beasts of the southern wild

movies:  The movie Beasts Of The Southern Wild was released to a very limited number of theaters back in July and is now getting its opportunity at art house theaters around the country.  It is a movie directed by Behn Zeitlan about a somewhere post-Katrina Louisiana where families are trying to make due and just survive.  It's setting is so amazing to watch.  You see people living in a world that you know is more or less the present that looks so disorienting in its presentation because you can hardly believe it could exist in your own world.  The lives of these people is primitive, with the farming of animals in stilt raised homes that barely look like anything we could conceive as such, with nothing in their lives besides the occasional bottle of alcohol that resembles the world we know.  There seem to be no jobs, no money, no commerce beyond the bartering of goods.  The characters seems to exist in world that while we know is our own, it seems impossible.  And the only real glimpse of our world is seen from a boat made out of the cover of the bed of a pickup truck floating down a river built of flood looking out over an industrial complex that appears to be at least remotely modern.  Yet we know, in that inexplicable way that you just know, this is in our world.  This does really exist.
The story of this world is told through the eyes of Hush Puppy, a young girl stuck in this hard luck life because she was born into it.  As we watch the juxtaposition of her life the story is put in motion.  Her youth gives her seeming love for all things that represent life.  We see her even holding small animals up to her ear to listen to their heartbeat to understand them better.  The other side is her father.  A man who has been beaten down by his circumstance, being stuck in this primitive world could be better if he were just elsewhere.  He takes solace in a bottle(although we don't even know if those bottles are filled with alcohol since Hush Puppy drinks water out of those bottle in place of cups or a real water bottle), takes his sadness out on his daughter, and ultimately struggles to find peace.  Despite this difficult relationship, Hush Puppy and her father do clearly love each other.  This is seen as they play primitive and often animalistic games together, breaking things and yelling like animals as they smile together.
That story is book-ended by Zeilan showing opposite sides of how one deals with a very basic human circumstance: death.  At the beginning of the movie Hush Puppy does a voice over to a celebration of a funeral, stating that in the bathtub - that part of New Orleans below the levee where the water won't go down, there are no tears, they celebrate the life of those who die because they need something to celebrate, it is their only time to celebrate.  The images of people drinking and laughing, fireworks going off while Hush Puppy runs through the woods with sparklers streaming from her hands, seems like the epitome of how to celebrate life even in the face of the horrible adversity these people have endured.  Maybe it even seems that epitome because of that adversity.  By the end of the movie that celebration of life holds less meaning when Hush Puppy's father dies of a terminal illness.  She sits by his side watching him go, and as tears streak down her face he tells her that in the bathtub there are no tears.  Not only can she not hold her tears back despite her father's words but his come as well, despite his own words of strength, as he looks upon the loving and wonderful child he is about to leave to that cruel world in which they both live.  Then that meaning is restored through that love of life that only a child can continue to have.
That world is most well summed up by Hush Puppy's teacher.  She tells her class that we are the same as animals.  All we are is meat, flesh, food, part of a world in which all beings fight for survival and those that stay alive are the ones who find another piece of meat that can sustain them just a little while longer.  And that is what this movie is really about.  It is a movie set in a world that looks so unlike anything we want to acknowledge would be a part of our own with characters that have nothing that looks like a life we want to acknowledge could exist in modern day let alone in our own country.  They are people - Hush Puppy and her friends, her father and his, fighting for survival every day from the moment they wake up till the moment to go to bed.  They kill and cook what they eat.  They use what is left to them to get around, from old trucks to a broken abandoned row boat.  They are beasts looking to survive in the wild.  Meat and flesh hoping not to be bested and have their little bit of the wilderness stripped of them.  And that wild in which those southern beasts live, while looking so different from our own, only reflects what it is that we go through every day.  Work, eat, pray, love, dance, cry (as long as tears are allowed in your bathtub).  We are all beasts in the wild.  And as Hush Puppy says, people will look back and see how we lived and how we survived and they will know who we are.  And who are we?  Despite our cell phones and our internet and our high rise condos, we are all just beasts, just meat and flesh.

