'Breaking Bad': Alternative medicine

Dear AMC executives,

On behalf of creator Vince Gilligan, who keeps knocking on wood, and Bryan Cranston, who needs an outlet for his nakedness, and those of us who just can’t do Oprah on Sunday nights, we beg of you: Bring "Bad" back.

Sunday was indeed a sad day for some of us in TV land, as we said goodbye to "The Wire" and waved see-you-later, hopefully, to "Bad," which ended its seven-episode run in fine fashion. Sure, this wasn't your usual season finale, what with the writers strike robbing us of two more intended episodes and a true cliffhanger of an ending, but it sure left us wanting more -– much, much more.

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the Scarface portion of our program.

A few weeks ago, series creator Vince Gilligan shared with us the pitch he’d long ago given to various network executives about town: “I said, ‘This is a story of a Mr. Chips who transforms himself into Scarface.’ That’s about all I really know about the character ... (he’ll) undergo a complete transformation and turn into someone else completely.’”

Six episodes in, we got our Scarface. And ‘Bad’ returned to the formula of its pilot episode, teasing us at the start with a chaotic image and then spending the rest of the hour showing us how we arrived there. In the pilot, that image was Cranston in his underwear at the shaky wheel of a speeding RV. Tonight it was Cranston again, thankfully clothed but this time bald, very bald. He was walking through what appeared to be some kind of war zone in some scary neighborhood, while we simultaneously intercut to a scene in which Cranston’s Walter White gave Jesse a lecture in some earlier time –- a time when Walt still had his hair and the Mister Rogers wardrobe.

“This operation is you and me, and I am the silent partner,” he told Jesse in the interwoven scene, stressing that he wanted no part of the selling aspect of the business. “No matter what happens, no more bloodshed. No violence.” Well, so much for that, because here now was our suddenly hairless hero, his nose bleeding and his feet crunching shattered glass as he walked away from a smoky building holding a bloodstained bag.

It was a good start that –- as with the pilot -– had us eagerly buckling our seat belts. But this time the rest of the ride wasn’t half as thrilling, even though it seemed to try twice as hard. In my opinion, we saw too many cringe-worthy scenes pertaining to Walt’s chemo –- IVs, pills, hair loss, hole in his chest, vomiting, urinating –- and not enough emotion surrounding them.

And when Walter berated Jesse for not selling enough meth, I hoped that the episode was about to follow its own advice. “Come on, you’ve got to be more imaginative,” Walter told Jesse. “Just think outside the box here.”

Instead we then embarked on a storyline that led us to a remarkably unimaginative drug lord. After much buildup, we met Tuco, the man who took Krazy 8’s place as the wholesaler in the Albuquerque drug chain. The very first shot of him? He was picking his silver teeth with a very large hunting knife. He wore a heavy chain around his neck. He sat in a big leather chair. He screamed a lot. He beat Jesse senseless. In other words, eh. Nothing really new.

When Walt later arrived, asking for $50,000 -– $35K for the stolen meth and $15K for Jesse’s pain and suffering -– Tuco dabbed out a cigarette on his tongue. At that moment I had to roll my eyes a little. I get it: he’s bad, very bad.

I also scratched my head a bit when, seconds later, Walt took a piece of what we thought was crystal meth but was instead “fulminated mercury.” To show Tuco he really meant business, Walt mightily threw the mercury at the ground before him, causing an explosion that blew out windows and air conditioners, and set off a series of car alarms outside. It was a tremendous show of force that was an inauguration of sorts, Mr. Chips graduating to Scarface.

But when moments later he walked from the building with that bloodstained bag of money in his hand, you had to wonder: Here was an explosion that rocked the neighborhood, and yet the man closest to the blast was now walking away ... with just a little nosebleed? Is Walter White a superhero? (Because if so, he belongs on NBC.)

I’d hoped to back up my argument here with a little scientific research data, but -– sorry, Mr. White –- I nearly failed chemistry in high school and, well, there just isn’t much other than “mercury fulminate is a primary explosive ... highly sensitive to friction and shock” on Wikipedia.

In all, this was an episode that felt flatter than the rest, one that seemed to rely too heavily on props and outside machismo rather than the show's much greater strength –- its core cast members and the interaction between them. 

