It's over. It's hard to say it and actually mean it, but it's over. Even if I don't feel like it's over, I can recognize that it's over. So, I guess the only thing I can do to help me come to terms with the fact that it's over is to talk about it in depth.
Since 2010, Breaking Bad has been my personal refuge in obsessive television habits. After hearing all of the hubbub about the show's "Half Measures" episode, I decided to watch it without any prior exposure to the show and only a vague knowledge of what it was about.
And, by the end of it, I was hooked. The cliffhanger of the episode sold me enough to watch "Full Measure," and the ending of that episode made me want to watch every previous episode.
Breaking Bad was a revelation for me. As someone previously apt to watch shows on a purely visceral level, the way Breaking Bad asked, nay, begged its viewers to watch it was marvelous. There were a bevy of "Holy crap!"-worthy moments that could hook those simply looking for thrilling television, but the layers underneath were astounding. There were the characters, developed and defined in ways that surpassed the typical "single defining characteristic" method. There was the blurred morality as viewers were constantly challenged on how much they wanted Walter White to triumph in his goals or how much they would support his decisions. And, for those brave enough to seek it out, there was a daunting amount of symbolism and meaning behind the images and framing that made watching the show with a close eye infinitely rewarding. (There's also the blistering stupidity of hatred towards Skyler, but it's best not to discuss that.)
So, with so much to live up to and more people watching than ever, Breaking Bad was inevitably going to fight an uphill battle in satisfying with its conclusion. Did it succeed? Well, from my own perspective, yes. But, in true Breaking Bad fashion, it did so in a way that I wasn't expecting.
Based on the build-up from the last few episodes (specifically from "To'hajiilee" onward), I was expecting a raucous, no-holds-barred, intense rush to the finish line. After all, given the cataclysmic events in "Ozymandias," one could easily assume that an eventful response was all but assured. The implied calm before the storm of the penultimate "Granite State" seemed to cement that things were primed for an explosive finale.
Yet, a curious thing happened on Sunday, September 29th at 9:00 pm. The final episode of Breaking Bad, "Felina" (which, as knowledgable Internet hounds have noted, has a triple meaning linked to the periodic table, referenced in a Marty Robbins song that appeared in the first scene, and as an anagram for "finale"), closed the series with a whimper rather than a bang. Things ended, loose ends were tied, nothing (with the exception of one Huell Babineaux, still presumably waiting in a DEA safe house) was left to the imagination. Yet, there was an oddly solemn, hollow, empty feeling to it all.
Clarification: This is not a bad thing. In fact, not only do I believe that this was intentional, I believe that it puts just the right footnote on the series and the legacy of Heisenberg. Here's why.
In the aftermath of the finale, I read a couple of reviews that suggested that things wrapped up a tad too neatly for Walt's often messily executed plans. Let me throw out a suggestion: "Ozymandias," the most eventful, chaotic episode of the series, in which everything spiraled horribly out of control, was the way it was because the control in that episode was out of Walt's hands. The Nazis kill Hank and Gomez in their unorganized yet effective manner. Walt twists the knife into Jesse due to his overflowing shock and rage. He loses his family because they finally reject his lies.
It's for this reason that "Granite State" is perhaps the most necessary transition episode of the show. The implied trapping of Walter White in the Hell that is his remote New Hampshire cabin, slowly dying from the cancer, unable to atone for his sins one last time when denied the opportunity to give his son the money he spent the entire series earning is what makes the Walter White we see in "Felina." Here is a man, left with no safety net, nothing left to hang on to, acting methodically and in control for the first time in a while. Perhaps it's the cancer taking hold, perhaps it's the systematic destruction of the hellish New Hampshire tundra, but this is a different Walter White than the one who left Albuquerque.
Note the minimalist dialogue in every scene with Walt. Now, no longer feeling the need to stand by his eloquent, drawn-out fibs that were meant to explain his every action, Walter White is the most honest he's ever been. That also means he has very little to say. The first couple of scenes have him making his first moves in near silence, occasionally muttering a couple of lines when he needs to. But, even when he's face-to-face with previous acquaintances, he speaks only the truth and as bluntly as possible. Take, for example, his first true moment of honesty with Skyler since the pilot:
"I did it for me. I was good at it. And I was really --- I was alive."
As I previous stated, there's an air of solemnity that naturally comes with the conclusion of a dramatic show, but there also lurks a hollowness beneath that was wholly unexpected. By the end of the episode, I wasn't all too emotional or stunned. I just got an empty feeling inside. I was satisfied, but I got the sense that the show ripped a hole inside of me, devoid of sentiment, that conveyed exactly how it is to feel loss even with closure. The shocking stuff was there, but with a expedient and deliberate attitude. The M60 massacre isn't an extended bloodbath as the show foreshadowed, but merely a sudden annihilation that practically concludes before the gun runs out of bullets.
In this respect, the finale could be a reflection of Walt's own actions: quick, effective, and ultimately withdrawn. The exchange between Skyler and Marie is especially telling; the Heisenberg legacy has reached a point where Walt simply being present generates a wave of panic and dread. Walt essentially goes through his to-do list without any major hiccups, but to what end? He, presumably, gets the money to his family, but, as the above quote establishes, that doesn't mean much to him. He frees Jesse, but only as a last-minute improvisation to his plotted course.
What matters, in the end, are the final moments of Walter White's life. Bleeding out from a stray bullet from his M60 rampage, he shambles over to the nearby meth lab and dies in the only place he truly lived. Family doesn't matter to Walter White. Jesse doesn't matter to Walter White. The only thing that does matter is his ego, fueling his legacy, his reputation as Heisenberg. In its waning moments, Breaking Bad strips its protagonist of his facade and lets the man who lived underneath show through.
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