last resort

tv:  Last Resort, the new show from creator Shawn Ryan, formerly known for his creating The Shield, is an intense action drama.  It is about a submarine crew who, after refusing some questionable orders to nuke Pakistan - which the United States has invaded in this version of the current political/military landscape, is fired upon by another U.S. submarine.  Once this is discovered the crew fuses the order, which the American Government fires upon them for, and decides to dock at a remote island nearby (the same coast of Hawaii that Lost was filmed on) while they decide what the next step is in order to hopefully stave off another attack.  It is hard to be honest about what this show appeared to be based on the trailers.  It looked ridiculous   The trailer was filled with insanely pretty people being wildly dramatic and delivering poorly executed lines about submarine procedures while Andre Braugher stared into the camera and said he would reign down hell upon those watching commercials.  Despite my better judgement, I watched the pilot.  Thankfully, my better judgement sucks.
The show was a wild and exciting action story, something that is hard to do on television (seriously you can count on one hand the good action shows that have ever been on TV).  It gave viewers a ton of characters that were either immediately interesting and endearing or could be built upon to create endearment.  Scott Speedman was very good as the young heartfelt, homesick XO of the sub, Sam Kendal, who is just trying to get home to his wife who he seemingly has the perfect, wholesome relationship.  Daisy Betts, who plays Lieutenant Grace Shepherd, was very believable (despite being so literally unbelievably hot) as the young woman growing into her role as a person of authority in a man's world.  Also she gives the potential, because of her beauty on top of her character's character, to create complications in Kendal's seemingly perfect marriage while they are stranded on an island together.  Robert Patrick is perfectly cast as the surly chief of the boat who would just be damn miserable anywhere.  And then there is Andre Braugher.  I know I just made fun of him in the previous paragraph, but he was great.  And in the moment in the episode, staring down the barrel of the camera, he is every bit as tough and kick-ass as he ever was as Frank Pembleton.  The characters with a chance to grow are there too.  There is the young Navy Seal James King, played both recklessly and tragically by Daniel Lissing.  He clearly has something to do with why our characters are in this situation and as that story unfolds hopefully the sadness he seems to feel will bring a complexity to his character as he drinks himself into a stupor, with gun by his side that he is clearly not afraid to use to show he is a "tough guy", at the local island bar.  Then there is the bartender serving him drinks.  Played by Dichen Lachman, known by fanboys round the world for her role on Joss Whedon's Dollhouse and so far without a name on the show, she seems like given her profession as barkeep, with the Seal pouring his soul and secrets out to her could be fun to watch as the lone nonmilitary perspective in this whole universe.  And there are two characters in Washington, an Admiral, who of course is Lieutenant Shepherd's father, who will come to the aid of our stranded crew against the American regime.  The other is Autumn Reeser's Kylie Sinclair, who I must say had the worst (and yet best) introduction of the show as she displayed that she is somehow connected to the military through some technological company that was "clearly" explained by having her do sexy technobabble in her underwear.  Whatever it was that she was saying, I can't decide if it made no sense or I was distracted, will clearly develop into something that unravels a larger picture than the government just saying screw you for not bombing Pakistan.   Wow, that really was a damn lot of characters.  But really looking forward that is what the show most has to work with.
The pilot, and its commercials, were all about an action show on a sub.  But as the episode ended they were off the sub and looking to settle on their "no man's land" island until order in the American government and military could be restored.  The show that looked like a cheap knock off of Crimson Tide is already over. It is off the submarine and now on an island.
I guess the long and short of it is that Shawn Ryan has a lot to work with.  The show moving forward looks very little like the show we have been seeing ads for for weeks.  He has a ton of characters who are going to have to develop and shed light on the series now that they have been established.  And maybe most importantly he has to sell audiences on the fact that for the next handful of years (assuming the show's success) that the American Government and its President are villains and that the rogue submarine crew is more worth rooting for.  But if you really want to be sold just kick back, watch, enjoy (especially the cheesy but fun crossing the equator scene) and marvel at how unbelievably tough Andre Braugher is in the final ten minutes of the episode after sitting through some surprisingly entertaining exposition (which is basically, despite the action what the whole episode is).
I don't know how good this show will be moving forward since it appears that it will be drastically different from the pilot we saw.  More of a day to day dealing with island gangsters than Crimson Tide.  Not to mention the unending Lost(Kendal/Shepherd/King=Shepherd/Austin/Sawyer) and Galactica(Braugher is basically Adama and Patrick does a great Tigh imitation).  But the pilot was damn fun and damn cool and a rare good action television show.  But one last time I will come back to it:  Andre Braugher is awesome.  He yells "Battlestations!" like he is the Old Man(ok I made the joke anyways) running from Cylons and then stares down a camera and goes back in time to when he was the most bad-ass dude on television in Homicide Life On The Streets back before the Wire ruined network cop shows.  Screw it, Pembleton is from Baltimore, he could have hung with McNulty or any of those guys.

awkward season finale

tv:  I have spent the past year, dating back to last summers first season of Awkward referring to it as "that shitty high school show on MTV."  But who am I kidding.  That is just too easy.  Sure it is a high school dramedy on a network more famously known for its reality shows than the music in its name, but it is time to come to terms with the how I really feel and what seems to be the truth:  Awkward, arguably the best show about high school on television, just ended its second season.  And in doing so it was almost one hundred percent on point.
The second season was built mainly around the love triangle created at the end of the first season, between Jenna, Mattie, and Jake.  The season one ended with Jenna shunning Mattie to be with Jake and Mattie wanting to fight to get her back but not being sure how to do so without hurting his best friend, Jake's, feelings.  That conflict drove the season and was at best interesting, until the show decided to real show its chops.  A little more than half way through the season, Awkward did a two part episode centered around the wedding of Jenna's mom, Lacey's, best friend Ally, played in brilliantly insane bitchy out of control way by Barret Swatek, referring to Jenna as Li'l Bitch.  At that point in the season the show had been kind of meandering its way through a more or less typical love triangle.  But all of a sudden, in an episode that could have been "just another episode", the shows tension began to mount.  Jenna wastrying to figure out how to show her true emotions to Jake after he said he loved her while her mom, at that point separated from her father, was facing seeing a former sweetheart at the wedding, that could permanently put an end to her marriage.  While all of that even seemed not so interesting, both men on the outside looking in decided to fight back; Mattie and Jenna's dad, Kevin.  And as all the secrets that had been building up over the first season and half of the show began to be revealed, viewers were left with a brutal part one cliff hanger and an even more brutal part two as all of the aftermath of finding out truths was revealed that ran at a surprising emotional depth.  The other true highlight of the season was the second to last episode, Once Upon A Blog (I feel weird using the word "penultimate", typically associated with second to last episodes, when not talking about shows like Breaking Bad or Game of Thrones).  This was a great episode because it really flew in the face of a common theme in shows about teenagers and relationships.  It was the story of Jenna trying to sort out what she wanted to when faced with the ultimatum by Jake and Mattie to choose who she wanted to be with.  She began to fantasize about how much better things would have been if she had just been more honest.  We got a fake scenario of how things would have been if she had been up front about her displeasure over Mattie's unwillingness to DTR (as Jenna's BFF Tamara would say).  And then there is a scenario where Jenna tells Jake before their first kiss about her past relationship with Mattie.  In a conventional show we are taught that to just be open and honest is always best.  But Jenna sees nothing go right.  A brilliant move by the creators to show, not that lying is the way to go, but to show that just the simple virtue of honesty is not enough to insure happiness.
That brings us to last nights finale (finally), which aired last night.  With Jenna having chosen Mattie over Jake, the tension of the show centered around a potential trip to Europe for the school that Jenna wanted to go on but would have to without Mattie.  As she waded her way through her decision making process, she got opinions from all sides.  Val, the counselor/principal, and one of the funniest characters maybe ever (see her Baby Got Back callback in this episode), was not only encouraging her to go but encouraging her parents to make financial sacrifices so that she could.  Her best friend Tamara, and even Mattie, were supportive of the trip.  Even her mom, who has proven to not be the worlds best mom after admitting she wrote the letter that kick-started the series among a plethora of other mistakes, gives Jenna rather heartfelt advice about why she should take this great opportunity and go.  Still Jenna is having doubts, considering spending the summer at camp with Mattie, where they first hooked up.
This is a great idea for a way to end the school year, and the season, until the final scene.  There, as Jenna doubts herself, we see her looking out onto the dance floor at Tamara and Jake, who halfway through episode became a thing, dancing together.  Jake the third in the season long triangle, Tamara who she gave her trip to Europe to.  There is an ambiguity about who her doubt is geared towards.  It could be geared at Tamara and her chance to go to Europe.  But based on the Jenna's mom gives her and a story about her high school sweetheart, that comes back in something Mattie says right at the end of the episode, her doubt could be geared towards Jake and the decision she made to be with Mattie.  It could even be both.  The show to that point had been all about how good things were going.  And yes, the love triangle was the main conflict of the season, and yes the show is built around Jenna's ability to step in it and make her life more awkward and harder, but the season was coming to an end.  Why not let that conflict be at and end and create a new one in the form of tension over Jenna making a decision about Europe that reflects her turning into her mom, who is exactly who she doesn't want to be, so that we have have something new to move forward with?
Despite my preference for specificity in the end of the episode, like all the other episodes of Awkward, this one was right on.  It hit all the emotional beats and drove home all of the major plots of the season.  But most importantly it seems to be a good representation of what its like to be a teenager.  They do drink.  They do have sex.  They do swear (although it is bleeped since MTV is not HBO).  And Jenna's best friends, Ming and Tamara, give a great look at other points of view on life high school while being interesting and hysterically funny.  I don't think I"d even be going too far to say that Tamara is the best part of the show.  And maybe most importantly, they are incredibly overly dramatic and awkward.  As long as those truths continue to be the foundation of the show Jenna, and the most amazing Tamara and all her awesome catch phrases, will continue to make Awkward not what we feel it should be, that shitty MTV show, but what it is, really damn good.

