Mad Men | Season 4 Tidbits

Okay. So, I have finished mourning Breaking Bad. I've gone through the five stages of grief, from denial to anger to depression, and have finally come to accept that there will be no new episodes for MORE THAN A YEAR. Ahem. Really, I'm fine. And with exactly a month to go until the return of Mad Men, I'm finally equipped to move on.

Fortunately, AMC have eased the process this week by releasing a few snapshots from fourth season opener Public Relations. There's also a rather snazzy new poster image for the season, pictured above.

In typically tight-lipped fashion, Matthew Weiner & co have revealed next to nothing else about the season so far. In typically over-analytical fashion, I'm going to see what scraps of speculation I can wring from these photos.

Let's start with That Poster.

It's not quite up there with last season's image of Don in a water-filled office, but it's striking and emotive and feels almost like a still from the credit sequence. What's interesting is that Don appears to be standing in a very upmarket, several-storeys-high office, very much along the lines of Sterling Cooper's - definitely a far cry from the hotel suite set-up where we left the newly-formed Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce. Does this mean we're in for a significant jump forwards in time, enough to allow SCDP to have moved up in the world into an office of this type?

Personally I'm still hoping we pick up relatively soon after Shut The Door, Have A Seat, because I'd be super sad not to see the fledgling company's early days, and see how the new group dynamic begin to take shape. Not to mention the dramatic potential of watching these characters thrust together in such an enclosed space - Pete and Peggy sharing a desk? Too good to pass up, surely. 

But most of all, I keep recalling this exchange between Don and Roger:
R: "How long do you think it'll take us to be in a place like this again?"
D: "I never saw myself working in a place like this."
I don't think that line was tossed out casually, and as such I have to think
that the empty office shown in the poster is a figurative space that's meant to reflect the imagery of the credit sequence, rather than an actual set used in the show. SCDP won't be in a place like that again for a good while, I'm thinking, which makes the fact that they used such a place for the season's defining image sort of interesting. 

Moving on, then, to These Photos.

Again the setting here is very Sterling Cooper-esque, although this looks a little smaller than their office's board room. Joan was very specific in Shut The Door... about not wanting to hold meetings at the Pierre, though, so again this doesn't necessarily mean we won't be seeing the hotel set-up.

I also just need to take a moment to admire the Pete/Don/Roger lineup. I am very, VERY excited for these three guys to share more screen time, and for Pete and Roger to be on screen more in general.

And there they are again. This looks like the end of a lunch between Don and Roger (glad to see that bridge has stayed rebuilt), of which Pete clearly was not a part. Heh. Pete's also wearing a fairly heavy coat, which given the show's attention to wardrobe details makes me think this episode may be set in the winter months. Season 3 ended right before Christmas. Maybe the time jump won't be so huge after all...or else an entire year has passed. Or two. Or Pete just likes wearing his coat all year round, and I'm grasping at increasingly flimsy straws.

Don Draper looking fiiine. Not much else to say here. Finally, though...

Oh. Peggy. Wow.

This seems to be the strongest evidence for a HUGE time jump. Say, fifteen or so years, into a time when Peggy is nearing forty. Not really, since none of the other characters seem to have gone through this traumatic aging process, but SERIOUSLY. WHAT is on her head? She's channeling Margaret Thatcher circa 1979, and that is literally not ever a good thing. Poor Elisabeth Moss just can't catch a break in the hair department, can she? I'll be interested to see what mention (if any) is made of this atrocity in the show. Hopefully Joan at least will have something devastatingly snarky yet helpful to say about it.

And that's it for photos. No sign of Joan, which makes me sad. No sign of Betty, which does not make me sad. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the character, but not when she and her issues are shoved down my throat at the expense of other characters (i.e. everybody on the show not named Draper). I don't want Betty gone, but I'd definitely like her to be absent for a few episodes, and for the office dynamics to be the focus with basically no distractions from the home front. That being said, Trudy Campbell can show up anytime she wants to.

Speaking of domestics, it strikes me that both Betty and Joan were left somewhat up in the air last season with regard to their marital situations. We assume Betty will marry Henry Francis, but she hadn't yet done so. Similarly, Joan's rapey husband Greg was headed off to Vietnam, but hadn't yet gone. Maybe the reason there's no photos of these two is that that photos would give away too much about their new circumstances. God, though, how great would it be if it transpired Greg had met some terrible fate in Vietnam? I can dream.


