‘Breaking Bad’ Retro Recap: ‘Hazard Pay’

Written by John Edward Betancourt

Starting over in life, in any capacity, can be quite the exhausting venture. For instance, if you’re starting a new job, regardless of your qualifications… there is an adjustment period that comes with a touch of unease and tiring worry and of course, if you’re hitting the reset button and completely starting over anew… there’s so much you have to do. You have to find a new place to live, a new job, and figure out the best way to get groceries and everything else you need as well. But we go through with it because we know a fresh start is necessary for us in that moment and because… modern society offers a lot of safety nets and guarantees to ensure that we don’t struggle and stumble in our new beginning.
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Which is something we should all be grateful for. Because in the underbelly of the world, where crime reigns supreme… starting over job wise for certain, can be quite the dangerous venture. After all, these aren’t noble jobs we are talking about in this world. The kind that come with a 401k and great insurance benefits, and workman’s comp and/or unemployment insurance if the company goes belly up. These are illegal acts and one wrong step during the restart could bring one’s world crashing down, and that rough aspect of the criminal’s life was put on full display in the next episode of Breaking Bad. For when we catch up with Walter White and his merry band of meth-makers in ‘Hazard Pay’, they’re trying to figure out how and where… to restart the production of Blue Sky and well… finding a new cook location goes about as well as one might expect.

Because everywhere that Saul takes them to in this tale, is filled to the brim with flaws. Since one warehouse, while out of the way, risked contamination of the product. While another… risked exposure since it was a delicious tortilla factory and since the failures kept on coming, it really appeared for a time that starting over in the drug trade… was an impossibility. But the arrival at a business called Vamonos Pest, instead taught us and Walt, that creativity is required to properly start over in this business. For Walt came to realize that using fumigation tents and a portable Meth Lab, could in fact… solve their problems and it most certainly did. Since Walt and Jesse were able to sneak into a house before fumigation started and cook up a fresh batch of Blue Sky and just like that… they were back in the game. But it wasn’t all blue meth and roses for this new outfit, since Walter learned a valuable lesson about being the man in charge.

In that, owning and operating a business is quite expensive. Since everyone’s cut took a delicious million-dollar payday and reduced it to a hundred thousand and some change and well… that revelation brought out the darkness in Walter once again. Because he simply wasn’t good with so many others getting a piece of the pie, especially when the whole point of going into business with Jesse and Mike, was to make money hand over fist. Plus, he was outright insulted by the fact that Mike was using some of that cash to make some of his and Fring’s guys whole again and he outright pondered… if by chance the time had come to take part in a little workforce reduction. The kind that would leave a trail of bodies and that was something that scared Jesse a bit. Since he’s never seen Walter that hungry for power and money. 

But while that was indeed both frightening and eerie to watch, this particular change in Walter’s behavior makes sense. For there is no fear in his heart anymore keeping him compliant. He is unleashed and he wants it all and this is just another step toward fully becoming Heisenberg and all the tragedy that will accompany that. But while we wait to see Walter continue his downward spiral into darkness, we can bask in another quality tale. One that really put the complexities of starting over in the drug trade, on display, and it also… set the stage for the future in more ways than one. For this episode features the first appearance of Todd (played by Jesse Plemons) and well, he would become quite the big deal down the line, and his arrival, and the fact that Walter is inching closer to embrace Heisenberg through and through, outright compels us to continue the journey. To bear witness to the incredible moments that await us. Until next time.

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