boardwalk empire season 3

tv:  Sunday night Boardwalk Empire returned for its third season in a very interesting place.  The end of the second season wrapped up almost all of the story lines that led to the end to the season.  Nucky beat his plethora of charges and evaded prison while managing to deal with the overthrow in Atlantic City lead by his former driver, James Darmody.  Agent Van Alden was forced to flee to the Chicago suburb of Cicero after being accused of murder.  The only loose end was the repercussion of Margaret signing the highway deed over to the local church and how Nucky would handle that.  It almost felt like that could have been the very Sopranos-esque life goes on ending that the story deserved.  But it wasn't the end.  The story of prohibition gangsters in Atlantic City moves on.
The story picks up a year and half later at the dawn of 1923.  Nucky is living large as the kingpin of Atlantic City once again, in thanks, largely, to Margaret's handing over the deed to the highway and making them the most generous benefactors in town.  He is also now the full gangster that the now deceased Darmody told him he would have to be in the pilot when he famously said, "You can't be half a gangster."  No longer looking for forgiveness and embracing who he is we find ourselves with a gun toting Nucky now recommending so bluntly that his problems be dealt with by putting bullets in peoples heads.
The episode tracks him through he and Margaret's New Years Eve party highlighted by many familiar faces both historically true and made up such as Arnold Rothstein, Lucky Luciano, and the lovable buffoon, Doyle.  Nucky has also now aligned himself with Manny Horvitz, played by the devastatingly creepy William Forsythe, who gets sent out to take care of the hit on the wheel man for the thief for whom that aforementioned bullet to the head was meant.
The B story of the episode is about Darmody's son, mother, and friend, Richard Harrow, played by Jack Huston as a sympathetic, mangled war hero turned cold-blooded killer who views himself as nothing but a soldier who hasn't really returned from the war.  Harrow is given the charge of taking care of Jimmy's son as almost a nanny while his mom, Gillian, played by Gretchen Mol, looks to turn the Darmody house into a brothel.  Gillian spends her time trying to turn herself into her grandson's mother while Richard looks to teach him about his past and true parents.
The show did very little to create a conflict, or even a story over its first hour back this year.  Without a driving story to compensate for the lack of universality, this is about a specific place and time, not like Mad Men where the Draper's story could be anyone's story in any time.  This, I believe, is going to be ok.  The threads are there.  A new potential villain has been introduced in the character of loose cannon Chip Rosetti who has not taken kindly to Nucky's new plan to sell only to Rothstein, and let interested parties buy from him.  Also the pending tension between Richard and Gillian could prove interesting as they fight over Jimmy's son's knowledge of the past.
I can only hope that Richard will prove to be a player in the episodes to come in more than a nanny capacity, which was alluded to when he shockingly and coldly dispatched of Manny (I wish Forsythe could have stayed on, but alas, the Mob Doctor had an appointment with him.).  He proved in season two to be one of the most interesting characters.  He gave a real sympathy to an unsympathetic world by using his tragedy, the mask he wears everyday, the brutality beneath it, and the burden of a soldier who has seen too much, to give meaning to the horrible world around him.
It is almost impossible after an episode such as this to look forward with any idea of what is going on.  Not because it was so confusing or suspenseful, but because there was so little to hang your hat on in terms of plot.  This may rub viewers the wrong way, but should come as no surprise.  Terrence Winter, the shows creator, was one of the key members of the Sopranos writing staff during season four and five when the show spent most of both of those seasons laying the groundwork for the ends with such subtlety that it seemed to go nowhere at all only to find by the end of the season that everything we saw did matter and we were in for a gripping end.  It is hard to say that that is what we are in for.  The pace could really pick up.  But based on how little was accomplished in terms of progressing the plot in this first episode, and the show runners track record, it certainly seems that way.  The only real struggle for the show at this point seems to be that it must overcome the loss of Michael Pitt as Darmody and the need to work Richard Harrow into a meaningful role in the story.  As the world of Boardwalk Empire unfolds, it appears that patience will have to be a virtue.  And in the meantime, soak in the sumptuous, beautiful world that you can literally see on your television: Atlantic City in a time gone by.

