While many cite Season 4 as a favorite, Breaking Bad's final season (split into eight episodes separated by a year in between) is remembered for many of its more engrossing and, ultimately, heartbreaking moments. However, when he heads home to retrieve the money from the crawl space underneath his house, he discovers Skyler took it to pay off her laundering former lover's debt to the IRS, inciting a startling bout of mania portrayed exquisitely by Bryan Cranston and resulting in one of the series' most breathtaking final shots. ![]() Walt enlists Saul Goodman (Bob Odenkirk) to help him relocate his family, which will require an immodest payment. When Gus catches word that Hank has come dangerously close to uncovering his operation with Walt's reluctant help, he severs ties with the cook completely, but not without threatening to kill his wife, his son, and his infant daughter before his exit. The tension comes to a world-shattering climax and Walt reaches the peak of his desperation in the season's eleventh episode. When we first see Walt in his classroom describing chemistry as "a study of change," he is unwittingly referring to the metamorphosis he is destined to undergo.Įveryone has a favorite season of Breaking Bad, but the majority seem to favor Season 4, particularly for the meticulously winding tension between Walt and his ruthless employer Gus Fring. It perfectly familiarizes us with the protagonist, quickly ropes the audience in with its bewildering flash-forward cold open, and drops subtle hints to the show's overarching theme. The premiere episode of Breaking Bad is one of the more expertly constructed introductions to a series. When he receives news that he has terminal lung cancer, he makes the decision to team up with his former student, Jesse Pinkman, to start a methamphetamine operation to be able to support his family once he succumbs to his diagnosis, but he soon discovers this new profession may be more life-threatening. In the episode that started it all, we meet Bryan Cranston’s Walter White, a high school chemistry teacher (and part-time car wash attendant) with a loving family that is about to add a fourth member, who still seems somewhat unfulfilled. While this threatening turn is clearly a performance, it is one convincing enough for even viewers to shed their pre-conceived notions of Walter White’s true nature. After Jesse’s first meeting with the drug slinger puts him in the hospital, a freshly head-shaven Walt pays Tuco a visit to lay out his own terms of negotiation, which include “a tweak in the chemistry” that proves to be literally explosive. Some might say the switch was flipped by the third or fourth year, but I would say we get our first inkling of who he is destined to become in the premiere season.Īfter deciding to continue his business agreement with Jesse, Walt becomes desperate for better funds and has his partner seek help with distribution from Tuco Salamanca (Raymond Cruz), who turns out to be a hostile negotiator, to put it lightly. It is debatable which point in Breaking Bad’s narrative marks the exact moment that Walter White’s transition into a ruthless criminal mastermind really begins to kick into gear. Crazy Handful Of Nothin’ - Season 1, Episode 6 ![]() Yet, the episode’s true strengths lie in how it paints Gus as a villain threatening enough to convince a man his life depends on an issue as seemingly frivolous as a housefly.ĩ. ![]() This forces him and partner Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul) to spend and entire workday hunting down the “contamination,” complemented by a witty, one-sided debate on the correct spelling of “possum” (or “opossum”) and Walt’s reflection on how his criminal lifestyle rivals the value of his life. In the series’ sole bottle episode, and the first directed by Rian Johnson, Walter White discovers the titular insect inside the meth lab provided to him by Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito). Yet, it has made this particular Top 10 list because, quite frankly, I believe it deserves more recognition than it has received. That may not sound too bad, but compared to the ratings of more widely acclaimed episodes, it is quite a dip. If you look at the top-rated episodes of Breaking Bad on IMDb, at the very bottom of the list, ranked at #62, is “Fly” with an average user score of 7.8.
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