Breaking Bad — news, coverage & facts — IJR

Main characters

Bryan Cranston as Walter White, a high-school chemistry teacher who, shortly after his 50th birthday, is diagnosed with stage III lung cancer and begins producing methamphetamine to secure his family's finances. As his drug operation expands, Walter gains a notorious reputation under the alias "Heisenberg". Cranston said he was interested in moving from comedy toward drama, while recognizing that dramatic roles could still include moments of comedy.

Anna Gunn as Skyler White, Walter's wife, who is pregnant with their second child before his diagnosis and becomes increasingly suspicious of his behavior. Gunn described Skyler as "grounded, tough, smart and driven", and said the character's stalled writing career reflected her desire to be creative and productive.

Aaron Paul as Jesse Pinkman, Walter's former student and partner in the methamphetamine trade. Paul described Jesse as a lost young man rather than a bad person, and compared Jesse and Walter's relationship to The Odd Couple.

Dean Norris as Hank Schrader, Walter and Skyler's brother-in-law and a DEA agent investigating the local methamphetamine trade. At the beginning of the series, Hank was intended to serve as comic relief.

Betsy Brandt as Marie Schrader, Skyler's sister and Hank's wife, who is characterized by her loyalty to her family and her recurring kleptomania. Brandt said that although Marie could be unpleasant, the character had greater depth through her concern for her family.

RJ Mitte as Walter White Jr., Walter and Skyler's son, who has cerebral palsy. Mitte also has cerebral palsy, although a milder form, and said he adjusted his speech and movement to portray the character.

Giancarlo Esposito as Gustavo "Gus" Fring (seasons 3–4; guest season 2), a drug distributor who publicly owns the fast-food chain Los Pollos Hermanos. Esposito said he incorporated his yoga training into his performance to give Gus a controlled and composed physical presence.

Bob Odenkirk as Saul Goodman (seasons 3–5; recurring season 2), a criminal lawyer who represents Walter and Jesse. Odenkirk drew inspiration for Saul Goodman's vocal delivery from film producer Robert Evans.

Jonathan Banks as Mike Ehrmantraut (seasons 3–5; guest season 2), a fixer, private investigator, and hitman who works for Gus and Saul. Banks said he avoided closely modeling Mike on Harvey Keitel's Winston Wolfe character from Pulp Fiction, despite comparisons between the two cleaner roles.

Laura Fraser as Lydia Rodarte-Quayle (season 5), a Madrigal Electromotive executive and former associate of Gus Fring who supplies Walter and Jesse with methylamine and helps Walter expand his operation overseas.

Jesse Plemons as Todd Alquist (season 5), a Vamonos Pest Control employee who becomes an associate of Walter and Jesse.

Conception

Breaking Bad was created by Vince Gilligan, who had spent several years writing the Fox series The X-Files. Gilligan wanted to create a series in which the protagonist became the antagonist. "Television is historically good at keeping its characters in a self-imposed stasis so that shows can go on for years or even decades", he said. "When I realized this, the logical next step was to think, how can I do a show in which the fundamental drive is toward change?" He added that his goal with Walter White was to turn him from Mr. Chips into Scarface. Gilligan believed the concept of showing the full drastic transformation of a character across the run of a television show was a risky concept and would be difficult to pitch without other powerful factors to support it, such as strong cinematography and acting.

The show's title is a Southern colloquialism meaning, among other things, "raising hell", and was chosen by Gilligan to describe Walter's transformation. According to Time entertainment editor Lily Rothman, the term has a broader meaning and is an old phrase which "connotes more violence than 'raising hell' does ... [T]he words possess a wide variety of nuances: to 'break bad' can mean to 'go wild', to 'defy authority', and break the law, to be verbally 'combative, belligerent, or threatening' or, followed by the preposition 'on', 'to dominate or humiliate'."

The concept emerged as Gilligan talked with his fellow X-Files writer Thomas Schnauz regarding their current unemployment and joked that the solution was for them to put a "meth lab in the back of an RV and [drive] around the country cooking meth and making money".

After writing the concept for the show and pilot, Gilligan pitched it to Sony Pictures Television, who became very interested in supporting it. Sony arranged for meetings with the various cable networks. Showtime passed on this, as they had already started broadcasting Weeds, a show with similarities to the premise of Breaking Bad. While his producers convinced him that the show was different enough to still be successful, Gilligan later stated that he would not have gone forward with the idea had he known about Weeds earlier. Other networks like HBO and TNT also passed on the idea, but eventually FX took interest and began initial discussions on producing the pilot. At the same time, FX had also started development of Dirt, a female-centric crime-based drama series, and with three existing male-centric shows already on the network, FX passed up Breaking Bad for Dirt.

