You know that specific feeling in your chest
when you're on a really serious roller coaster?
Oh yeah. The anticipation. Right. But I'm not
talking about the drop itself. The drop is just
pure adrenaline. I mean, that that click click
of the chain lift. You're inching up this impossibly
steep hill. The gears are just grinding underneath
you and you look down and see the entire park
laid out below. Everyone looks like tiny ants.
Exactly. It's so quiet up there. You feel like
a god just looking down at the world. You are
for this fleeting, terrifying moment gliding
over all of it. And then, well, gravity remembers
you exist. That is honestly it's the perfect
metaphor. That is exactly the sensation we are
dealing with today. We aren't just talking about
a television show here. We are dissecting the
precise moment of apex in this universe. That
split second of weightlessness right before the
screaming starts. Welcome back to the deep dive.
Today we are opening the file on gliding overall.
This is the mid -season finale of Season 5, the
eighth episode. It aired back on September 2,
2012. And if you were watching live, you probably
remember the sound of your own jaw hitting the
floor in those final seconds. It is a massive,
pivotal piece of television history. And honestly,
it's a really difficult thing to watch in some
ways because it's so cold. Our mission today
is to figure out why this specific 47 minutes
works the way it does. We're going to look at
the ruthless consolidation of power. You know,
the transition from a desperate cook to a legitimate
kingpin. Yeah, and we're going to dig into the
production notes regarding that famous pile of
money. And I mean, we are going to get into the
actual physics of that money. We have this fascinating
debate between the creator and the prop master
about whether that much cash is even physically
possible to accumulate in that time frame. And
we're going to break down the irony. The central
irony of the entire story really culminates right
here. You have a criminal mastermind who uses
high tech surveillance, complex chemistry, international
logistics, and yet He's undone by a bathroom
book. Exactly. He's ultimately undone by something
as analog as a book of poetry in a bathroom.
It's the ultimate pivot point. We've got plot
summaries. We have critical reception data from
2012 and some very specific production notes
on the callbacks hidden in the background that
you definitely missed on the first watch. So
let's get into the weeds. Let's do it. We have
to start with the cleanup. It doesn't start with
a bang. It starts with a hum. We're at Vimono's
pest and immediately. The narrative is forcing
you to remember where we started. We see Walter
White and Todd Awquist disposing of Mike Ermentrott's
body. They're using the hydrofluoric acid barrel
method. Which is a massive callback to the second
ever episode, Cats in the Bag. Yeah. But the
vibe here is completely different. Think back
to that first season. Jesse and Walt were panicking.
They didn't know which plastic to use. The bathtub
literally fell through the ceiling. It was visceral,
grotesque, and totally amateur. It was a trauma.
Right. In the beginning, the disposal of a body
was the moment he realized he was in hell. He
was retching. He was crying here. It's just a
chore. It's a Tuesday. The direction here really
emphasizes the mechanical nature of it all. They
are breaking down the body of a man who is essentially
the third lead, a character the audience really
loved, and they are treating him like hazardous
waste. They are checking their watches. They
are just rolling barrels. It's so sanitized.
And then Jesse walks in. This interaction really
struck me in the source notes. Jesse's the only
one acting like a human being in this room. He's
rattled. He asks, did you do it? And notice the
language used in response. He doesn't say I killed
him. He doesn't say Mike is dead. He says he's
gone. Gone. It's such a soft word. It's a very
soft word for a bullet to the stomach. It's a
politician's word. It is entirely passive voice.
It removes the agency. If Muck is gone, it sounds
like he moved to Florida or retired to a golf
course. Doesn't sound like he was murdered by
a river. This is really the first clear indicator
in this specific deep dive of his psychological
state. He has completely compartmentalized the
violence. He has separated the physical act from
the reality of it. And the dynamic between them
has shifted so much. Jesse isn't just asking
about Mike as a friend. He brings up a legitimate
business problem. Mike had nine guys in prison.
They were being paid hazard pay to keep their
mouths shut about the operation. No Mike means
no payments. No payments means that they talk.
Jesse is spiraling, asking, how do we handle
this? And look at the reaction. He doesn't panic.
In previous seasons, this would have been a sky
is falling moment. He would be in his underwear
in the living room, hyperventilating, asking
Jesse what to do. Here, he's just dismissive.
