Shotgun

Shotgun
Season	4
Episode	5
Directed by	Michelle MacLaren
Written by	Thomas Schnauz
Running time	47 minutes
Air date	August 14, 2011
U.S. Viewers	TBA
← Previous	"Bullet Points"
Next →	"Cornered"

"Shotgun" is the fifth episode of the fourth season of Breaking Bad and the thirty-eighth episode altogether.

Teaser

Walter White races through busy Albuquerque streets, dodging traffic while shouting instructions to Saul Goodman on his cell phone. If Walt doesn't return within 24 hours, Saul is to deliver all of Walt's money to Skyler White. Walt then calls Skyler and leaves a message, telling her he loves her: evidently, Walt is heading into some kind of showdown.

Summary

Armed with his .38, Walt storms into Los Pollos Hermanos and demands to speak with Gustavo Fring. The manager says that Gus isn't there, but Walt doesn't believe her and says he'll wait for him to come. While he waits, Mike Ehrmantraut calls him to say that Jesse Pinkman will be with him for the day, and puts a blase Jesse on the phone. It's true. He's all right. But Walt will have to handle the cook alone. Walt pushes his way into Gus' office, only to find it empty.

Out in the desert, Mike drives up a long dirt road. Despite seeming not to care whether he lives or dies, Jesse positions his keys between his fingers to use as a weapon. He watches nervously as Mike exits the car and grabs a shovel from the trunk. Is this it? But Mike passes Jesse by and starts digging. After a few moments, Mike pulls a bag of money out of the ground and tosses it in the trunk. Mike tells Jesse that they have six more collections to make today.

At home, Hank Schrader jokes with Tim about the oddball personality that Gale's notebook evokes, it's "like Scarface had sex with Mr. Rogers." He then identifies Badger and Jesse as the only people directly tied to the blue meth . Hank admits to having "a history" with Jesse—meaning the savage beat down he delivered last season—but doubts that Jesse murdered Gale. Finding Gale dead, the man he now believes is his Heisenberg, "feels like closure," so he no longer wants to contribute to the investigation.

Mike makes his next pickup at an abandoned warehouse and finds Jesse standing guard when he returns to the car. If he's accompanying Mike "in a guard-type capacity," says Jesse, then he needs a gun. He doesn't, Mike replies, implying he's not going to guard anything here.

As the pickups continue, Jesse becomes increasingly bored and frustrated. If he's riding shotgun as "the guy" on this assignment, then Mike should tell him what they're doing and why.

Mike abruptly pulls the car over and barks that in no way is Jesse "the guy." There may be some reason Gus has for sending Jesse on this mission, but Mike does not know it. "Sit here, shut up, and stay in the car," Mike says.

In the lab, Walt has difficulty managing both his and Jesse's portions of the cook preparation. While the batch cooks, Walt returns home to sign papers finalizing the loan to buy the car wash. For them to succeed going forward, Skyler tells Walt, they have to be completely honest with each other. "I'm all for that," Walt assures her.

Skyler then plays her phone messages and hears Walt say that he loves her. The two stare at each other meaningfully for a moment, then rush into the bedroom in the heat of passion. Later, Walter Jr. arrives home and realizes that his parents are having (or just had) sex. Skyler frets over Walter Jr.'s reaction and suggests that Walt move back home "so it's easier to explain to everyone." Walt kisses Skyler in reply.

Later, back at the lab, Walt drops a barrel of methylamine while struggling with the forklift. Fed up, he screams at the security camera that the cook is a two-man job. He's not cooking anything until Jesse returns. A while later Tyrus Kitt arrives at the lab and operates the forklift for Walt. Jesse's not coming just because Walt asks for him.

Mike makes the final pickup of the evening at another abandoned warehouse. While he's inside, a second vehicle arrives, and Jesse notices one of its occupants approaching Mike's car with a shotgun. Jesse, convinced Mike is about to be robbed, shifts into reverse, floors it, knocks the guy to the ground, and slams into the other car. Then he peels out in an attempt to lose the gunman and his cohort.

