Breaking Bad episode review — 4.10 — Salud

Original air date: September 18, 2011
Director: Michelle MacLaren
Writers: Peter Gould and Gennifer Hutchison

Rating: 9/10

Most of the drama of this episode comes south of the border, though there’s still some up in New Mexico.

Before Gus, Mike, and Jesse get there, Ted gets called in to Saul’s office where he learns he is left $600,000 in the will from his European aunt whom he doesn’t know. It’s all Skyler’s doing, of course, hoping he has enough money to keep the business afloat while being honest with the books.

But Saul informs Skyler that Ted immediately bought a sports car after leaving, so Skyler chews him out and admits to it being her.

In Mexico, Jesse’s taken to the cartel’s lab, where he becomes a hardass and criticizes how they keep their lab, possibly to the approval of Gus.

His meth is deemed 96% pure, far purer than the cartel’s, though not quite up to Walt’s standards. The cartel informs him that he will stay in Mexico, though Mike tells him that they’ll either all stay, or all go.

And that’s because Gus has a plan, which we don’t see until the celebration with Don Eladio at his place, where Gus’s partner was killed so many years ago.

He gifts Don Eladio some tequila, which Gus, Don Eladio, and his men all drink together. Gus makes sure Jesse doesn’t get any because he’s an addict, but in reality, it’s because the tequila was poisoned.

Just before the men start dropping dead, Gus goes to the bathroom to vomit out what he had drank.

There’s a bit of a gunfight as Mike and Jesse help Gus escape. Mike gets shot, but Jesse proves his own worth.

Jesse’s never been more valuable to Gus, and you have to think that he loves feeling appreciated, far more so than Walt ever is with him.

And meanwhile Gus has become much more interesting over the last two episodes. Now you wonder if the reason he got as big as he did in the meth business was all out of revenge.

At any rate, it’s quite the episode.