Breaking Bad/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Alas, Poor Villain:
    • The extremely moving music as Gus walks to his death reminds you that he was once a similar guy to Walt, and he'll die failing to get his final revenge on the people who killed his "brother".
    • Similarly, the sheer amount of anger and sadness in Hector's face as he looks at Gus before setting off the bomb that will kill both of them makes you almost feel sorry for him.
    • While a grunting, dead-eyed cretin who did Gus' bidding without so much as the slightest bit of hesitation, Mike was still one of the show's most sympathetic villains. And yet he dies a completely pointless death, right after his attempt at making sure his granddaughter was financially set for life completely imploded.
    • Walt's death in the Grand Finale. In spite of all the awful things he's done over the course of the show, there's still something profoundly sad about seeing him die alone in a meth lab, having alienated almost everyone close to him due to his pride and ego overriding his genuine love and desire to provide for his family.
  • Alternate Character Interpretation: Possibly the purpose of the show.
    • It's hard to decide if Walt's "cooking" is retaliation against a world that never cut him a break or a genuine desire to provide for his family, not that they're necessarily mutually exclusive. While the series finale has Walt himself give an answer by saying that he did it for his own sake, it doesn't necessarily invalidate the options presented above, either.
    • Skyler. A good woman who's acting poorly due to her husband's action? A victim of simple human frailty? A control freak who ran the family up until Walt's Break Bad and is now looking for any method to put him under her thumb in some form of twisted love?
    • Jesse, Book Dumb Anti-Villain or Villain Protagonist who's been using Walt?
      • Or neither. His actions make people's sympathy for him swing like a pendulum. In some instances he's actually shown to have one of the higher moral standard of anyone in the show (in regards to certain things, like kids).
    • The bathtub incident? Walter's fault, not Jesse's. Did it never occur to Walter to explain to Jesse why he absolutely needed to use plastic? Especially since the idea of an acid that eats through rock, glass, metal, and ceramic, but not plastic, is kind of counter-intuitive. Granted, using his own bathtub was kind of dumb, but only in that you wonder how he planned to rid of the slurry afterwards.
    • Jesse's parents: Long-suffering, well-intentioned people who just came to the end of any human's thread with their screwup son? Or faux-caring, shallow people obsessed with image who arguably caused his behavior by treating him as The Unfavorite?
    • Was Gale merely a fanboy of Walt's, or did his admiration go a liiiiiittle bit deeper than that?
      • Likewise, did Gale know that Gus was planning to kill Walt when he told him that he'd be dying from cancer soon, or was he taking his boss' words at face value?
  • Badass Decay: Justified with Hank. He goes through a Humiliation Conga that ultimately leads to Break the Haughty, leaving him rather helpless and emasculated in the end. He gets better though.
  • Base Breaker:
    • Walter would develop into one long after the show finished airing. Depending on who you ask, he's either a thoroughly unsympathetic scumbag and pure evil incarnate, or a tragic Anti-Hero pushed into the role of an Anti-Villain due to circumstances beyond his control. Similarly, arguments about whether he's a genuine Badass or a petulant, pathetic egomaniac who thinks he's badass tend to spring up when he's discussed.
    • Jesse's got a strong fan following due to the softer side hidden under his veneer of a Book Dumb gangbanger, and think that in light of the horrific Trauma Conga Line that he's subjected to, he's easily the most sympathetic character in the show. However, just as many people criticize or hate him entirely for making a ton of stupid decisions to the point of being an active liability to Walt, and find him even less sympathetic than his mentor since his stupidity is often the thing that triggers the traumatic events he suffers through.
    • While well-liked for being a lovable Noble Demon who takes Walt to task for his stupid and hypocritical actions, Mike has a loud hatedom due to his own penchant for stupidity and hypocrisy. To those people, his famous Reason You Suck Speech comes off as less of a Crowning Moment of Awesome and more of a self-righteous attempt at acting like his shit doesn't stink and feel that as petulant as it was, he absolutely deserved to get shot by Walt.
    • Thanks to their over-the-top actions and presentation as sadistic, near-unstoppable Terminators in human skin, the Salamanca Twins have fans split on whether they're the shows coolest villains, or its lamest.
  • Broken Base:
    • Over "Fly". Much of the fandom seems to think that it's either the best or the worst episode of the show. It's either a brilliant character study, or a pointless Filler episode.
    • The plane crash at the end of season 2 is either a Contrived Coincidence that's a Cliffhanger Copout after all the vague flashforwards and build up or its a great metaphor for how Walt's actions have consequences he can't imagine.
    • While one of the show's most popular characters, fans don't quite agree on if Hank's crusade against Walt in the final season is done out of a genuine desire to punish the man for his many crimes or if it's motivated purely by ego and spite towards him.