It should be noted, however, that each time this show has let me down even just a little bit, the very next week it seems to provide just what this ‘Bad’ blog orders, the perfect mix of action and emotion. Considering we only have one episode left –- ‘Bad’ completed seven of its nine intended episodes before the writer’s strike, and AMC has yet to announce if the series will be renewed -– here’s hoping that the trend continues.

When I asked Gilligan a few weeks back about the strike effect, he said that the work stoppage indeed robbed the show of “a really cool cliffhanger episode” that had long been planned for the season finale, but that his writing team did manage to rush through a seventh episode that still had an intriguing finish.

“Peter Gould, one of our writers, had written the seventh episode and the ending he came up with was pretty cool to begin with but it wasn’t a ‘cliffhanger,’ per se,” Gilligan said. And when word spread on Nov. 4 that the strike would indeed become reality on that very midnight, his writers went to work to “slightly curtail” the script before it was time for pencils down.

“There was no effort to turn it into something it wasn’t intended to be,” Gilligan said of the episode. “Hopefully, the audience will appreciate it for what it is. In my mind it doesn’t really have an intriguing ending on the scale of a season finale, but it is intriguing in the sense that it begs the question, ‘What is Walt going to do now?’ Something is unresolved, and so hopefully it works.”

-- Josh Gajewski

Let’s start at the beginning, where I wish 'Bad' had begun.

Remember last week’s cliffhanger ending? Our man Walt had walked into his bedroom and said to his wife, “Skyler, there’s something I have to tell you.” Finally, with three episodes already gone, he was set to tell his wife that he has cancer and maybe two years to live. This also left us with the even bigger question to ponder: What exactly was he going to say, and how? Would it be the truth (I have cancer … ), the whole truth (and I’m now cooking meth … ) and nothing but the truth (and, um, I sort of killed a couple of guys)? Up to this point he’d told only one person about his illness; his name was Krazy 8, and the words “I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you” kinda-sorta applied to the poor guy. Krazy 8 was 86’d. 

But let’s quickly recall that heart-to-heart Walt and Krazy 8 once shared. The doomed drug dealer had asked our hero why his family didn’t yet know the news. “Not a conversation I’m even remotely ready to have,” Walt said. Which is exactly why I wanted to see it. I’d spent a week waiting to get back inside that bedroom, and I fully expected to land there, considering each previous episode had picked up exactly where the prior one ended, a nice touch of continuity and something I figured would be the norm.

But instead we faded in to the brother-in-law, Hank, and a roomful of cops at Hank's DEA office. Some bad jokes preceded the meat of the meeting, when Hank announced, “We’ve got new players in town. Now we don’t know who they are or where they came from, but they possess an extremely high skill set. Personally, I’m thinking Albuquerque just might have a new kingpin.”

Cue the kingpin, a shot of Walt in his tighty-whities, brushing his teeth. This gave me a little chuckle, but the Walt-in-his-underwear thing is a bit played out at this point, and that air of anticipation had left the balloon. An aside: who enjoys taking his shirt off more? Bryan Cranston, Will Ferrell or Matthew McConaughey? There should be a study. But I digress …

Skyler White, meet Jesse Pinkman … 

GENERAL INTERESTS:
Fine herbage! Keepin’ it real, Jui Ryo Ki Kung-Fu (blue belt with shuriken certification). Banging the skins with my smoking band … European motocross (plan to attend Wheelie School in Vegas this summer).

EDUCATION:
J.P. Wynne High School, DeVry University data systems management… The STREETS, YO!

… your husband’s new business partner.

Whereas Jesse was first introduced to us last week when he stumbled naked out of a second-story bedroom window (the naked part seems to be the de facto entrance around here), Skyler had the pleasure of making his acquaintance this week. After overhearing a suspicious telemarketing call fielded by her husband, she pulled the ol’ *69 trick on her cordless and got the following voicemail: “Yo, yo, yo! 1-4-8, 3 to the 3 to the 6 to the 9! Representin’ the ABQ! What up … Leave it at the tone!”

Yeah, awkward. So she further investigated online and found Jesse’s MySpace -– er, “MyShout” –- page, which revealed the details mentioned above. Classic, yo.