And that's about all I can eke from these. I'll be recapping the series weekly once it returns, so be sure to check back in if you're a Sterling Cooper devotee. 

Breaking Bad | 3x13 | Full Measure

This shattering finale to Breaking Bad’s third outing is a tense, moving study of loyalties, and how far they can be stretched. It’s a fitting culmination to a season that’s focused very heavily on alliances being forged, bridges being burned and rebuilt.  

We saw Skyler sever ties with Walt, but come to gradually renegotiate their relationship so that they are now business partners, and only nominally husband and wife. Walt and Gus forged a business alliance that seemed to have the makings of a match made in heaven, to the point where Walt sat at his right hand in last week’s episode.  Most crucially, we saw Walt and Jesse’s partnership break down, and reform itself into something that now appears stronger than ever; dangerously so, if this episode is anything to go on.

In Full Measure itself, relations between Walt and Gus fell apart as a direct result of Walt’s loyalty to Jesse – one alliance sacrificed for another. Saul was surprisingly loyal to his alliance with Walt and Jesse by refusing to sell them out. Most significantly, Jesse’s loyalty to (and love for?) Walt ultimately forced him to take his first life. I know it was left somewhat open to interpretation, but there’s no doubt in my mind that he did shoot and kill Gale, because this is not a show that pulls its punches. 

But I’m getting way ahead of myself. 

We begin with a younger Walt and Skyler purchasing their house, some sixteen or so years ago based on Skyler’s heavy pregnancy. It’s clear that Walt is very much not teaching high school at this point; the realtor mentions something about the “fascinating work” he’s doing at the lab, and there’s a sense of youthful hope and ambition about the couple as they playfully argue over the house. Skyler, ever the realist, likes it because it’s within their price range, while Walt doesn’t see the point in buying a “starter home” which they’ll only live in for a year or so. There’s something powerfully sad about his “We’ve got nowhere to go but up,” given what we know the future holds for them.

Post credits, Walt (in full Heisenberg get-up) heads out into the desert and, in a scene straight out of a revisionist western, makes his slow way across the dusty plains to meet Mike and Gus in a Mexican stand-off of sorts. We see a return to the cold, furious Gus witnessed last week with Jesse as he demands that Walt explain himself, and Walt assures him that he and Jesse are done. Reasoning that Jesse is now “a couple of time zones away, at least” and out of the picture, Walt proposes that he continue cooking for Gus with a new assistant, and they both forget about Jesse. 

It’s interesting to note in this scene that even as Walt verbally “denies” Jesse, he subtly takes his side in the discussion of Tomas’s murder, almost accusing Gus outright of ordering the hit. And as magnetic as Giancarlo Esposito is in this role, there is something loathsome in the way he describes Jesse as “a contemptible junkie”, given that Jesse has more moral fibre in his pinkie finger than Gus has likely ever conceived of.

In any case, Walt persuades Gus that his plan is preferable to option A (i.e. he and Jesse being killed) and returns to the lab to find Gale waiting for him. Apparently eager to please, Gale says that he doesn’t want to make the same mistakes as last time, and asks Walt to teach him exactly how he likes things done. Walt accepts, with a strangely haunted look on his face.

Meanwhile Mike – caring grandpa by day, badass fixer by night – drops off his granddaughter after an afternoon at the zoo, before heading off to Gus’s chemical supply company to thwart an attempted raid from the cartel. Great work from Jonathan Banks in the first scene especially, he switches seamlessly from being so convincingly sweet to a stone-cold professional. 

Clearly feeling the heat from the cartel activity, Gus pays a visit to Gale and, with chilling lightness, asks how soon he would feel able to take over running the lab, explaining that Walt’s cancer may mean he’s unable to continue. “I don’t know that he’s fully accepted the reality of it,” he murmurs, and it couldn’t possibly be clearer that the demise he’s talking about has nothing to do with Walt’s health. Gale, off Gus’s meaningful stare, eventually concedes that one more cook with Walt should be enough.

I don’t know how much we’re meant to believe Gale knows in this scene, but all I’ll say is that he’s clearly an intelligent man and he became involved with Gus independently of Walt. I don’t buy that he’s in any way ignorant of the type of people he’s in business with, and Gus’s body language left very little room for ambiguity. Ironically, even if he’s consciously signing Walt’s death warrant, he has no way of knowing that he’s in fact signing his own.

