Monday, January 6, 2014

Breaking Bad

Given that it recently ended, and was something a lot of people were talking/raving about – I'm very into my pop culture, and I hate it when I'm outside the loop on a popular/interesting tv show – one of my goals over the Christmas break was to watch Breaking Bad from start to finish. So, on New Year's Day I achieved completion of that goal: all sixty-two episodes in just under a week of watching (a few things got in the way, like cricket, going to the cinema to see American Hustle and New Year's Eve celebrations1) – and I'm now reflecting upon the experience.

1I went out to the city with friends, had a bunch of drinks and wandered down with them (the friends, not the drinks) to the Festival Centre and watched the fireworks2.
2Something I don't think I've actually done before. I can't remember the last time I was in the city on New Year's, and I almost certainly never bothered to go watch the fireworks.

The version without spoilers

It's weird, since I remember a couple of years back watching the first couple of episodes but not being particularly drawn in to it; I think I had intended to keep at it, but I have a vague notion I stuffed up recording it (it was on ABC2 at an odd time of night) and never bothered to get hold of the ones I missed in order to keep going.

But, upon rewatching, I now can't imagine what I was thinking at the time, because I got sucked right in.

As you're probably aware, it's the story of Walter White – a nebbish high school chemistry teacher who, to support his family, turns to cooking illegal methamphetamine with a former student, Jesse Pinkman, after he is diagnosed with terminal lung cancer; as you can imagine, things get more and more complicated.

What makes it so good – and able to make a show that ran to 62 episodes over five seasons – is a combination of things: exceptional writing and amazing performances, especially from Bryan Cranston (Walter) and Aaron (Jesse). I didn't realise until I was reading up on it that creator Vince Gilligan was a writer for The X-Files, and he wrote some of the best episode – including my all-time favourite, Bad Blood3. It's so exceptionally well-thought-out – the internal continuity is stunningly good, with so many callbacks to earlier episodes throughout.

Basically, it's a show worth watching if you're into a show with a reasonably slow-boiling plot, morally ambiguous (at best) characters, the occasional 'holy freaking crap!' moment, subtle social commentary and an undertone of very dark humour (think Fargo) then I highly recommend it.

3The one about vampires with a Rashomon-style narrative, a guest appearance from a young Luke Wilson, and a scene where Mulder sings a line from Theme from Shaft4.
4Seriously. And it's brilliant.

The version with some spoilers

I've thinking about it constantly since I finished watching it, and I've come to the conclusion that it's easily amongst the best television shows I've seen. Trying to work out what I'd consider *the* best would be difficult, since there are a few contenders, but where BB stands head and shoulders above the rest is by virtue of the fact that it was brilliant all the way through, right to the end – most of the other shows I've loved over the years had me enjoying them for a period and then losing interest. In fact, the more I think about it, I don't believe there's any other show I've watched that was so consistently brilliant. And I'm not alone in thinking that; it's one of the highest-rating shows at places like IMDB and Metacritic – the third-to-last episode, Ozymandias, has a 10.0 score (out of 10.0) at the former, which is damn impressive.

At the heart of it is the journey of Walter White as he goes from a downtrodden high school chemistry teacher to a deadly, manipulative, criminal mastermind (and then, at the end, a broken man seeking at least some redemption) – and, between the writing (in plot and character development it borders on the Shakespearean at times, particularly the notions of hubris and the danger of ambition); it really is Walter's pride that is the biggest reason for his downfall.

Great writing wouldn't go far without an actor to make it work – and they've got that in Bryan Cranston. Apparently the suits balked at casting him because his most significant role was as the bumbling dad in the quirky sitcom Malcolm in the Middle6. But creator Vince Gilligan convinced them by showing them a dramatic performance of Cranston's in an episode of The X-Files which he'd seen years before after he began working on the show. It's not only Bryan Cranston, though; there's been a number of great actors doing excellent work: Aaron Paul has won a handful of awards for playing Jesse Pinkman, Anna Gunn won an Emmy in 2013 for her portrayal of Skyler White, and Jonathan Banks (Mike Ehrmantraut), Mark Margolis (Hector 'Tio' Salamanca) and Giancarlo Esposito (Gustavo Fring) were all nominated for supporting actor Emmys at some point. And there were other wins and nominations for lesser-known awards.

I found myself getting attached to the characters as well – which meant that when, as was somewhat inevitable, they would kill one off, I felt bad. Especially when it was one I wasn't expecting – something they did more than a few times; it may not quite be Game of Thrones, but it's still pretty lethal to its people.

Obviously it's a very dark show – it has to be, given the subject matter – but there's always (very black) humour throughout. It did tend to take a bit of a back seat in the later episodes, but there were still a few lighter moments here and there. I laughed myself silly on more than a few occasions, but rather than try and list them myself I'll just link to TV Tropes, which has an entry in their Crowning Moment of Funny section for the show – though I will say I really enjoyed every moment with Saul Goodman and the random scenes featuring Jesse's friends Badger and Skinny Pete.

Really, I could talk (okay, write) about it for hours – but all I'd be doing is reiterating the points above and heaping praise upon it. It really is an amazing show; I suspect I'm going to buy the box set so I can a) watch it all again and b) listen to the commentaries and so forth to get a better insight into how they put it all together ­– and I don't do that for too many things; in recent years I've only done it for Game of Thrones and Hannibal7.

I expect that, if you've seen it, you know what I mean. If you haven't, I hope I haven't given enough away that you won't want to watch it for yourself.

5The episode title itself is indicative of the cleverness of the show's writers, since Ozymandias is a poem by Percy Shelley about a king who builds a giant statue of himself, thinking he'll be remembered for ever – but all that remains of the statue is ruins. Allegory, people.
6He was nominated for a few awards for that role but never won any.
7Incidentally, I'm a big Bryan Fuller fan; I also have both Wonderfalls and Pushing Daisies on dvd.

2 comments:

  1. I'm an extreme cable critic, and I have to say the only other cable series that engrossed me as much as this one did was Deadwood.

    ...and this one had much better control of the direction it took, and a fantastic wrap up that the writers of Deadwood I am sure would have only wished they could have done with their series.

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  2. The first season of Deadwood was brilliant, and the second was almost as good. But the third – ugh. That's the thing, though – I can list a dozen shows which had some great seasons, but none that was as consistent throughout.

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