Indeed, all things Jesse tickled the tummy Sunday night, especially the early scene in which the Indian comes to the rescue of Walter and Jesse in the New Mexico desert, pulling their RV out of that roadside ditch (an aside: With bulldozer-equipped Indians apparently roaming the middle of nowhere, who needs Roadside Assistance?). Job complete, the silent Indian stands there before our two fidgety heroes, Walter not wearing any pants and Jesse sporting an eye that’s swollen shut.

This is what we learned on Sunday night: A man wearing nothing but his underpants and a gas mask can actually be taken seriously. For this feat alone, perhaps it’s not too much of a stretch to imagine Bryan Cranston around this time next year, in a tux instead of tighty-whities and holding a Golden Globe instead of a gun.

Sure, this is crazy talk -– next year’s awards after just one episode and not even a month yet flipped off the 2008 calendar -– but then again, “Breaking Bad” wasted no time in getting a little crazy itself. The pilot’s opening featured Cranston at the shaky wheel of a speeding RV, his middle-aged gut hanging over those undies and his face hidden beneath that mask. As the vehicle swerved, so did a couple of lifeless bodies along the floor behind him.

And this is where you may have rolled your eyes.

And this is where Cranston lost control, crashing the vehicle alongside a desert road and spilling out of it. Thankfully for us, he managed here to ditch the mask and pull on a shirt.

“My name is Walter White,” he then told a handheld video camera outside the RV. “ … To all law enforcement entities, this is not an admission of guilt. I am speaking to my family now. Skyler, you are the love of my life, I hope you know that. Walter Jr., you’re my big man. There are going to be some things, things that you’ll come to learn about me in the next few days. I just want you to know that no matter how it may look, I only had you in my heart. Goodbye.”

Our seemingly doomed new friend then walked to the middle of the road and pointed a gun toward the sound of approaching sirens.

Cut to the opening title credit and then a “Three weeks earlier … ” subtitle. Bada bing, bada boom.

'Breaking Bad': Boom

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the Scarface portion of our program.

A few weeks ago, series creator Vince Gilligan shared with us the pitch he’d long ago given to various network executives about town: “I said, ‘This is a story of a Mr. Chips who transforms himself into Scarface.’ That’s about all I really know about the character ... (he’ll) undergo a complete transformation and turn into someone else completely.’”

Six episodes in, we got our Scarface. And ‘Bad’ returned to the formula of its pilot episode, teasing us at the start with a chaotic image and then spending the rest of the hour showing us how we arrived there. In the pilot, that image was Cranston in his underwear at the shaky wheel of a speeding RV. Tonight it was Cranston again, thankfully clothed but this time bald, very bald. He was walking through what appeared to be some kind of war zone in some scary neighborhood, while we simultaneously intercut to a scene in which Cranston’s Walter White gave Jesse a lecture in some earlier time –- a time when Walt still had his hair and the Mister Rogers wardrobe.

“This operation is you and me, and I am the silent partner,” he told Jesse in the interwoven scene, stressing that he wanted no part of the selling aspect of the business. “No matter what happens, no more bloodshed. No violence.” Well, so much for that, because here now was our suddenly hairless hero, his nose bleeding and his feet crunching shattered glass as he walked away from a smoky building holding a bloodstained bag.

It was a good start that –- as with the pilot -– had us eagerly buckling our seat belts. But this time the rest of the ride wasn’t half as thrilling, even though it seemed to try twice as hard. In my opinion, we saw too many cringe-worthy scenes pertaining to Walt’s chemo –- IVs, pills, hair loss, hole in his chest, vomiting, urinating –- and not enough emotion surrounding them.

And when Walter berated Jesse for not selling enough meth, I hoped that the episode was about to follow its own advice. “Come on, you’ve got to be more imaginative,” Walter told Jesse. “Just think outside the box here.”

Instead we then embarked on a storyline that led us to a remarkably unimaginative drug lord. After much buildup, we met Tuco, the man who took Krazy 8’s place as the wholesaler in the Albuquerque drug chain. The very first shot of him? He was picking his silver teeth with a very large hunting knife. He wore a heavy chain around his neck. He sat in a big leather chair. He screamed a lot. He beat Jesse senseless. In other words, eh. Nothing really new.