He tells Jesse, effectively, you're out. I'll
handle it. It feels exactly like a corporate
firing. It feels like he's laying off a mid -level
employee. That's because he is. He is the CEO
now. Jesse is the redundancy. He dismisses him
not to protect him, but because Jesse's conscience
is a massive liability. He has a solution in
mind that he knows Jesse absolutely won't stomach.
He doesn't want the argument. He just wants the
execution. Which brings us to the cafe scene.
The meeting with Lydia Rodarte Coyle. Now Lydia
is a character who usually vibrates with anxiety.
She's always frantic, but here she's sitting
across the table and the tension is different.
It's not just anxiety. It's terror. It's the
tension of a prey animal sitting right across
from a creditor. She knows what happened to Mike.
Yeah. She is not stupid. She knows that house
is being cleaned. When he asked for the list
of the nine prisoners, she knows that list is
her death warrant. She understands the transaction.
perfectly. Once she hands over that piece of
paper, she has absolutely zero value. And in
this new world order, things without value are
discarded. So she pivots. And this is where the
empire aspect really kicks in. She appeals to
the one thing she knows he loves more than power,
which is expansion. She pitches the Czech Republic,
which seems so random at first glance. Why the
Czech Republic? Why not Mexico or Canada? It's
actually a brilliant piece of world building.
based on real drug trade logistics. Lydia explains
that the domestic market is stable, maybe even
a bit saturated, but the Czech Republic has a
remarkably high percentage of meth users. Historically,
this is actually true. Pervitin, which was a
methamphetamine brand, was huge in that region
during the 20th century. It's a massive, untapped
market for a high -purity product like the Blue
Sky. She's offering him a global franchise. And
you can see his eyes light up. He's not just
a local kingpin anymore. He's an international,
distinct brand. He's Coca -Cola. Precisely. And
that appeals to his ego in a way nothing else
could. But here is the detail from the production
notes that genuinely gave me chills. The hat.
The hat on the table? We've seen that pork pie
hat a million times. It's a symbol. Yeah. But
in this scene, it's a hiding spot. After Lydia
leaves, having successfully pitched the check
deal and saved her own life, he picks up the
hat. And what is underneath it? The vial of ricin.
The ricin he had already. That is the blink and
you'll miss it horror of this scene. He didn't
go to that coffee shop to negotiate. He went
there to execute her. public place. If she hadn't
come up with that check distribution scheme in
that exact moment, she would have been dead within
24 hours. He would have slipped it right into
her stevia. It really underscores how far he's
fallen. Murder isn't the last resort anymore.
It's his opening move. It's just a tool in the
toolbox, as mundane as a wrench. And speaking
of murder as a business strategy, we have to
talk about the prison hits. This sequence, this
is arguably the darkest point of his entire career.
He has the list now. He takes it to Uncle Jack
and the Aryan Brotherhood. This is a significant
downgrade in the quality of his associates, isn't
it? He went from Gus Fring, who was this buttoned
up terrifyingly polite businessman, a real pillar
of the community, to Jack Welker, who is, well,
he's a Nazi thug. It shows his desperation or
perhaps just his complete apathy. He doesn't
care about the ideology or the optics anymore.
He just needs a blunt instrument. He tells Jack
he wants all 10 men, the nine prisoners plus
their lawyer, Dan Wachsberger, taken out. And
the logistical demand is insane. He wants them
all killed within a two minute window. across
three different prisons. Even Uncle Jack, who
literally kills people for a living, says, that's
hard. That's really hard. He tries to explain
the sheer complexity of it. And this is the line
that defines this era of the character. He looks
at Jack and says, figure it out. Figure it out.
It's pure arrogance. It's the manager who sets
an impossible deadline and leaves the engineers
to suffer. He takes absolutely no responsibility
for the how, only the result. He's buying a service
and he expects delivery. And the result is brutal.
The montage that follows is set to this upbeat
music, but the imagery is horrific. Stabbings,
burnings, beatings. The source notes say this
entire montage takes less than two minutes of
screen time. Which perfectly matches the window
of the murders. It's rhythmic. It's incredibly
efficient. But the most important shot isn't
the stabbings. It's what he is doing while this
is happening. He's at home. He's looking at a
painting. Right. And this is a deep cut for the
super fans. The painting he's staring at, it
shows a woman in a rowboat leaving a larger ship,
is the exact same painting from the season two
episode bit by a deadbeat. Oh, wow. I totally
missed that on the rewatch. What is the significance
of that specific painting? Why bring it back
now? Context is everything here. In season two,
he was in the hospital. He was faking a fugue
state to explain why he had been missing when
he was actually kidnapped by Tuco. He was staring
at that painting, feeling trapped, powerless
and terrified. He was lying to his family just
to survive another day. And now? Now he's standing
in his own living room, holding a glass of something
nice, staring at the exact same painting while
he orchestrates the simultaneous murder of ten
people. He's looking at the same image, but the
man looking at it has completely transformed.