  • Catharsis Factor:
    • Tuco finally getting his just desserts in "Grilled" is incredibly satisfying after all the pain he put Walt and Jesse through. Whether it's Walt's vicious verbal takedown, his screams of agony when Jesse shoots him in the gut and kicks the bullet wound, or Hank finishing him off Scarface-style, you'll be cheering as you watch this "insane, degenerate piece of filth" meet a gruesome end.
    • Walt tricking Mike into letting him order the murder of Gale isn't satisfying because of the act itself (if anything, Gale's death is one of the show's saddest moments). Rather, it's because he makes Mike look like a complete idiot after having to deal with his condescending, creepy attitude.
    • Jesse strangling Todd to death in the finale. Jack's death is satisfying as well, but Todd's is especially so after all the shit he did to Jesse, as well as his callous murder of a child and Andrea. Just watch this crowd's reaction and try not to cheer along with them.
    • Thanks to Better Call Saul, we have a retroactive example in Mike's killing of Leonel Salamanca. In the context of this show, it's just him taking care of loose ends for Gus. But with the prequel taken into account, he's getting personal vengeance on one of the men that threatened to kill his granddaughter.
    • Similar to the above example, Gus' horrific murder of Victor is so much more satisfying thanks to Better Call Saul showing off how much of a sadistic asshole he is. For many viewers, it's a retroactive form of Laser-Guided Karma for having the gall to smirk at Nacho's suicide.
  • Complete Monster: Jack Welker, leader of the Aryan Brotherhood. And Walt himself may have crossed the line into becoming one towards the end of the show, committing illegal atrocities purely because it makes him feel alive. If not for his concern for his family and Villainous BSOD-inspired atonement in the finale, he'd have been 100% far gone. But as it stands, he only made it 99% of the way.
  • Crowning Music of Awesome: The music that plays when Gus walks into the nursing home in Face Off. It manages to convey the emotion of that scene perfectly.
    • A more light-hearted example would be "Negro y Azul", Heisenberg's catchy and goofy Villain Song from the cold open of the episode of the same name.
  • Dead Baby Comedy: Walt rationalizing that the airplane crash he inadvertently caused wasn't his fault... by hijacking a school assembly and making it all about himself. "It was really only the 50th worst crash in aviation history."
    • "Tied for 50th in fact."
  • Draco in Leather Pants:
    • No matter how badly the scale of his crimes escalate, plenty of fans will bend over backwards to make excuses for Walt's actions. Endangering innocent people? Manipulating and gaslighting Jesse? Murder? Poisoning children?! It's not his fault, it's everyone else's for never cutting him a break!
    • While he's more sympathetic than Walt and has clear lines he'll never cross, Jesse's often painted as an innocent angel who can do no wrong instead of the deeply flawed and troubled criminal that he really is.
    • From 2019 onward, Skyler's attracted a surprising amount of defenders who desperately try to whitewash her into being a blameless victim of Walt's cruelty. While nowhere near as outright awful as he is by the end of the show, she's far from blameless herself since she's complicit in laundering Walt's money, was willing to cover up Ted's own illegal actions, and tried pressuring Walt into murdering Jesse once he finally turns against him. Hell, even before that she smoked while pregnant, risking the health and life of the unborn baby Holly purely out of passive-aggressive spite towards Walt.
  • Ensemble Darkhorse:
    • Hank and Saul. Especially Saul, he even has his own spinoff now!
    • Mike's stone cold badassery, intelligence, and Hidden Heart of Gold made him a fan favorite. Even some of Walt's most ride-and-die supporters were soured on him when he killed him over what was basically a petulant fit of rage.
    • Jesse oddly enough fits a certain definition. Apparently, Jesse was originally supposed to die at the end of the first season but after seeing Aaron Paul's performance, they decided that it would be a huge mistake to kill the character off and by the middle of the second season, Jesse had become just as important to the show as Walt.
    • Badger gets quite a lot of love thanks to being a big, lovable dope responsible for some of the show's funniest moments. His buddy Skinny Pete also gets plenty of love for being just as funny, as well as having some mad piano skills.
    • Huell and Kuby, Saul Goodman's hired flunkies. Thanks to Lavell Crawford and Bill Burr's hilarious performances, their rare appearances are always a treat to watch.
  • Epileptic Trees: For some reason this series seemed to inspire a lot of pretentious attempts to reframe it as something else. Everything from the relatively mild "Most of the last episode takes place in Walt's mind as he succumbs to his cancer" to the ludicrous "The entire series is Hank's daydream about what his boring brother-in-law might get up to in his off time". This all despite the series never really giving any indication that what you see isn't exactly what you get.
