Breaking Bad – A Retrospective





Breaking Bad is fantastic, it’s incredible and I’m sure if you have had any interaction with anyone who has seen ‘Breaking Bad’ you will have heard how good it truly is. It is extremely rare that such a show arrived on our screens and took the world by storm, everyone was talking about it and it seemed to be the water-cooler conversation event of our generation. Walter White’s descent from lonely chemistry teacher to meth kingpin captivated everyone, the moral ambiguity and the razor-thin tension surrounding his fate was pitch-perfect throughout all 5 seasons. With the anticipation surrounding ‘El Camino: A Breaking Bad Film’ I thought I would go back and look at this fantastic feat of television.





Season 1





Walter White is first seen as this bumbling hyperventilating man in that enticing in media res sequence as he stands out in a situation that he does not fit in with, from there the ‘Pilot’ takes us back to three weeks earlier and explains how the middle aged chemistry teacher ending up in such a dangerous situation. The show has this winking self-awareness, this world we are presented to entraps us in and we know what’s going to happen in the endgame and this tension is the goldmine of the show. From the ‘Pilot’ we know things aren’t going to work out for Walt, his brother is in the DEA, his family is unapologetically normal but the world he unveils and becomes more of a part of is a disturbing antithesis to our preconceptions of this man. The first season is a slow look at Walt putting himself in a progressively dangerous place, the way the plot is paced is through a slow acceleration, every event compels Walt to cook more and more, it is a tense and disturbing set of events that keeps the viewer mesmerised. The first season is surprisingly big on comedy in comparison to the later seasons, Jesse and Walt’s relationship is hilarious to watch and it actually indulges in some entertaining levels of slapstick self-awareness which is a welcome change of pace to the tension. Gilligan and Cranston’s collaboration over the character of Walter White is nothing shy of revolutionary, this character is fascinating to watch and the slow inclines of evil that Season 1 demonstrates is captivatingly interesting.





Season 2









Walt stares at a pink bear in his pool, the bear has had its left eye blown off, Walt’s face is full of anguish and shock hidden behind something evil and malicious. Season 2 is a beautifully intense series of episodes that mould the show into the staple of Television that it becomes, I see this season as the ‘beginning of Walt’s descend into evil’ in the entire season he goes from an understandingly flawed character into someone who committed an act of evil that caused many people’s lives motivated by anger. The season opens with Walt and Jesse escaping and killing Tuco, resolving the cliff-hanger from last season and in many ways the rest of the episodes are dealing with the fallout from those actions. Seeing Walt and Jesse start their own empire is entertaining and some of the highlights of the season, Jesse becomes more and more forthright until he descends into heroin abuse resulting in that harrowing scene from the finale. It is full of hope, before everything crashes down to the ground in those final episode, my favourite being ‘Over’ in which Walt finds out his cancer is in remission and he seems to viscously act out in anger, combining the guilt of his actions with the realisation he doesn’t have the excuse of his own mortality. It is character combined with more and more tensions and complications within the world these characters reside in, the drug industry is unorganised and chaotic, and Walt seems like the man with the intelligence to profit from it, however this results in his own self-destruction and those haunting events of ‘ABQ’





Season 3





I could happily write the entirety of this review about the character of Gustavo Fring and Giancarlo Esposito’s magnificent performance if I’m quite honest, he will always remain as my highlight of ‘Breaking Bad’. Season 3 revolves around the rise and fall of Gus and Walt’s partnership and the unravelling of Jesse due to this partnership, it feels like this incredible chess game as characters’ actions all have lasting consequences that reveal themselves in unpredictable fashions. Gus is a threatening force who is the first intellectual that stands at odds with Walt, these characters live on this fine wire of tension that compels the season up until when Walt breaks the wire in that finale. The Season has this fascinating mid-season turn, Hank seems to be getting closer and closer to finding out about Jesse and Walt but then Gus steps in and sends The Twins to kill Hank instead of Walt, resulting in him being hospitalised and the Cartel being less and less powerful. This begins the incredible acceleration towards Walt breaking a deal with Gus’ and propelling Season 4’s arc revolving around Gus’ downfall. I also want to give a massive shout pout to the criminally underrated episode ‘The Fly’ which is essentially a bottle episode revolving around Walt and Jesse trying to kill a fly, it is weird and full of character and is essential in giving these two characters the downtime they deserved.