One of Gilligan's agents spoke to Jeremy Elice, the director of original programming for AMC who was looking for more original shows to add alongside their upcoming Mad Men. Elice was intrigued, and soon a meeting was set up between Gilligan, Elice, and two programming executives. Gilligan was not optimistic about this meeting, fearing they would just put him off, but instead all three showed great interest, and the meeting ended up establishing how AMC would acquire the rights from FX and set the pilot into production. It took about a year following this meeting before Sony had set up the rights with AMC and production could start.

Development history

The network ordered nine episodes for the first season (including the pilot), but the 2007–08 Writers Guild of America strike limited the production to seven episodes, as well as delayed the start of production for the second season. Within the original nine-episode arc, Gilligan had planned to kill off Jesse or Hank, as a "ballsy" moment to end the season on. This death was eliminated with the limited episode count, which Gilligan found to be a net positive given the strength of acting that both Paul and Norris brought to these roles through the seasons. The strike also helped to slow down production long enough for Gilligan and his writing team to readjust the pacing of the show, which in the original arc had been moving too quickly. Gould stated that the writer's strike "saved the show", as had they produced the two additional episodes in the first season, they would have gone down a different creative path that he believes would have led to the show's cancellation by its third season.

The initial versions of the script were set in Riverside, California, but at the suggestion of Sony, Albuquerque was chosen for the production's location due to the favorable financial conditions offered by the state of New Mexico. Once Gilligan recognized that this would mean "we'd always have to be avoiding the Sandia Mountains" in shots directed toward the east, the story setting was changed to the actual production location. Filming would primarily take place in Albuquerque Studios. It was shot primarily on 35 mm film, with digital cameras employed as needed for additional angles, point of view shots and time-lapse photography. Early episodes cost about $3 million each to produce, higher than the average cost for a basic cable program.

Around 2010, AMC had expressed to Sony Pictures Television and Gilligan that they felt that the third season would be the last for Breaking Bad. Sony started to shop the show around, having gained quick interest from the FX network for two more seasons, upon which AMC changed its mind and allowed the show to continue. At the same time, Netflix was starting to shop for content to add to its service and arranged a deal with Sony for Breaking Bad to be available after the airing of the fourth season. Knowing that AMC had placed Breaking Bad on a potential cancellation route, Sony pushed to have the show added to the service in time for the fourth season. Breaking Bad's viewership grew greatly as viewers binged the series on Netflix, helping to assure that a fifth season could be made. The fifth-season premiere had more than double the viewership compared to the fourth season premiere, attributed to the Netflix availability. Gilligan thanked Netflix at the Emmy Awards in September 2013 after the series's conclusion for the popularity of the series, saying that Netflix "kept us on the air".

As the series progressed, Gilligan and the writing staff of Breaking Bad made Walter increasingly unsympathetic. Gilligan said during the run of the series, "He's going from being a protagonist to an antagonist. We want to make people question who they're pulling for, and why." Cranston said by the fourth season, "I think Walt's figured out it's better to be a pursuer than the pursued. He's well on his way to badass."

In July 2011, Vince Gilligan indicated that he intended to conclude Breaking Bad at the end of its fifth season. In early August 2011, negotiations began over a deal regarding the fifth and possible final season between the network AMC and Sony Pictures Television, the production company of the series. AMC proposed a shortened fifth season (six to eight episodes, instead of 13) to cut costs, but the producers declined. Sony then approached other cable networks about possibly picking up the show if a deal could not be made. On August 14, 2011, AMC renewed the series for a fifth and final season consisting of 16 episodes. In April 2012, Bryan Cranston revealed that the fifth season would be split into two halves, with the first eight episodes airing in 2012, and the final eight in 2013.

Before the series finale, Gilligan said that it was difficult to write for Walter White because the character was so dark and morally questionable: "I'm going to miss the show when it's over, but on some level, it'll be a relief to not have Walt in my head anymore." Gilligan later said the idea for Walter's character intrigued him so much that he "didn't really give much thought on how well it would sell", stating that he would have given up on the premise since it was "such an odd, dark story" that could have difficulties being pitched to studios. Ultimately, Gilligan chose to end Breaking Bad with Walter's death, occurring in-story two years after he had first been diagnosed with cancer and given two years to live. Gilligan said by the end of the series, "it feels as if we should adhere to our promise that we explicitly made to our audience" from the first episode.