He's no longer the victim in the boat. He's the
storm. Really measures the distance he has traveled.
From a desperate man in a hospital gown to a
kingpin ordering a massacre from the comfort
of his home. Exactly. And the massacre is completely
successful. The lawyers killed. The nine henchmen
are killed. The threat of exposure from Mike's
crew is neutralized. And with the threat gone.
The business just explodes. This is where we
enter the empire business phase of our outline.
We get another montage, this time set to Crystal
Blue Persuasion by Tommy James and the Shondels,
which can I just say is a perfect music choice.
It is iconic, but it's also deceptive. The song
is dreamy, almost psychedelic. It's about peace
and love and higher consciousness. Look over
yonder. What do you see? The sun is rising. Most
definitely. But on screen, we are seeing the
industrial scale manufacturing of a deadly narcotic.
We see the vats, the blue crystals, the shipping
crates. It suggests a smooth, easy ride. And
the source notes highlight the passage of time
here. This is crucial. The script indicates the
next few months past during this song. That time
jump is huge. We often think of this story as
happening over a very compressed timeline. The
whole narrative is only about two years of his
life. But here, months pass in a blink. boring,
highly profitable success. And the money, oh
my god, the money is just rolling in. Billions
of dollars. Which leads to the scene that I think
absolutely everyone remembers from this deep
dive, the storage unit. Skyler brings him to
the storage unit to show him the reality of his
success. She pulls back that tarp and there it
is, a pile of money. The source notes estimate
it to be roughly six feet long, three feet wide,
and two feet deep. It is a physical manifestation
of too much. It looks like a solid block of masonry,
but made entirely of cash. Skyler admits she
can't launder it anymore. It's too much for the
car wash. She can't weigh it. She can't count
it. She says, I stopped counting. I just waited.
It's fascinating. Skyler reaches a breaking point,
not because of immediate physical danger, but
because of logistics. The sheer volume of cash
has become a burden she simply cannot manage.
It's no longer an asset. It's a storage problem.
Now, here is where it gets really interesting,
and this is why I love digging into these sources.
There is a production fact in the notes about
a debate regarding exactly how much money was
actually in that pile. Yes. This is fantastic
detail. In the later episode, Ozymandias, it's
claimed the pile was $80 million. $80 million.
That is a staggering amount of cash. However,
Vince Gilligan actually expressed doubts about
this figure in a podcast later on. Really? So
the creator himself didn't think it was that
much. Well, he asked the prop master, Mark Hanson,
he said, is this realistic? Does that physical
pile look like 80 million? Hanson and his team
actually did the math. They calculated the volume
of the bills. They figured if it was a mix of
20s, 50s, and hundreds, the volume shown on screen
would indeed be somewhere in the vicinity of
80 to 90 million dollars. OK, so the math works
out for the volume. The math of the physical
pile works perfectly, but Gilgen admitted they
might have, and I quote from the source here,
erred on the side of showmanship regarding whether
he could actually earn that much that quickly.
Even with the check deal. Netting $80 million
in three months is incredibly optimistic. Ah,
I see. So the pile accurately represents $80
million, but the timeline might be a bit of a
stretch, even for a high -tech operation. Exactly.
But visually, it serves its absolute purpose.
It answers the question he has been asking himself
since day one. How do I provide for my family?
The answer is lying there under a tarp, and it
is more than they could spend in 10 lifetimes.
It's monstrous. And that leads to Skyler's question,
the question that finally breaks the spell. She
asks him, how much is enough? She wants her life
back. She wants her children back. And she presents
the pile not as a trophy, but as a dead end.
She's asking for a metric. How big does the pile
have to be before we can go back to being human
beings? And surprisingly, he listens. He eventually
tells Skyler he is out. If you compare this to
the earlier situations, where he was struggling
for pennies, negotiating with Tuco for a few
thousand dollars, frantically digging under the
floorboards, the contrast is stark. He has climbed
the mountain, he has the view, and now he decides
to walk back down. But you don't just walk away
from this life, do you? You have to make amends.
