Fifty-One

Episode Summary & Review

Summary

Walt celebrates another birthday. Skyler considers her options. An associate complicates Walt and Jesse’s plan.

Our Take

Walt’s 51st birthday: a party nobody wants, a car he buys his son as an apology for a life he can’t explain, and Skyler’s admission that she’s waiting for his cancer to come back. The hour measures the empire’s cost in birthday breakfasts — and in the fight that ends it: Walt Jr. forced to choose between parents, Marie threatening to take the kids, and the family, as a unit, functionally dead. The empire’s only remaining stakeholders are criminals.