Casting

Breaking Bad creator Vince Gilligan cast Bryan Cranston for the role of Walter White based on having worked with him in the "Drive" episode of the science fiction television series The X-Files, on which Gilligan worked as a writer. Cranston played an anti-Semite with a terminal illness who took series co-protagonist Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) hostage. Gilligan said Walter had to remain both loathsome and sympathetic, and believed Cranston could maintain that balance. AMC officials, who were initially reluctant with the casting choice, having known Cranston only as the over-the-top character Hal on the comedy series Malcolm in the Middle, approached actors John Cusack and Matthew Broderick about the role. When both actors declined, the executives were persuaded to cast Cranston after seeing his X-Files episode.

Cranston contributed significantly to the formation and development of the Walter White persona. When Gilligan left much of Walter's past unexplained during the development of the series, the actor wrote his own backstory for the character. At the start of the show, Cranston gained 10 pounds to reflect the character's personal decline, and had the natural red highlights of his hair dyed brown. He collaborated with costume designer Kathleen Detoro on a wardrobe of mostly neutral green and brown colors to make the character bland and unremarkable, and worked with makeup artist Frieda Valenzuela to create a mustache he described as "impotent" and like a "dead caterpillar". Cranston repeatedly identified elements in certain scripts where he disagreed with how the character was handled, and went so far as to call Gilligan directly when he could not work out disagreements with the episode's screenwriters. Cranston has said he was inspired partially by his elderly father for how Walter carries himself physically, which he described as "a little hunched over, never erect, [as if] the weight of the world is on this man's shoulders". In contrast to his character, Cranston has been described as extremely playful on set, with Aaron Paul describing him as "a kid trapped in a man's body".

Aaron Paul's casting was also initially questioned by production, as Paul looked too old and too much of a "pretty boy" to be associated with meth cooking. Gilligan reconsidered Paul's skills after seeing his audition and recalling that he had also guest-starred on The X-Files episode "Lord of the Flies". Gilligan originally intended for Pinkman to be killed at the end of Breaking Bad's first season in a botched drug deal as a plot device to plague Walter White with guilt. However, Gilligan said by the second episode of the season, he was so impressed with Paul's performance that "it became pretty clear early on that that would be a huge, colossal mistake, to kill off Jesse". Similarly, Dean Norris had shown his ability to be a law enforcement official in The X-Files episode "F. Emasculata", and was brought on to be Hank Schrader, Walter's brother-in-law and DEA agent.

Other cast members later described performance choices that shaped their characters. Anna Gunn described Skyler White as "grounded, tough, smart and driven", and said the character's stalled writing career reflected her desire to be creative and productive. RJ Mitte, who has a milder form of cerebral palsy than Walter White Jr., said he learned to walk on crutches and slowed his speech for the role. Giancarlo Esposito said his ashtanga yoga and meditation practice helped him create Gus Fring's controlled, methodical physical presence.

Bob Odenkirk said he was offered the role of Saul Goodman during the second season, when the character was planned for the final four episodes. Odenkirk contributed Saul's comb-over hairstyle and drew on Hollywood agents and film producer Robert Evans for the character's fast-talking delivery. An oral history of Saul Goodman later described the character as initially uncertain in long-term importance, before Odenkirk's performance and the writers' development of the role led to the creation of Better Call Saul. Jonathan Banks said he avoided closely modeling Mike Ehrmantraut on Harvey Keitel's Winston Wolfe character from Pulp Fiction, despite comparisons between the two cleaner roles.

Music

Dave Porter composed the original score and main title theme for Breaking Bad. Porter became involved with the series through music supervisor Thomas Golubić, who was preparing for a meeting with Gilligan and the producers while the pilot was being developed. Porter supplied temporary music during the pilot process and was later hired as composer after Gilligan and the producers responded to his work. Golubić said Porter helped build the sound of the series and that the title theme developed through several drafts before the production settled on its final version.

Porter said his goal was to create a score that reflected the particular world of the series rather than using a conventional orchestral approach. He avoided traditional Western orchestral instrumentation and instead used ethnic instruments, found sounds, field recordings, vintage and modern synthesizers, and electric guitar. The score was recorded and processed digitally, allowing sounds to be altered into new textures. Porter described the score as a unifying element for a series that moved between drama, suspense, black comedy, and violence.

