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Breaking Bad, the seduction of evil and subversion of the viewer


I am re-watching Breaking Bad on NetFlix ( * more to say about NetFlix below ) right now.

I am struck about how disgusting both Walt and Jesse are. Particularly in one scene where Jesse has cooked using Walt's recipe and was testing it out. He bought 70+ dollars worth of gas in a roadside station and conned the cashier into accepting meth for it. She said she never used it and Jesse was trying to sell her on it telling her how great it was ... and flaunting it shamelessly as a Police Officer walks into the store.

We see Walt in the process of learning to shove down his emotions and morals for the rush he gets out of being a "man", somehow "man" is accepted in the context of this show as Breaking Bad. This is the exploration of why we like bad boys.

I have contended before that Hank is the actual backbone of this show. Hank is our lives where we have people who are not so beautiful or articulate as bad characters are when people have been honing their roles and parts to make them more interesting. Hank is a solid, bloated, warty-looking guy who wherever he goes, whatever he does he carries the burden of society with him. Hank, the guy who embarrasses and grosses out the viewer and would not last 10 seconds before he was accused of racism, sexism and hustled out of the picture even though it is Hank that keeps our world working.

Breaking Bad shows us to our face how corruptible we all are by taking us down a windy path to scenes like where Hank bursts into Jesse's house and beats the living shit out of him, and now somehow Hank is the bad guy, and we all root for Jesse, even though .. giving what we know was what Hank did is light punishment for Jesse's disgusting life.

The lesson we are supposed to learn from Breaking Bad is so subtle that it might take a generation for it to really sink it. That is that TV, movies, the Internet, advertising ... is all a lot like Meth, total poison when it overcomes our humanity and logic by inculcating us with a twisted idea of reality and reward system.

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What do you think of Vince Gilligans extended treatment and ultimate redemption for Jesse in El Camino?

Do you think he tried to rectify Jesse's past indiscretions with his captivity by the White Brotherhood gang to make up for it?

I still view Jesse as a criminal who probably should have been either jailed for life or killed by those he did business with.

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That's a hard call. If BB was an actual reality, Jesse was pretty far gone, and it was not because he had a bad home. We never really find out where Jesse went wrong or what his problem was. He was so stupid though. It's kind of a mystery as to why being a caged animal abused slave would have fixed his soul or made him a better person. I liked the movie, but it was kind of pointless in that it did not touch on any those points.

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Yeah, that was my reaction to El Camino as well. I somewhat disappointed that this was all we got, along with an extended delay in getting to see season 5 of Better Call Saul. Unless Jesse circles back to us in BCS there really wasn't much of a point for his own movie. The ending in Breaking Bad left us with enough info that he broke free and what he did after that wasn't really essential.

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I think the point of El Camino was to use the sympathy we have for Jesse in a kind of scared straight way. After all of that we want him to get away, and hope that into the future Jesse gets it right, but given Jesse's propensity to fall back on drugs, and that it's the only thing he knows, that is hanging in the air out there. I have to hope it was not a set-up for a Jesse series BB Jr.

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The main issue I have with El Camino is that it doesn't work a stand alone movie at all. Someone who haven't watched Breaking Bad wouldn't really be able to follow the story. Plus, not much really happened. It was basically a whole movie about Jessie trying to enough money to disappear, with some flashbacks that gave us minor extra inputs about what happened during the event of Breaking Bad.

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My main issue with it was that I basically had it figured out. It was an epilogue; I knew what was coming - more or less. Okay, I didn't have the details or the flashback stuff (which I enjoyed), but "where did Jesse go?" I had already intuited.

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Good post , all true.
I guess people just like to imagine what it would be like to be a criminal and live an exciting life -on-the-edge , and get rich at the same time.
Hence bank robbery films.

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same reason for all the Skler hate - she's the voice of reason, and puts a downer on our hero's nefarious activities

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I think Skyler caught flak for emasculating Walt - constantly putting him down and riding him to make more money - while not really doing anything herself. She has abandoned her writing aspirations, quit her job, and is selling chotchkies on ebay, but she criticises him for not working hard enough for Bogdan. She barely pays him any romantic or sexual attention, clearly more interested in her auction.

Now, I don't hate Skyler. As the show went on I would agree that she had a lot of reasonableness to her and even displayed some badassery of her own. She also dumped less on Walt. We got to see more sides of her. But I think that the damage was done. She was a bit of a shrew in episode one, so the average viewer's perception was coloured from that point onward; first impressions are the most important.

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op, i found BB way too dark, and that (after season 2) i was usually rooting AGAINST walt and for whatever minor character was featured in a given episode.

i just find it hard to pull for a character who is actually sincerly mean and hateful, and harmful to innocent people. like a MFer who tortures dogs or birds for fun. that's a sick fuck IMO and this is how i felt about walt after a while. so i struggled to finish the whole series, but i did really enjoy season one and mostly season two. the pilot rocked, when he was a bonafide underdog. he was actually quite likeable at that point. me, i wish the whole thing had gone in a different direction, and somehow kept walt's virtue intact in spite of making and selling meth. i mean, yes i get it, what gilligan and them were trying to do. it just doesn't jive with my personal sensibilities.

