Breaking Bad Season 1 Disc 1

Episode 1: Pilot
Bryan Cranston is my hero. He just puts it all out there, literally, and goes for it. I love the mustaches, because with the staches and the hair do, he kind of looks like Ned Flanders, but more because I have a friend who is a teacher and has this exact same look going on. For all I know, he watched this show and decided on the look.
At first glance, the show seems like it has a crazy premise. A good guy who is an upstanding member of the community, a teacher, discovers he is mortally ill with inoperable lung cancer, decides that the only way he can pay for the super expensive chemo-therapy and maybe hope to leave his wife some money is to 'break bad'. Which he then does in a big way by deciding to cook methanphetimenes. It turns out he's brilliant at it, from the standpoint of the drug dealers because his product is so pure, but Walt is all like, "it's just basic chemistry". I would like to think that at that point that many of the teachers watching with the know-how to do this entertained for at least a brief moment the possibility that they might make some money cooking up some drugs.
The best part of the episode is the awakening that Walt has throughout. He realizes likely for the first time in his life that he doesn't have to take the crap that the jackholes are dealing up for him. Not only that, but when Walt does take charge of his own life in these situations, he's kind of a bad-ass.

Episode 2: The Cat's in the Bag
The mustaches are gone and somehow Walt doesn't look right. We don't see him shave it off, and this episode starts 12 hours after the first one ends. I guess before he passed out on the floor in the bathroom, he must have shaved.
Not as much happens in this episode. It is much more the story about Walt and Jesse and Walt and Skyler than about Walt versus the world like the pilot was. It's really neither good or bad, just different. It did yield more conversation and less action, particularly hijink action.
I've got to say, that if I found out my husband was buying and smoking pot and I didn't want him to do it, I would not figure out where the drug dealer lived and go over there and tell him to stop selling to my husband. I would either have it out with the husband, or you know, just talk to my brother-in-law in the DEA.

Episode 3: ...And the Bag's in the River
Even less action this episode than the previous one, but way higher emotional content. It was good. Things seemed way less goofy for Walter and Jesse and Skyler, though the brother-in-law DEA agent has no clue about what is going on. When he tries the scared straight tactic on Walter Jr. you understand why Walter Jr. keeps cracking up. I've got to side with the meth-whore (not quite the ring to it that 'crack-whore' has), that it just seems like the cop wants to buy some pot.
I really thought for a while that Walter was going to let Domingo go free. They were having their moment and I felt like Walter was generating that memory of buying the crib on the spot, just to have a reason not to kill the guy. When he sees the pieces of the broken plate and puts them back together to discover that a dagger sized shard is missing, two things happened for me. First, I felt the heart break as Walter realized that he was going to have to kill Domingo to protect himself and his family. Second, if I had been in Walter's shoes, I would have been stabbed to death because I never would have thought to piece the plate back together like that to find that a piece was missing. My hat is off to Vince Gilligan for coming up with that simple, yet very powerful and believable plot device.
I write each of these entries immediately after watching the episode. So, when I see a cliff hanger like I did here with Walter, all serious, walking in on Skyler, crying, and he says, "I've got something to tell you." I am willing to bet money it's not that he has lung cancer, or maybe that's what he's intended but she is crying for a reason (maybe baby related) that will trump him telling her about the cancer. Also, the DEA now has enough evidence in their possession to lay some strong suspicions on Walter, if they can only figure out what they have.

Breaking Bad at IMDb