The score also reflected the series' Western influence. Porter said the instrumentation was not generally Western, apart from the resonator guitar used in the main title theme, but that the music shared an aesthetic with classic Western scores. He connected this to Gilligan's references to the use of sound in films such as Once Upon a Time in the West, as well as to sparse orchestration, short solo motifs, deliberate tempos, and the desert landscape. Porter also said that the production often avoided music during dialogue-heavy scenes and major revelations, allowing the writing and acting to carry those moments. He treated the end credits as part of the storytelling process, discussing with Gilligan what emotion the audience should be left with after each episode.

Golubić supervised the use of licensed music in the series. He described music supervision as a storytelling process and said Breaking Bad allowed for unusually obscure and exploratory song choices. Budget limitations also affected the process, sometimes pushing the music team toward less obvious selections. Golubić cited TV on the Radio's "DLZ", used during Walter's confrontation with another methamphetamine dealer, as a song choice that helped mark a turning point in Walter's transformation. He also said that Gilligan selected Badfinger's "Baby Blue" for the final scene of the series after thinking of the song while writing the finale. The New Yorker later described the song as thematically tied to Walter's attachment to his methamphetamine operation and noted that the series often used popular music as a plot device or clue rather than merely as background music.

Several soundtrack albums were released for the series. Breaking Bad: Music from the Original Television Series included Porter's main title theme alongside licensed songs used in the show. In 2012, Madison Gate Records released Breaking Bad: Original Score from the Television Series, a 20-track album of Porter's score from the series.

Scientific accuracy

Donna Nelson, a professor of organic chemistry at the University of Oklahoma, checked scripts, helped prepare dialogue, drew chemical structures, and wrote chemical equations that were used as props. Gilligan said Nelson approached the production after watching the series and offered to help with its chemistry. He said the production consulted experts in chemistry, electrical engineering, and physics when needed, although there was no full-time science adviser on set. Gilligan also said that Nelson reviewed scripts to keep the chemistry dialogue accurate and current, and that the production also consulted a Drug Enforcement Administration chemist based in Dallas. Nelson said Gilligan was interested in presenting the science accurately and that this was important to him.

Several episodes of MythBusters examined the plausibility of scenes from Breaking Bad, with Gilligan sometimes appearing as a guest. In 2013, the MythBusters Breaking Bad special tested two scenes from the first season and concluded that neither was physically plausible as depicted. The tests found that hydrofluoric acid would not fully dissolve metal, flesh, or ceramic as shown in "Cat's in the Bag...". They also found that fulminated mercury could produce an explosion, as shown in "Crazy Handful of Nothin'", but that Walter would have needed a much larger quantity of the compound and would have had to throw it at a much faster speed, likely causing fatal injuries to people in the room. A later MythBusters episode, "Blow It Out of the Water", tested the possibility of mounting an automated machine gun in a car as in the series finale "Felina", and found it plausible. An episode of MythBusters Jr. concluded that the electromagnet scene in "Live Free or Die" was not physically plausible.

Jason Wallach of Vice commended the accuracy of the methamphetamine cooking methods presented in the series. He noted that early episodes depict the Nagai red phosphorus and iodine method, which uses pseudoephedrine as a precursor to d-(+)-methamphetamine. By the season 1 finale, Walter changes to a reductive amination route involving phenyl-2-propanone and methylamine, reflecting the difficulty of obtaining enough pseudoephedrine for larger-scale production. The series depicts phenyl-2-propanone, also known as phenylacetone or P2P, being produced from phenylacetic acid and acetic acid with a tube furnace and thorium dioxide catalyst, and later depicts reduction using mercury aluminum amalgam.

The blue color of Walter's methamphetamine is a recurring plot point in the series. Although the product is described as highly pure, pure crystal methamphetamine would normally be colorless or white. Debbie Ball of The Candy Lady in Albuquerque created the methamphetamine prop used in the first two seasons. Ball said the first version was clear and that the blue tint was chosen later by the production.

In their article "Die Chemie bei Breaking Bad" in Chemie in unserer Zeit, translated into English by ChemistryViews as "The Chemistry of Breaking Bad", Tunga Salthammer and Falk Harnisch discuss the plausibility of the chemistry portrayed in the series. They write that chemistry is depicted primarily as a manufacturing science, with limited attention to analytical methods, and that scientific subjects are incorporated into dialogue to support a fictional world in which chemistry plays a central role.

Season 2 (2009)

Shortly after Walt and Jesse complete their first deal with Tuco, they are kidnapped by him. After being held hostage for a day, Hank discovers their location, and shoots Tuco dead. Walt and Jesse hide from Hank and are never found. After Hank leaves, Walt and Jesse are alone. While Jesse simply returns to town without an excuse, Walt pretends to enter a fugue state. Walt's held in a hospital until doctors are assured it won't happen again. Walt finally tells his doctor he faked the fugue state, although he doesn't tell him what actually happened with Tuco, instead fabricating a story about running away to avoid family. Jesse is interrogated by Hank, but is never arrested.

