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(Spoilers, duh)
Let’s get fucking nerdy.
I really love the episode about the fly. I was talking with one of my roommates about it this morning. My analysis of it was more broad, that the fly represented the decay of Walter’s family/relationships, that he himself is the source of it And consequentially the the distress it’s causing him; the fly wouldn’t matter if he didn’t keep chasing after it. And then, my roommate suggested that it was more about the guilt he was experiencing. That one kind of blew my mind wide open. It’s not very hard to get me excited about these things.
I ran with her interpretation, and eventually came up with this: The fly is a contaminant. Walter hyper-focuses on its presence ‘compromising the purity’ of the meth that they’re producing. The fly represents this new arising conflict, the first introduction of real Rot to Walter and Jesse’s relationship— Jane’s death. Walter and Jesse have been very functional* as a duo until this point. And in the past they always managed to come out on top through their struggles, and that is ONLY because of how heavily they were able to rely on each other, ONLY because of the complete and utter trust they had in one another at the core of their relationship. But Jane’s death compromises that trust. Walter has another secret to keep, but this time, from the only person who has ever truly known him. From the only person he felt that he could trust with anything. And that knowledge, of watching someone Jesse cared about die, and doing NOTHING, is what drives him insane. He wants it gone, he wants to erase it, he wants to remove all potential contaminants, anything that could compromise him and Jesse’s relationship, and he’d go to any length to do so. That’s why he didn’t stop until Jesse literally drugged him out of concern for his wellbeing, and when he’s delirious from the medication Jesse gave him, he apologized for Jane. I can’t remember if he caught the fly or not. But, if my analysis holds any weight, i’m going to believe that he didn’t. Because this is something that was out of his reach. Nothing could erase the part he had to play in Jane’s death.
* They are so bad for each other………
It’s just so good. Not a lot happens in this episode, but it’s a fantastic character study if you take the time to read into it.
I rambled. Your turn…^^
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skenp
i need to talk about this because i just rewatched this ep. in the end jesse drugs walter to put him to sleep, while he tries to kill the fly. while walter is half asleep and incoherent, he goes “im sorry about jane” to which jesse responds “its not your fault”. after that walter tells him to stop trying to get the fly. he says “let it go. we need to cook”. jesse asks “what about the contamination?” to which walt responds “its all contaminated”. in the very end, jesse is the one who kills the fly, and walter is asleep. in the end, without walter realizing it, jesses speech about how janes death is nobodys fault and how walter was right when he said theyd be dead within a week is what dissolved his guilt about jane. its all contaminated. his life as heisenberg is impossible to make ethical. skyler knows, she doesnt want his money, hes lost his family, doesnt even live with them anymore. hes lost what he tried to convince himself was his motivation for all this. theres nothing left but to fully lean into what hes become— heisenberg
WAIT. i missed something. the final scene of the episode is walter sleeping in his bed. he wakes up from the sound of a fly. he looks up, and there, on the blinking light of his smoke detector, is a fly. another one. but i wonder if in his mind its the same, even though he watched it die. or its the shadow of the fly, like jesse said happened to his aunt and the opossum, when she saw it die but kept insisting that it was still around. im not sure which is which, but it was a fantastic scene and it was like a minute long
by skenp; ; Report
that second one wasnt an analysis and just a description of the scene but thats because i cant decide what to make of it, LOL. also if the fly follows him then my initial interpretation was off too
by skenp; ; Report