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"No Más" is the first episode of the third season of Breaking Bad and the twenty-first episode altogether.

Summary[]

Teaser[]

BB 301 01

In a rural village in Mexico, men and women crawl on their bellies up a dusty, adobe-lined desert road. A Mercedes sedan stops alongside the procession. Two men exit the car; both wear expensive suits and cowboy boots tipped with silver skulls. The men begin to crawl with the others. The procession winds to a candlelit shrine to Santa Muerte, a Mexican folk deity representing death. The two men rise to their feet. One makes an offering, while the other pins something to the shrine: a crude sketch of Heisenberg.

Act I[]

BB 301 02

Walt tries to burn his money

In Albuquerque, coverage of the Wayfarer 515 disaster dominates the news. In the week since the crash, Donald Margolis has been identified as the air traffic controller who, distracted by grief over his daughter's recent death, allowed the airliner to collide with a charter plane in midair. At the pool behind the White residence, a contrite Walt, fully aware of his culpability in the crash, dumps his drug money onto an outdoor grill and sets it ablaze. Seconds later, he second-guesses his decision and hurls the flaming grill into the pool. His robe sleeve having caught fire, he too jumps in after.

Meanwhile, Skyler meets with a divorce attorney who advises her that maintaining residence in the house will strengthen her position in a child custody case. Skyler explains that Walt is moving out that day. Questioned about the family's finances, Skyler momentarily freezes. "You'd be amazed what I've seen partners hide from one another," the lawyer says.

BB 301 03

Hank helps Walt move out

Hank visits the house to help with the move just as Walt fishes the last of the cash — and the plastic eyeball belonging to the pink teddy bear from the crash — out of his pool. Wrestling a duffel bag full of drug money away from his brother-in-law, Hank asks, "What have you got in there? Cinder blocks?" After a thought, Walt replies, "Half a million in cash." Hank laughs, assuming that Walt is joking.

Act II[]

NoMas-4

Jesse learning self-acceptance at rehab

At the Serenity rehab center, Jesse participates in a group therapy session in which the group leader states that self-acceptance and self-improvement as essential to transformation. The next day, Walt calls home from his new apartment. Walt Jr. picks up the phone and rants that no one is telling him what is going on between his parents. Over Skyler's objections, he arranges for Walt to drive him to school. Later, Walt receives a one-word text: "POLLOS."

BB 301 04

The school assembly

At J. P. Wynne High School, a student assembly is called to discuss the recent plane tragedy. Walt is visibly uncomfortable as a student describes finding the remains of a crash victim on his lawn. Noticing this, Carmen encourages Walt to express himself. He tries to assuage his guilt by telling his increasingly incredulous audience to "look on the bright side" of what happened, using the higher death toll from the Tenerife disaster to suggest that the Wayfarer crash wasn't so bad by comparison. Carmen, finding his words inappropriate, cuts his speech short.

NoMas-6

The Cousins

Outside a dilapidated desert farmhouse, the Mercedes sedan stops and the Cousins exit and approach a clothesline. A young girl and her parents watch as the men exchange their suits for common work clothes, keeping only their guns and their cowboy boots. After a brief standoff with the girl, they hook the car key ring on a goat's horn and walk away.

Act III[]

NoMas-11

Junior confronts his mom

When Walt drives Junior home, his son asks why he doesn't come into the house. Inside, Junior angrily lashes out at Skyler, under the impression that she is persecuting Walt. Marie, who is present, reasons that Junior is anxious to learn why his parents have separated, which she wants to know herself. Skyler tells Marie that she needs to be supportive without prying.

During another group therapy session, a despondent Jesse — blaming himself for Jane's death as well as the plane crash asks the group leader, "Have you ever really hurt anybody?" He is shocked when the group leader admits that he accidentally killed his own daughter while intoxicated. "How do you not hate yourself?" asks Jesse. "I did, for many years," admits the group leader. But guilt and self-hate, he explains, stand in the way of true change.

Skyler visits Walt at his apartment, asking if they can talk. She surprises him with divorce papers. When he resists, she bluntly accuses him of being a drug dealer. She's stunned with his non-denial. Drawing on his connection with Jesse, she infers that Walt has been paying for his medical treatment by dealing marijuana. Shocked at how much she has figured out, Walt reluctantly admits that he cooks methamphetamine. Refusing to hear Walt's rationalizations, Skyler promises not to tell Hank or anyone else what Walt is doing, but only if he grants the divorce and stays away from the family. She hurriedly leaves.

Act IV[]

NoMas-7

A preoccupied Walt picks up Jesse at rehab

After Walt picks up Jesse from rehab, Jesse intimates that he is responsible for Jane's death and, by extension, the plane crash. Walt tries to convince Jesse not to blame himself for the tragedy, listing off a host of minor factors that he insists contributed more to the crash. "You either run from things, or you face them," Jesse replies. He's learned to accept about himself what Walt cannot: "I'm the bad guy."

NoMas-9

Walt and Gus at Los Pollos Hermanos

Walt visits Los Pollos Hermanos and meets with Gus. Walt tells Gus that despite his great respect for him, he has decided to stop cooking meth. In response, Gus offers Walt $3 million for three months of his work. Walt still declines, stating that his family means more to him than any money he can make from continuing in the drug trade.

