No, you are pretty good. You are a great director.

I’ve mentioned it somewhere, but Todd always frightened me. I’ve met people who remind me of them... very unsettling.

I prefer “fat, sumo wrestler body/sumo wrestler Asian looking face” Plemons compared to skinny, “picked up chicks on the FNL show looking like that” Plemons. Much more...frightening, that Plemons.

This made me laugh. I half can't tell if it is supposed to be serious or not, but I was rolling.

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Tough to watch as this was basically torture porn, all told from the perspective of Jesse. I hate that character....a complete ****up and coward. It was ultimate-cringe-inducing watching him broken and quivering. He had multiple opportunities to escape/take out his captors but was too cowardly to take them. As previously stated, I hate that character.



All of that said, the writing, pacing, direction, acting, all excellent. It was definitely a solid entry by Vince Gilligan, which is not unexpected. You know you are super talented when you can make a program about a despicable useless character and still not only hold your audience, but truly entertain and do so in a smart, impressive fashion.

I am curious then who you would root for in the BB universe. I think many people misinterpret the message and cheer on Walt, who really is a sack of shit.

Agreed. I've always been surprised by people's attitudes toward the BB characters. I get why people root for Walt but never got how walts sins were forgivable but people like Jessie and, in my opinion, Marie weren't. Skyler and hank I gst. But Jessie and Marie ended up at least having some moral conviction.

Marie sucks.

That's the genius of Gilligan...he can take piece of shit and make probably more than half of fans root for him as their favorite character. Besides, rooting for bad guys is fun.

She tried to lift hank out of depression. Took care of skyler. Adamantly defended her family. Toward the end, her and Walt Jr were almost the only main characters left with any semblance of a moral compass. Her only crime was being annoying early in the show and petty theft. Meanwhile Walt and skyler threatened her family, lied to and manipulated her husband, and was behind a lot of the murders of her husband's colleagues.

I think you guys missed some of the nuance laid in on Jesses character. He got manipulated by well everyone. And generally he was a soft soul. There are a bunch of examples. He had a soft spot for kids and even that big scene was a callback to an earlier scene.

I think the objective Gillian wrote with was he was a generally good person that went down a bad road. Whereas Walt was a generally bad person that went down a good road until he broke bad. There is an interesting dichotomy there.

Moreover it is a reflection of real life. Virtually no one is always good and chooses the right thing.

Jessie grieved over kids getting shot or hurt while Walt treated that as business decisions. Agreed, he wasn't perfect, but in a show where "heroes" did some really awful things Jessie is easily one of the more redeemable characters in the show.

It was ok. You can tell it was made by tv people cause it dragged like ****ing hell. It should have been like one and a half ours or 1:45 instead of 2 hours. I wouldn't call it a bad movie but yeah, it was slow and boring. And Im a big fan of better call Saul so I'm used to slow but sheesh...

Fwiw, the first 30 or so minutes were great. Badger and skinny Pete killed it. Wish they would have stayed involved somehow.

I don't know if you really can "root" for a BB character....they are all complex with positive and negative attributes. I gues Hank would be the closest to a hero archetype, but he is such a douchebag you really can't root for him.

I know I really could not stand Jesse from the beginning. He is a coward, a poser, and ****up. Just a complete shit show of a character, whose only real purpose/value was to introduce Walter into the seedy world of meth.

This again speaks volumes to the ability of Vince Gilligan. He wrote despicable characters yet made the show so goddamn engrossing and nearly perfect.

I don't know if root is the right word but there were sympathetic characters with Jesse being the main one.

I enjoyed it for what it was. It was a really good reminder just how much anxiety the original series was able to generate during episodes. As someone with misophonia, the throwback diner scene with Walt, and Jessie chewing and talking with his mouth full was excruciating to watch.

Yeah. She still sucks.

Whatever you think of the character, Betsy Brandt is a "yes" for me.

https://imgix.ranker.com/user_node_i...rop&crop=faces

I watched it last night and I thought it was HORRIBLE! This show just doesn't make for a slow movie. I just didn't see the point in making this film - other than knowing their fans would think this would be good.

Reasons this movie sucks:

1. Jessie/Paul just isn't a good enough actor to handle the load.
2. Jessie has to be the dumbest crook out there. How long does it take to get out of town?
3. Why pay a guy $250K to drive you to Alaska?
4. Are you serious this guy is not gonna let Jessie slide for the missing $1800 when he just handed him a sack full of cash?
5. Why does it take $125K to drive someone and get a passport? Mexicans pay less than $10K to their coyotes.
6. Why go take on 5 guys in a shootout when he had the upperhand on 2 earlier?
7. An old fashioned high noon shootout? Really?

Movie sucked.

I'm pretty sure that guy gives you an entirely brand new identity so I see why that costs so much.


But it also creates the plot hole of if he has a brand new identity, why does he need to be smuggled in a secret compartment in a moving truck?

And the shootout scene nearly was one of the stupidest movie scenes I've seen the last few years.

I swear the more I think about this movie, the worse it gets.

I loved it.