weeds says goodbye, and misses

tv:  Last Night the series finale of Weeds aired.  This is a show that started off with such a bang, earning critical and fan acclaim.  Mary Louise Parker was awe inspiring.  Kevin Nealon found a new home as one of the funniest men on television, a title he held long ago on Saturday Night Live.  We were introduced to Justin Kirk, who played uncle Andy, and learned to love his lost, sarcastic view of life.  But maybe most importantly we all bought into what Nancy was selling.  The show as a cutting edge look at life in the suburbs and the role that weed plays in that world.  It showed us the more or less harmless effect smoking it could have while the dealing aspect was shown as threatening.  Weeds was the freshest hottest show on TV.
As with most shows though, even premium cable shows that have shorter seasons, it may have outstayed its welcome after a full eight seasons on Showtime.  Having left Agrestic after the third season for different scenery and bigger stories, the show began to lack its initial impact.  It is not to say that Weeds was never good after the end of the third season.  It just wasn't as good, and was only good in flashes.  And that lack of impact as exactly how the show ended.
Watching the series finale I was surprised by how many important points they managed to touch on while not resonating emotionally at all.  Silas was finally able to acknowledge his love of his mother while achieving the independent life he always wanted.  Andy was finally able to break free of Nancy's hold and create a fulfilling life for himself, caring for his child with his wife Megan (yes "deaf" Megan) and running a legal marijuana business.  And maybe most importantly, Shane agreed to seek the help, through rehab and therapy, that he has needed since the show began.  All of these character growths viewers had been waiting for the entire series were overshadowed, however, by an unnecessary trip into nostalgia with long lost characters who no long have a place in Nancy's world, a total lack of conflict, the need to create an end for the character of Doug, who is the only character not named Botwin to be in every episode, that ended up feeling more forced than emotional.  The nostalgia of old characters is a common theme in bad ends to shows and Weeds didn't disappoint, bring back Dean and Guillermo and Sanjay amongst many others who have been absent from the story for years.  This was justified by making them part of Nancy's legal weed distribution company.  It is a nice notion, but these characters were bid farewell years ago.  The lack of conflict was just glaring.  There was a need to get the main characters to a place where we could say goodbye to them in a place where their lives would go on in an acceptable way.  This, of course, is what you want to do at the end of a series.  But instead of creating an arch that would get the Botwins where they need to be, it was done simply by sending Nancy walking around a Bar Mitzvah talking to her family while they showed her they were happy or, in Shane's case, ready to change.  I almost hate to advocate for another season of Weeds, but it would have been worth it to let relationships develop to where we cared about their individual moments with Nancy, rather than basing them on what we know from the past.  Not to mention Shane's secret of being a killer is revealed to other characters with nothing more than a shrug of a response.  I can't imagine that that is what viewers were hoping the response to that reveal would be.  As far as Doug's conclusion goes, it was a mess.  The notion of Doug reconnecting with his son, who he kicked out of his house when he was a teenager for being gay, could have been a very moving occasion in the hands of writers more equipped to deal with that relationship (see Ryan Murphy and the Hummel relationship).  But in this instance it was just a total miss.  Doug was his usual ridiculous self, which in most cases is perfect, but in this case just made for a meaningless scene with a character we said goodbye to eight years ago that we still ended up not caring about.  The best scene featuring Josh Wilson was the interaction between he and Nancy where they just sort of bullshit about  life and how he managed to turn out OK.  The father son scenes were just not meaningful.  As I said earlier, it hit all the right points, they just didn't seem to matter as they were presented.
It is not to say that Weeds was incapable of creating a great series finale.  The argument could be made that they had already done it twice.  The burning of Agrestic, and all that Nancy had built as her drug empire and her relationships within that world (Conrad and Heylia), was a perfect end to the story the show had been telling up to that point.  The end of the sixth season, when Nancy turns herself in and admits to the murder of her husband Esteban Reyes, was an emotionally stirring end that showed her finally realizing that what she needed to do was give in to the hole she'd dug herself (a mile deep and a foot wide) and sacrifice herself for her families well being by answering for all of the wrong she had done and hell she had created.  But when it came to the actual end, the show just didn't get hardly anything right.  Sure the characters came a place they needed to be from the start, but it was a place gotten to in way that was hard to care about.  It is hard to ever fault shows for staying around too long, after all, who wouldn't continue with a thing that is both lucrative and desired.  But in the end Weeds best days were behind them.  And saying goodbye to those little boxes was not as hard as it should have been.

glee season 4

tv:  Glee returned last night for its fourth season.  After the end of last year, there was a lot of work to do.  The third season ended at an emotional apex, with a significant portion of the original cast saying goodbye after graduation, not to return to McKinley High.  Santana was seemingly foregoing college to move to New York (although we found out last night she did go to college with her cheerleading scholarship), Mercedes moved to L.A. to pursue a career in pop music, Mike Chang moved to Chicago to join the Joffrey Ballet, Puck moved to L.A. to start a more lucrative pool cleaning business, Finn joined the army, and Rachel moved to New York.  With all of these main characters set to leave the show and Kurt's future after graduation uncertain, the shows future was equally uncertain.
Season four picked up with Rachel in New York struggling to deal with her mean as hell dance instructor, played by a bitchy as ever Kate Hudson.  Over the course of the episode we find that Rachel is quite lonely. Her roommate is isolating her through her slutiness, and her dance teacher, Hudson's Cassandra July, is making her doubt her ability to succeed.  Through this Rachel finds a new friend, Brody, played by Dean Geyer, who helps her realize she is not as alone as she thinks.  Given nothing else than Brody's good looks, this seems to be set up as a possible New York post-Finn love interest.  But Personally (and I hate saying that, I don't want to be too personal) I think she could just use a friend to help her find her way.  And one way or the other they seem to have something good to work with between the two of them in terms of chemistry.
Meanwhile, at McKinley, the glee club is dealing with their new-found popularity and stardom rather poorly. They have fallen in with the "popular" kids after the win at nationals at the end of season three and it doesn't seem to have done them any good.  Mean girl Kitty, who unfortunately at first glance seems to have zero character besides the word bitch, an inadequate replacement for season one Quinn, has all but stripped their sweetness by playing on their desire to remain at the top of the popularity food chain.  The members of the club who have remained in high school have all but lost all of their sweetness while enjoying their stay at the top, being mean and being ashamed of new outcast types looking to join New Directions.  During all of this there are two desperate searches that collide.  One is the search for new members and the other is the search for their new star.  As the club bickers for the position as the "new Rachel", resulting in a hyserically bad version of Call Me Maybe, auditions reveal that a new member, Marley Rose, played by Melissa Benoist, maybe be the person to fill that role.  They use her under privileged upbringing to bring the club back to their roots and getting them out of their mean girl spirit while letting her show her true star power by the end of the episode.
All that plot not withstanding (and maybe because of how much there was), the first episode of season four was choppy at best.  There was a lot to cover in a limited amount of time.  And that could be the hardest thing for the show to deal with moving forward.  The continuing story of Rachel in New York added on to the required, by the show choir rule book, minimum of twelve students and built in faculty members, could be too much to cover.  Even in this story coming back, it really took all of that storytelling, not to mention the arrival of Puck's younger half brother, till the final minutes of the episode to register emotionally.  This was done largely by settling Kurt's story by moving him to New York to chase his dreams.  It gave Rachel the friend and roommate she had been lacking.  It resolved the one story line from last year that needed to be finished.  And maybe most importantly it allowed a (possibly final) return of Mike O'Malley, as Burt Hummel, to say goodbye to Kurt as he bid his son farewell.  All that can be said is that that Burt is the best TV dad, besides coach Taylor, since the Cosby show.  It was awesome and moving and so sad and hopeful.  With that having been resolved I can only hope that Glee turns its focus back to the club.  After all that is where the show's foundation, not to mention title, lie.  It will condense the story and the foundation of what we are watching while not splitting loyalties between the old favorites and new characters we need to learn to love.
But it won't be easy.  Sure there are about ten built in characters, the returning glee club members and various faculty members.  But our new and future stars, namely Marley and Jake (the young Puckerman), did not resonate in their first episode.  Jake's story is only beginning, so that has room to grow.  Marley on the other hand seems to be the new star of the glee club.  And by the end of the episode she brought everyone back to where they needed to be, but it wasn't because of who she is, like the leaders that Rachel and Finn once were, it was because of what she is, the girl who's mom got made fun of with the great voice out to teach a cheesy morality lesson.  I can't say it is impossible to learn to care about these characters.  But in their introductions, they just didn't resonate like those we have said goodbye to.
I feel like I might be a little harsh coming down on the episode this way.  Glee tends to start its seasons with their worse feet forward and only improve from their.  They also have this weird thing going where when the club sucks the show seems like it sucks too.  Almost a syndrome of their ability to make what they write come true.  If being a part of something special made them special, the show sucks when they aren't speical.  The show, and the club, have a lot of work to do to get themselves back to where they once were.  But as long as they stick to their formula of some funny mixed with some drama and their star belting ballads at the end of the episode, they might be ok.  The jury is definitely out on the post-original cast era.  I guess they will just keep on chasing pavement.