Gus isn’t the only one making visits: Mike turns up at Saul’s office and demands, in no uncertain terms, Jesse’s location. Saul shows a surprising level of backbone as he reasons that he can’t violate attorney-client privilege, but appears to back down pretty quickly under pressure and gives Mike an address for Jesse in Virginia.

Later Walt and Saul go to the laser tag place from Abiquiu, ostensibly for Saul to try and persuade him of its merits once again, but actually so that they can talk without being overheard. Saul’s fuming: his car’s now bugged, he’s being followed, and he swears that if they make it out of this alive, he’ll be rethinking his pricing.

“That goes double for you, Hip Hop,” Saul snarks, and as the shot changes we see Jesse! JESSE! Who’s evidently been holed up at the laser tag all along, and not in any way in Virginia. Saul’s got balls, yo. This is the first of two great fake-out double cross moments this episode, where you think a character has sold out another when they’ve actually done something far cleverer.

Saul heads off to “see if they got Tetris or something” and leaves Walt and Jesse alone to talk, which is strangely reminiscent of the realtor giving Walt and Skyler privacy to look around the house.

Walt and Jesse share a sympathetic “how you holding up?” moment, and both seem palpably relieved to be reunited. Walt reveals that he knows exactly what Gus has planned; “So he’s their boy, huh?” Jesse says grimly. He asks what they do, and Walt answers “You know what we do.” Boom.

Jesse is adamant that there has to be another way, trying to persuade Walt that the best option for he and his family is to go to the police, and give them his extensive insider knowledge in exchange for witness protection. It’s endearing how little self-interest he shows here, vaguely saying that he’ll “hit the road” and make his own way provided Walt is covered. “We had a good run…but it’s over,” he says, a little shaky. Walt dismisses this – he knows Gus needs a cook, and with Gale out of the picture he’ll have no choice to let Walt (and by extension, Jesse) live.

Jesse quietly says that he can’t do it – as Walt said, he isn’t a murderer – and Walt replies that he’ll do the bloody deed himself, but he needs Jesse’s help to track Gale down. After that, he thinks he can “make it look like an accident.” Jesus. As a final resort, Walt pulls out the sucker-punch: “I saved your life, Jesse. Are you gonna save mine?” Ouch. Bye, Gale.

Next, a gorgeous silent moment: Walt sitting with Holly in his arms, her playing adorably with his glasses (seriously, how cute was this?) with Skyler and Walt Jr in the background. It’s shot in this warm, honey glow and there’s something so idyllic and sad about it, Walt relishing what feels like one last moment with his family. He knows he’s about to go somewhere they can’t follow.

Jesse calls with Gale’s address, and there’s a great beat from Bryan Cranston as he visibly wilts when asked when he’s going to do it. The reality of it sinking in like a physical weight. Jesse implores him one more time to reconsider, and Walt hangs up on him.

As Walt heads out to his car, Victor the ever-watchful lab attendant rolls up, saying there’s been a chemical leak at the lab and Walt needs to come with him. And there’s an absolutely gut-wrenching sense of dread here, with Walt knowing very well that this is it. This was very reminiscent of Seven Thirty Seven’s end, when Tuco pulled up with a gun to Jesse’s head and ordered Walt to “get in”. 

At the laundry, Mike opens the door to the lab and also orders Walt to get in, though with a more cordial “You first”, approach. Walt, knowing he’s out of options, starts to panic and desperately tells Mike he doesn’t have to do this (echoing Jesse’s words to him earlier). After a few minutes of Walt effectively begging for his life, Mike tells him to shut up, there’s nothing he can do.

“I’ll give you Jesse Pinkman,” Walt gasps, and this viewer’s heart leaps into her throat. Not to go on about how great Cranston is (because, duh) but he really pulls off this totally undignified moment where Walt is absolutely coming apart, and apparently resorting to every cowardly measure to save his own skin. He persuades Mike to let him call Jesse and get him to meet.