After a failed attempt by Walter and Jesse to start their own business, resulting in two of Jesse's friends, Badger and Combo, being arrested and murdered respectively, Walt hires corrupt lawyer Saul Goodman, who connects them to high-profile drug distributor Gus Fring and fixer Mike Ehrmantraut. Jesse is kicked out of his Aunt Ginny's house by his parents, and quickly tries to find housing. He finds an apartment, managed by Jane Margolis. Shortly after moving in, Jesse starts dating Jane. Jane introduces him to heroin after relapsing. After selling a shipment to Gus, Walt refuses to pay Jesse his half of the money suspecting he'll use it on drugs, but Jane threatens to reveal Walt's secret to the public if he does. Walt returns to Jesse to apologize but instead finds him and Jane passed out on heroin. Although he is capable of intervening and saving her life, Walter allows an unconscious Jane to choke to death on her own vomit due to an overdose. Jesse wakes up the next morning and finds Jane beside him, dead.

Mike comes over to destroy any trace of their heroin use, and a traumatized Jesse enters rehab. Days after Jane's death, two planes collide mid-air over Albuquerque; a result of Jane's father, Donald Margolis, an air traffic controller, returning to work early despite still being distraught by his daughter's death. After being put under anesthetics for a cancer surgery, Walt accidentally reveals he had two cellphones. This causes Skyler to do some more research, and finally finding out about all of Walt's lies. Skyler confronts Walt and files for divorce.

Devotion to family

The show explores most of the main characters' connections to their families in great detail. Walt justifies his decision to cook crystal meth and become a criminal because of his desire to provide for his family. In the third season he tries to exit the business because it has driven Skyler to leave him. Gus convinces him to stay, telling him it is a man's job to provide for his family, even if he is unloved. In the final episode of the series, Walt finally admits to Skyler that the main motivation for his endeavors in the meth business was his own interest, in spite of secretly securing the $9.72 million he had managed to salvage for her and the children. Jesse's loneliness in the early seasons of the show can be partly explained by his parents' decision to kick him out of their home due to his drug-related activities. This parental disconnect brings him closer to Jane, whose father berates her for her drug use. When Walt crosses paths with Jane's father, Walt refers to Jesse as his nephew and laments the fact that he cannot get through to him. Jane's father responds by telling him to keep trying, saying, "Family. You can't give up on them, ever. What else is there?" Jane's subsequent death, which Walt let happen while he watched, is what leads in her father accidentally causing the airliner collision at the end of the second season.

Even the show's more hardened characters maintain ties to family. In the second season, Tuco Salamanca spends time caring for his physically disabled uncle, Hector. When Tuco is killed by Hank, his cousins vow revenge. Their actions are further explained in a flashback, where Hector explains to the brothers that "La familia es todo" ("Family is everything"). Gustavo Fring's franchise Los Pollos Hermanos translates to "The Chicken Brothers". This refers to the fact that the company was co-founded by Gus and a man named Max. When Max is killed by Hector Salamanca, Gus vows to destroy the Salamanca family and in particular to humiliate Hector and prolong and draw out his suffering. In the first part of the fifth season, it is explained that Mike Ehrmantraut's intentions for being in this business were to provide for his granddaughter's future, and by his final episode he is conflicted when having to leave her in a park by herself once he has been warned that the police are onto him. During the second part of the fifth season, white supremacist Jack Welker says "don't skimp on family", and he lets Walt live after capturing him in the desert because of love for his nephew Todd Alquist, who has great respect for Walt. Lydia Rodarte-Quayle repeatedly demands that if Mike insists on killing her, that he leave her in her apartment so her daughter can find her, fearful she will think Lydia abandoned her. Much like Walt and Mike, Lydia seems to engage in the meth business in order to provide for her daughter, with actress Laura Fraser stating in an interview that Lydia's daughter is important to how "Lydia justified what she did to herself".