LTUM .02

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I can see that. Walt was really a miserable SOB.

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Good analysis.

Is it okay to do the wrong thing for the right (perceived) reasons?

Can evil acts ever be redeemed through good acts?

How do you cast judgement on someone while knowing that you'd probably do the same in identical circumstances?

Are good and evil absolute or relative? Can you forgive one man's minor transgression if it prevents an even bigger transgression.

These were all questions that the series wrestled with and, thankfully, let us come to our own personal conclusions about.

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SPOILERS FOR BREAKING BAD BELOW!

While those questions are the kind of deep, philosophical quandaries that might not actually be answerable, I love thinking about them and I love Breaking Bad for posing and tackling such big ideas.

Question No.1: I think if something's wrong it's wrong. If you perceive the action as being morally correct, then you should do it, but beware of personal bias and the danger of lying to yourself. In the context of the show, I think Walter's motives at the beginning are, at least from his perception, to provide for his family. With that "true north" setting his moral compass, his actions (to him) are justified, or perhaps even laudable. Of course, as we learn later, Walter is lying to himself, at least partially, and is more motivated by being in the "empire business": he's on an ego trip to get revenge on the world for "wronging" him. Thus, his actions are shown to be moral. Causing the harm he does with his actions is not justified.

Question No.2: I would say that they can. Of course, this does depend on the actions, both good and bad, but I believe in the power of redemption and in the value of the second (and third, etc.) chance. Jesse, in Breaking Bad, constantly tries to pull himself out of his spiral. He fails, but we're gunning for him to do the right thing. Hank might come off like a pig, but he sticks to family and morality when the chips are down.

Question No.3: Personally, I try to judge as little as possible. I try not to think of myself as being better than anybody else. We're all a mix of good and bad. You try to stoke the fires of "good" wherever you find them (in yourself or in others) and put out the bad fires. Marie judges people, gossips constantly, and thinks she's better than everybody else, yet she has a kleptomania problem. Jesse struggles with non-judgement in his rehab, and later on finds a bit more equilibrium to who he judges and why.

Question No.4: Extremely complex; I think it's a mixture of both.

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Good observations all.

It's rare -- and refreshing -- to see this sort of well thought out commentary on these forums.

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This kind of thing is why I come here. I want to get into the deeper aspects of TV shows and films with people who love this kind of stuff. I get side-tracked by B.S. occasionally, or sometimes by what I think will be a productive conversation that turns sour.

I'm glad I read your post about these themes.

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I began watching 'Breaking Bad' just a couple of weeks ago. I almost quit the series about midway in Season 1 Episode 4 because it all just seemed so depressing. It was actually Walt's impromptu torching of the loudmouth jerk's car with the squeegee on the battery trick that made me think, "Now it's getting interesting" and kept me watching.

As someone else mentioned, the whole "getting rich as a criminal" theme is something that fascinates many (maybe most) people at some time or another. It isn't that we (most of us) admire or want to emulate Walt necessarily, or that we don't ultimately turn a blind eye to the human destruction his "product" is causing - Vince Gilligan certainly can't be accused of glamorizing meth use - but the forbidden nature of the enterprise, the cat and mouse game between the criminals and the authorities and all the suspenseful "almost getting caught" moments are highly entertaining.

My all-time favorite t.v. series is 'Sons of Anarchy' and regardless of how much you loved or identified with those characters, at the end of the day you had to admit, as Jax did toward the end of his life, that they were criminals and bad guys. Jesse says pretty much the same thing about himself in one episode, and Walter's angst about his own actions is visible on his face much of the time.

I'm midway through Season 3 at the moment - Hank has just been put in the hospital by the two brothers from Mexico, and Walt has managed to get Jesse installed as his new assistant at Gus's high tech lab.

"Who is that actor?" side-note: In the episodes just before and after Walt's cancer surgery, the surgeon is briefly seen, and his face was so familiar. It took me a couple of minutes to place him: 'Glen' from 'Raising Arizona', Sam McMurray. The man is a very in demand actor - almost 200 screen appearances on IMDB.

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https://youtu.be/bqGBn0jUq-k
https://youtu.be/MDheXEIxWas

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Wow! I never watched 'The Sopranos', so I had no idea. That's really kind of weird, that he would be cast as a cancer surgeon in two different shows. I mean lots of actors get cast as cops a lot, that sort of thing, because they just LOOK like cops...but playing a cancer surgeon twice? I wonder if whoever was casting 'Breaking Bad' remembered McMurray from 'The Sopranos' and thought it would be funny to have him do it again. I was actually kind of hoping that he'd be playing the same character in both shows - sort of a subtle crossover - but that didn't happen.

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It would be interesting to hear what you think when you get the end of BB.

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Honestly I'm torn between wanting to binge-watch the last two-and-a-half seasons and wanting to prolong my watching so that it lasts longer. 'Breaking Bad' is an amazing show, and I'll admit to being one of those people who have a hard time letting go of characters I've come to - not so much love, in most cases, but whom I've grown accustomed to having around.