Still at the laser tag and about to smoke up a pipe of somethin’ (I’m assuming meth, but who knows), Jesse answers Walt’s call and asks if he did it. Walt answers in the negative, and before Mike can react he tells Jesse “It’s going to have to be you…They’ve got me at the laundry and they’re going to kill me.” As the phone is snatched away Walt screams out to Jesse to do it quickly, and Jesse runs for the door without a moment’s hesitation. OH. YES. That’s more like it, Walt. Awesome bluff. So that’s the second faux double-cross moment, and thank god. I didn’t want to live in a fictional world where Walter White would ever sell out Jesse Pinkman.

Although what happened next was unbearable, I was cheering hard for Walt and his badassery here. He recites Gale’s address and watches the colour drain from Mike’s face with a steely “Yeah.” Victor dashes out, but we know it’s way too late.

Cut to Gale at his apartment, dorkily singing along to more dorky music and making a dorky cup of tea with his laser thermometer. Poor Gale. Upon opening the door to a shaking, gun-toting Jesse, he tries to offer him money before begging for his life. “Please don’t do this,” he says, marking the third and most wrenching use of the phrase. “You don’t have to do this.” Crying, gun trembling violently in his hand, Jesse pulls the trigger and fires.

Fade to black.

Oh, god.

And so we’ve come full circle from last week, when Walt prevented Jesse from becoming a murderer. He didn’t just save his life, he also saved his soul. Which makes it all the more tragic that it was Walt, or Jesse’s feelings of loyalty and love for Walt, that drove him to finally become a murderer and compromise his soul this week.  

When this show began, it was about the lengths one man will go to to save his family. To a great extent, it’s now a show about the lengths two men will go to to save each other. Theirs is the most destructive, co-dependent bond on television, and yet there’s something so absolutely moving about it that I just can’t root for Jesse to run far, far away from Walt, much as I know it would be best for him. As damaging as their relationship is, this season’s closing arc has cemented the fact that these two love each other, and would do anything for each other. As Walt said: “When it comes down to you and me versus him, I’m sorry. I’m truly sorry. But it’s gonna be him.” 

Other thoughts:
-       Even if Jesse doesn’t get away from Gale’s before Victor arrives, I’m not worried for him – the whole point is that with Gale dead, they need Walt, and they know they don’t have Walt unless Jesse is alive. I’m way more worried about Jesse’s mental state following that ending. Just…oh. Jesse.
-       “I trust the hole in the desert I’d leave you in.” “Yeah, that’s…an argument.” Gotta love Saul.
-       Being pragmatic a la Gus for a second here: exactly how much leverage has Gale’s death really bought Walt? I know Walt is now their only chemist, and he can refuse to teach anyone besides Jesse his methods, but how long before Gus starts threatening Walt’s family to make him comply? It’s amazing they’ve escaped for this long, IMO.
-       One last thought on the “what lengths they’ll go to save each other” thing. This has always been there, right from the moment when Walt half blew up Tuco’s den in retribution for beating up Jesse. But Jane’s death is the most powerful example up to this point; Walt let her die almost solely because she posed too great a risk to Jesse. It was only a matter of time before these two killed for each other.
-       Now we know why Jesse was the one holding the gun in this promo image.

Breaking Bad | 3x11 | Abiquiu

This was a pretty low-key episode, a definite calm before the storm with groundwork being laid for the final two. That being said we did get the fairly huge step of Skylar taking on a role in Walt’s business, which doesn’t seem like finale setup to me so much as something that will only begin to pay off next season. 

Very exciting to see Jane again in the opener. Krysten Ritter had hinted on Twitter that she’d be back, so I’d been imagining some kind of dream sequence or hallucination, maybe where Walt was tormented by an accusatory, smart-talking Jane a la the dead folks on Six Feet Under, or Amber on House. The latter's sort of an interesting parallel – House, feeling responsible for the death of his best friend’s girlfriend, began to hallucinate her everywhere. If Walt gets a little more unhinged, maybe we’ll see Jane again before too long.

Anyway, it’s nice to see that Jesse and Jane made it to the Georgia O’Keefe exhibit after Jesse’s four-day desert detour. Their conversation in the car brought up a lot of interesting parallels to future stuff – maybe most obvious was Jane’s “I just threw up a little bit in my mouth” line, made fairly horrific considering the way she ultimately died. 

Jane talking about fixation, and the idea of wanting to make a feeling last, plays really powerfully into episode 303 with Jesse playing her voicemail recording over and over, clinging to what little he had left. And fixation was central to Fly, with Walt’s seemingly inexplicable obsession gradually giving way to deeper meaning: “Sometimes you get fixated on something, and you might not even get why.”