Critical reception

Breaking Bad received universal acclaim and has been praised by many critics as one of the greatest television shows of all time. The series has also developed a cult following. The series has an overall rating of 87 of out 100 on Metacritic. The American Film Institute listed Breaking Bad as one of the top ten television series of 2008, 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013. In 2013, TV Guide ranked it as the ninth greatest TV series of all time. By its end, the series was among the most-watched cable shows on American television, with audience numbers doubling from the fourth season to the fifth. A 2015 survey by The Hollywood Reporter of 2,800 actors, producers, directors, and other industry people named Breaking Bad as their #2 favorite show. In 2016 and 2022, Rolling Stone ranked it third on its list of 100 Greatest TV Shows of All Time. In September 2019, The Guardian ranked the show fifth on its list of the 100 best TV shows of the 21st century, describing it as "[t]he show that arguably killed off the antihero drama: nothing since has been able to top the depraved descent made by Walter White (a never-better Bryan Cranston), from milquetoast chemistry teacher to meth overlord, and few have dared to try". In 2021, Empire ranked Breaking Bad at number two on their list of The 100 Greatest TV Shows of All Time. Allen St. John of Forbes called it "The best TV show ever". In 2021, it was voted the third-best TV series of the 21st century by the BBC, as picked by 206 TV experts from around the world. In 2023, Variety ranked Breaking Bad as the fifth-greatest TV show of all time. In 2023, Breaking Bad was ranked as the best TV series in the last 25 years by critics in a poll conveyed by Rotten Tomatoes.

For the first season, the series saw a generally positive reception. Robert Bianco of USA Today praised Cranston and Paul, exclaiming, "There is humor in the show, mostly in Walt's efforts to impose scholarly logic on the business and on his idiot apprentice, a role Paul plays very well. But even their scenes lean toward the suspenseful, as the duo learns that killing someone, even in self-defense, is ugly, messy work."

The second season saw critical acclaim. Entertainment Weekly critic Ken Tucker stated "Bad is a superlatively fresh metaphor for a middle-age crisis: It took cancer and lawbreaking to jolt Walt out of his suburban stupor, to experience life again—to take chances, risk danger, do things he didn't think himself capable of doing. None of this would work, of course, without Emmy winner Cranston's ferocious, funny selflessness as an actor. For all its bleakness and darkness, there's a glowing exhilaration about this series: It's a feel-good show about feeling really bad." San Francisco Chronicle's Tim Goodman claimed, "The first three episodes of Season 2 that AMC sent out continue that level of achievement with no evident missteps. In fact, it looks as if Gilligan's bold vision for Breaking Bad, now duly rewarded against all odds, has invigorated everyone involved in the project. You can sense its maturity and rising ambition in each episode." Horror novelist Stephen King lauded the series, comparing it to the likes of Twin Peaks and Blue Velvet.

The third season also saw critical acclaim. Time proclaimed, "It's a drama that has chosen the slow burn over the flashy explosion, and it's all the hotter for that choice." Newsday stated Breaking Bad was still TV's best series and it stayed true to itself. Tim Goodman praised the writing, acting, and cinematography, pointing out the "visual adventurousness" of the series. Goodman went on to call the show's visuals "a combination of staggering beauty – the directors make use of numerous wide-angle landscape portraits – and transfixing weirdness". After the finale aired, The A.V. Club said that season three was "one of television's finest dramatic accomplishments. And what makes it so exciting – what makes the recognition of the current golden age so pressing – is that the season has not been, as [another reviewer] put it in another context, 'television good.' The heart-in-the-throat quality of this season comes as much from the writers' exhilarating disregard for television conventions as from the events portrayed."

Season four won near-universal critical acclaim. The Boston Globe referred to the show as a "taut exercise in withheld disaster" and declared the show "riveting". The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette labeled the series "smart and thought provoking that elevates the artistic achievements of the medium". Season four was listed by many critics as one of the best seasons of television in 2011. Time listed Walter White's "I am the one who knocks" line as one of the best television lines of 2011. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette listed it as the best series of 2011 while noting that "Breaking Bad is that rare TV series that has never made a seriously damaging storytelling misstep". The A.V. Club's review of the finale summed it up as a "fantastically fitting end for a season that ran in slow motion, starting and continuing with so many crises begging for resolution week after week. Now the decks are cleared, but that doesn't mean anybody is home free. Nothing's ever easy on Breaking Bad." The reviewer continued to exalt the season, and proclaimed, "What a season of television – truly something none of us could ever have expected, or claimed we deserved."

