Although individual episodes are sure to keep us guessing, we know what to expect from Breaking Bad’s final season: Walter White, having killed Gus Fring, finally seizes the power he’s wanted so badly for so long. As creator Vince Gilligan has said, Walt is transforming from embattled hero into full-blooded villain, and these final 16 episodes are sure to make last year’s bomb-planting and kid-poisoning look tame. Since we spent the Season 5 premiere drinking blue cocktails and doing spit-takes over Walt’s ridiculous, audacious, and often reckless swagger, we’ve decided that this year we’ll be rounding up each episode’s biggest Walter White WTF moments. The top five for this week, which gave us a rare glimpse into Mike’s personal life and motivations, are after the jump.
1. Walt wants to start cooking again, despite the massive disaster the past year or so of his life has been. “There is gold in the streets just waiting for someone to come and scoop it up,” he tells a skeptical Saul. Right, because that’s exactly how it’s worked out so far.
2. After replacing Jesse’s ricin cigarette with one containing a vial of salt, Walt hides the original ricin vial in his own home, where his wife, son, and baby daughter live. Surely, there is no way this plan can backfire.
3. “It gets easier. I promise you that,” he tells Skyler while engaging her in perhaps the most uncomfortable attempt at seduction we’ve ever seen on television. What follows is some babble about how we do awful things for our families and actually that’s totally morally fine. We can feel Skyler’s skin crawling, and we involuntarily shudder, too.
4. Walt plants the faux ricin cigarette in Jesse’s Roomba in an attempt to set his partner’s mind at ease — and further prove that he isn’t the one who poisoned Brock. Jesse cries about how he almost killed Walt. We are paralyzed by the cruel irony of his remorse. More than ever, we want Walt dead.
5. The pair approach Mike about going back into business. This is at the bottom of the list because he eventually sees no other option but to join them — and yet, it’s worth noting the extent to which Walt underestimates Mike’s intelligence. “You are a time bomb,” says Mike, and as usual, he’s absolutely right.