Moving onto Jesse…it is a sad day when Badger and Skinny Pete are giving you moral lessons; “There’s like, positivity and stuff goin’ on here.” We saw a return of the predatory, seductive Jesse from the gas station scene earlier this season in the way he maneuvered Andrea. And yet what this episode ultimately showed is that no matter how much he claims to be “the bad guy”, he simply isn’t unscrupulous and has a powerful internal sense of right and wrong.  There are certain lines that are absolutes for him (children being one), which is interesting as one of the things that’s really scary about Walt, by contrast, is his ability to blur those moral lines in his own mind. 

If there is one absolute Walt seems to have held onto, it’s family and the need to protect them at all costs. When it came to the revelation that Skylar hadn’t divorced Walt, it struck me that she’d probably had time to really think about the reality of what he had done, and it maybe didn’t repel her as much as she would have liked. In contrast to the downtrodden husband from the pilot, he’s now shown himself to be a man who will stop at absolutely nothing to provide for his family, and there’s something very attractive about that on a sort of primal level. Especially as Skylar has had the luxury of hearing only Walt’s sanitized version of events - I doubt the possibility of his having killed, for example, has even crossed her mind. His “Do you really want to know? Really?” was very telling in this sense, because there’s a whole lot she is better off not knowing.

When Gus talked about the “mistake” Walt shouldn’t make twice, there was some ambiguity in terms of whether he meant Jesse or Skylar. My guess is Jesse, because although bringing Skylar into the business may well prove to be a mistake, it’s not one Walt has made before, whereas Gus has warned Walt before about his attachment to Jesse. I’d be tempted to say that Gus is someone who sees almost all attachments as weaknesses or mistakes, since he seems to be so permanently alone himself, but he did mention “the kids” not eating the recipe he cooked.  Does he have family?  It would make sense in order to keep up the “responsible local business owner” front, but where the heck are they?

Finally, Jesse’s sudden desire to go after the guys who killed Combo is, to me, heavily linked to his feelings about Jane. The decision to open the episode with that flashback felt very deliberate – Jesse stated last week that Jane’s death was nobody’s fault, but that means he has nobody to strike out at, nothing to direct his rage towards. So again we’re back to the idea of fixation, with Jesse desperate to avenge Combo because he has no way to avenge Jane. Thoughts?

Other thoughts:
-  “I once convinced a woman that I was Kevin Costner, and it worked because I believed it.”
-  While Hank’s bad temper is understandable, there was something ferociously irrational about the way he reacted to the hospital bed in his room.  Marie handled him with so much grace, but I’m wondering whether his PTSD will soon progress to the point where he becomes genuinely frightening to be around. 
-  “My name is Brandon.  And this is, I believe, Peter.”  Heh.  

Breaking Bad | 3x10 | Fly

One day, I will be a timely, efficient television blogger. One day, my posts will arrive hot on the heels of each new episode, rather than crawling lethargically in their wake. But it is not this day. 

So, Fly was a tiny slice of television genius, y/y?

When I first saw it, I think I tweeted that it was Bryan Cranston and Aaron Paul’s long awaited two-hander. This episode could very easily have been a play, with the claustrophobic set and precise structure and characters revealing themselves through monologue. I’m still surprised by how divisive it’s proved to be, as I thought it was just a brilliantly constructed hour; tense, layered, emotionally charged, and an answer to every prayer from viewers who have missed Walt-Jesse time this season. I genuinely, genuinely loved every second of it and wanted to marry it and have its surreal, Kafkaesque babies. 

Just so we’re clear.

This episode struck me as very self-contained, structurally – several elements were set up in the early scenes, and all of them were resolved or paid off by the end – or, if to get a bit pretentious and Chekhovian about it, several guns appeared in the first act and went off in the last.

The first of these came with the fly-with-lullaby-soundtrack opener, which rivals last season’s Pink Bear Of Floating Ambiguity in its disorienting, creepifying WTF factor. But it paid off during the much later scene where Walt, in a semi-drugged state, movingly describes to Jesse the “perfect moment” at which he wishes his life had ended. 