Season 4





And here’s where things crank up even further, this entire season revolves around Walt and Jesse’s attempts to kill Gus after the thrilling opening showing the power of Gustavo Fring compelling Walt to realise, he isn’t safe whilst Gus is still alive. The season is tenser and darker than the previous three, Walt is at the most risk of his professional life as each episode puts him closer and closer to Gus murdering him. Jesse struggles to cope with the fact he murdered Gale, and this turns him into this shell of the person he used to be, he spends a lot of time barely functioning and it is clear that Walt is the person to blame for Jesse’s breakdown. Gus gets some much-needed backstory and ‘Hermanos’ is a stand-out with that fascinating flashback showing his partner’s murder at the hands of Hector Salamanca, building and exploring this fantastic rivalry and the reason behind Gus being the person he is. It has this fantastically natural flow to the season, watching Jesse fall and get back up again countless times due to Walt is captivating television. The Season Finale ‘Face-off’ is where all the cards are placed on the table, everything is revealed and as Walt says himself, he wins. The iconic death of Gus is shocking, grotesque and terrifically rewarding as well as that horrifically dark reveal that it was Walt who poisoned Brock basically confirms his descent completely into Heisenberg. Season 4 is intense captivating television in which every episode is addictively entertaining, and it all pays off in one of the most satisfying season finales of all time.





Season 5









By Season 5 it is fair to say Gilligan had a lot on his shoulders when he had the task to conclude ‘Breaking Bad’ as the hype and speculation around the show had become unlike anyone had ever seen. The first few episodes seem surprisingly optimistic, Walt has the possibility to make his own empire, to take Gus’ place but it hits a point where it is clear he isn’t doing this for the money, he is doing this for the glory and the adrenaline. Season 5 is my personal favourite of the show as it somehow improves on the tension provided throughout yet with that added level of closure and satisfaction as events we knew had to happen, finally happen. That’s not to say that this is predictable, the decision to add the new characters of Jack’s gang is ingenious as the events we were expected are elevated to allow a fascinating level of surprise and excitement. Just as everything seems to be turning Walter White’s way, Hank discovers his secret in a moment so entertainingly unexpected and creates this fantastic turnaround into the demise of Walter White. Of course, I have to mention ‘Ozymandias’ how can I not? I recently rewatched the show for the first time after its original run and I was still shaking with tension and shock throughout all of ‘Ozymandias’. It is horrifically dark, intensely upsetting and the kind of thing Television is made to be with its twists and turns drawing in a captivated audience. However, it is the finale that I believe to be ‘Breaking Bad’s’ finest hour, with its melancholy goodbye to the show and the character of Walter White being satisfying yet upsetting and an ending that I couldn’t imagine being better.





The One Who Knocks





I adore everything about this show’s run, and it is definitely something I loved revisiting. Bryan Cranston delivers the single greatest performance in any television show, that is a bold statement that I make with confidence as Cranston creates a beautiful chaotic and insane man. Aaron Paul is insanely sympathetic as ‘Jesse’, Paul has to go to every extreme of his acting ability in order to communicate the darkness his character goes through which is beyond admirable. The show is shot to perfection, the cinematography is about the level of any AMC show but ‘Breaking Bad’ includes some fantastic breaking of forms and colour grading that adds to the show’s aesthetic beautifully. The ensemble cast including Anna Gunn as ‘Skylar’, Jonathon Banks as ‘Mike’ and the wonderful Bob Odenkirk as ‘Saul Goodman’ are all developed and interesting, with loads of variety. It is a bold and beautiful show, utilising developed characters with some of the best use of tension and plot pacing I have ever seen that make ‘Breaking Bad’ a staple of modern television.

Thanks for Reading!