This Sunday, AMC starts the fourth and perhaps final season of Breaking Bad, the Emmy Award winning series starring Bryan Cranston as Walter White, a high-school chemistry teacher turned top of the line drug kingpin; Aaron Paul as Jesse Pinkman, a former student drop-out who cooks crystal meth with him in a makeshift trailer lab; and later on, Giancarlo Esposito as Gus, a Mexican drug lord who operates the drug cartel on the American side of the border, while operating two legitimate businesses — a Mexican fast food emporium and a commercial laundry — as fronts.
I started watching the very first season; to my mind, the program was good but not terrific, certainly not on the level of The Sopranos. It was largely a dark comedy. White, the main protagonist, found that he had incurable cancer, and might only have a short time left to live. With a family to support, and desperately in need of funds to support them, he decided to use his knowledge of chemistry to develop a method of cooking pure crystal meth, which he thought he could sell to addicts with the aid of a former student drop-out, who would handle cooking the meth with him and the selling of it as well. The student, named Jesse Pinkman, was also an addict himself, which gave Walt the idea that he would be the perfect person to make the necessary contacts needed in order to sell their product.
As the series progressed, it turned violent and almost unwatchable. Jesse got involved with characters depraved and vile; to watch them in action was rather hard to take. The irony of the series was that White, a cultured and serious family man, had to involve himself in a world he hated in order to make ends meet. To make things worse, his brother-in-law, Hank Schrader — played by Dean Norris — is a DEA agent, on the trail of trying to find out who is supplying the new deadly crystal meth suddenly arriving in his territory.
I skipped the second season, only to find not only that the series and its stars got major Emmys in the last year, but that critics began to call it the single best show on television. After reading one such piece a week ago, I watched the entire third season “On Demand” this past week. For once, the critics are on target. This week, the new issue of Time features James Poniewozik’s report on the program, and he gets it completely right. As Poniewozik says:
When Breaking Bad debuted in 2008, it seemed like a dark comedy along the lines of Showtime’s suburban pot-dealing show Weeds. Walt, a chemistry genius whose career fizzled out, is teaching kids he resents and working part time at a car wash — then he gets diagnosed with lung cancer. Desperate to build a nest egg for his family before he dies, he partners with Jesse, his former student and a small-time dealer, to cook meth. It turns out he’s amazing at it. And it feels good. He stays in the business even after his cancer goes into remission. “He wants to own this,” says Cranston, who’s won three Emmys for the role. “He’s feeling powerful for the first time in his life.” As Walt gets in deeper, embracing his criminality and signing on to run Gus’ pharmaceutical-grade-meth superlab, Breaking Bad becomes something incredibly compelling — and dead serious.
Rarely has a TV program morphed in a few seasons from a breaking-the-mold dark comedy into a compelling and tense thriller of a life in crime, in which a middle-class regular family with a handicapped teenager and a young baby,live in two different worlds. One is that of a regular suburban family struggling to get by; the other a wealthy criminal family whose head of the household even becomes willing to commit violent murders in order to succeed in his new criminal endeavor. Like The Sopranos, AMC’s Breaking Bad offers the viewer complex characters one identifies with and hopes succeed. After all, who wants White’s family to fall into economic collapse because he was given the bad deal of incurable lung cancer?
As Poniewozk writes, the more White falls into the drug world, he finds that he is a master cook of crystal meth, “and it feels good” to him. Unlike teaching chemistry to bored and unappreciative students, he is on top of the world — and making a bundle to boot. To quote the critic once more, “As Walt gets in deeper, embracing his criminality and signing on to run Gus’ pharmaceutical-grade-meth superlab, Breaking Bad becomes something incredibly compelling — and dead serious.”
The questions raised are moral issues. What would we do if faced with the stark alternatives Walter White faces? Would we put aside the quandary of whether good people can and will do bad things to others, if necessary to save one’s own loved ones? The key to the morality is the character of Jesse. The former student is a crazed junkie when we first meet him. By season three, he has gone to rehab and cleaned himself up, and is dedicated to working with his old teacher in order to make a business and build a life for himself.
But Jesse develops a conscience and a heart and, unlike Walter White, has trouble doing what is required to succeed in the criminal world — especially murdering others when asked to do so. In his AA group he meets a girl he becomes involved with and, learning that she is a mother of two young children, urges her to clean up her act and break her meth habit. Despite his good intentions, he is dragged further into going where he does not want by Walt who, in the last episode, orders him to murder someone who had to be put out of the way for the two of them to move ahead. We see him about to cross the point of no return and are left with the question of whether or not he did carry out the order to murder given him by Walt.
If you subscribe to a cable service that has “On Demand,” I urge you to watch at least the last episode of season three. If you don’t, turn on AMC Sunday night — I guarantee you that like those who take Walt and Jesse’s crystal meth, you will be hooked.
If you deal with corrupt people in real life , you will really relate with this series.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGN3SBVIjjA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iypBTQYnJi4&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IL0pge4_StA&feature=related
I have watched the show from the beginning (when Walter’s lab was the Winnebago in the desert) and while I love Bryan Cranston and Aaron Paul, along with the supporting cast, I am an adult – this is NOT a show I would let my kids watch. Case in point: last episode, Walter & Jesse were being held captive by Mike in the lab, and another guy starts making the meth (Walter insists he’ll forget the aluminum, but he doesn’t), Gus comes in, dresses up in lab garb, grabs a razor utility knife, walks behind the guy & slits his throat multiple times, – never showing emotion, never flinching, then calmly walks back to the sink, washes his hands, gets dressed, tells Walt & Jesse to get back to work, then exits.
Aside from the premise of cooking meth, which isn’t the best of subjects for young, impressionable minds, violence like this isn’t programming I would let my kids watch, either. Violence in shoot ‘em up cowboys good guy/bad guy flicks are one thing, but slitting a guy’s throat with a razor & watching him bleed to death is quite another.
Seems likes some of the best movies and shows are now on cable, such as with HBO, Showtime, or AMC, USA, plus a few other channels. Point is, you’re NOT seeing creative new material like this in movie theaters. You are NOT seeing many serious movies for adults in movie theaters these days, either. Only science fiction, animated, superhero trash that is geared for 10 or 12-year-olds. And the precious few movies for adults that do come out are just bland or silly soft-core porn. Stupid, really. So it’s refreshing to see that cable TV is picking up the slack and is being rewarded with great ratings. There’s a reason for this. It’s because what they’re putting out is good, a concept many Hollywood film makers find hard to grasp these days.
Is that because adults never leave the house, but prefer watching TV?
Liberty: I agree 100%. It seems that Hollywood makes movies now that, if not directed at the kiddies, are simply progaganda films for the socialist crowd (approximately 25% of Americans).
Imagine the money to be made if one could produce a film that appealed to the patriotism of the 75% of Americans who do NOT buy into the socialist’s siren song.