nfl preview part 2, the afc

sports:  Welcome to part two of what became after a lot of words last night something of an NFL extravaganza, and my first ever two part post.  Last night I discussed the NFC and made my picks for who would go where in the conference.  Tonight it is the AFC.  So Lets get started.
The AFC South seems to be the easiest division to figure out.  The Houston Texans are the runaway favorites.  Despite losing Pro Bowl defensive end Mario Williams, the Texans defense should remain solid.  And with Matt Schaub and Andre Johnson returning after seasons full of injuries, not to mention the contract extension given to Arian Foster, the offense should be one of the best in the entire league.  Assuming everyone can stay healthy, this could be one of the top teams in the entire conference.  Even if some of their best players get injured, the division should be easily within their grasp.  The Tennessee Titans should come in second at or just below .500.  Their defense has lost its star player, Courtland Finnegan, to the Rams, but they should remain decent.  The offense will have to rely heavily on Chris Johnson with first time starter and second year quarterback Jake Locker taking the reigns.  Despite the fact that Locker looked shaky last year in his few opportunities, his time holding the clipboard, despite modern the modern wisdom of starting rookie quarterbacks, could help him adjust with a better understanding of his offense.  But really it comes down to Johnson and if he can rebound from his more or less bad year last year.  If he can be even close to what he was in 2010, this team could get to 8-8.  The Colts will be in a rebuilding mode this year.  Andrew Luck should be able to step in and show why he was so highly regarded in the draft process.  But with a bunch of either really young or really old players around him on offense, this year is still a transition.  Not to mention they did nothing in the off season to improve their defense, instead focusing on getting young players around Luck(which by the way was the right thing to do).  The Jaguars round out the South as a team that is still looking for a lot of improvement.  Blaine Gabbert showed very few signs in his rookie season last year as a starter that he is capable of being successful at the NFL level.  The addition of Justin Blackmon should make his job easier.  But with Maurice Jones Drew holding out till only days before the start of the season, and not getting the deal he wanted, and given the short shelf life of the modern day back, it is hard to believe that he will have a true impact on this teams success.  This is possibly the team in the AFC playing for a great spot in the draft to continue to build for tomorrow.  The Texans come out of this division seemingly by default, but also as a real threat.
The AFC East is probably the other easiest division to handicap.  With a weak schedule, the AFC South and the NFC West, as well as home games against those divisions toughest opponents, the Texans and 49ers, the Patriots have pretty smooth sailing.  Not mention they have added deep threat Brandon Lloyd to the dynamic passing game that includes two of the top five tight ends in the league and pass catching machine Wes Welker.  The Pats have also seemingly improved their defense through the draft.  Landing Alabama standout Donta Hightower and physically and genetically gifted, Chandler Jones (he is the brother of Ravens defensive linemen Arthur Jones and UFC Light Heavyweight champ Jon Jones).  The Jets seem to be a total mess.  They have not scored a single touchdown in the preseason on either side of the ball.  Their best wide receiver is cornerback Antonio Cromartie.  And their best quarterback is third stringer Greg Mcelroy.  Not to mention with Tebow, a marginal signal caller and all time great media guy, Sanchez, a fragile media guy with equally marginal talent, and the big mouth of their coach Rex Ryan, the media distraction for this team alone could be enough to bring them below .500.  The Buffalo Bills could be a team on the rise in the East.  If Ryan Fitzpatrick and dynamic, yet sometimes crazy, Stevie Jackson can play together healthy for a full season, the passing game should be good.  And running back duo Fred Jackson and C.J. Spiller should take enough pressure off Fitzpatrick to keep him effecient while providing a great running game in the brutal Buffalo winter.  The Dolphins are another team to throw in with Jacksonville as a play-for-next-year team.  They got rid of their best play maker, Brandon Marshall.  They are relying on Reggie Bush to be their feature back.  Bush can make plays sure, but I am not sure he is a 25 to 30 carries a game back.  He certainly never has been.  To make matters worse, the Dolphins are sending out rookie first round quarterback Ryan Tannehill.  Tannehill someday could turn into a very good player, but he is an eighth over pick that should have gone in the third round and held a clipboard and learned for two years, if not for Miami's desperation.  New England should make a joke of this division, not to mention the rest of their schedule, with Buffalo stealing a wild card spot and ending their playoff draught that dates back to the music city miracle.
Now we move on to the AFC North, one of the two divisions with a little more room for error.  There are three teams in the division that could seem like they could fight for the top spot.  The Ravens are mostly in the same spot they seem to be in every season since about fifteen years ago.  They have a tough defense and a great running back, and that will get them to the top of their division.  This year will be different though.  The Ravens have vowed to open up their passing game and really let quarterback Joe Flacco take the reigns of the offense.  With Ray Rice, maybe the second best running back in the league, in the backfield, this could prove both exciting and problematic.  Rice's skills could only help a passing game by forcing a defense to account for him.  But Flacco has not shown much besides being adequate that would lead one to believe that one of the most consistant teams in recent years should revamp their offense to make him the focal point.  So not relying on Rice like usual could be their demise in the end.  On defense this could very well be the year the Ravens start to show their age.  This is not because of some sort of tipping point that has clearly occurred, but more because it has to happen sometime.  And what better time than when their all world outside linebacker, Terrell Suggs, is out for the season with a torn ACL.  The Pittsburgh Steelers are another model of consistancy facing potential problems this year.  Their questions seem to be coming almost entirely on offense.  Yes Mike Wallace is back after his holdout, but it may take him a few weeks to get into game shape.  More importantly though, the Steelers have a new offensive coordinator, Todd Haley.  Haley seems to be the lynch pin of the Steelers season.  After playing in the same system for years, it is unclear how Ben Roethlisberger will acclimate to a new system.  That new system could also be what is the their undoing.  Haley wants to implement a new pass happy offense.  This will take the focus off of running back Rashard Mendenhall, who has been a rock in the Pittsburgh back field.  With a suspect offensive line, and putting Roethlisberger in a place where he is consistently looking to pass will only force him to take more hits.  This could be horrible for a guy who thanks to his toughness already takes too many.  The Cincinatti Bengals would be the third team in contention in this division this year.  Everything about this team is just plain old solid.  They have starless and yet remarkably good defense.  And their offense is lead by the potentially damn good A.J. Green at wide receiver and the not flashy but efficient, Andy Dalton, at quarterback.  People seem to be expecting Dalton to take a step back and have the sophomore slump, but with his no frills style of pocket passing and the growth of report between him and Green, I find it hard to believe.  The Cleveland Browns are our third and final AFC play for next year team.  Regardless of how good rookie starter Brandon Weedon will play, they just don't have enough talent to make any headway.  And if Weedon doesn't work out then they are still at square one, instead of at best square two.
And finally we come to the final division to cover, the AFC West.  This is a division with no great teams and no terrible ones.  Everyone should finish in the middle of the pack, and thus the mix.  The Denver Broncos are certainly the most intriguing team with Peyton Manning coming off of four neck surgeries.  I am going with superstition on the Broncos.  Someone with that much going on in their neck in a game where the goal is to hit someone as hard as they can can't end well.  Not to mention trading Tebow should make God mad at them.  I hope Manning makes it through the season, but I just can't believe it.  The Raiders are looking to build on last years first sign of improvement since their Super Bowl appearance against the Bucs.  This team may just have too much working against them though.  The roll over in the front office after the death of Al Davis, and the changes on the coaching staff seem to be heading the franchise in the right direction, just not immediately.  The offense will need Darren Mcfadden to be healthy for the whole season, especially after losing his replacement, Michael Bush, to the Bears in free agency.  Carson Palmer is the really wild card though.  If he can be the player he was before things in Cincinatti go so bad he retired, he can give the Raiders a real chance to win.  The Kansas City Chiefs seem to be the team with the most upside in the division.  After an injury riddled 2011, they are returning a lot of players, most notably running back Jamal Charles, that could have enough talent to cancel out the resume of Romeo Crennel.  Then again, this team seems to like Crennel.  The last team in this division is the San Diego Chargers.  I love Phillip Rivers.  I love his game.  I love his swagger and trash talk.  But he lost his go to receiver Vincent Jackson.  And he is still saddled with Norv Turner who seems to roll out such remarkably mediocre teams year after year.  There is no team in this division that will have more than nine wins or less than six.  Look for a new look, thanks to health, Chiefs to take it.
In the playoffs, a healthy Matt Schaub and Andre Johnson will lead the Texans to the AFC championship after beating a few teams not quite there yet and one or two that have been there too many times.  In that game they will face the Patriots in a shootout between the conferences best team of the past ten years and its best team of the next ten years.  Brady, Gronk, experience, and a slightly improved defense will prove too much for the Texans to handle as they continue to make their climb towards the top of the league.  Their, as stated in last nights post, the Patriots will meet the Packers in what should be the highest scoring game in playoff history and the game everyone wanted last year.  With the two most unstoppable quarterbacks in the game going head to head the game ends at a staggering 63-58.  I wish I didn't have to pick a winner and just could marvel at the beauty that game could create, but here we go.  Brady gets his fourth in six trips and cements himself as the best ever.  Meanwhile Aaron Rodgers doesn't feel too bad because he knows that he will someday have a chance to take down all of Brady's records.
So there we go.  I have now spat out what I see to be the NFL season we are about to watch.  Now I just need the players not to prove me wrong, especially on the final score of the Super Bowl.