Both halves of the fifth season received overwhelming critical acclaim. Following the end of the series, critic Nick Harley summarized his commendation of the show: "Expertly written, virtuosic with its direction, and flawlessly performed, Breaking Bad is everything you could want in a drama. Critics will spend the next decade dissecting and arguing about what made it great, but the reasons are endless and already well documented." During the final season, the show also received praise from George R. R. Martin, author of the A Song of Ice and Fire novels, particularly the episode "Ozymandias"; Martin commented that "Walter White is a bigger monster than anyone in Westeros". In his review of the second half of season 5, Seth Amitin of IGN stated, "This final batch of Breaking Bad is one of the best run of episodes TV has ever offered", and praised "Ozymandias" in particular, referring to it as "maybe the best episode of TV [he's] ever seen". Jonah Goldberg of National Review called it "the best show currently on television, and perhaps even the best ever". The veteran actor Sir Anthony Hopkins wrote a letter of praise to Bryan Cranston, telling him that his "performance as Walter White was the best acting I have seen – ever". He lauded the rest of the cast and crew as well. The letter first appeared on Steven Michael Quezada's (who portrayed DEA Agent Steven Gomez) Facebook page, and in spite of it being taken down, the letter soon went viral. In 2013, Guinness World Records named Breaking Bad the highest-rated TV series of all time, citing its season 5 Metacritic score of 99 out of 100.

In 2018, Paul MacInnes of The Guardian wrote: "Breaking Bad became a classic drama for many reasons: some to do with craft, some to do with creativity. But above all else it stood out because, however surreal the surroundings, in its conflicted, complicated characters it was true to reality."

Controversies

Breaking Bad has been accused by some members of the law enforcement and legal communities of normalizing or glorifying methamphetamine creation and usage. In 2013, a local prosecutor and self-proclaimed Breaking Bad fan wrote on Time's website: "While Breaking Bad may not glorify meth in the sense of making it attractive to the average viewer, it does normalize the idea of meth for a broad segment of society that might otherwise have no knowledge of that dark and dangerous world. [...] I'll continue to wonder about the long-term effects of mainstreaming such a dangerous drug into popular culture. I'll be mindful that there are others for whom the consequences of drug addiction are a miserable and persistent reality, not merely the stuff of a TV drama, no matter how "gritty" and artful and captivating."

A Telegraph article published in 2014 stated that a "leading academic" blamed the series for a "shocking" increase in crystal meth use. Some have speculated that the show's realistic depiction of methamphetamine use may have deterred potential users, resulting in lower rates of meth use since 2006. DEA spokesperson Barbara Carreno has dismissed this notion, instead attributing the drop in use to the Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act of 2005, which resulted in pseudoephedrine being listed as a controlled substance. She was quoted saying: "The numbers go up and down and up and down over the years, but generally speaking, it's never reached the 2006 levels. [...] We've gotten many, many, many calls about Breaking Bad. We're not commenting on Breaking Bad. Breaking Bad is fiction."

In 2014, American toy retailer Toys "R" Us pulled four collectable action figures from its stores after complaints from a concerned parent out of Florida, due to the inclusion of toy drug money and toy meth. Bryan Cranston took to Twitter, joking: "I'm so mad, I'm burning my Florida Mom action figure in protest."

In 2022, the erection of statues of Walter White and Jesse Pinkman in New Mexico drew criticism from some Republican figures. Variety reported that conservative talk radio host Eddy Aragon said: "It's not the type of recognition we want for the city of Albuquerque, or for our state. What you saw on Breaking Bad should be a documentary, honestly. I think, really, that is the reality in New Mexico. We try to say it's fictional, but that is the reality... we've joked that [Breaking Bad] should be on PBS. That is, unfortunately, the reality." Vince Gilligan said: "In all seriousness, no doubt some folks are going to say, 'Wow, just what our city needed.' And I get that. I see two of the finest actors America has ever produced. I see them, in character, as two larger-than-life tragic figures, cautionary tales." Highlighting the revenue and economic activity that the series had brought to the area, Albuquerque Democratic Mayor Tim Keller defended the erection of the statues, saying: "While the stories might be fictional... jobs are real every single day. The city is also a character... We see ourselves in so many ways, good and bad."

Writers reunion

Variety held a Q&A with most of the original writing staff to reflect on the show's run, the final season, the writing process, and alternative endings. Along with creator Vince Gilligan, fellow writers and producers Peter Gould, Thomas Schnauz, Gennifer Hutchison, Moira Walley-Beckett, Sam Catlin and George Mastras joined to discuss memories from the show's humble beginnings, character transformations that concluded in the final season as well as surprising developments along the way. For instance, Jesse's character was originally supposed to die halfway through season one in a tragic drug deal gone horribly wrong. The reasoning behind this decision was that Jesse served his purpose "in a meat-and-potatoes, logistical sense. The character would give Walt his entrée into the business" before meeting his demise. However, this was eventually done away with as the story progressed beyond Gilligan's early scripts.