You’ll note my moniker, which indicates I’m a fan of a show that was on for ten years without my knowing about it, because I don’t have pay-for-TV. However, it does point out the free-market system working without hollywood. The Stargate series was filmed in Canada, thus making the outdoors shots completely NOT southern California, which was a nice change. Plus, they were less expensive to make, allowing greater flexibility and set design, not having to pay high union-scale to the guy who brings lunch to the actors. Canada? OK, so it’s a socialist nation…but it’s not without its good points. Primarily Canadian actors, not the usual re-hash of SAG never-make-it-in-hollywood types. In other words, “not the cool kids” and Richard Dean Anderson gave them all great opportunities and they did not disappoint. Australia is also on the up-and-coming threat to hollyweird’s hold on the industry. Unions and socialism/political-correctness have taken their toll and though the same may happen in the non-US studios, they are currently cranking out some great stuff.
I used to go to movies regularly, 2 or 3 times a month, now it’s once every 2 or 3 years, if that. Hollywood is for the most part catering to the teenies and the greenies with juvenile messages and missing the adult market completely. Mind you, I guess that isn’t hard to understand when you look at the people in Hollywood.
I’ve watched the show since the beginning as well. In my opinion, it is simply the best thing on TV today. Cranston is a superb and unusual choice as the star. When I first watched the show, I knew I had seen him someplace but couldn’t place him. He was the father on Malcolm in the Middle. I have never missed an episode, and I don’t plan on missing any either.
This is a great recommendation for a show that absolutely deserves it — but HOLY SPOILER ALERT!!! You have ruined many of the most epic twists in the storyline for anyone who decides to watch the show based on your review.
Liberty Ship, the late Charlton Heston observed that the cheapest, lightest summer rom-com these days costs more to make than it cost to make “The Ten Commandments.” There is so much money at stake that producers prefer to stick to the trite and true, stale but potentially profitable. That’s why they make so many movies out of comic book characters, so many sequels and remakes. For creativity, you have to look at the so-called independent movies whch cost so much less to make that they can take a creative risk.
The show had great potential but lost me. I haven’t seen the third season so will reserve judgement until I do (3rd not available as of 6 mos ago on Netflix). Walter is made to act as the superhumanly devoted husband while his wife leaves him for a job and attractive, sympathetic boss. Such loyalty. So she’s a slut or potential slut. As happens in American TV feminist victim dogma must be satisfied. I found it incomprehensible for this story. Walter White has discovered his inner James Bond, not Walter Mitty. If he’s to regain his honor so must his woman.
I also didn’t find Jesse Pink’s character very believable either. Are young people that weak these days? And, according to Mr. Radosh, he is now supposed to care for another man’s brats. Good God.
I started watching one night three years ago. They were showing the first season in back to back to back episodes. Started at 10. I was up until 4. Hooked! Bryan Cranston is simply fantastic.
I was struck by the comment Ron made about the dilemma of doing what you despise because you are in a survival mode for your self and those you love…an age old question.
I have been doing research for a new book about IG Farben and the third Riech and have suffered through all 500 pages being bombarded with this conudrum of some of the top basically decent executives of this world-wide Cartel who find themselves sucked into this nightmare of complicity with evil. Surrounded by the constant treat of their oun extinction, not only do they numb themselves into a blindness to the horrors of slave labor,deliberate stavation and mass murder but actually take pride in their affectiveness in performing their jobs of facilitating the war machine. Is this the dark side of human nature?
Not as good as The Sopranos? Never mind, then. Why bother with something that’s not as good as the best I’ve seen?
The library of arhooley contains one book. Breaking Bad is at least in the top twenty best TV shows of all time.
Hey arhooley, recognize your name from AoSHQ! Sopranos was always my favorite TV show of all time, but “The Wire” was far better in my opinion – (and I thought that nothing would ever surpass the Sopranos . . . . )
…Sopranos was always my favorite TV show of all time, but “The Wire” was far better in my opinion….
Amen!! I also found The Sopranos quite compelling but I have never seen a better dramatic series than “The Wire”. It’s not just me either; Virtually everyone who sees The Wire agrees that it is brilliant. Just look at the user reviews on IMDB. With over 36,000 ordinary people (and 57 critics) voting, it has an average rating of 9.7 on a scale of 10. Look at any of the 150+ reviews and virtually everyone gives it a perfect 10 rating.
I don’t want to get carried away but it is my fervent hope to live long enough to see just one or two more series of comparable quality before I die – but I think it unlikely than anyone will top The Wire for a very long time.
That’s not to take anything away from The Sopranos, Breaking Bad, or other compelling series like Sons of Anarchy. It’s just that The Wire is that good. The other shows, while worthy in their own rights and well worth watching, are always a couple of notches less impressive than The Wire.
If you haven’t seen The Wire, I urge you with all my heart to see it. Plan to buy it; you’ll want to watch it again. I’ve already watched it through three full times and expect to watch it again every year or two – and I don’t really watch very many shows even a second time! Just one thing: give it several episodes to get its hooks into you. The Wire starts slow and you probably won’t think it’s that great for the first few episodes. Many people said the same in the IMDB Reviews. But I guarantee that it gets better and better and by the end of Season 1, you will be hooked.
One additional benefit of watching The Wire: you may get some insight into Obama. The Wire is Obama’s favourite show and Omar Little – a criminal with a code – is Obama’s favourite character.
You’ve convinced me, Henry. I had heard about the Wire but somehow had the idea that it was a yuppie family drama like thirtysomething. I’ve heard other good things about it recently so after reading your comment, I’ll give it a try.
then you have not seen dexter, the wire was very good until the last season
Here is a thought. I like pure escapist nonsense, with easy to understand plot lines and visual cues to the action. Sex, sexual content, language, violence, nudity, these are the things I look for in a movie. I want things to blow up in fantastic pyrotechnic displays for no apparent reason. As for tv, I don’t watch, maybe the news occasionally. If I wish to explore the depths of the human soul, I’ll read a book. God, that sounds pretensious. Lol
You promised us a thought. Cough it up, man.
Because we don’t have nearly enough shows awash in violent crime on TV. Because we really, really are in desperate need of a show that, finally, at last, shows us a character who starts out sympathetic and goes over to the dark side. Nope, never see THAT kind of thing on TV these days. Obviously, this show is filling a gaping need we have for more darkness in our entertainment, what with all those puppies & unicorns shows out there.
Huh?
I saw one episode. Some guy was chasing a fly around his lab. That was it. An entire show.
Well, so much for an hour I could have more profitably spent watching infomercials.
Two possibilities (aside from the obvious) -
i. I missed some symbolic significance in man vs. fly.
ii. There’s another show titled “Breaking Bad” and I’ve managed to confuse the two.
Funny that you happened to watch just that one. It is atypical, and rather like a pause in the storm.
The infamous fly episode was a one-off aberation that ran the same time as the super bowl. You should start watching the show from season 1, it only gets better as it goes along.
You picked the exact wrong episode to watch for your first Breaking Bad. “Fly” was a slow character study episode sandwiched between several suspenseful action episodes.
There were several standout moments:
1. Walter starting to crack up under the pressure now that he realizes that he is in a situation with “no room for error” (where even a fly can get them killed).