FYI, do a quick binge of season 5 if you forgot some details of the story

The perfect ending:

Jesse: Yo, man, like why the F did you make me ride in a UHaul?

Robert: Because you're a bitch, bitch.

/quick cut to credits. chorus of that old Ben Folds song plays quietly.

"Give me my money back
Give me my money back
You... bitch"

It was fine. It was just a longer finale. Jesse is by far the most likeable character because he really isn't a bad guy. Bueller is right, Jesse is a good person that went down the wrong path and Walt is a bad person who went down the right path.

Although it could be interesting in 5 or 10 yeara to make a spinoff of Jesse and his new life in Alaska whenever he inevitably gets into another mess.

Man. That was a waste of time.

2 hours to do EXACTLY what we all assumed he'd do anyway. And Todd was just distracting. It was just a 2 hour collection of callbacks that didn't add to the story in any way.

Just disappointing as hell.

Not trying to be an asshole, but what were you expecting?

Hence it's necessary to binge season 5 to truly get the movie, or you'll be disappointed because nothing new is added.

It was made for the fans and to give Jessie a proper send off. I would’ve liked if it was made sooner

Breaking Bad: Alaskan Ice 2030

Jesse Pinkston manufacturers hot new drug with Walt Jr. Sells snow to Eskimos.

Something meaningful?

I think if the movie was going to hinge on Jesse going to Alaska just because Mike said that's where he would go, it should have shown Jesse in Alaska and him trying to start a new life there and him trying to adjust to life away from being a meth dealer/hostage.

The movie basically didn't really show or tell anything that the ending of the show didn't. The same "ok and then what happened?" feeling that spurred this movie is the same feeling that still exists now that Jesse is in Alaska.

Well if you're gonna have Todd show up, maybe pump the brakes on shooting as quickly as possible and put the !@#$ing guy on a Keto diet so as not to be distracting as hell.

And maybe don't make the central conflict between Pinkman and the eraser (and a bullshit conflict at that; no, he's not gonna take $0 instead of $248K). Do a time jump if you need to and show us how Pinkman's settling in - that's a truly worthwhile send-off for Jesse.

BB was never about pacing or action to begin with and I LOVE Better Call Saul, which is a slow burn on its best days. But 45 minutes into that show we'd effectively accomplished nothing. And the last 45 minutes was nonsense because again - $1,800 !@#$ing dollars wasn't going to make a difference there, not if the eraser was willing to give him the $125K he was 'owed' back if/when he didn't come up with the full $250K. Either he's principled about it (You owe me this and I'm keeping it) or he's not - in which case it's a bargaining chip and $248k would've done the job.

It was bad. It was WELL beneath the standard I'd come to expect from Gilligan. It was nothing but ham-fisted nostalgia and inexplicable narrative/plot devices.

I'm not sure you and I even watched the same thing.

Exactly like Breaking Bad isn't about making meth, it is about the journey these really fleshed out characters go on, this is about Jesse becoming the guy that got Todd's gun and then gave it back to him, to a dude that will do what the **** ever it takes, including get into a shootout for $1800, to change his circumstance.

Additionally there is a lot of exploration into the effects of his being held against his will.

If all you got out of that was "Jesse went to Alaska" then why did you watch BB in the first place?

I just have to disagree here. Not with the Keto diet, do the Keto diet for Christ sakes.

The central conflict, IMO, is very much between the character Jesse was and who he must become. That's why they spent so much time on the flashback, so as to establish as stark of contrast as possible to present day.

Much like BB isn't about the believably of making meth in an RV, a giant lab in a laundromat, laundering money through a car wash, or robbing a train, this isn't about how probable his escape from Albuquerque. Both stories are an examination of how characters respond to a set of circumstances.

That's what all this has been all along. Better Call Saul too.

In my opinion anyway.

Neither of those events are all that significant especially when one was during a flashback and not part of the adventure Jesse had after he escaped. That shooting scene was the stupidest thing Vince Gilligan has ever come up with in any of his shows.

And I watched BB because it told a great story. El Camino didn't.

Unequivocally false. Having Gus walk out of Hector’s room and then straighten his tie with half a face was easily the dumbest. It was just ****ing cartoonishly awful.

The story was secondary to the character study IMO. The complexity and nuance in the characters was the true art.

What did we learn about Jesse in those flashbacks that we didn't already know? We knew he was a servile puppy dog who seemed desperate for any kind of mentor figure and who was shockingly easily manipulated. That was a 5 year character arc made obvious by the fact that he called Walter "Mr. White" through the end and was played like a fiddle all the way through.

What did I get from an hour burned watching Fat Jesse be weird or largely irrelevant dialogue with Jessica Jones? That was PURE fan service and did nothing to demonstrate his character either before or after. We KNEW his character. And it's not even all that believable that literally overnight he would become a completely different person (if he even was). That's why I suggested the time jump. The idea that you can discern luck from skill by it's duration applies here - this was all within like 72 hours of the end of BB - it tells us effectively nothing about the long-term outlook of Jesse Pinkman.