nfl preview part 1, the nfc

sports:  Welcome to what is part one of the first two part post I have ever done.  I have been thinking all day about starting my NFL preview on the eve of the first game of the season and realized that to cover all the teams in all eight divisions was just more than I could put myself through in one night without my head exploding.  The decision to do the NFC first was made simply by the fact that I wanted that out before the Giants and Cowboys play tomorrow night since they are both in that conference and then I can hit the AFC before they start their games on Sunday.  I really wish there was a more entertaining way to go at this, but this will be more or less a division by division breakdown with a few predictions thrown in there.  So here we go.
We start with the NFC East since they kickoff the season.  The Super Bowl defending New York Giants seem to be the most complete team in the division.  With Eli Manning coming off of a career year and that defense, particularly the pass rush, looking as tough as usual, there is no reason to believe that success won't come their way.  They still have Jason Pierre-Paul causing havoc on their defensive line rushing opposite Osi Umenyiora, which makes them the typically solid defense they are.  On offense, despite losing Super Bowl hero Mario Manningham, Manning still has his top two recievers in Hakim Nicks and Victor Cruz.  Their running game may struggle a bit after losing the thunder in Brandon Jacobs to Ahmad Bradshaw's lightening, but the run game should remain solid enough to allow for the passing game to get off.  Not to mention that despite winning two Super Bowls in the past five years, the Giants have yet to have a truly great regular season, and with Tebow and the Jets eating up the New York press, maybe they have the incentive to prove they are still New Yorks best team.  The Eagles, probably the Giants closest competition, have a lot to prove.  Having come off a year where spectacular offseason signings were followed by inconsistancy and chemistry issues, they also have a lot to prove, but with them it is about meeting expectation, instead of reminding everyone that those expectations should be higher.  Jeremy Maclin should prove to be the Eagles most consistant offensive weapon at running back.  The defense should be improved having had a full year and camp to integrate its new players.  The biggest questions should be whether or not Michael Vick can keep himself from getting hurt and play a full season.  If he can't, this team has little chance to make waves.  The other question is how the entire organization will respond to the death of head coach Andy Reid's son.  Suffice to say, that is something that is impossible to go through without having ramifications on anyone near that situation.  Everyone knows that Reid is a great coach and his players love him, but that is difficult situation.  And how the team responds to it will be the difference.  The Dallas Cowboys enter the season seemingly in the same place they have been for a few years now.  People look at the talent of Tony Romo and Miles Austin and Dez Bryant (I'm not even getting into the insane rules he has to follow to keep himself out of trouble) and DeMarcus Ware on defense and believe that on paper they should be great.  Then they underachieve.  While that talent still remains, it is hard to believe after years of let downs that this year would be anything more than the same; a team knocking on the door and not knocking it down.  Then there are the Redskins, having leveraged their future for RGIII (once again, not getting into it.  I addressed this in an earlier post, if you want to know see here: http://robpoppost.blogspot.com/2012/03/rgiii-and-skins.html).  Griffin should be thrilling, but ultimately shouldn't be enough to get this team to the top of its division, not on his own as a rookie.  In the end there should be a lot of what has come to be expected from the NFC East.  These highly competitive yet not dominant teams should beat each other up till a 10-6 or 9-7 team wins the division.  That team should be the Giants.
Next we move to the South.  Like in the East, this division should be led by a consistant yet not overpowering team, the Atlanta Falcons.  The Falcons have a solid, if not potentially great, passing attack with Matt Ryan getting to throw to Julio Jones, Roddy White, and Tony Gonzalez, along with Jacquizz Rogers as a swing back.  The always solid Michael Turner should provide enough as a straight ahead runner and goal line threat to balance the offense, giving Atlanta, as always, a chance to be very good.  New Orleans, who has been the power in the South for a few years, have a lot working against them.  Yes Drew Brees is electric with the football in his hands and probably good enough to run the offense even without Sean Peyton there.  Yes the defense should be better under Steve Spagnuolo than it was under Greg Williams.  But the personnel losses could be too much to take.  Despite a better coach on defense, the Saints will be without there captain, Jonathan Vilma for the whole season due to the bountygate scandal.  On offense they lost arguably Brees's most reliable weapon, Robert Meecham, as well as his all pro offensive lineman, Carl Nicks, to free agency.  Nicks no less went to division rival Tampa Bay.  Those personnel losses, combined with all the bounty drama may be too much for them to overcome.  The sleeper in this division may be the Bucaneers.  Tampa Bay has rid themselves of Raheem Morris, maybe the worst coach in football last year.  Quarterback Josh Freeman comes into camp in much better shape than last year and with a few fun new additions to his offense.  Carl Nicks protection should no doubt help Freeman have time in the pocket to make better decisions.  The addition of Vincent Jackson as a receiver gives Freeman a go to pass catcher, and rookie running back Doug Martin should only make their running game, spearheaded by tough downhill runner LeGarrette Blount, more formidable.  The Carolina Panthers will be looking to take steps forward with second year quarterback and record setter Cam Newton.  While the Panthers should improve. The popular notion that they should compete for a playoff spot, however, should not ring true.  Their defense just isn't that good.  And quite frankly neither is Newton.  In the fourteen games following his fantasy explosion, (over 800 yards passing in his first two weeks in the NFL) he averaged less than 250 yards per game.  While the Panthers should be a team on the rise, this is not the year that they make that leap.  The rock solid Falcons have the best chance to win the division.  The revamped, bounce back team of the year, the Bucs, I think will take second and a wild card spot.  The Saints will have trouble overcoming the loss of good players along with their bad mojo.  And in New Orleans, you know mojo matters.  As for Carolina, a team of the future, that future is not now.