2. Walter’s monologue about realizing he’s lived too long and that there was an ideal time for him to die before he got too involved as a drug manufacturer (i.e. before his wife found out, and before he was involved with such a dangerous organization).
3. Walter struggling to hold onto the ladder for Jesse, who is (stupidly) climbing too high and actually standing on the very top to kill the fly. This scene is symbolic of the entire season: Much of the plot revolves around Walt trying to protect Jesse from his own impulsive behavior. (And Jesse killing the fly on top of the ladder could be symbolic of him getting the job done at the end of the season.)
4. Walter *almost* telling Jesse about his accidental role in Jesse’s girlfriend’s death.
It was actually a great episode but everything good about it would have been lost on someone who isn’t familiar with the show and characters. You’d really have to start farther back to appreciate the show.
“Fly” was actually one of my favorite episodes! Although I do agree with other commenters that to appreciate the full emotional impact, you have to have seen the series from the beginning. To me, that episode is when Walt really realizes, for the first time, how far he has fallen. And it adds an entire new layer to the love-hate relationship between Walt and Jesse, as Jesse finally understands that Walt is just as messed up as he is, only in a different way. Anyway, I found it mesmerizing, I was completely spellbound throughout, wondering about the intentions of the writers, the symbolism of the fly, for example (to me it represents disorder; the aspects of our lives that we can never make the way we want them, no matter how hard we try). It is precisely the unexpected, boundary stretching episodes like this one that make me love this show so much.
Better than “The Simpsons”? NO WAY !!!
Better than “Mythbusters”?
Or even “Dirty Jobs”?
I’m sure it’s well done.
But, why would anyone subject themselves to this kind of dreary storyline? I kept trying to get the message from your synopsis.
As near as I can tell, the message comes to us from the typical Hollywood cesspool. Even an upstanding family man is one downturn from turning evil. Stable, nuclear families are no better than broken, crack families with a mother and drug addict boyfriend who have hearts of gold.
Admittedly, I haven’t watched it, and i have no doubt it is written and acted well. But to what point?
I’d rather watch something lighter that lets me walk away and think better of my fellow man. Maybe something with some nobility. I don’t even care that my entertainment is that realistic. Call me a pollyanna, but I think you wallow in that Hollywood crap and it does subtle and bad things to you over time.
I really advise everyone knocking the show on the basis of this review to go watch the first three episodes, and see for yourself. This article doesn’t do the show justice, not its narrative arc. I got hooked at the beginning by the premise of a middle aged man who lives a respectable but not very respected or “successful” life, suddenly backed into a corner by his cancer. His sense of helplessness and solitude was horrible. Being an obviously good man, he wants only to provide for his family before he dies. This aspect was brought out compellingly, and so it is all the more effective in the following season to watch this desperate situation corrupt that same virtuous man. It is an excellent and rather conservative character study in the vein of Dostoyevski, as well as a dark study of the meaning of “success” in the modern American world. And the writing, characters, and acting are the best on TV or any movie I’ve seen in dogs’ years.
“Being an obviously good man…”
He needs money “for his family,” so he decides that the way to get it is make and sell addictive drugs, thereby ruining the lives of untold numbers of other people.
He’s not “good”; he’s a f’n sociopath.
Nah, I think it’s pretty understandable, even for someone who believes in the drug war. He doesn’t just “need money” — he’s 50 years old with a crippling mortgage, a pregnant wife, a handicapped son, no health insurance or life insurance, and 3 months to live. He merely decides to do something illegal, but for which he is uniquely qualified for, to get some scratch for his family. He rationalizes that he is selling to gangsters, rather than junkies, and avoids contact with the end users as much as possible. If deeply in debt with a family to support and three months to live, I cannot say I wouldn’t be willing to do something equally morally grey.Ireject the notion that cooking meth itself is a purely evil act, or the act of a psychopath. The show deals pretty deftly with these adult moral ambiguities, and pretty clearly, in the end, comes down on your side — that his choice was a huge mistake.
“I haven’t seen it…” is the point at which you needed to step back from the keyboard and stop bloviating.
Sounds like it was intended to bolster support for health care reform towards someone else paying for everyone’s health care.
Never seen the show, hope I never do. Why in the world would I want to watch absolutely depraved people as “entertainment”?
“…complex characters one identifies with and hopes succeed.” That is truly sick and depraved in its own right. I hope all such people fail, immediately. I hope those who enjoy watching this sort of thing get a grip.
The fact that these shows are so popular is a fair-sized indicator of why the world is so screwed up today.
Then “Oedipus Rex” and “Heart of Darkness” must have starring roles on your cultural #@&* list. Such unpleasant folks doing such unpleasant things to one another…
I had a television machine once. When I turned it on I kept getting headaches, so in 1978 I gave it away.
Haven’t had a headache since.
The show is crap and virtually unwatchable by anyone with even the rudiments of a normal moral sensibility.
Why giving us a quote from a TIME critic? Isn’t the idea of PJ Lifestyle supposed to be an alternative to the reliably leftist media? We care about what you think. We don’t care about what they think, and neither should you–especially a writer like Ron Radosh, since I doubt he’s looking for a gig at the magazine.
A show about a DEA agent who dreams nightly of the six innocents a day (30 a day total) the Drug War kills in America might be interesting. Or maybe he dreams of the 30 a day in Mexico.
He is always asking his buddies at the office:
“Do you support the drug war because it finances criminals at home, or because it finances terrorists abroad?”
They just shrug their shoulders and say, “It’s a job.”
Nah, AMC’s The Walking Dead is the best on tv right now….or will be again when season 2 starts in October….
If you like this show then you should watch “Intelligence”. You can stream it on NetFlix.
The show is set in Vancouver and is one of the most devious, complex and corrupt plot lines I have seen in a while. Brilliant show.
Fringe is right up there. Some of the best science fiction I have ever watched.
Oh, yes! See this series, because, what Americans need is an understanding of the love and compassion of meth dealers. Got money problems? Forget planning, eschew saving…Sell drugs! But, slways feel some remorse for the people whose lives you destroy…that balances the scales for you.
May I also recommend Weeds, so Americans can fully involve themselves in the understanding that, when times are rough, break the law! (Perhaps there will be a spinoff, ‘Ho’, for moms who can’t make ends meet but who don’t have the acumen for advanced crimes)
And, don’t forget to look for the complete set of ‘Shield’, so Americans can empathize with the dirty cops that, also, just want to be rich and successful. And, how else could they do it but by breaking the law!
Yes, My thanks to the author for his insights. I feel like such a sucker, never having made the correct choices for my family, merely WORKING for a living, when there were acceptable (though prudishly illegal) paths to riches and comfort…….
My feeling exactly.
I’m sure it’s well made, cunningly written, and fabulously well acted.
But, why would any sane person want to watch it? Don’t you come away feeling unclean?