Or at least, he thinks he does. Section 3 of
our outline covers these reconciliations and
callbacks, and the first stop is Jesse. He visits
Jesse. And the vibe is, well, it's strange. Imagine
being Jesse right now. Your former partner knocks
on your door. The last time you saw him, he was
talking about handling Mike's guys. You're terrified.
It's a very tense scene. Jesse has a gun concealed.
We have to remember, Jesse is genuinely terrified
of him at this point. He thinks he is there to
tie up another loose end, just like Mike's guys.
He thinks he is about to be handled. But he isn't
there to kill him. He's there to pay him. He
leaves two bags on the porch. When Jesse unzips
them, he finds cash. It's the money Jesse was
owed. Plus, maybe more. It's the five million
he was owed. It's a peace offering. Or perhaps
a severance package. He's closing the book. He's
paying his debts. But look at Jesse's reaction.
He doesn't count it. He doesn't cheer. He slumps
against the wall. His relief is palpable. Not
because he's rich, but because he realizes he
isn't going to die today. He throws the gun away.
That's the real tragedy of Jesse's character
here. His greatest victory is simply surviving
his mentor. And then the family reunites, the
kids move back in, the sources, the family seems
to be in repair. It does. On the surface, everything
is returning to normal. But the production is
very clever about reminding us of the past. The
notes list several specific callbacks in this
section that are designed to trigger our memory.
to remind us that the rot is still very much
there. Oh, I love catching these. Let's run through
them. First, the fly. Right at the beginning
of the runtime, we see a fly buzzing in the Vamanos
pest office. This is a direct reference to the
highly polarizing episode, Fly, from season three.
Which was all about contamination and the obsession
with control. Exactly. Seeing it here suggests
that the contamination is still present. Even
if he thinks he's cleaning it all up, you can't
just swat it away. Then there's the paper towel
dispenser. in the restroom of the cancer clinic.
He goes for a scan and he sees the metal dispenser
is damaged. It's dented. This is a reference
to the episode four days out in season two. He
punched it back then. Why did he punch it again?
Remind me. Because he found out his cancer was
in remission. Back then that was actually bad
news because he fully expected to die and leave
the money, not live and had to deal with the
terrifying consequences of his crimes. Now he
sees the dent and it's a reminder of his own
survival. A reminder that he is still here, for
better or worse. That is such a deep cut. I love
that detail. And then the dialogue callbacks.
Lydia says, we're going to make a lot of money
together. Which directly echoes Tuco Salamanca
from the season one finale. It links the corporate,
nervous Lydia to the erratic, violent Tuco. It's
the exact same business, just a different dress
code. And he tells Lydia, learn to take yes for
an answer. Which is exactly what Mike told him
in the bar in 38 Snub. He is now adopting the
wisdom of the men he has killed. That is fascinating.
He's absorbing them. He wears the traits of his
defeated enemies almost like trophies. Precisely.
Now, there's one more detail in this section
from the notes that I find very interesting.
A cut scene. Oh, right. Peter Gould, one of the
writers and producers, revealed this. Apparently,
there was a scene written where the doctor explicitly
tells him his cancer is still in remission. But...
They cut it out completely. They cut it. They
wanted to keep his health status entirely ambiguous
for the audience. Why do you think that is? What
does that ambiguity add? Well, think about it.
If we know for sure he's healthy, his retirement
feels safe. It feels calculated. By leaving it
ambiguous, there's a lingering question. Is he
quitting because he finally won? Or is he quitting
because he feels the cancer coming back? Did
he get bad news off screen? It adds a complex
layer of uncertainty to his sudden contentment.
It makes us wonder if he knows the clock is ticking
again. That makes total sense. So he is retired,
the kids are home, money is hidden. We get to
section four of our deep dive, the fall. And
it happens in the most mundane setting imaginable.
Lunch by the pool. The Schraders, Hank and Marie
are over. Everyone is eating, laughing. The sun
is shining. It feels safe. It feels like the
whole story could just end right here. It is
the domestic bliss he claimed he was fighting
for from the very beginning. It's the ultimate
American dream tableau. And then nature calls.
Hank has to use the bathroom. And he needs reading
material. This is the moment, the absolute pivot
point of the entire saga. He rummages around
and finds a book hidden under some magazines.
Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman. Now, you and
I know this book. We've seen it before. Yale
Boetticher gave it to him. Gale, the brilliant
chemist he replaced, and ultimately ordered Jesse
to kill. Gale, who practically worshipped him.
Hank opens the book. He's literally just killing
time on the toilet. And he sees the inscription.