Even the brief scene with Mike was nothing more than the 'seed' that Gilligan had planted in a dozen interviews after the show's original run; yes, we knew Jesse was going to Alaska.

It was essentially fan fiction put on tape and far beneath the level of the storytelling I've come to expect from this crew.

I think all that you describe is why it was a made for Netflix movie and not a series. The goal was to close a lot of loops and give a little boost to some side characters, and I'd say it did a good job of that. Todd's character stufy as a subtle sociopath was well done. Skinny Pete and Ed the vacuum guy were good character boosts. Even Mike and walts brief vignettes were subtly solid. I didn't love the kandy story arc but otherwise I'd call the movie not great, but satisfying enough. I don't think anybody was ready or interested in a slow burn or suspenseful send off. Just quick closure and this did that fine enough.

Bingo.

I would have been upset if Netflix hyped an 8 episode mini-series for a year with the promise that it was centered on Jesse with an "explosive ending" and this was ultimately the story that was told. But, there was little to no hype or expectation on this, we didn't even have confirmation it was happening until a month before its release. It kept expectations low, and it was a story that did not at all need to be told, but I still loved my two hours back in the universe.

The part with Krysten Ritter was, yes, fan service but it did serve the purpose of showing his transformation. Initially he was believing her initial comment of you go where the universe takes you or whatever, and by the end, he realized that was ****ing hogshit. That's a central premise to the story being told here.

The story is very much his transformation from who he was at the end of BB to who he is in Alaska, and those two dudes are massively different dudes. Yes, it had the feel of a BB episode and yes, there was fan service for all those characters, but this wasn't just an extension of old Jesse. It starts 10 minutes after Jesse gets out of the cage, so he's essentially that Jesse and ends up with a dude that did a massive amount of hardship that was necessary to get himself out. In the series he had opportunities to just that, when it would have been far easier to pull off, when the movie ended, he did whatever it took to get it done. That's a hell of a transformation if there has ever been one, man.

Yes it looked and sounded like BB. Yes there was fan service, but it was in there to help tell the story of Jesse's transformation - which is significant. (I'll concede your point on Mike, that wasn't necessary, but I'm glad it was in there). The story isn't "well let's throw some more BB shit at the wall for the sake of BB. This story is very much Jesse departing who he was in the series, to the guy who he was when he got the **** out.

Then why be so heavy-handed with re-establishing 'old Jesse'?

If I'm a person who is going to enjoy the character development and 'before/after' contrasts that El Camino was trying to establish, then I'm NOT a person that needs to be force-fed the beginning of Jesse's arc. I'm an involved fan that understands the character.

And if I'm NOT that kind of fan and I need to be re-immersed in the character, then I'm not gonna have much of an appreciation for where the character ended up.

In a lot of ways it was insulting. Trotting fat Todd out there and pretending like we wouldn't notice just to we can re-establish what we just spent 5 years fully understanding was ridiculous and a waste of my time. And acting like Jesse Pinkman 7 days after his release from captivity is some fully formed, fully reformed version of who he'll be for any appreciable of time is simply an insult to me as an adult, let alone a fan.

I understand that the whole thing was a send-off for Pinkman - so why spend half of it spinning your wheels on stuff we largely already knew unless it's A) mindless fan service (most likely) or B) a simple plot device to make up for staid writing when you can't figure out how to give Jesse a massive pile of money so you just plop him in Fat Todd's apartment and go from there.

Ultimately I think there was a chance to do what you hinted at - make it about Jesse's transformation. But there were only glimpses. Instead most of that WAS just "throwing some more BB shit at the wall for the sake of BB."

I guess we’ll just have to agree to disagree.

It is certainly possible that I’m a simpleton but it worked for me.

I just wish Cranston would have actually shaved his head for his scene.

I've been in a trap house and watched somebody on meth play Russian Roulette with an actual functioning revolver for a gram of dope. Now that I think about it I've seen other things that high dudes have done with guns that are even dumber. So, I can believe the shootout scene.

Yeah, that scene worked for me for that reason alone. I’ve seen people do things almost that ****ing stupid whilst high on some heavy ****.

Me too. And I can't believe how intrigued that minimal teaser just made me.

He was flown in the middle of shooting a movie production (for about 12 hours to film in a restaurant filled with people who were part of the film crew). I can forgive it.

LMAO

I watched it last weekend, and I completely agree. I thought it was just about the slowest and most boring piece of shit I've seen in years. I'm glad to see someone else thinks the same thing.

Maybe my problem was that I decided to re-watch the last season of Breaking Bad before watching El Camino. As I was re-watching Breaking Bad, I kept saying over and over "I forgot how great this show really is!!".

Then I watched El Camino, and it literally put me to sleep. After the first hour, I was exhausted and went to bed. I had to finish watching it the following night.

It was slow and pointless. The last scene of Breaking Bad where Jesse drove off into the sunset was a thousand times better than this. Vince Gilligan should have left it at that.

El Camino was exactly like Season 8 of Game of Thrones: a total letdown.

Decent. Was worth the 2 hours.