I’m with DSmith and Vincent. Why is it that the best of the craft is routinely devoted to sordid circumstances and debauched characters? I find it difficult to sympathize with a character, apparently talented and intelligent, who sees a life of violent crime as his only means to provide for his family — gosh, his motives are so noble. It all seems to boil down to his own self-absorption, and when his wife leaves him is it too much to imagine that his personality and temperament has become unbearable to those around him? The needs of the very loved ones he claims are the reasons for his criminality are reduced to mere revenue. He is the reason his family collapses. The show just doesn’t sound like entertainment to me.
The Sopranos was a thuggish soap opera punctuated by flying lead.
Though Breaking Bad lingers a bit too much on the joys of drug use, it’s a fascinating take on William’s moral dilemma. He had to choose between his personal integrity and his prime directive: caring for his family.
In any event, these are TV shows, and as such are not on the moral level of, say, Al Gore. In fact, they’re on a different level altogether.
When the show first aired, everyone at work just raved about it. After the premiss was explained to me I was horrified. I could never watch such a thing.
A teacher blackmails a student who is TRYING TO STAY CLEAN into making meth??? That is pure evil. Anyone now the recovery rate for meth addicts? Its about 3% for thous who actually desire to get clean. Meth messes with the head, it short circuits ones ability to think rationally. Addictions NEVER go away. In real life, the kid would have relapsed and his life would be destroyed.
Ask any recovered, by the Grace of GOD, meth addict,like me.
Your friends misinformed you. Walt does not blackmail Jesse, Jesse is definitely not trying to get or stay clean, and he is already one of the most well known meth slingers in Albuquerque whose lab was just busted up by the DEA. He’s also a former student, not a current one. Walt just propositions him to cook meth together and split the profits. Walt also forbids him to use any meth they cook, and it is Walt who ultimately puts him in rehab. So the show’s basically the opposite of what you described. Kick your friends in the teeth. If the show does anything well, it shows the disgusting and destructive effects of meth and heroin. Good luck with your recovery, though.
I still don’t think I could bring myself to watch the show. Meth is the living embodiment of Corruption in its fullest sense. It is a malignancy that infects and ultimately destroys all good in everything it touches, leaving nothing behind, but slow destruction. The only people from my former life who made it, are me and an 11 year old boy I ended up taking care of because his dad was too busy using. That was 17 years ago. BTW, that 11 year old boy, who is now my 28 year old son, is the only good thing to have resulted from my past. I consider him to be a Gift given to me by GOD, as a reward for sobriety and to give me an incentive to stay that way.
The fact that it deals with the New Mexico meth scene make it worse for me. One of my buddies would say that I am having a “Charlies all around me!” moment right now.
“Breaking Bad” does nothing to glorify or encourage the use of meth. In fact, the episode where Jesse goes after the tweaker couple who ripped him off is one of the best “scared straight”-type pieces of video I’ve ever seen. I made sure my 14-year old son saw it.
Hey, congrats on getting your life together. Must have been difficult. Yours is a story that might be worth watching.
The Sopranos is lightweight compared to Breaking Bad.
What makes Breaking Bad so good is what made The Wire so good in its heydey – not only was it strong on plot, characters, action and drama, it also told a gripping, realistic, identifiable story of how the decay of our nation’s social contract has inevitably brought about the decay of our families and our moral character. Initially, the brilliant physicist Walter White began to cook meth because his two jobs – working as a high school science teacher, and at a neighborhood car wash – were barely enough to support his family, and not nearly enough to pay for his cancer treatments. In a country where public school teachers are demonized on cable news and druglords are idolized on HBO, where the hell is the incentive to be a good person? Where the hell is the incentive to teach the future of America when you can barely feed your family doing it? This is what Breaking Bad is about. It’s not about glorifying drugs or guns; its quite the opposite. It’s really just one big, brilliantly executed open ended question to the audience: How can we survive as a country if the Walter Whites of America decide that teaching is just not worth it when compared to the allure of the bear limitless money and power of the drug kingpin?
Very nicely put. One quibble: it’s brilliant CHEMIST, not brilliant physicist.
This is a female-oriented show like most on TV. It “thrills” the female audience by providing a bland, boring, and doomed family man who morphs into a violent killer that provides thrills and chills. Its not quite Twilight but getting there.
As a guy, I don’t care. I don’t get the hots for a bad guy killing people and making money. That stuff leaves me cold. It is BORING (like the Sopranos). A bunch of people running around, all to provide excitement, thrills, and sexiness. Also a depressing comment on the female fan base.
This is what happens when TV becomes a female-gay ghetto. Characters like Jim Rockford, Brett Maverick, Paladin, Columbo, McCloud, James West, Magnum, Spencer, Robert McCall (the Equalizer), Hannibal Smith, Sonny Crockett, and even Charlie Crews (Life) all disappear. Instead we are left with Walt White. A guy no man would want to be, and only bad-boy obsessed women (and gays) find attractive. The heroic, good male, just as complex (Charlie Crews was far more interesting than Walt White, not the least was his moral limits coupled with his aims) if not more so than the bad-boy is simply gone. Bad guys are not that interesting. We already know they’ll do anything, so them killing someone is not much news. It puts a thrill up the leg of the intended audience, but leaves everyone else cold.
“As the series progressed, it turned violent and almost unwatchable. Jesse got involved with characters depraved and vile; to watch them in action was rather hard to take.”
Some friendly advice: If they ever make a movie about The Pricess And The Pea, buy a wig and audition for it.
“Rarely has a TV program morphed in a few seasons from a breaking-the-mold dark comedy into a compelling and tense thriller of a life in crime, in which a middle-class regular family with a handicapped teenager and a young baby,live in two different worlds.”
“The questions raised are moral issues. What would we do if faced with the stark alternatives Walter White faces? Would we put aside the quandary of whether good people can and will do bad things to others, if necessary to save one’s own loved ones?”
Puh-leeze! Breaking Bad is great TV but it raises moral questions that are as deep as the ones raised in the movie Pulp Fiction. It’s a cartoon, for Pete’s sake!
If you think this TV series in any way represents the reality of the drug world then I can only conclude that you have lead a very sheltered existence.
To suggest people watch only the last episode of the last season is to do them a disservice. Better they rent the first 3 seasons and watch them in marathons to catch up first, then come into this season with a complete understanding of the situation and characters.
I can never understand how people expect to drop into a continuing story like this with any appreciation for what they are watching.
I’m with Whiskey, though my belief is that Hollywood’s obsession with bad boys is a bit less anti-masculine than that. “The Godfather” and “Scarface,” not to mention “Goodfellas” are all mob-oriented crime dramas that more or less glamorize the lifestyle and the character of people who do lots of bad things to make themselves rich at the expense of others. All the way back to the thirties there were movies doing this, in one fashion or other. Occasionally I’ll like a mobster movie (I generally enjoyed the Cohen brothers film “Miller’s Crossing”) but for the most part I avoid them. I was generally uninterested in “The Sopranos,” and haven’t even had an inkling of an interest in “Breaking Bad.”
