Midway review of Breaking Bad
I pretty much watched no TV growing up. So despite Breaking Bad being aired from 2008-2013, I am only just getting around to watching it in 2024. I'm currently half way though season 3 (last episode I watched was the one where Gus reveals his giant underground cooking setup to Walt). This post will give my thoughts on the show now that I'm half way through it.
Firstly, I think the plot of the show is excellent; it's exciting and engaging without relying too heavily on misdirection and cliffhangers. The fact that Walt is surrounded by people like Skylar and Hank who are out to expose his secret is a very clever writing choice and makes the show much more tense than if Walt was just a single man running his operation in isolation.
Walt is a stereotypical "nice guy", and by that I mean he's a people pleaser who spends all his time keeping up a facade instead of being real with other people. He hides his own feelings and focuses on trying to keep up a "nice guy" persona, resulting in constant inner frustration as his own feelings are pushed down, and his fake niceness never satisfies anyone - especially his wife Skylar who always sees through his lies and abnormal behaviour.
There is a good selection of characters from all walks of life: Walt and Skylar, the married couple with kids, Hank the tough guy drug enforcement officer, Jessie the drug dealer, Jane the recovering junkie, Jessie's clean cut Christian parents, Saul the sleazy criminal lawyer. All the characters work well together. Despite some of them holding positions that society would consider good and respectable, there isn't a single character in my opinion that is "good". All of the characters engage in bad, or self-destructive behaviour, either openly or secretly. In the first two seasons Skylar seemed like a good person, a well-meaning woman who wanted the best for Walt and was deeply concerned by his suspicious behaviour and deception. However in seasons 3 she starts flirting with her boss and ends up having an affair with him, even after Walt comes clean about his second life and there is no longer any suspicion that he is also being unfaithful.
I think the acting in this show in exceptionally good. I don't have much of a reference for comparison since I've watched very few other TV shows, but I think the way the characters interact with each other, especially the non-verbal interactions are superb. Skylar and her sister Marie have a lot of these moments, and each time I'm able to perfectly follow what is being communicated. There's quite a few scenes where tension and comedy is created without much being said at all, the family meetings with Walt and Hank's families are a great example of this.
Walt's character is sometimes a bit unbelievable, which I think is one of the only weak points of the show. Although it could be argued that what Walt's character does is so insane that the show wouldn't work if his character was kept realistic and consistent. The inconsitency I'm talking about is that Walt seems to be very nervous, risk adverse and sensitive in some situations, but then is somehow able to repetedly lie to his wife without cracking and run a massive drug operation. He's too scared to follow his dreams and apply for the job he really wants, but is able to confront drug lords and kill multiple people.
Although maybe his character is intentionally designed like this. Walt has spent his whole life being fake so he has lots of practice surpressing his true feelings and presenting a tough guy persona when he needs to. And the cancer diagnosing and feeling of near death that accompanies it would be a big driving factor to him acting out and feeling no fear of dying in his criminal activities.
Overall I think the show is a great and I am thoroughly enjoying it. I don't really have any idea of what's going to happen in the rest of the show - I think TV show writers love enjoying making up things as they go along and making retroactive adjustments to past events to fit whatever stupid plot twists they want to come up with, so I think trying to predict what will happen in a future season is almost impossible.
I guess the show is probably going to end on a destructive note rather than a positive ending. Some kind of depressive bitter ending that makes you question all of Walt's decisions and realise that through all the risk, death and pain, none of it was worth it in the end. I am guessing that either Walt or Skylar will die, and his family won't be left with any money. Or they'll be given some minimal amount as an insurance payout or money from the government or something that they could have got anyway without Walt doing everything that he did.