and that keeping his mouth shut is a great idea. Skylar is pacified, but Saul is still on edge and decides to involve Walt. Walt confronts Skylar and ….forgives her generous gift of $600k.

Back to the laptop situation. The boys reconvene at the junk yard and buy a high powered magnet used for moving junk cars. They load it into a wood and aluminum van and use it to scramble everything in the local police evidence room safely from outside the building. The on duty cop watches as row after row of evidence flies across the room and sticks to the exterior wall. Walt kicks up the magnet to full power and tilts the van necessitating a swift escape.

Okay I am just going to jump in here and say that I love that they let Jesse solve this problem. I mean this plan is straight out of a cartoon! Not only that, but Walt actually takes this seriously and runs with it. Yeah it seems a bit silly, but Jesse’s plan is a non-violent solution to their problem and will keep their identities a secret.Plus the scene where they test it is pretty great you just watch the laptop fly right out of his hands and smash into pieces. Each of the onlookers are high fiving and celebrating. Plus we get the best line of the episode, “Yeah Bitch, Magnets!”

The police officers attempt to return order to their evidence room and log the damage done by the unorthodox breech. During this inventory we learn that Gus had hidden some important bank account info within a picture frame. This bit of info would have gone unnoticed if not for Walt’s interference. We are not sure if there is any other info included.

Very excited to see where this is going. This is the last season so I expect that they are going to pull out all the stops and Walt is going full Scarface. Heisenberg will reign supreme!