A bit later, Jesse catches up with Mike elsewhere in town and tells him what went down outside the warehouse. "I saw," says Mike, impressed enough to finally let Jesse smoke in his car.

The next morning, over coffee in the White's kitchen, Walter Jr. tells Walt, "Mom said you're moving back in.” It's news to Walt, whose face tightens when he notices that Walter Jr. is drinking out of a Beneke mug.

Later at the lab, Jesse tells Walt that he spent the previous day guarding Mike and bristles when Walt makes light of the notion. Two dudes tried to rob them, Jesse retorts, and he took care of business.

Mike and Gus rendezvous outside Los Pollos Hermanos. Everything with Jesse went the way Gus planned, Mike reports. "The kid's a hero," he says. The gunman clearly was a plant, and Gus set it all up for Jesse's benefit.

At Hank and Marie's house for dinner, Walt anxiously swills wine in the kitchen as Skyler discusses the car wash. When Hank jokingly refers to Walt as famous card shark Nick the Greek, Marie criticizes him for enabling Walt's gambling addiction.

Walter Jr. changes the subject to the Boetticher case. Hank says that he's stopped working on it, but praises Gale as not merely a cook but a five-star meth "chef": a bona fide genius. Walt, by now a little tipsy, can't let someone else take credit for his work. He dismisses the "Lab Notes" journal as "simple rote copying, probably of someone else's work". Skyler looks on disbelievingly as Walt muses that "this genius" of Hank's might still be at large.

The next morning, Hank tells Marie—in a more polite tone than he has used with her in quite some time, even apologising for making a small mess on the kitchen table—that he's resumed looking into the Boetticher case. Looking through police photographs taken in Gale's apartment, Hank notices a napkin from Los Pollos Hermanos, with some letters and numbers—perhaps a serial or model number for some product—inked at the bottom.

Reflecting on Gale's dietary habits, Hank wonders aloud to Marie, "Since when do vegans eat fried chicken?"

Credits

Main Cast

• Bryan Cranston as Walter White
• Anna Gunn as Skyler White
• Aaron Paul as Jesse Pinkman
• Dean Norris as Hank Schrader
• Betsy Brandt as Marie Schrader
• Bob Odenkirk as Saul Goodman (credit only)
• Giancarlo Esposito as Gustavo Fring
• Jonathan Banks as Mike Ehrmantraut

Supporting Cast

• Nigel Gibbs as Sgt. Tim Roberts
• Ray Campbell as Tyrus Kitt
• Ashley Kajiki as Cynthia
• Rutherford Cravens as Alan

Trivia

• The episode title, "Shotgun" is a reference to both Jesse riding shotgun with Mike and to the shotgun the attacker is holding when approaching Jesse.
• There's a slight reference to the pilot episode of the show in this episode. At the table, Hank says "I've got your wipe-down right here" and grabs his crotch; this is very similar to what Walter said and did to Bogdan as he was leaving the job.
• The song Jesse humming while he waits in the car during the final pickup is Fallacies by TwaüghtHammër (Jesse's old band in the show).

Featured Music

• "Aztek" by Dave Porter (as Walt drives from the superlab to Pollos Hermanos)
• "1977" by Ana Tijoux (during the pickups montage & montage of Walt cooking alone)
• "The 808 Track" by Bassnectar (when Jesse turns on the radio during the pickups montage)
• "Fallacies" by TwaüghtHammër, performed by Aaron Paul as Jesse (while he waits in the car during the final pickup)
• "Corrido de Tiburcio Calderon" by Arturo Salas (playing from Garcia's diner as Mike meets up with Jesse after the attack)
• "Unknown Track #4" by Unknown Artist (playing in Jesse's earphones as Walt arrives at the lab)

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