To my other favorite, WW. Sand Q the flashback.
Hank immediately remembers the case file. The
Gale Boetticher investigation. He remembers the
notebook with the exact same handwriting. He
remembers joking around about who WW could be.
Woodrow Wilson. Willy Wonka. Walter White. And
in that moment, in the bathroom, staring at the
handwriting, the realization just hits him. The
source notes point out that he matches the handwriting
in the initials. Perfectly. It's undeniable.
The monster he's been chasing for a year is his
own brother -in -law. Vince Gilligan called this
poetic justice from beyond the grave for Gale.
It really is. Gale, the gentle vegan chemist,
brings down the massive drug lord from the afterlife.
And there's a profound tragic irony here for
Hank, too. Earlier in the day, Hank was reminiscing
about a summer job he had tagging trees. He said
he wished he had a job where he didn't have to
chase monsters anymore. He was so tired of the
chase. And then he goes to the bathroom and finds
the monster. Right, in his own family. Sitting
at his patio table, under his nose the entire
time. The betrayal is total. The title of this
section, Gliding Overall, is actually from that
book, right? It is. It's poem 271 in Leaves of
Grass. The poem speaks of death and the soul
gliding over all things, over life, over death,
over the entire universe. It reads, gliding o
'er all, through all, through nature, time, and
space, as a ship on the waters advancing, the
voyage of the soul, not life alone. Death, many
deaths I'll sing. Death, many deaths I'll sing.
That is incredibly ominous. It suggests a sense
of finality. of seeing the whole picture. Just
like the rollercoaster view we talked about at
the start, he thought he was gliding over everything.
Untouchable, above the law, above basic morality.
But the poem reminds us that gliding inherently
includes death. You can't glide forever. Eventually
you land. And usually you land hard. Wow. Just
wow. It's such a powerful ending. Let's talk
about how the world reacted to this. Section
five. Reception and legacy. The reviews were
understandably glowing. This was a massive culture
-stopping cliffhanger. Matt Richenthal from TV
Fanatic gave it 4 .8 out of 5 stars. He specifically
noted the shock of seeing him find contentment.
That was the real twist. We all expected a shootout
or a fiery disaster. We didn't expect him to
just be happy. Richenthal wrote about the satisfaction
over a job well done, an emperor who no longer
needed an empire. We were lulled into a false
sense of security, just like the characters.
And Alan Sepinwall from HitFix called it an absolutely
gorgeous piece of work. He praised it visually
and narratively. It really set the stage for
the final run of episodes. And remember, the
audience had to wait a year or nearly a full
year to see what happened next. The ratings were
solid too. 2 .78 million viewers. Which, for
cable television in 2012, was a very strong number.
And crucially, the word of mouth from this specific
cliffhanger is what caused the ratings to practically
double when the show finally came back. Everyone
spent that entire year telling their friends,
you have to watch this. You won't believe how
it ends. And we absolutely have to mention the
awards. Kelly Dixon won the Emmy for single camera
picture editing. Well deserved. That prison montage
alone is a masterclass. And the crystal blue
persuasion montage. The editing was truly the
heartbeat of this entire narrative. Michelle
McLaren was also nominated for directing and
Michael Slovis for cinematography. It's a visual
stunning piece of work. The shadows, the framing
of the money pile, the painting. The Ringer ranked
it the 13th best out of all 62, which places
it firmly in the absolute top tier. So what does
this all mean for us? We've gone from the sheer
brutality of prison murders to the height of
financial success, only to be completely undone
by a book of poetry left in a bathroom. It brings
up that central question of enough. Schuyler
asked it directly. How much is enough? He thought
he had found the answer. He thought he could
just stop. But the universe has a way of balancing
the scales, doesn't it? It really does. The final
thought I want the listener to consider is this.
Would he actually have stayed retired if Hank
hadn't found that book? That is the ultimate
what -if. Was the contentment real? Or was it
just another passing phase? Was he getting bored
yet? We'll never know for sure. I strongly suspect
the boredom would have crept back in. He loved
the game too much. But because the book was found,
we get the collapse instead of the drift. The
past is never truly gone. It's always there,
gliding over all. I want you, the listener, to
go back and watch that final scene. Look at Hank's
face. Look at the mixture of confusion, betrayal,
and absolute horror. That is the exact moment
the world changed. It's the moment the gliding
stopped and the fall began. Thanks for listening
to this deep dive. We'll see you next time.