When Walt later arrived, asking for $50,000 -– $35K for the stolen meth and $15K for Jesse’s pain and suffering -– Tuco dabbed out a cigarette on his tongue. At that moment I had to roll my eyes a little. I get it: he’s bad, very bad.

I also scratched my head a bit when, seconds later, Walt took a piece of what we thought was crystal meth but was instead “fulminated mercury.” To show Tuco he really meant business, Walt mightily threw the mercury at the ground before him, causing an explosion that blew out windows and air conditioners, and set off a series of car alarms outside. It was a tremendous show of force that was an inauguration of sorts, Mr. Chips graduating to Scarface.

But when moments later he walked from the building with that bloodstained bag of money in his hand, you had to wonder: Here was an explosion that rocked the neighborhood, and yet the man closest to the blast was now walking away ... with just a little nosebleed? Is Walter White a superhero? (Because if so, he belongs on NBC.)

I’d hoped to back up my argument here with a little scientific research data, but -– sorry, Mr. White –- I nearly failed chemistry in high school and, well, there just isn’t much other than “mercury fulminate is a primary explosive ... highly sensitive to friction and shock” on Wikipedia.

In all, this was an episode that felt flatter than the rest, one that seemed to rely too heavily on props and outside machismo rather than the show's much greater strength –- its core cast members and the interaction between them. 

It should be noted, however, that each time this show has let me down even just a little bit, the very next week it seems to provide just what this ‘Bad’ blog orders, the perfect mix of action and emotion. Considering we only have one episode left –- ‘Bad’ completed seven of its nine intended episodes before the writer’s strike, and AMC has yet to announce if the series will be renewed -– here’s hoping that the trend continues.

When I asked Gilligan a few weeks back about the strike effect, he said that the work stoppage indeed robbed the show of “a really cool cliffhanger episode” that had long been planned for the season finale, but that his writing team did manage to rush through a seventh episode that still had an intriguing finish.

“Peter Gould, one of our writers, had written the seventh episode and the ending he came up with was pretty cool to begin with but it wasn’t a ‘cliffhanger,’ per se,” Gilligan said. And when word spread on Nov. 4 that the strike would indeed become reality on that very midnight, his writers went to work to “slightly curtail” the script before it was time for pencils down.

“There was no effort to turn it into something it wasn’t intended to be,” Gilligan said of the episode. “Hopefully, the audience will appreciate it for what it is. In my mind it doesn’t really have an intriguing ending on the scale of a season finale, but it is intriguing in the sense that it begs the question, ‘What is Walt going to do now?’ Something is unresolved, and so hopefully it works.”

-- Josh Gajewski

Let’s start at the beginning, where I wish 'Bad' had begun.

Remember last week’s cliffhanger ending? Our man Walt had walked into his bedroom and said to his wife, “Skyler, there’s something I have to tell you.” Finally, with three episodes already gone, he was set to tell his wife that he has cancer and maybe two years to live. This also left us with the even bigger question to ponder: What exactly was he going to say, and how? Would it be the truth (I have cancer … ), the whole truth (and I’m now cooking meth … ) and nothing but the truth (and, um, I sort of killed a couple of guys)? Up to this point he’d told only one person about his illness; his name was Krazy 8, and the words “I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you” kinda-sorta applied to the poor guy. Krazy 8 was 86’d. 

But let’s quickly recall that heart-to-heart Walt and Krazy 8 once shared. The doomed drug dealer had asked our hero why his family didn’t yet know the news. “Not a conversation I’m even remotely ready to have,” Walt said. Which is exactly why I wanted to see it. I’d spent a week waiting to get back inside that bedroom, and I fully expected to land there, considering each previous episode had picked up exactly where the prior one ended, a nice touch of continuity and something I figured would be the norm.

But instead we faded in to the brother-in-law, Hank, and a roomful of cops at Hank's DEA office. Some bad jokes preceded the meat of the meeting, when Hank announced, “We’ve got new players in town. Now we don’t know who they are or where they came from, but they possess an extremely high skill set. Personally, I’m thinking Albuquerque just might have a new kingpin.”