The writers also opened up on their collaborative process and how their form of storytelling evolved with the show. According to writer George Mastras,

Screen time was precious, and infusing every moment with the emotion [was the point], not just forming the pieces of the puzzle to tell the story, which is hard enough. If you're going to take five seconds of screen time, you'd better damn well be sure that there's an emotion there. It may be very, very subtle, but trust the audiences to pick up on that, because audiences do.

The development of certain characters posed challenges. Skyler became unsympathetic to some viewers in earlier seasons as she was often presented as an obstacle to Walt's ultimate agenda. The writers struggled to change the dynamic and realized that "the only way people were going to like Skyler was if she started going along with what Walt was doing". It was a tricky shift to alter on screen; the writers did not want to betray her character. This led them to justify the change by using her past job as a bookkeeper to segue into her helping Walt launder his money. Breaking the individual episodes was another form of problem-solving for the writers. They stressed the importance of not letting the "master plan" stop them from staying true to the world they created. There came a point where tracking the characters on a moment-by-moment basis proved to be more useful rather than the general direction of the story. Gould said they would always start with the last thought in a character's head. "Where's Jesse's head at? That was always the prelude to the breakthrough moment, because when you said that, it's usually because we had gotten attached to some big plan or some big set-piece that we thought had to be there, but the characters didn't want to do what we wanted them to do."

Audience response to Skyler

Particular backlash was directed towards the character of Skyler White. It has sparked an ongoing dialogue about a number of topics, including society's attitude towards women, feminism, sexism, and double standards.

In August 2013 (while Breaking Bad was in its original run) Anna Gunn published an op-ed in The New York Times titled "I Have a Character Issue" in which she discussed her experience playing Skyler, with particular focus on the vitriol that audience members directed towards her character. She compared Skyler to similar television wives who seemed to inspire venom from audience members that their respective husbands did not, in particular Carmela Soprano from The Sopranos and Betty Draper from Mad Men. In Gunn's words, "Vince Gilligan, the creator of Breaking Bad, wanted Skyler to be a woman with a backbone of steel who would stand up to whatever came her way, who wouldn't just collapse in the corner or wring her hands in despair. He and the show's writers made Skyler multilayered and, in her own way, morally compromised. But at the end of the day, she hasn't been judged by the same set of standards as Walter".

In a 2018 cast reunion, Aaron Paul commented "Why did our audience not sympathize with this poor woman? I really felt for Anna, because she's just such a beautiful human inside and out, and she played Skyler in such a fierce way, and people just dragged her character the most."

Vince Gilligan has defended both Skyler and Anna Gunn, saying at the same 2018 reunion "I figured Walt would be the one that'd be hard for people to sympathize with. Suddenly, lo and behold, we're hearing this animus toward Skyler White. To this day, it confounds me. Anna Gunn gave such a brilliant performance. We never tried for sympathy or lack of sympathy, we let the chips fall where they may. I would change that if I had a magic wand." He later buttressed these sentiments in a 2022 interview, adding "I realize in hindsight that the show was rigged in the sense that the storytelling was solely through Walt's eyes, even in scenes he wasn't present for. Even Gus, his archenemy, didn't suffer the animosity Skyler received. It's a weird thing. I'm still thinking about it all these years later."

Bryan Cranston has also defended Gunn and Skyler, saying "If you look at the elements that were involved in this—husband she finds out is lying, husband she finds out is doing something illegal, is doing something that puts her family in lethal danger, and she's being chastised—it's like, 'Wait a minute.' It baffled me from an objective standpoint."

In 2018, Gunn reflected on her experiences on the show, saying "This is not about me, Anna Gunn, and it's really not about Skyler. It's about the way people are connecting to him (Walter). It's also about the way that people still hold on to, perhaps, older ideas of what a woman or a wife should be or how she should act, or how she should behave. In the end, change isn't always comfortable and isn't always pleasant, but it's good that it was brought to people's attention and consciousness."

Reflecting more than a decade after the show ended, Gunn remarked that she saw an improvement as to how the character of Skyler White was received, as well as in the state of television actresses and female characters in general. She said "when people come up to me, it's incredibly different ... There's still a long way to go, but we have made seismic changes since then. So people come up to me now and say, 'You were the linchpin for me. You were the conscience of the show. You were what pulled me into the show.' Or they say, 'The first time I watched it, I hated that character. But the second time I watched it, I realized, 'Oh my God, that poor woman.''"

Breaking Bad

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Breaking Bad

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Breaking Bad across IJR

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Family guide

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Premise

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