Oh, and Spenser’s name is spelled with an *s*, like the English poet. Good you mentioned Charlie Crews from “Life” too. I would have added Louis Fitch (Michael Imperioli) from Detroit 1-8-7, which got cancelled a little bit ago. If you didn’t see it the first time around, Imperioli’s a good actor (who got his big break in “The Sopranos” but we like him anyway) and the character is an interesting one, full of passion and not quite able to deal with the little things in life, like calling his kid. The whole case was good, the plots were interesting, they filmed it in Detroit so it had a gritty-street-feel…and ABC cancelled it after 18 episodes. Stupid stupid stupid.
When the boob tube went digital I thought surely this must be a Goobermint conspiracy so I left it on its stand and checked back from time to time. After several days I figured they were serious about this thing but so was I. I don’t miss inviting those characters into my house, in fact I miss nothing about it at all.
Take a walk, spend time with the kids or talk to your wife, it’s time well spent.
Just started watching this series due to a bought of insomnia and AMC airing the Breaking Bad episodes back to back late night. So thanks AMC for keeping me from getting a good nights sleep for the past several weeks.
I get the criticism from those of you who question the impact the morality of the main characters plays into the plot line. But what is not being discussed is the fact that this drama clearly shows the deadly consequences of the decisions they make.
We see Walt’s fear of his untimely death due to lung cancer and the desire to provide for his family after his death lead to him making the decision to cook meth ultimately lead to him losing the love of his wife and the breakup of his marriage.
As well, we see the drug overdose of Jessie’s girlfriend, Jane, lead to the tragedy of her air traffic controller father making a fatal error that leads to a midair collision and the deaths of 160 people. Coincidentally right over Walt’s home.
And not to forget that Walt’s DEA brother in law becomes so obsessed with finding whoever is making Walt’s crystal meth that he ends up destroying his career and becoming paralyzed in a failed hit attempt on his life by two hitmen who originally set out to get Walt.
It is for this and other reasons that Breaking Bad is so much above the cut over everything else on TV.
Agreed…and in a sense it’s like watching a car wreak. You want to look away sometimes, but can’t…and you hope gthey survive, but usually they are scarred for life.
I understand that I risk sounding comically naive here, but I can assure you that I am well read and highly educated, and that I don’t routinely criticize entertainments that I have not seen. Yet the fact is, I have no desire whatsoever to watch a show that makes a drug kingpin the hero (and yes, even if he’s an “anti-hero,” which is just an expression meaning “too cool to be earnest or decent, but still the protagonist we expect you to root for”). I don’t know when, exactly, it was that our society started cranking out pop culture that asked kids to pretend not to be Batman but the Joker, that asked moviegoers not to identify with the quiet and decent everyman but with the coked-up psycho, that asked television viewers to empathize with a man flooding a marketplace with one of the deadliest illegal drugs concocted. So, hurray for you for discovering that you really like such programming. For me, this kind of “Grant Theft Auto” type of glamorization of the people who are cancers on society is nothing more than typical liberalism.
Well, since we’re tossing TV viewing suggestions around, I’d like to plug my latest obsession, “In Plain Sight”. I’ve been streaming the first three seasons on Netflix. Watching it has been a brutally emotional experience. Who knew a show about the Witness Protection Program could so successfully exploit the themes of sin and redemption; love, hate, and family; and really get at the core of what makes us tick, the passions and rationalizations that drive our relations with other people and the world?
SPOILER In one episode that I can’t get out of my mind, Martin Landau plays a quiet old man pushing a broom in a bar in Albuquerque. We find out he was one of the original entries into Witness Protection, having rolled on his mob buddies in Philadelphia back in the 1970′s. He has not seen or talked to his family since then. One day the marshals show up to inform him his son has died of cancer. Rules are broken, and he makes his way to his son’s wake, where he finds out that instead of being the object of scorn for walking out on his family, his son idolized him as the “man who broke the back of the Philly Mob”, inspired him to grow up to be a lawyer and “the toughest prosecutor in the state”…. The mind reels. The story is almost Biblical, the acting superb.
The show is not like a CSI, with a clever pseudo-science twist that saves the day, or like Bones, or NCIS, or any of dozens of cop/doctor shows. Twenty years ago I might not have liked it, because the talk/bullet ratio is pretty high. But for a man of my age, very concerned with issues of sin and redemption and love and hate, it’s a very fruitful premise and the producers have made good use of it.
cheeflo asks:
Why is it that the best of the craft is routinely devoted to sordid circumstances and debauched characters?
Cheeflo, this is a critical question.
The best that “Breaking Bad” can aspire to is to be another “Faust” — that of a man who sells his soul to the devil for an earthly gain (even if well-intentioned and sympathetic) and, in the end, suffers the consequences of the bargain, i.e. damnation. And it’s not like achieving the level of a modern-day “Faust” would be, in terms of art, chopped liver.
BUT
The next truly great TV show destined for classic status, which I submit we haven’t seen yet, is going to be counter-cultural and not cultural. It is going to break the mold. And the mold in cable drama, right now, is overwhelmingly lurid and dark.
It is, in a phrase, a carnival of the damned.
Cop shows like “The Closer” and “Southland” are probably the closest we get to having lead & regular characters who have not made the Faustian bargain, but the prevailing tide in cable is that of an obsession with evil. Evil as a powerfully seductive force.
And we can put “The Sopranos” at the top of that list. Was it a well-written, well-acted, well-directed show? Of course. You think Hollywood is incapable of first-rate style and craft? “Breaking Bad,” “Sons of Anarchy,” “Mad Men” (Faust in a Brooks Brothers suit) … all are very well-executed shows.
But take a step back and ask yourself what ennobling thing any of these shows has added to our culture, and our spiritual condition as a nation. In what cable dramas are we seeing evil being resisted and, ultimately, conquered? I would submit that that is the extremely rare outcome. Evil conquers is the typical storyline and series arc.
Must all drama have positive outcomes? Of course not. But you should ask yourself what it says about a society (the most free and affluent in world history, I might add) where fictional depictions of evil triumphant are (a) the entertainment norm, (b) consumed by tens of millions, (c) critically acclaimed, and (d) not just tolerated but celebrated, omnipresent in media, for a decade or more.
Frog, pot, anyone?
Or are you among the blissfully naive who still clings to the notion that a steady cultural diet of immorality & demoralization has no effect upon the populace at large?
I come back to cheeflo’s question: So this is the best that the best minds in the TV business can come up with?
That they are incapable of separating themselves from the lemming herd rushing headlong over the cliff of depravity speaks to their paucity and rigidity of imagination, not the richness or flexibility thereof.
I wouldn’t trade 100 “Breaking Bad”s for 1 “Cinderella Man.”
miles: This was a very well written post. I may not agree with everything you say, but you present your arguments beautifully and write very well. (Almost the same sort of compliment you gave to the “execution” of TV drams, now that I think about it! But, you’ll have to take my word for it: that wasn’t my intention, to somehow parody that line about the fact that TV can have excellent direction, excellent scripts, and excellent acting — I merely noticed the similarity while I was writing my compliment to your “execution” of prose).