Cue the kingpin, a shot of Walt in his tighty-whities, brushing his teeth. This gave me a little chuckle, but the Walt-in-his-underwear thing is a bit played out at this point, and that air of anticipation had left the balloon. An aside: who enjoys taking his shirt off more? Bryan Cranston, Will Ferrell or Matthew McConaughey? There should be a study. But I digress …

Skyler White, meet Jesse Pinkman … 

GENERAL INTERESTS:
Fine herbage! Keepin’ it real, Jui Ryo Ki Kung-Fu (blue belt with shuriken certification). Banging the skins with my smoking band … European motocross (plan to attend Wheelie School in Vegas this summer).

EDUCATION:
J.P. Wynne High School, DeVry University data systems management… The STREETS, YO!

… your husband’s new business partner.

Whereas Jesse was first introduced to us last week when he stumbled naked out of a second-story bedroom window (the naked part seems to be the de facto entrance around here), Skyler had the pleasure of making his acquaintance this week. After overhearing a suspicious telemarketing call fielded by her husband, she pulled the ol’ *69 trick on her cordless and got the following voicemail: “Yo, yo, yo! 1-4-8, 3 to the 3 to the 6 to the 9! Representin’ the ABQ! What up … Leave it at the tone!”

Yeah, awkward. So she further investigated online and found Jesse’s MySpace -– er, “MyShout” –- page, which revealed the details mentioned above. Classic, yo.

Indeed, all things Jesse tickled the tummy Sunday night, especially the early scene in which the Indian comes to the rescue of Walter and Jesse in the New Mexico desert, pulling their RV out of that roadside ditch (an aside: With bulldozer-equipped Indians apparently roaming the middle of nowhere, who needs Roadside Assistance?). Job complete, the silent Indian stands there before our two fidgety heroes, Walter not wearing any pants and Jesse sporting an eye that’s swollen shut.

This is what we learned on Sunday night: A man wearing nothing but his underpants and a gas mask can actually be taken seriously. For this feat alone, perhaps it’s not too much of a stretch to imagine Bryan Cranston around this time next year, in a tux instead of tighty-whities and holding a Golden Globe instead of a gun.

Sure, this is crazy talk -– next year’s awards after just one episode and not even a month yet flipped off the 2008 calendar -– but then again, “Breaking Bad” wasted no time in getting a little crazy itself. The pilot’s opening featured Cranston at the shaky wheel of a speeding RV, his middle-aged gut hanging over those undies and his face hidden beneath that mask. As the vehicle swerved, so did a couple of lifeless bodies along the floor behind him.

And this is where you may have rolled your eyes.

And this is where Cranston lost control, crashing the vehicle alongside a desert road and spilling out of it. Thankfully for us, he managed here to ditch the mask and pull on a shirt.

“My name is Walter White,” he then told a handheld video camera outside the RV. “ … To all law enforcement entities, this is not an admission of guilt. I am speaking to my family now. Skyler, you are the love of my life, I hope you know that. Walter Jr., you’re my big man. There are going to be some things, things that you’ll come to learn about me in the next few days. I just want you to know that no matter how it may look, I only had you in my heart. Goodbye.”

Our seemingly doomed new friend then walked to the middle of the road and pointed a gun toward the sound of approaching sirens.

Cut to the opening title credit and then a “Three weeks earlier … ” subtitle. Bada bing, bada boom.

'Breaking Bad': Int. DEA office?

Let’s start at the beginning, where I wish 'Bad' had begun.

Remember last week’s cliffhanger ending? Our man Walt had walked into his bedroom and said to his wife, “Skyler, there’s something I have to tell you.” Finally, with three episodes already gone, he was set to tell his wife that he has cancer and maybe two years to live. This also left us with the even bigger question to ponder: What exactly was he going to say, and how? Would it be the truth (I have cancer … ), the whole truth (and I’m now cooking meth … ) and nothing but the truth (and, um, I sort of killed a couple of guys)? Up to this point he’d told only one person about his illness; his name was Krazy 8, and the words “I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you” kinda-sorta applied to the poor guy. Krazy 8 was 86’d. 

But let’s quickly recall that heart-to-heart Walt and Krazy 8 once shared. The doomed drug dealer had asked our hero why his family didn’t yet know the news. “Not a conversation I’m even remotely ready to have,” Walt said. Which is exactly why I wanted to see it. I’d spent a week waiting to get back inside that bedroom, and I fully expected to land there, considering each previous episode had picked up exactly where the prior one ended, a nice touch of continuity and something I figured would be the norm.