BB 301 05

Meanwhile, hidden amid a farm truck's bales of straw, the two Cousins sit with a group of undocumented immigrants being smuggled across the U.S.-Mexico border. A young man brags to the men about painting cars for gangsters in Michoacan, but quickly clams up when he notices the skulls on their boots. Hearing gunshots in the back, the truck driver stops to investigate. He flees when the men emerge from the back in the truck and is subsequently shot in the back. The two men then set the truck and its murdered passengers ablaze. They silently walk away as the vehicle explodes.

Official Photos[]

Trivia[]

  • This is the second premiere episode to be directed by Bryan Cranston. The first was "Seven Thirty-Seven".
  • When Barry is referring to how colleges grant students an automatic A if their roommate commits suicide, he is making a reference to an old but incorrect rumor that has circulated though college campuses for decades that also formed the basis of the film Dead Man on Campus.
  • Several relatives make a cameo in this episode:
  • "No Más" is Spanish for "no more," which refers to Walt initially refusing to keep manufacturing meth.
  • In the scene in which Walt decides to burn his money, Bryan Cranston is literally on fire before he jumps in the pool.
  • Following the devastating plane crash, the city of Albuquerque is in a state of grief. Presumably, all the characters are depicted in this episode wearing the blue ribbon in support of the victims. All except Walter White and Jr., Illustrating Jr's desire for closeness with his father after Skyler kicks him out, and illustrating Walt's desire to wash his hands of it as justification.
  • The light blue ribbon is also reminiscent of the color of Walt's Blue Sky meth.
  • A direct flight from Saint George, UT to Amarillo, TX wouldn't take the plane directly over Albuquerque, NM; especially at the altitude at which the two planes collided. There would also be no reason to make a stop under normal circumstances as the flight is only 4 hours long.
  • In the scene where the cousins blew up the truck, the footage of the explosion was filmed from far away using a long-focus lens. This had the effect of shallowing the perspective, and making the explosion appear much closer to the actors than it really was. They did it all in one take, and literally set the truck ablaze.
  • The news footage of a building on fire (ostensibly from being struck by Wayfarer 515 debris) was taken from televised footage of a real life fire that broke out at the Huning Castle Apartments at 15th & Central on August 4, 2009.
  • The number of Walt's temporary residence is 221, an homage to Sherlock Holmes' famous apartment number 221b. This homage is quite common, as seen in House M.D. and more.
  • Walt is shown having the impulse to cut the crusts off of his sandwich, something he'd done for the sandwiches he made for Krazy-8. ("Cat's in the Bag...",  "...and the Bag's in the River")
  • This is one of four episodes (along with "Crawl Space" "Dead Freight", and "Buyout") with no licensed music (only the original score by Dave Porter).

Production[]

Credits[]

Co-Starring

Uncredited

  • Holly Rice as Teacher
  • Erik Beacham as Rehab Patient
  • Kathryn Dove as Teacher
  • Will Ontiveros as High School Student

Featured Music[]

  • "The Cousins" by Dave Porter (during the episode teaser and when the cousins change their clothes)

Memorable Quotes[]

"I guess what I would want to say is to look on the bright side. First of all, nobody on the ground was killed, and that– I mean, an incident like this over a populated urban center– that right there, that's–that's just gotta be some minor miracle, so... Plus, neither plane was full. You know, the–the 737 was–was what? Maybe two-thirds full, I believe? Right, yes? Or maybe even three-quarters full. On any rate, what you're left with casualty-wise is just the 50th-worst air disaster. Actually, tied for 50th. There are, in truth, 53 crashes throughout history that are just as bad or worse. Tenerife? Has–has anybody–anybody heard of Tenerife? No? In 1977, two fully-loaded 747s crashed into each other on Tenerife. Does anybody know how big a 747 is? I mean, it's way bigger than a 737, and we're talking about two of them. Nearly 600 people died from Tenerife. But do any of you even remember it at all? Any of you? I doubt it. You know why? It's because people move on. They just move on. And we will, too. We will move on and we will get past this. Because that is what human beings do, we survive."
―Walter at the high school assembly about the air crash.

Skyler: "You’re a drug dealer."
Walter: "No. What? How? What?"
Skyler: "Yeah. How else could you possibly make that kind of money? Marijuana. That Pinkman kid. No? Oh, my God, Walt. Cocaine?"
Walter: "It’s methamphetamine. But I’m a manufacturer. I’m not a dealer per se. It doesn’t mean–no, Skyler! Listen to me. Skyler, listen! No, no! There are a lot of angles to this, okay? It’s complicated, all right? So please, let’s–please, let’s just sit back down and talk it through."
―Skyler confronting Walter on his inexplicable sudden financial resources.

Jesse: "You either run from things or you face them, Mr. White."
Walter: "Now what exactly does that mean?"
Jesse: "I learned it in rehab. It's all about accepting who you really are. I accept who I am."
Walter: "And who are you?"
Jesse: "I'm the bad guy."
―Walter and Jesse's conversation.

  

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