My one quibble however is with your final sentence. While I was deeply engrossed in Cinderella Man — I loved it and could barely contain myself from punching the air along with Russel Crowe (playing James Braddock) towards the end, I would like to note that, presumably with the goal of enhancing the script, the writers ignored and unfortunately distorted some truths to the real life warmth of Max Baer (Braddock’s opponent).
It turns out — and one can read multiple sources other than this one from Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Baer_%28boxer%29
– that Baer was indeed a kindhearted and sensitive man — not at all like the “evil” opponent — the way in which Cinderella Man painted him. The only character trait which Baer shared with his onscreen character was his tendency towards showmanship, jokes, and “playing for laughs.”
The real Baer was a Jew who moved out to California and built up his humongous shoulder muscles by, among other heavy manual labor jobs, working in a gravel pit. The infamous fight in which he accidentally ended up killing his opponent was instantly followed by a wholly sincere concern and continuous presence at the side of the man whose life was slowly ebbing away after the pounding he took from Baer. Wikipedia cites the Oakland Tribune, AP, and the MaxBaer.org website — the latter at:
http://www.maxbaer.org/faqs.html
in reference to that fight as saying:
“As Baer rose for the 5th round, Tillie “Kid” Herman, Baer’s former friend and trainer, who had literally switched camps overnight and was now in Campbell’s corner, savagely taunted and jeered Baer. In a rage and determined to end the bout with a knockout, Baer soon had Campbell against the ropes. As he hammered him with punch after punch, the ropes were the only thing to hold Campbell up. Tillie Herman, as Campbell’s chief second had the privilege of throwing in the towel but did not. Referee Toby Irwin seemed oblivious to what was occurring. When Irwin finally stopped the fight, Campbell collapsed to the canvas. It is reported Baer’s own seconds administered to Campbell and that Baer was by his side until an ambulance arrived 30 minutes later. Baer “visited the stricken fighter’s bedside” where he offered Frankie’s wife Ellie the hand that hit her husband. “She took that hand and the two stood speechless for a moment. ‘It was unfortunate, I’m awfully sorry’. said Baer. ‘It even might have been you mightn’t it.’” Ellie replied.
At noon the next day, with a lit candle laced between his crossed fingers, his wife and mother beside him, Frankie Campbell was pronounced dead. Upon the surgeon’s announcement of Campbell’s death, Baer broke down and sobbed inconsolably. Brain specialist Dr. Tilton E. Tillman “declared death had been caused by a succession of blows on the jaw and not by any struck on the rear of the head.” and that Campbell’s brain had been “knocked completely loose from his skull.”
The next day, local sportswriter Bob Shand reported that “Nobody feels sorrier over the tragic ending of the bout than Baer. The big kid is heartbroken and ready to quit the racket” and that “in one of his earlier bouts, Baer was reprimanded for not stepping in and finishing his man. He never forgot that advice.” After Campbell’s wife and his mother refused to press charges, the District Attorney charged Baer with manslaughter. Appearing before San Francisco Municipal Judge Albert J. Fritz, Fritz remarked to Baer, “You are in a difficult position.” to which Baer replied, “Its not so bad for me your Honor, but it sure is tough for Mrs. Campbell.” Referee Toby Irwin claimed that because it was well known that Frankie Campbell ‘played possum’ during fights so that his opponents, thinking he was hurt, would leave themselves open to attack, “waited until he was certain that Campbell had been knocked out for fear the audience would claim the fight was faked.” Charges were later dropped and Baer received a one year suspension of his boxing privileges in California. According to his family members, Baer was in a deep depression and did not leave the family home for over 2 months, endlessly smoking, drinking and eating very little. Baer later said for weeks he was “unable to sleep for more than an hour a night” as visions of the fifth round replayed themselves over and over in his mind. Baer later held an exhibition fight which raised over $10,000 for Ellie Campbell. After the exhibition fight, when Ellie was asked whether she forgave Baer, she replied, “I have no resentment toward Mr. Baer. There’s only room in my heart for sorrow.”
Indeed, for the remainder of his career, it was often Baer who stopped short of delivering a coup-de-grace punch, often stepping back and looking towards the referee for a decision so that he would never again do such harm to a fellow boxer.
Finally, and unbeknownst to me until just now, Baer fought Braddock with 2 broken hands! Nevertheless Baer refused to blame his loss on his injuries. Again, from
MaxBaer.org
the following quote:
“‘I have no alibis to offer,’ he explained, ‘Jimmy won and no better fellow deserves a break. He didn’t hurt me in the fight, but my trouble was that I couldn’t hurt him.’ “So saying, the ex-champ held up a right hand in the form of a fist, pressed the knuckles and demonstrated to observers how the metacarpal bones jumped out of position considerably.” ‘That hand, not too good to start with, went completely in the fifth round, and the left, though you may not believe it, went in the third.”
“He visited Dr. Leo L. Michael early in the afternoon to have his hands examined and it was revealed that both weapons were broken. X-ray photographs indicated that there were two bones broken in the right hand and a chip fracture in the left. Despite the injuries, Baer strenuously objected to offering any alibis. ‘I know I deserved to lose the decision,’ he stated ‘and I don’t want to take anything away from Braddock. I thought my hands were strong enough when I went into the ring, and its my own fault I didn’t knock Jim out early.”
There was no hint of this side of Baer’s personality in the film, and his descendants are rightly upset as they know the power of movies-as-reality today. I cannot tell you how many times I have brought up an historical event, or have overheard someone else bring one up, say, “Pearl Harbor” to which the listener, mind-bogglingly interjects, “Yeah, I saw that movie!” to which one then wants to then say, “uhhhhh, yeah, you saw the film about that — it really happened(!) men died. To which the 2nd man then says (and I’m now veering well off into fantasy), “yeah, but that old reality… it was all in black and white, you know… boring. People didn’t even bleed red blood. I mean what’s with that?”
Anyway, as stated in other places on the websites, and in my own opinion, its highly unfortunate that Baer’s reputation had to be so smeared in the film simply to provide an “extra little bit” of “bad-guy-ness” to Baer, and the story. The bout was exciting enough in real life such that the whole “Cinderella Man” story was being written contemporaneously by sports writers at the time. Why Ron Howard could not simply have focused, as they did, on the “rags-to-riches” portion of Braddock’s story, is beyond me as there is hardly another boxer who had more genuine warmth and charm than Max Baer.
Drug use destroyed my brother’s life, and subsequently my mother’s. I can’t watch any show that takes a sympathetic tone toward drug dealers. I don’t care if they have families, or exigent circumstances, or any of that. They destroy lives.
What makes Breaking Bad so good is what made The Wire so good in its heydey – not only was it strong on plot, characters, action and drama, it also told a gripping, realistic, identifiable story of how the decay of our nation’s social contract has inevitably brought about the decay of our families and our moral character.
I think it was George Lucas who said, back in the day, that movie theaters had become our churches. While not universally true, it is probably more true than not, and to that description we might add TV rooms & in-home theaters.