The NFC West shall be our next division.  They are lead by the San Fransisco 49ers.  This team seems to be a popular pick to not follow up on their success from last season.  I think I see it differently.  Jim Harbaugh will have his first full off season to work with a team that was as solid and mistake free as anyone in the league last year.The defense astoundingly returns all eleven starters from what was the top defense in the league last year.  And their offense should be comparable if not better.  With addition of Randy Moss as a potential deep threat to compliment Vernon Davis and the aforementioned Giants loss, Mario Manningham, as a reliable receiver should improve the passing attack, which under Alex Smith was one of the most conservative in the NFL last year.  The 49ers have lost feature back Frank Gore and have replaced him with situational back Brandon Jacobs.  As long as the revamped passing attack works out the way Harbaugh is hoping, Jacobs should compliment the offense nicely with his power game.  The Seahawks appear to be the only other competitive team in the west.  With them things seem to be pretty simple.  Their defense is solid.  They seem to have the best home field advantage in football with their deafening stadium.  The only questions are whether or not Pete Carroll is as good a pro coach as he was in college.  And if Russell Wilson, as a rookie, is the right choice to be the starter for a team with playoff hopes.  And by the way, I am rooting for Wilson.  After a year watching him at Wisconsin, I just like the way he plays.  The Rams and Cardinals will in all likelihood be playing for high draft picks.  Under Jeff Fischer, and hopefully with a healthy Sam Bradford, the Rams should be better than last year.  But not anywhere near contention.  Under Fischer, and given time, they will get there.  But not yet.  And the Cardinals find themselves in the unenviable position of having the most talented wide receiver in football in Larry Fitzgerald and a quarterback battle in which they like neither of their choices.  Until they find someone who can get the ball in the air and take advantage of having Fitzgerald, the best we can say is that Patrick Peterson should be exciting again in coverage and returning kicks.  Look for the 49ers to more or less repeat their success from last year.
And finally we get to what might be the best division in the conference, the NFC North.  The Packers, well there really isn't much to say.  The Packers bring back a devastatingly great offense lead by Aaron Rodgers, who might be the best quarterback in the league.  He also still have more weapons to throw to than possibly anyone in the league.  If their defense can limit the yards they gave up last year (as the worst in the league in that category, ever) even a little and get back to their ball hawking ways, they should be the Super Bowl front runners.  The Bears look to be the Packers biggest competition.  They return with a stout defense, a trademark in Chicago.  Jay Cutler is healthy.  He has more comfort at wide receiver.  Along with former college roommate Earl Bennett, Cutler will also be throwing to his former go to stud in Denver, Brandon Marshall.  Matt Forte is back after an injury and contract dispute to gain as many all purpose yards as he can as the best pass catching back in the NFL, and with Michael Bush added to the running game, the load on Forte should lighten, keeping him both fresh and healthy.  The question for the Bears is all about health.  Can Cutler stay healthy.  Can Matt Forte return and play a full season.  And can a defense, that has been great throughout the years, stay healthy for yet another year as they only get older.  Last years beneficiaries of the Bears injury problems, the Detroit Lions, are looking to keep the good times rolling.  After being the doormat of the league for basically its entire existence, the Lions looked like the next big thing last year.  They should not be expected to revert to form.  But with basically no running game putting all the pressure to produce on Matt Stafford, Calvin Johnson, and Titus Young, along with a growing list of both injuries and arrests on defense, it is hard to believe that the Detroit can recreate the success they had last year.  They will continue to build on that success, assuming Stafford can stay healthy, just not when there are so many factors working against them in such a tough division.  And the Vikings.... Oh I think it is only fair to say that with a still developing Christian Ponder, and Adrian Peterson trying to do his best Superman immitation by coming back for week one after a torn ACL and MCL, not to mention the brutally tough group of teams in their division, it will be another year to look at the draft and look forward to rebuilding to a brighter future.  The Pack are runaway favorites to win.  The Bears get that other wild card spot.
Preseason predictions in the NFL are always tough being that they are mostly built on the assumption that no one gets hurt, but here it goes for the NFC.  You have my division and wild card winners.  Packers and 49ers get the buy weeks.  The Bears and Giants come out of wild card weekend to face the 49ers and Packers respectively (the Bears get that seed based on their better regular season record despite not winning the division.)  Then we get the apocalypse.  Bears vs. Packers for the NFC.  While the Packers are clearly the better team, a confident Cutler and rough and tough defense could be the difference, but in a rivalry game it is too hard to tell.  All bets will be off, but in the end the best QB in the game comes through.  Packers are in.  To find out how the AFC will do and what my final predictions will be (since they are of course right), check it out tomorrow when I round out the league.