But instead we faded in to the brother-in-law, Hank, and a roomful of cops at Hank's DEA office. Some bad jokes preceded the meat of the meeting, when Hank announced, “We’ve got new players in town. Now we don’t know who they are or where they came from, but they possess an extremely high skill set. Personally, I’m thinking Albuquerque just might have a new kingpin.”

Cue the kingpin, a shot of Walt in his tighty-whities, brushing his teeth. This gave me a little chuckle, but the Walt-in-his-underwear thing is a bit played out at this point, and that air of anticipation had left the balloon. An aside: who enjoys taking his shirt off more? Bryan Cranston, Will Ferrell or Matthew McConaughey? There should be a study. But I digress …

Skyler White, meet Jesse Pinkman … 

GENERAL INTERESTS:
Fine herbage! Keepin’ it real, Jui Ryo Ki Kung-Fu (blue belt with shuriken certification). Banging the skins with my smoking band … European motocross (plan to attend Wheelie School in Vegas this summer).

EDUCATION:
J.P. Wynne High School, DeVry University data systems management… The STREETS, YO!

… your husband’s new business partner.

Whereas Jesse was first introduced to us last week when he stumbled naked out of a second-story bedroom window (the naked part seems to be the de facto entrance around here), Skyler had the pleasure of making his acquaintance this week. After overhearing a suspicious telemarketing call fielded by her husband, she pulled the ol’ *69 trick on her cordless and got the following voicemail: “Yo, yo, yo! 1-4-8, 3 to the 3 to the 6 to the 9! Representin’ the ABQ! What up … Leave it at the tone!”

Yeah, awkward. So she further investigated online and found Jesse’s MySpace -– er, “MyShout” –- page, which revealed the details mentioned above. Classic, yo.

Indeed, all things Jesse tickled the tummy Sunday night, especially the early scene in which the Indian comes to the rescue of Walter and Jesse in the New Mexico desert, pulling their RV out of that roadside ditch (an aside: With bulldozer-equipped Indians apparently roaming the middle of nowhere, who needs Roadside Assistance?). Job complete, the silent Indian stands there before our two fidgety heroes, Walter not wearing any pants and Jesse sporting an eye that’s swollen shut.

This is what we learned on Sunday night: A man wearing nothing but his underpants and a gas mask can actually be taken seriously. For this feat alone, perhaps it’s not too much of a stretch to imagine Bryan Cranston around this time next year, in a tux instead of tighty-whities and holding a Golden Globe instead of a gun.

Sure, this is crazy talk -– next year’s awards after just one episode and not even a month yet flipped off the 2008 calendar -– but then again, “Breaking Bad” wasted no time in getting a little crazy itself. The pilot’s opening featured Cranston at the shaky wheel of a speeding RV, his middle-aged gut hanging over those undies and his face hidden beneath that mask. As the vehicle swerved, so did a couple of lifeless bodies along the floor behind him.

And this is where you may have rolled your eyes.

And this is where Cranston lost control, crashing the vehicle alongside a desert road and spilling out of it. Thankfully for us, he managed here to ditch the mask and pull on a shirt.

“My name is Walter White,” he then told a handheld video camera outside the RV. “ … To all law enforcement entities, this is not an admission of guilt. I am speaking to my family now. Skyler, you are the love of my life, I hope you know that. Walter Jr., you’re my big man. There are going to be some things, things that you’ll come to learn about me in the next few days. I just want you to know that no matter how it may look, I only had you in my heart. Goodbye.”

Our seemingly doomed new friend then walked to the middle of the road and pointed a gun toward the sound of approaching sirens.

Cut to the opening title credit and then a “Three weeks earlier … ” subtitle. Bada bing, bada boom.

'Breaking Bad': Tweedle Dee, Tweedle Dum

Skyler White, meet Jesse Pinkman … 

GENERAL INTERESTS:
Fine herbage! Keepin’ it real, Jui Ryo Ki Kung-Fu (blue belt with shuriken certification). Banging the skins with my smoking band … European motocross (plan to attend Wheelie School in Vegas this summer).