I would submit that we are long past the point, culturally speaking, where the only measures we ought to use to describe a show as “good” are gritty, real, well-written & well-acted, or (in the case of shows like Mad Men), exceptionally stylish.
If movies theaters & TV rooms are our churches, and the shows themselves our “Bible stories,” then I would say that we are the recipients of a tsunami of unproductive fire-and-brimstone preaching from Hollywood.
What do we get, week in and week out, but a thinly veiled version of this overall message?
America, yer goin tuh hell.
America, yer goin tuh hell.
America, yer goin tuh hell.
America, yer goin tuh hell.
The fire-and-brimstone preacher has become a character of mockery and dismissal in Hollywood entertainment (those that bother to depict this guy at all anymore, really). Quite ironic that Hollywood has become the very thing it has so despised, and is completely unaware of this development.
Someday, if this country manages to survive with any remnant of our patriot soul, we will look back on this era as the period in which we were Elmer Gantry’ed by Hollywood.
It is the best thing on television, and I think much better than the over-praised “Mad Men.” When the show started, I recognized Brian Cranston as an exceptional actor, but did not give Aaron Paul his due. I was fooled. He was such a convincing “stoner” that I thought he REALLY was one. Luckily, his superb acting has now been recognized — he won an EMMY last year and deserved it. The shootout with Dean Norris in the shopping center parking lot was thrilling and better than any shootout that I have ever seen (second place: “Open Range,” also on AMC; third place, Walter White running down the drug dealers with his car.). Radosh got one thing wrong: the murder of Gale. He has to do it because their boss has decided to get rid of Walter White and replace his with Gale. It must be done of Walter White is history. This became inevitable when Gus asked Gale when he could take over the lab — susposedly because of Walter’s declining health due to cancer. It was a way for Gus to keep a trained chemist, Gale, while getting rid of Walter White and Jesse Pinkman, a person whom Walter White protected — he had even “fired” Gale susposedly because he cooked a batch of meth at the wrong temperature (the temperature Walt told him). I wonder how the writers will get out of this. Gale has to die to protect Walter White (aka “Heisenberg”). Either Gus or Walter White must eventually die. Gus tried to murder him, and Walter can never forget it or trust Gus again. “Breaking Bad” is also so good because the other part are uniformly fine. The character of Saul Goodman is great — an attorney skating on the edge of crime. When Walter did somethig that Saul did not like, Saul said “I’m rethinking my pricing schedule with you.” Even the parts of “Badger” and “Skinny Pete” are wonderful. Kudos to whoever does the casting. I always thought “The Sopranos” had great casting. But I think “Breaking Bad” does better with actors unknown to the public. For example, the guy who plays Mike — the ex-cop and private investigator for Gus (who Saul Goodman thinks works for HIM) — is excellent. That speech that he gave in “Half Measures) about the battered wife was unforgettable. Gus is one of the all-time great villians — smooth and friendly on the outside; coldly calculating on the inside). I loved him giving “get well soon” messages to Hank Schrader when he had ordered the “hit” that had amost killed him. “Breaking Bad” captures some of the hidden duplicitousness and calculation that occurs in real life — which almost nothing else on television does. This is a show for grown-ups who know something of the complexities of life.
Characters like Jim Rockford, Brett Maverick, Paladin, Columbo, McCloud, James West, Magnum, Spencer, Robert McCall (the Equalizer), Hannibal Smith, Sonny Crockett, and even Charlie Crews (Life) all disappear…
If you’re going to bring up Charlie Crews and Life, you owe it to all of those who haven’t seen it to mention his co-star, Sarah Shahi, one of the hottest women alive. Talk about eye candy!
I’ve checked Hulu, Netflix and AMCtv.com – can’t find a place to get this show on demand – where you you go to watch the past episodes?
This is a show for grown-ups who know something of the complexities of life.
This statement could also be seen as a rationalization.
In the end, goodness is more complex than evil. You could be done with a study of why Hitler did what he did in a lot less time than you could study why Dietrich Bonhoeffer did what he did.
The sheer complexity of true goodness, esp. the self-sacrificing kind that does not get blown down in the gales of trial, is THE most grown-up subject you could find. Because it probes both extremes — man’s degradation and his glory. To constantly depict degradation without glory is a half-@ss cop-out on the part of the “artist,” IMO. Because if art is anything, it is a relentless commitment to telling the truth. And the truth is, there is such a thing as “the better angels of our nature,” as Lincoln put it. To deny the existence of goodness and the power of goodness, to obfuscate it, to disort it, or to just flat out ignore it while obsessing on the power of evil, is to do a great disservice to one’s talent, one’s art, and one’s audience.
But it seems the fashion these days to wallow in the slough of despond and call it “sophistication.”
Whatever.
You do realize that this is a TELEVISION show, not real life. No one is arguing that Walter White is admirable. He is just a middle-aged schlub who made an unconventional choice to make some money before he died. Part of the brilliance of the show is depicting how Walter White, mild-mannered school teacher, gradually becomes “Heisenberg,” dangerous drug manufacturer. He is somehow able to rationalize that he is not a drug dealer because he is a drug MANUFACTURER. In an effort to protect his family (financially), he LOSESE his familty when Skyler learns the truth. Now, various things have happened to place her in tempatation for “Breaking Bad.” Walter White’s drug career is like a cancer that is spreading through his whole family, even though he wanted to “protect” them.
You do realize that most of what comes out of Hollywood is propaganda, don’t you? That those people are using the medium of television (or TELEVISION if you prefer) as a vehicle for leftist messages. And it’s been hugely effective.
There are very few things in this country as serious as television.
If you don’t see this, it’s working.
I liked Friday Night Lights. That was a great series.
I didn’t know there are so many uptight pilgrims.
I guess it depends on if you think light disenfects or causes growth. I prefer the days when kids could be out all day on their own vs. what we have today when they could be abducted (and dismembered). Does the media cause that or is it just a reflection of it? Not sure… I think it is both. The things that are piped into our homes today via cable or satellite are deplorable. You cannot even watch family commercial TV without having to filter out the commercials anymore.
A decent review, but the show did not “morph” from a “dark comedy” to “something more serious.” Were not Walt and Jesse’s lives threatened convincingly in the very first episode? Of course the story and characters have developed over time, but “Breaking Bad” has been what it is since it started. The moral issues didn’t pop up in season three.
Yeah, I’ve been interested in BB. But every time I watch it – every single time – I come away feeling hopeless, forlorn and even guilty. It is a depressing show. I’ve decided I can’t watch it. Not just because of how bad it makes me feel, but what it means about us and what increasingly harmful behavior we are willing to tolerate…at least in the behavior of the lead characters of our tv series.