BTW, I finally had to look it up because it was driving me crazy. The actor who plays George Merkert, Hank's DEA boss, the tall, grey-haired guy with the mustache - his face and voice were so familiar but I couldn't place him. He played Jury White, the SoA club President who Jax shoots on 'Sons of Anarchy'. Michael Shamus Wiles. Coincidentally (?) he also appeared with Brian Cranston in a couple of episodes of 'Malcolm in the Middle'.

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So far I have not watched any of Sons of Anarchy or Malcolm in the Middle.

Don't want to say too much about BB so as not to spoil it for you.

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My recommendation is to at least keep it to one per night. There aren't that many Breaking Bad episodes total and you don't want to run out.

Of course, I've also watched the show through a few times, so it's not like rushing it now prevents you from revisiting it in the future...

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I agree. One of the show's best qualities is its play with the "grey areas" of morality and how everybody has good and bad and can change either slowly or sometimes in haste.

There's a conversation between Walt and Hank about Cuban cigars, prohibition, and crystal meth which highlights this theme well.

The performances and the writing are equally creditable for keeping us, as you say, "rooting" for Walt and Jesse even though they are capable of heinous acts.

It's a mistake, though, to write off anybody completely. That's the other side of the coin. Walt does something AWFUL, but he clearly loves his family. Maybe not to the extent he tells people (or himself), but he does love them. He liberates Jesse at the bitter end. He hates himself for what he did to Hank. He is evil more often than not (particularly as the show goes on) but not 100%. Jesse, too, keeps trying to be better, and failing, but trying and trying.

I think the lesson of the show is that we are all capable of good and bad. We are corruptible and redeemable. We have choices to make and we should match our priorities with the good, not with the evil.

Hank is one of my favourite characters precisely because of his later "good guy" traits in juxtaposition with his "jock bigot" stuff we see from the word "go". He's a "man's man" in the worst ways - at first - and only later on do we witness how he really is a protector, provider, and caring husband and uncle (and brother-in-law). Yes, he is inappropriate in speech and attitude sometimes, but he brings a lot of good will to the table.

Another great example is Marie, who is a pretty model citizen, but is a kleptomaniac and catty.

What a great show.

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> He hates himself for what he did to Hank.

I think that is the only thing that got through to Walt, but even that, he looked after himself first. He came up with that video idea and of blaming Hank that led to the whole debacle. The reality of this show, the "externalities" if you will are that Jr. and Skyler are messed over for life. People don't get over stuff like this in real life like they do in the movies and TV. It's like when someone gets shot or stabbed in the middle of a fight, and they get up and keep fighting and keep going ... I'm convinced that American movie make Americans a little crazy, but not to mention the fake news from FOX, etc.

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Yes, Walt had fallen so low at that point that he needed a wake-up call as loud as that. That is the only reason I think he sells Jesse out as hard-core as he does: he's so enraged and hurt from Hank's death that he turns it outward and hurts Jesse rather than deal with that pain himself.

The reality is clear, yeah: Walt Jr. and Skyler won't recovery any time soon. I do think it's possible, though. It would be a long, hard road, but possible, nevertheless, for them to come to some terms with what happened. Why do I think this? Well, because I think the show displays their strength well. Skyler also gets a LOT of closer in the scene where Walt *finally* admits to her (and himself) that he did this for himself moreso than for the family. (Although, I think he did start out more focused on his family and gradually let out his inner tyrant.)

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He blamed Jesse instead of himself.

To know your father was a major king-ping drug-dealer and murdered, and that he murdered your Uncle, and other police, and staged a mass-murder of witnesses in prison ... I don't know if that is the kind of thing anyone survives from.

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I don't know either. Walt Jr. has an uphill battle for sure. On the other hand, he's young enough that he has time to realise that he is his own man and can heal and move forward. It will either be the millstone that sinks him or something he uses to make himself stronger.

Nothing is quite certain as to "what happened next", and maybe I'm just looking for as happy an ending as possible, but I choose to believe that Walt Jr. and Skylar eventually "got better" and had good lives.

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I pondered those questions and the best I could come up with that we have to assume "mediocrity", which is that the state we see them in last is where they will be. I think the Black's after a while would not be fooled by Walt's laser pen charade and would get legal advice because a CEO of a huge company would have huge liabilities if that ever came to light, and would report the money.

That may seem bleak, but if you look at the whole story in total without the humor and drama it is essentially a comedic romp into psychopathology and the reality - at least for anyone the audience would really care about would be pretty terrible.

I guess I have seen so many TV shows and movies I am aware that they actually do distort the world views of those who watch them.

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Howso distort the worldviews of viewers? Are you saying that television leads people into psychopathic behaviour or that watching Breaking Bad would increase the number of meth cooks? Or are you saying that it would just colour the perception of people like meth cooks and DEA agents?

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What are you, British?

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I try to keep such things vague online in general and on message boards in particular.

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