It’s insane to me that anybody could say nothing happened in this episode after this scene alone; it’s such a powerful insight into Walt’s state of mind this season. His entire plan was built on the assumption that he would die within months, and so his new life was strictly on a time-limit basis with an end date set. Now suddenly there’s no end in sight and he’s left with a whole lot of consequences which he never planned for, stuck in a living nightmare which is spiralling further and further out of his control. And if that’s not Kafkaesque, I don’t know what is. (Seriously, this is the episode that deserved that title.)

Also set up in the first act and resolved in the third: Walt’s realisation that Jesse is skimming meth off the top. What surprised me about this is that Walt didn’t actually seem to care about the stealing per se. His concern was for Jesse’s safety if, and when, Gus cottons on, which makes it extra aggravating that Jesse completely shut him down at the end. You don’t need Walt’s protection? Really? I love me some Jesse, but he’s being staggeringly naïve and clearly doesn’t take Gus seriously at all.

I’m still trying to decide exactly what the “contamination” was meant to represent, but I think it boiled down to unspoken things that were stewing between Walt and Jesse – the stealing, but also Walt’s guilt over Jane. The fly in the room was the elephant in the room. So once Walt had apologised for Jane’s death, the fly ceased to matter, and he told Jesse to “let it go”. This is probably reductionist, but to me the fly was a plot device to get to a situation where these two guys are forced to open up with one another.

Watching Jesse’s expression transform as Walt described meeting Jane’s father was so sad, too, the desperation for answers. I just can’t say enough about these two actors. They are immense.  And of course, Walt still left the most crucial fact about Jane’s death unspoken, which is just fine as far as I’m concerned. I don’t want to see their dynamic annihilated in the way that revelation would anytime soon. 

The other idea that was set up early in the episode for later resolution was Jesse’s concern for Walt’s health. I’m glad somebody in the show raised this, and it makes sense for it to be poor Jesse, who if I remember correctly nursed his aunt pretty singlehandedly through to the end. However fractious their relationship has been, Walt is the closest thing Jesse has to an active parental figure, so the very real possibility of losing him in such a familiar way must be sort of awful to live with. 

It was nice to see a sweeter, gentler Jesse this episode, since he’s seemed pretty close to losing his soul lately. He took good care of Walt and dealt with his weirdness in a smart, mature way, playing along with the fly obsession and quietly slipping him sleeping pills rather than continuing to argue pointlessly with someone who clearly wasn’t firing on all cylinders. Not that I’m advocating slipping pills into people’s coffee as a rule, but y’know, it worked for House and Wilson.

One last note on Jesse: he seems to have reached a surprisingly healthy perspective on Jane’s death. His matter-of-fact “It’s not your fault, it’s not mine either” is a million miles from “I killed her” in ABQ, or his obvious feelings of responsibility in No Mas. He even acknowledged that he and Jane, junkies with a duffel bag full of cash, wouldn’t have lasted a week in any case. He’s matured in so many ways, but at the same time he’s acting more recklessly and naively than he ever has with this meth business. First season Jesse was all about caution, with Walt pushing him to take more risks – now the dynamic is reversed and I can’t see it ending well. 

Other thoughts:
-  Is Walt’s skeleton made of titanium? That fall from the second storey did not look fun. In fact, it looked like the rib-cracking, temporary-paralysis-inducing opposite of fun. Expected Jesse to find him on the floor the next morning.
-  “This is a swatter. And it happens to work quite well, thank you.”
-  Jesse tucking Walt up with his jacket? Aww.
-  Walt’s resigned comment that “It’s all contaminated” is sort of haunting. I’m not totally sure what he meant, but wonder if it relates to the idea that the lab is bugged. Walt’s personal guilt aside, their entire operation is contaminated now that they’re effectively under the thumb of someone they don’t fully understand. And who is fairly scary. 
-  Jesse had some classic stream-of-consciousness moments this episode, between hyenas licking each other and Ebola and opossums (“Makes it sound like he’s Irish, or something.”) But the one that cracked me up was his bitching about Gus’s “pecking order”. Because he’s the chicken man.  Pecking order. Heh. Just me?
-  When Walt talked about his family-themed conversation with Donald, he didn’t tell Jesse that he spoke specifically about him as family. Which makes me wonder what Jesse thought he meant by “I took his advice.” I’m pretty sure he didn’t think he meant “I let your girlfriend die so she wouldn’t drag you any further into an ill-fated spiral of heroin addiction”, though. Pretty sure.