We’re supposed to excuse and root for Walt White because it’s so unfair that he’s so smart and yet feels he’s underpaid, has a son with CP, and then he’s diagnosed with terminal cancer. Yep, tough breaks, truly. But it happens every day…and much, much worse…to much better people than Water White. And they don’t consider turning hundreds of people into meth addicts so the kids can go to summer camps of their choice. We’re supposed to look at Walt as an economic victim who is forced to do these simply horrendous, monstrous acts. What it comes down to is the writers have sunk to a new “Hollywood” low by excusing repeated killings (some deliberate hits) and the unleashing of incalculable misery on the populace because White wants to amass a bunch of money. Just as I’m sure countless incarcerated drug dealers and murderers did as well in real life.
True to their breed, professional reviewers have fallen in love with BB, as they so often do with series which go a little bit further in breaking down the remaining walls of morality which previous generations erected to protect us from the law of “he who can, may”. Look at the terms they use so euphemistically in their reviews : “edgy”, “transgressive”, “complex”, “complicated”. These are the words we see used about those series in which protagonists break new ground in the nature and degree of the social, personal and domestic destructiveness the series’ writers attribute to them.
The very same way in which other shows in which the protagonist and his/her enablers and accessories are, at a minimum, objectively, serial felons: Dexter, Weeds and Nurse Jackie. We’re edging closer and closer to the point where there are neither any more crimes left, or any exculpatory and ameliorating circumstances. We’ve only got cannibalism and pedophilia left in the writers’ quivers of shocking crimes to be engaged in by an “edgy” central character. Perhaps some type of torture may be left. (Although in our perverse postmodern society, we’ll gadly watch torture of infants before we’ll accept puppies being depicted in a hot car. The mind simply boggles.)
And with BB using Walt’s money problems as an excuse, we’ve defined down what motives are sufficient to permit these increasingly outrageous crimes. With Nurse Jackie’s unhappiness providing her an excuse to steal drugs from the hospital, we’re close to using boredom or personal dislike as the okay to start whacking away with a machete.
Bottom line: the fact that BB was even pitched in the first place is a sign of our decaying culture, and the producers’ recognition of that fact. Don’t think so? Then why wasn’t this show on tv in the 60′s? Or even the 90′s? The widespread praising of it is terribly disheartening evidence that the show’s producers knew their audience.
Thanks for the review, I’ll have to watch it, just as soon as I finish re-watching Season 2 of the REALLY best show, TREME, which, unfortunately was passed over by the Emmys. There is no justice.
Ok, I watched the first season. Lets recap: A long time chemistry teacher (he has at least a BS in chemistry but probably an MS plus an MA in education because an Med is what is required to teach high school in Albuquerque). He is making at least 60K per year. Can anyone show me a teacher with bad health insurance? But that is one of the premises of the show. In spite of teachers having the best health insurance in the US.
The entire claim of being poor and not having enough money because of bad health is a total lie. As I said before, teachers have the best health insurance.
He’s making and selling drugs while out on sick leave. (Typical teacher.)
The retarded son generally has the most incisive grasp of the situation.
Typically shows a white cop as insensitive non pc Archie Bunker type (like that could still go on)
Shows cops wife as kleptomaniac in denial.
Yet paradoxically, shows a top ten in the US oncologists as a black doctor living convenient to Albuquerque. Right, like that is going to happen, but nevertheless, he charges a lot for his services as well, ’cause he’s a doctor.
Psycho drug dealer kingpin.
Oh, what the hell, there isn’t much else on.
The son isn’t retarded. He has cerebral palsy
Also, Breaking Bad, like so many others resorts to “family as motivation”. Which is basically, I can justify anything as long as it protects my family. (A similar plotline is used in “Fast Five”.
Once Hollywood destroyed honor, patriotism, integrity and doing right for its own sake, the only motivating force left is “teh family”. (‘teh’ is on purpose here, but ‘sic’ just doesn’t fit). That is their only good.
He’s a long time NM teacher. He’s got a nice house, wife doesn’t work, has a pool in the back yard, a teachers salary with guaranteed pension and benefits and health insurance. And he works two jobs as well. A total motivational crock that is full of typical liberal lies.
I’ve seen a few episodes of Breaking Bad, and it was entertaining but not enough to really suck me in.
The moralist critiques of the show seem to me overwrought–the audience is not a passive receptacle and the series of bad things that happens to this guy as a direct result of his choices and rationalizations is like an object lesson to those who think becoming an outlaw would improve their lives. Of course, the main character has to be sympathetic enough to get the viewer engaged, to make the viewer question why he’s rooting for this guy, and to create a sense of tragedy. Not really that obscure–the show does anything but glamorize its (unrealistic) portrayal of the drug biz.
A great exploration of evil and redemption is the movie Another Day in Paradise, which initially presents James Woods as a “hip,” appealing junkie/thief mentoring two younger addicts. Without giving any spoilers, the story shifts the moral center of the “family” interestingly and compellingly. Melanie Griffith is also terrific, by the way.
A more conventional but also compelling wallow-in-the-darkness-but-ultimately uplift drug film is The Salton Sea, starring Val Kilmer.
For those who like good/evil battles where good is the default viewpoint, the old Buffy the Vampire Slayer TV series was extremely clever and moving at times.
Talk about a foolish premise for a show, this one tops them all, and yet it is starting its fourth year? No one ever made a mistake underestimating the brain power of Americans. But Ron Radosh? Really!
Just for context, I have watched and enjoyed (in the end) much of Friday Night Lights and almost all of Deadwood, Big Love, Downton Abbey, and Mad Men. We had BB recommended to us, and probably will get to it eventually.
But the responses to this show here makes me think about our need for heroes, even if they have not been redeemed by Jesus. Man/woman without Jesus is a fallen creature, so any corruption and depravity on his/her part is to be expected, right? But some of us also have the need for heroes as a different cultural phenomenon, people who embody goodness in humanity, whether the goodness comes via having Jesus as their personal saviour, OR just some innate or stumbled upon goodness.
Would it be immoral to show a heroic, decent person, who was also NOT a believer?
I also found fascinating the comment defining Hollywood/tv as the new Elmer Gantry.
One of my regrets here is that I do not respond enough to the interesting, off-the-PJM-agenda comments, but settle for trying to whack the dopes. Mea culpa. Henceforth I will try to be more productive.
So miles, whoever you are, this Sam Adams is for you.
Yet another show filmed in nausea-cam.
I get never get seasick, never get carsick, but it is impossible for me to watch anything filmed (or possibly edited) in the cheap, crappy, phony handheld effect that’s taken over so many TV studios.
I can’t appreciate the plot, the characters, the dialog, or the screenplay if they can’t keep the camera steady.
There are some fascinating points in time on this article but I don’t know if I see all of them middle to heart. There may be some validity but I will take hold opinion until I look into it further. Good article , thanks and we would like extra! Added to FeedBurner as properly
Nice read Dick, lost alot of respect for Ditka that day.
This show is better than nearly every movie coming out of Hollywood. Those clowns that spend 100 million dollars to make crappy movies that rely only on CGI and explosions could learn so much from a show that likely costs a couple million…for the whole season!!! The show has fully developed characters, incredible plot twists, slow suspense peppered with just enough shock and horror to leave you on the edge of your seat. It is also funny at times.
Enjoy full movies for free of charge