Breaking Bad - Series Finale - Recap: Here Today, Gone Tomorrow
Recap video and review of Breaking Bad - Series Finale - Felina:
Breaking Bad has always been a series set on a sliding moral scale. We can appreciate Walter White's circumstances even while we might find it hard to identify with some of his choices. It's conceivable to see how a good man might resort to criminal enterprises in the name of providing for his family. Hell, it's conceivable to see how he might continue even after it became clear he was in way over his head. But the show often found cause for viewers to be disgusted by Walter White as frequently as it found cause for us to root for him. Ultimately, "Felina" largely tosses aside the complicated morality in favor of getting Walt back to a point he hasn't been since the pilot: he's 100% the protagonist here, an avenging angel of sorts, and in that respect it's fitting to see the series bow out on a note that brings Walter White's journey full circle. Power and control are as addictive as the drugs Walt peddled, and when you refuse to get clean, you die by that addiction. And so it was with Walt. "Felina" is the white whale of modern TV storytelling: it's a wholly satisfying series finale. With Breaking Bad as a whole, Vince Gilligan has accomplished something that will be hard to match.
Walt's checklist:
Gretchen and Elliott Schwartz: Walt sets about getting the location info for Gretchen (Jessica Hecht) and Elliott Schwartz (Adam Godley) by posing as a New York Times reporter. He then breaks into their home, in a scene of magnificently tense staging, as Walt basically lounges around their ostentatious house as they go about their mundane nightly business. When Gretchen spots Walter, she's understandably perturbed, but Walt assures her that he isn't there to hurt them. Instead, he's there to give him the $9 million remaining to him, with instructions to put it in a trust to be given to Walt Jr. (RJ Mitte) on his 18th birthday. Cranston is wonderful here, as Walt plays the villain Gretchen and Elliott expect him to be, having two unseen accomplishes train lasers on their hearts. Walt indulges in telling them that if his instructions are ignored, they'll have to answer to "the best hitmen" in the west -- maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but someday. They agree to give the money to Walt's children, and it's only later that we learn the two hitmen were none other than Badger (Matt L. Jones) and Skinny Pete (Charles Baker) -- because OF COURSE they were.
Credit: AMC
Lydia Rodarte-Quayle: Because Lydia (Laura Fraser) is one of the least subtle "cautious criminals" on the planet, Walt is easily able to track her down to the same cafe they would meet when they were regularly doing business together. Naturally, Lydia is ordering chamomile tea with soy milk and Stevia, while Todd (Jesse Plemons) is busy ogling her and doing his best to keep his obvious attraction under control. And so Walt approaches the stunned couple to propose a new business arrangement, as he's able to surmise that they're low on methylamine. Lydia pays lip service to hearing him out, but once Walt excuses himself, she reveals to Todd that she has no plans of doing business with the man, and implies that they'll be putting a bullet between his eyes when the inevitable meeting goes down. Unbeknownst to Lydia, however, Walt has retrieved the ricin capsule from his former home (seen in the flashback in the premiere). As Lydia empties the Stevia into her tea, she does it without knowing that Walt has replaced the sugar substitute with the deadly ricin. Smooth criminal.
Skyler White: In an exceptionally well-directed scene, Skyler (Anna Gunn) takes a phone call from Marie (Betsy Brandt), who is frantic because police have found the car Walt is accused of having stolen in New Hampshire in town, in addition to their former neighbor identifying Walt and confirming he's come back. Skyler assures Marie she'll be on high alert, only for the camera to pan to the left to reveal that Walt was in the room with Skyler the entire time. And so husband and wife have their final conversation, and it's one of those moments you never really think is going to come, even in a show that is ostensibly airing its final episode. Walt gives her the lottery ticket with the GPS coordinates to Hank and Gomez's bodies (a revelation that utterly devastates Skyler), but not before explaining what really happened in the desert, adding that he's intent on making things right and ensuring that no one comes after their family again. Skyler seems to gradually pick up on the finality of Walt's statements, but she balks at having to hear that he did all this for their family.
