Giancarlo Esposito certainly made Gustavo Fring into a cold and chilling antagonist, one who puts everyone and the audience on edge as soon as he enters the scene without even speaking very much. As fearsome a villain as he is, though, we don’t really know much about him aside from what we see, mostly through the eyes of other characters.
This episode is as close as we get to uncovering the mystery of the character, but that still amounts to just scraps. The show never really delves too far into the past, merely hinting at it in the present-day scenes and only sporadically dropping an anecdotal flashback. This one goes beyond even that, like it’s careful not to reveal an iota more about Gus than viewers absolutely need to know.
The episode does give us a flashback explaining the bad blood between Gus and the Mexican Cartel, as well as Tio Salamanca (Mark Margolis). The scene has the feel of a great gangster movie like Scarface, and the presence of Steven Bauer (the show’s second veteran of the classic film after Margolis) as Cartel boss Don Eladio adds some gravitas to the whole thing. I also like the aesthetic choice of making Eladio resemble the real drug lords of Mexico’s current drug war, a nice touch of authenticity for those in the know.
At the same time, I hate this sequence. Not because of any flaw, but because it seems to be taunting us by not revealing much of Gus’ origin. The way the scene plays out (with Eladio saying he knows who Gus is but not going beyond that) seems like the writers’ way of saying, “Ha ha! We know, but we’re not telling!”
Maybe we’ll learn more in the final eight episodes, or if the Saul Goodman spinoff proves successful, perhaps we may one day see a prequel miniseries or TV movie about Gus (lines of dialogue this episode mention Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, which could make for an interesting storyline). But for now, Gus is still an enigma to us the viewers.
Aside from Gus, things get interesting for Walt (Bryan Cranston) as Hank (Dean Norris) escalates his investigation into Gus’ dealings. I love the scene where Hank tries to get Walt to put a tracker on Gus’ car. The way he nervously tries to talk Hank out of it is actually painfully funny in an awkward way. Then when Mike (Jonathan Banks) silently pulls up alongside them and gives Walt a disapproving poker face, the scene becomes tense but also that much funnier. Mixing humor and tension is hard to do, but this little sequence nails it. And after so much relentlessly serious tension building up, it’s nice to have a little laugh.
Below are a few updates from the show at Comic-Con. Be aware there may be spoilers regarding the remaining eight episodes.
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