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.