‘Breaking

Bad” enters its final lap July 15 on the heels of last season’s explosive finale — in which Walter White (Bryan Cranston) completed his transformation from “Mr. Chips to Scarface” by murdering arch-enemy Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito), and then phoned his wife.

“I won,” he told her chillingly.

But with the victor comes the spoils — and that’s a complicated dynamic in the dark world of “Breaking Bad” which, over the past four seasons, has charted Walt’s journey from a milquetoast chemistry teacher to a ruthless drug kingpin.

“I think the thematic arc this season is all about what it is to win, which is a strange place in which Walt finds himself,” says series creator Vince Gilligan. “He’s been under-the-gun and up against it for four seasons . . . and faced an existential threat with his season-long chess match with Gus Fring,” Gilligan says. “Now he finds himself in the very unusual position of being ‘The King’ — and being in ascendancy is going to be an interesting place for Walt.”

Nothing in “Breaking Bad” is ever as it seems — that’s part of the show’s allure — and fans should strap themselves in for another wild ride.

With Gus dead and Jesse (Aaron Paul) back in the fold, and still calling his partner-in-crime “Mr. White,” Walt now has to figure out his next move — with his brother-in-law, tenacious ex-DEA agent Hank Schrader (Dean Norris), drawing the circle closer around Walt’s secret life.

“Will Walt handle his being king gracefully and choose this moment to bow out and perhaps make an intelligent choice to cash in his chips and go home — or will he double-down and continue on his path toward becoming Scarface?” Gilligan says.

“This season is about making those choices and realizing it’s one thing to win — and another thing to keep those winnings.

“And there’s an interesting parallel between Walt and Hank this season,” he says. “Walt is in ascendancy in his criminal enterprise, and we can look forward to seeing Hank doing pretty well in his chosen career path.

“At the end of last season Hank was kind of in the wilderness — he was home recuperating from his grievous wounds, was bitter and having a terrible time — and then he comes upon the realization that Gus is a drug kingpin and he’s kind of like Cassandra giving prophesies that no one believed . . . I think we can look forward to Hank’s peers starting to believe him.”

The final season of “Breaking Bad” will be divided into two parts — eight episodes starting July 15, and the final eight airing next summer.

“That was done in large part for my benefit,” Gilligan says. “I’m very proud of the show we do and I’m not a speed demon; it takes the writers and I quite a while to write and shoot each episode, and I jealously guard the editing room.

“The best structure was to write, shoot and edit these first eight episodes, have a little production break . . . then start back up next month.

“The best gift is the knowledge of when we’ll end the show — and with that knowledge we can build the story . . . and end ‘Breaking Bad’ as well as we humanly can.”