Why You Should Be Watching Breaking Bad

I’m going to tell you something you’ve probably been hearing a lot lately, but I’m telling you again in case you haven’t been paying attention.

Breaking Bad is the best TV show ever put to print, and if you haven’t started it yet, you should. Very few times in life are you truly missing something special when that something slips off your pop-culture radar, but in this case, you are. You are missing something special.

If you’ve watched Breaking Bad (or BrBa as the geeks call it), feel free to pass this post on to any unbelievers you may know. Or just sit there and nod, because you get what I’m saying here.

I’ll give you the same advice I give everyone when Breaking Bad comes up in discussion: you need to give it 3–5 episodes. The show isn’t pulpy TV, designed to draw you in with silly circumstance, absurdity or inanity to set the quick hook. No.

The show is a slow immersion into a world of Walter White, a cancer-stricken, brilliant chemistry teacher who has missed his big opportunity for millions and realizes his family will struggle when he’s gone. So, through happenstance, Walter comes across Jesse Pinkman, an former student who’s walking on the dark side of the law and substance abuse, and the two slowly form an unlikely partnership.

That’s the premise you’ve probably heard about.

Once you’re into the show, once the show absorbs you (oh, and it will), it becomes a story of choice and consequence, greed, control and a desire so strong that it winds up being one of the most destructive forces throughout the show’s entirety. It’s a dark show interspersed with moments of dark humor, but it never goes over the edge. You never say, “I can’t handle this” and turn it off. The balance Breaking Bad achieves is remarkable.

And the acting. Bryan Cranston and Aaron Paul and Bob Odenkirk and the rest of the cast pull off performances so strong, so consistent that I’m hard-pressed not to call it the finest activing I’ve seen, maybe anywhere. And if you want to get nerdy, the cinematography and sound editing are every bit up to silver screen standards.

Breaking Bad is an example of why TV will eventually supplant movies: it’s amazing entertainment, the kind you think about while lying in bed or driving to work.

It’s the best show ever made. Full stop.

Oh, and in casse you think I’m being hyperbolic, don’t take my word for it. Seriously, just blow off everything I just said.

But maybe you should take Anthony Hopkins’ word for it. Here’s an excerpt of the letter he just sent Bryan Cranston (Walter White) about Breaking Bad, one actor to another:

I’ve just finished a marathon of watching “BREAKING BAD” – from episode one of the First Season – to the last eight episodes of the Sixth Season. (I downloaded the last season on AMAZON) A total of two weeks (addictive) viewing.

I have never watched anything like it. Brilliant!

Your performance as Walter White was the best acting I have seen – ever. I know there is so much smoke blowing and sickening bulls**t in this business, and I’ve sort of lost belief in anything really.

But this work of yours is spectacular – absolutely stunning. What is extraordinary, is the sheer power of everyone in the entire production. What was it? Five or six years in the making? How the producers (yourself being one of them), the writers, directors, cinematographers…. every department – casting etc. managed to keep the discipline and control from beginning to the end is (that over used word) awesome.

From what started as a black comedy, descended into a labyrinth of blood, destruction and hell. It was like a great Jacobean, Shakespearian or Greek Tragedy.

The whole letter is here.

Are you a believer now?

Have a good weekend, everyone. Watch some good TV.