EDUCATION:
J.P. Wynne High School, DeVry University data systems management… The STREETS, YO!

… your husband’s new business partner.

Whereas Jesse was first introduced to us last week when he stumbled naked out of a second-story bedroom window (the naked part seems to be the de facto entrance around here), Skyler had the pleasure of making his acquaintance this week. After overhearing a suspicious telemarketing call fielded by her husband, she pulled the ol’ *69 trick on her cordless and got the following voicemail: “Yo, yo, yo! 1-4-8, 3 to the 3 to the 6 to the 9! Representin’ the ABQ! What up … Leave it at the tone!”

Yeah, awkward. So she further investigated online and found Jesse’s MySpace -– er, “MyShout” –- page, which revealed the details mentioned above. Classic, yo.

Indeed, all things Jesse tickled the tummy Sunday night, especially the early scene in which the Indian comes to the rescue of Walter and Jesse in the New Mexico desert, pulling their RV out of that roadside ditch (an aside: With bulldozer-equipped Indians apparently roaming the middle of nowhere, who needs Roadside Assistance?). Job complete, the silent Indian stands there before our two fidgety heroes, Walter not wearing any pants and Jesse sporting an eye that’s swollen shut.

This is what we learned on Sunday night: A man wearing nothing but his underpants and a gas mask can actually be taken seriously. For this feat alone, perhaps it’s not too much of a stretch to imagine Bryan Cranston around this time next year, in a tux instead of tighty-whities and holding a Golden Globe instead of a gun.

Sure, this is crazy talk -– next year’s awards after just one episode and not even a month yet flipped off the 2008 calendar -– but then again, “Breaking Bad” wasted no time in getting a little crazy itself. The pilot’s opening featured Cranston at the shaky wheel of a speeding RV, his middle-aged gut hanging over those undies and his face hidden beneath that mask. As the vehicle swerved, so did a couple of lifeless bodies along the floor behind him.

And this is where you may have rolled your eyes.

And this is where Cranston lost control, crashing the vehicle alongside a desert road and spilling out of it. Thankfully for us, he managed here to ditch the mask and pull on a shirt.

“My name is Walter White,” he then told a handheld video camera outside the RV. “ … To all law enforcement entities, this is not an admission of guilt. I am speaking to my family now. Skyler, you are the love of my life, I hope you know that. Walter Jr., you’re my big man. There are going to be some things, things that you’ll come to learn about me in the next few days. I just want you to know that no matter how it may look, I only had you in my heart. Goodbye.”

Our seemingly doomed new friend then walked to the middle of the road and pointed a gun toward the sound of approaching sirens.

Cut to the opening title credit and then a “Three weeks earlier … ” subtitle. Bada bing, bada boom.

'Breaking Bad': A study of change

This is what we learned on Sunday night: A man wearing nothing but his underpants and a gas mask can actually be taken seriously. For this feat alone, perhaps it’s not too much of a stretch to imagine Bryan Cranston around this time next year, in a tux instead of tighty-whities and holding a Golden Globe instead of a gun.

Sure, this is crazy talk -– next year’s awards after just one episode and not even a month yet flipped off the 2008 calendar -– but then again, “Breaking Bad” wasted no time in getting a little crazy itself. The pilot’s opening featured Cranston at the shaky wheel of a speeding RV, his middle-aged gut hanging over those undies and his face hidden beneath that mask. As the vehicle swerved, so did a couple of lifeless bodies along the floor behind him.

And this is where you may have rolled your eyes.

And this is where Cranston lost control, crashing the vehicle alongside a desert road and spilling out of it. Thankfully for us, he managed here to ditch the mask and pull on a shirt.

“My name is Walter White,” he then told a handheld video camera outside the RV. “ … To all law enforcement entities, this is not an admission of guilt. I am speaking to my family now. Skyler, you are the love of my life, I hope you know that. Walter Jr., you’re my big man. There are going to be some things, things that you’ll come to learn about me in the next few days. I just want you to know that no matter how it may look, I only had you in my heart. Goodbye.”

Our seemingly doomed new friend then walked to the middle of the road and pointed a gun toward the sound of approaching sirens.

Cut to the opening title credit and then a “Three weeks earlier … ” subtitle. Bada bing, bada boom.