Why did Gus Fring kill Victor in Breaking Bad?

The ultimate evil in Breaking Bad is our antihero, Walter White/Heisenberg (Bryan Cranston). But if anyone can match him and (almost) beat him, it’s drug lord Gustavo “Gus” Fring (Giancarlo Esposito). A Chilean immigrant with a mysterious personal history, Gus wears the smiling face of the charitable and friendly fried chicken chain Los Pollos Hermanos – but that’s just a mask pasted on a ruthless master criminal. Then buried up additional Beneath Gus’s ice lies a vengeful rage. Not only is he in the meth business for the money, he eventually kills the leadership of the cartel that killed his long-time friend Max (James Martinez).

Given the success of Breaking Bad and its popularity, Gus is the character Esposito will play for the rest of his career, whether his name is Stan Edgar (“The Boys”), Moff Gideon (“The Mandalorian”), or literally… Gus Fring again (in the prequel series Better Call Saul, after some early bookings to revisit the character).

Aside from Two-Face’s death scene in the Breaking Bad season 4 finale “Face Off,” Gus’s most famous moment was in the season 4 premiere “Box Cutter” when he slit the throat of his henchman Victor (Jeremiah Bitsui) with a throat slug. eponymous knife tool. This moment was so infamous that a short “Better Call Saul” video later appeared containing a joke about Gus’ “sharp” dress sense:

The scene is of course set up as if Gus is about to kill Walt and Jesse (Aaron Paul), which makes it all the more shocking when he kills his loyal dog instead and makes them watch. To the show’s credit, it doesn’t spell out the motivations for you through some demonstration – “Breaking Bad” was truly the best of both worlds, as the writers knew how to plan for television But he never talks down to the audience, with masterful direction and visuals befitting the film.

If you’re just watching or passively scrolling your phone (Just as Netflix intends!), although at this moment you may be as confused as Walt, Jesse, and Mike (Jonathan Banks). So why? an act Gus killed Victor? Keep in mind that “all of the above” is a possible answer here as well.

This is the most obvious and implicit interpretation of the scene, at least within the “Box Cutter” itself. In the season 3 finale, “Full Measure,” Gus was planning to kill Walt and Jesse for disobeying him. So, Jesse kills Gus’s other meth cook Jill Boetticher (David Costabile, who had to fight for the role). This way, Gus I cannot Kill them because they are absolutely essential employees.

And they were right, Gus I cannot Kill them. But he also couldn’t let them escape his challenge. So he brutally kills Victor as punishment by proxy, leaving them to stare down his slow, agonizing death knowing they must die — and if they keep getting out of line, they will.

Gus Fring was introduced again in Episode 11 of Breaking Bad Season 2, “Mandalas”, as a wary criminal, who has remained hidden for decades through his knowledge of keeping a safe distance from his work. Victor’s murder comes with the poignant symbolism that Gus has finally gotten his hands dirty. (Being the mastermind and style freak he is, he wore an orange scrub suit to prevent any blood/evidence from getting on his clothes.)

By seeing their boss kill Victor, Walt and Jesse know what he is fully capable of; Not only in ordering the killing, but also in carrying it out with his own hands, making it quick and efficient, and painful. This way, they will be less likely to be arrogant about feeling invincible because of their meth skills.

But wait, wouldn’t killing a loyal follower like Victor seem wasteful for someone like Gus? It could also send the wrong message to Mike, who is also witnessing the murder, that his loyalty will not be rewarded. Well, you have to remember that Victor didn’t have a clean record at that moment.

Earlier in “Box Cutter”, Victor rushes to Gale’s apartment, arriving too late to stop Jesse from killing him. He was observed by three other tenants running to the scene, breaking down Gail’s door and then running outside once he confirmed Gail was dead. This is certainly a memorable and suspicious scene, and one that witnesses would certainly report to the police. Worse still, Victor also left his car at the scene, and instead drove back to the lab in Jesse by holding him at gunpoint.

When Victor takes Jesse back to the lab, Mike interrogates him. When Victor asks if anyone saw him, Victor looks down and doesn’t answer, as if he knows he’s wrong. Mike presses the question, and Victor says yes but ignores him. All that was at the scene was “just another toilet.”

Both Gus and Mike are meticulous operators, so one must assume that Mike has included Victor in his scene to Gus. Victor’s survival was too great a risk to Gus’s operation, because if he were identified, the police might imprison him and, by extension, Gus. So by killing Gus Victor absolves himself of responsibility.

Is this extreme? Sure, but Gus doesn’t take unnecessary risks. A wanted scheme poster for Victor is later seen in “Hermanus” when Gus goes for questioning about his connections to Jill. So, from the crime boss’ perspective, he made the right decision to exclude Victor from his operation.

But did Victor also sign his death warrant by another mistake? Walt thinks so.

While Walt, Jesse, Mike, and Victor wait for Gus, the latter tries to prove that the two are expendable by cooking up a batch of Blue Sky Meth himself. (He learned by observing Walt and Jesse’s cooking process several times.)

Victor’s death then gets one final mention in Season 5 of Breaking Bad, after Walt and Jesse get rid of Gus and the former becomes an ABQ drug addict himself. At the end of the season’s third episode, “Paying the Risks,” Walt, Jesse, and Mike finish dividing the first spoils of their new drug empire. But there is disagreement about the “cost of legacy” or buying the silence of his now-arrested followers when he worked for Gus. Mike subtracts it from their collective pool, while Walt believes it should only be subtracted from Mike’s share.

Mike wins, and after he leaves, Walt believes that Victor may have “flew too close to the sun” by “taking the liberty” of cooking meth; Gus killed him to consolidate himself as president. In this context, Walt threatens Mike (especially since… He does Kill Mr. Ehrmantraut at the end.) Part of the dialogue also indicates that Walt understands Gus better now that he works the same job. In the words of Tony Soprano“You have no idea what it means to be number one!”, except now, as President Walt He does You get the idea – that a president needs to ruthlessly impose his authority and punish ambitious upstarts to remain president.