breaking bad finale

tv:  Last night the Breaking Bad mid-season finale, Gliding Over All, aired.  The creators decided to air the fifth and final season in two installments of eight episodes broken up over this summer and next.  This news probably comes as no shock to fans of the show.  And with only eight episodes remaining now, and seven episodes that didn't lead to a direct climax like the war with Gus did last year, the show had to find a way to lead into the coming end.  That lead in came with a thud as this installment came to an end.
Gliding Over All picked up right where the previous episode left off.  Like Buyout, starting with the disposal of the witness to the train heist, this one picked up with the disposal of yet another body.  This time it was Mike's.  The tension built when Jesse showed up to talk to Walt about the list of names that could be there undoing as Walt tried to hide the body of Jesse's friend (as much as this trio could have been friends).  This opening scene set the tone for the episode beautifully, not just because of the growing tension between Walt and Jesse, but to show the viewer that every single scene could be that moment where everything comes crashing down.  Which is what everyone is waiting for.
From there Walt heads to see Lydia, one of the season new and best characters, to obtain the list he could not get from Mike.  Lydia show's not only why she is a riveting character but, for the first time, why she was involved in the business begun by Gus Fring.  She continues her usefulness by giving yet another thrilling and dangerous plan, this time to traffic overseas, while playing Walt beautifully.  She pitches not just to him, but to his only weak points: his desire to build his empire, and his ego, stating that no one in the Czech Republic has ever seen anything like what he's making.  How can Walt not buy into what she is selling.  After all she is selling his drug: power.  (I would love to see her pitch this same idea to Gus, which she says she did.  I want to see her play Gus and find out what his weakness was.  I am sure she found it and that is how she got him to sign off on Prague.)
From there Walt heads out to take care of the problem of the now ten people in prison who could bring about his demise.  All there is to say about that sequence is that Walt standing at the window watching the clock tick down(the clock ticking down to the end of it all) on his perfectly executed plan, looking like the kingpin of Albuquerque, while the montage of death plays, is one of the most awesome and chilling things anyone could hope to see.
News of Walt's hit reaches Hank quickly, though he of course has no idea who could have pulled off such a bold move.  Hank comes home to find Walt in the living room playing with his baby daughter.  It is hard to believe this is at all genuine.  To think that Walt cares for anyone, even his baby girl, is almost absurd at this point, not to mention the fact that we have seen him use his family to get close to Hank in previous episodes.  Walt is simply there to gloat and enjoy his victory and let the unending appetite of his ego be fed.  Hank comes in, pours them both a drink.  Then he pours himself a second very quickly and starts talking of better, simpler times when he didn't have to chase monsters.  And in that moment staring into the face of the very monster he is chasing, he becomes first person to truly alert Walt to what he has become.  Skylar knew it but was too afraid.  Mike knew it but only described it.  Hank looked him in the eye and told Walt the truth.  And in that moment not only did Walt possibly have to accept himself, but he saw his adversary.  A man that if he only knew, would hate him and do anything to stop him.
In the wake of all of that comes a "life is good in the drug game montage" that puts Walt in a position where he can cut ties with Jesse, by giving him his five million he was owed from Buyout, and just walk away with untold millions.  Aaron Paul gives a chilling performance in this scene as their seemingly awkward friendship and reminiscing is underscored by the fact that when Walt leaves he collapses on the floor and pulls a gun out his pocket in relief of not having to use it against what he thought was coming, showing that he is also aware of the monster in his presence.  Walt decides to take the option to walk away and rebuild his family. The kids move home, he has a cookout.  And then in the final seconds everything changes.  Hank goes to the bathroom and is given his proof of who Heisenberg really is.
For a show that seems to have such an inevitable end, the question of how they would get there has remained as long as possible.  But now that Hank knows, and Walt has gone to a frighteningly dark place, the showdown between these two brothers is on.  I have no idea how exactly this is going to play out over the final eight episodes but I do know one thing.  Nothing will end well for anyone.  Breaking Bad has shown time and time again that all of the actions of its main character have horrifying consequences, not just for him but for everyone involved in the world around him.  And as this investigation plays itself out, the movies referenced in the earlier episodes of this season, Heat and Scarface, come to mind.  Can Walt walk away once that heat comes around the corner?  And believe me it will.  And if not, will that blaze of glory with the weapon in the back of his Volvo in the flash forward of Live Free Or Die be his little friend.  I would have to bet on the latter.  And when Walt makes that terrible decision, as is always the case, everyone in his life will suffer for it.  No one is getting out alive.