However, in a moment that is simultaneously poignant and jaw-dropping in its level of self-awareness, Walt finally admits his selfishness. "I did it for me," Walt says, explaining that he liked cooking meth, that he was good at it, and that he felt alive while doing it. It's a beautifully understated moment from Bryan Cranston, and Anna Gunn does remarkable work without saying a whole lot, anchored as she's been by the weight of Walt's supposedly good intentions. With this moment, it's crystallized just how much ego factored into things, as Walt's desire for power and control overwhelmed his instinct to provide for his family. And this would be aching enough, but Walt goes on to ask Skyler, while fighting back tears, "May I see her?" Walt is permitted to see baby Holly one last time, and it's devastating, all the more so when Walt leaves and chooses to hang back for a little while longer, to watch Walt Jr. one last time from a distance as he arrives home from school. These are the people Walt set out to do this for, but it's hard to know for certain if he'd have chosen a different path if he had it all to do over again. Sure, he might have burned the copy of Leaves of Grass, maybe covered his tracks a little better. But would he have eschewed the meth business altogether? It's one of those questions that doesn't have an answer and never will, but the depth behind Cranston's performance gives enough doubt as to whether he would have chosen differently at all.
Credit: AMC
The Nazis: And so we come to the main event, as Walt meets with Uncle Jack's crew and is immediately frisked upon entry. They find he's clean, although it's strange that they never check the trunk of his car. But I suppose it's just as well (he angles the car opposite the building just so, in order to prepare for what's to come). Walt meets with Jack, who isn't in the mood to talk business. He simply wants this pesky Heisenberg business to be over with, and it nearly is, until Walt plays into Jack's vanity by calling him a liar, saying that instead of honoring his word and killing Jesse (Aaron Paul), he made him his "partner." At this insinuation, Jack flies off the handle and orders Todd to bring Jesse in. Jesse is absolutely destroyed both physically and mentally following the events of last week, and it shows on his face, in a tremendous bit of physical acting from Aaron Paul (whose posture tells you everything you need to know about what a broken man he's become). The sight is doubly heartbreaking due to a flashback earlier in the episode to a blissful moment in Jesse's life: the crafting of the "perfect box" that he built and slaved over for weeks, before selling the prized object to pay for drugs (as revealed in season 4). Jesse and Walt come face-to-face, and one could probably surmise what Walt was planning, as he tackles Jesse and hits the button on the remote lock of his car keys, a trigger which brings the automated M60 rising from out of the trunk of his car. As Walt covers Jesse with his own body, the bullets tear into the Nazis, a total Scarface ending that sees the crew getting theirs.
As the dust settles, only Todd and Jack are alive among the Nazis, and Todd is quickly taken care of when Jesse wraps his handcuffs around the killer's throat and breaks his neck while strangling him. Meanwhile, Walt picks up a gun and nonchalantly plugs Jack in the head as he tries to bargain for his life with Walt's money. It's the most cathartic moment of the series, and it's followed by an incredibly tense confrontation with Jesse, to whom Walter surrenders the gun, imploring Jesse to kill him like he wants to. Speaking for the first time in the episode, Jesse demands that Walter admit that this is what he wants. However, before Walt can do so, Jesse notices that Walt has suffered a bullet wound to his abdomen from the hectic gunfire. Jesse tosses the gun aside and tells Walt that if he wants to do it, he'll have to do it himself.
But Walt isn't done with his former protege just yet. Todd's phone rings, and it's Lydia, asking if "it's done." Walt answers and horrifies Lydia by confirming that it's her allies who've been killed, adding that she doesn't have much time left either, thanks to the ricin he put in her Stevia. It was a point that didn't need to be stated for the viewer, but it becomes clear that it needed to be said for Jesse -- Walt makes sure Jesse overhears the conversation, and the two former partners share a knowing glance once the phone call ends. Walt is confirming to Jesse that it's over, that everyone has answered for their crimes, and he's now free. Jesse hops into one of the spare cars and drives off into the distance, never looking back, and letting off a cathartic howl as he speeds faster and faster. I found myself wondering last week if it wouldn't have been more humane to have allowed Jesse to die, yet I'm beyond happy that, of the erstwhile criminals of this series, Jesse was allowed to live. I suppose one could argue all day about whether or not he "deserved" to live, but of all the characters, Jesse showed the most remorse about his poor choices, and exhibited a real desire to change. If nothing else, I felt he deserved to survive the finale. What happens to him after the cameras stop rolling is for viewers to ponder.
As for Walt, we get a definitive ending for him, as he retires to the meth lab, spending his final moments surrounding by the chemistry that would become his life's work. In the distance, the police cars are visible as they approach the compound. Walt collapses and stares up at the ceiling, a look of relief across his face as he dies. By the time the police find him, Walter White has drifted off into the ether, shrunken back down to a humanity from the legend he'd become in his own mind.
"Felina" is that rarest of TV treasures: a satisfying series finale. Vince Gilligan has given us an episode that is free of the constraints of ambiguity, the "open to interpretation" / "make your own ending" nonsense that has become the norm for many mediums in entertainment in recent years. Breaking Bad ends on a note as definitive as any of its single plotlines, and as strong as the series itself.