  • Evil Is Cool: Mike and Gus. One is a grizzled old badass who can clear a room of hostiles out by himself, the other is a powerful drug lord running his operation right under the DEA's noses. Both are some of Walt's most dangerous and compelling foes.
  • Fashion Victim Villain: Good god, just look at some of Saul's suits.
  • Fan Nickname: Todd is "Meth Damon", due to the show's subject matter and, well, looking a lot like a version of Matt Damon who got kinda screwed up on meth.
  • Fridge Brilliance: The title of the final episode of season four, 'Face Off', suggests a direct confrontation between characters. It isn't until you've seen the episode that you realize the title means blowing Gus's face off.
  • Genius Bonus: Heisenberg. If you paid attention in chemistry, this would bring to mind the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle.
  • Growing the Beard:
    • Many people agree that while it was tightly plotted, compelling and contained an incendiary performance from Bryan Cranston, Season 1 suffered from having its run truncated by the Writers' Strike. Season 2 picked up at exactly the point Season 1 left off and went on to exceed all viewer expectations, not only developing Walt and Jesse as characters, but giving ostensibly ancillary characters (from Hank, Skyler and even Tuco) an unexpected depth. Add to this the addition of Bob Odenkirk as Saul Goodman, and Breaking Bad became must-see television.
    • The pace of the show markedly picks up from the beginning of season 2, with every episode feeling like an 'end of season cliffhanger'. While season 1 was great, season 2 onwards is as addictive as, well...crystal meth.
    • Also a literal example, as Walt grows himself a suitably villainous goatee towards the end of the season.
    • Season 3 and 4 have both been improvements on the previous seasons. Lets just say that this show has grown more beards than ZZ Top.
  • Harsher in Hindsight: Thanks to the events that take place in Better Call Saul, many of this show's own events take on a whole new weight years later.
    • Saul Goodman getting his law degree from the University of American Samoa (and from an online course, at that) and Skyler's incredulous reaction towards it is basically a punchline, a cute little joke showing just how shady and illegitimate of a lawyer Saul is. It turns out that he worked his ass off for that degree, and Chuck, his own brother attacking his legitimacy as a lawyer by belittling it makes it come off as an unintentional Kick the Dog moment for her.
    • Whether it's Jesse goofing off with the lab equipment or Walt's slapstick-laden war against a stray housefly, the sillier moments that take place in Gus' underground superlab feel weird with the knowledge that they're happening directly on top of the shared grave of Howard Hamlin and Lalo Salamanca.
    • When Walt and Jesse kidnap Saul Goodman so they can press-gang him into helping them build their criminal empire, his terror over "Lalo" potentially sending them after him is hilarious. It's a lot less funny in light of Lalo's ascension from a throwaway line to a fleshed-out character that quickly establishes himself as one of the series' most terrifying villains and leaves Saul traumatized by his actions.
    • While Hector's refusal to look at Gus seems to stem from their tumultuous history together and Gus' psychological torture of the man, it truly seems to be rooted in the fact that the last time Hector looked him square in the eye, it set off a domino effect that led to the death of his beloved nephew Lalo, the beginning of the end of the Juarez Cartel and the Salamanca family as a whole, and him losing his last chance at removing Gus from the playing field before he could do too much damage to their operations.
  • Hell Is That Noise: Only a show like Breaking Bad can turn the simple ringing of a call bell into something ominous.
  • Hilarious in Hindsight: "The Fly" is an unconventional episode that has people split down the middle on whether they love it or hate it. It's meant to be a cerebral character study that sheds new light on Walt and Jesse's mindsets, and just so happens to be directed by Rian Johnson. This was nearly a decade before the release of The Last Jedi, which was even more polarizing and hit a lot of superficially similar beats, up to being directed by the same guy!
  • Holy Shit Quotient: All the freaking time.
  • Jerkass Woobie: Both Jesse and Walt qualify. While the suffering they endure tends to be a result of their own evil actions, the trauma they suffer due to awful things happening beyond their control helps them maintain an air of sympathy. It certainly helps that when they're at their most emotionally vulnerable, they tend to show genuine remorse for the awful things they do (even if it isn't enough to turn them away from the path they're walking on).
    • Hank, whose private pain is concealed by a willfully ignorant and obnoxious public personality.
  • Magnificent Bastard: Gus. The owner of Los Pollos Hermanos chain of chicken restaurants, and now the biggest Meth dealer of them all. Uses his chain as a cover, never been caught, and organizes anti-drug fun runs that means he associates with DEA agents that tell him all about their work. The Cartels respect him enough that he's able to call off a hit with but a single text message to two killers seeking personal vengeance. The only reason Walt is still alive is Gus can use him. Walt even figures out Gus is using him to break free of the Cartels to the point he's planning everything for his own advantages including Hank and the Cousins.
    • Walt himself has his moments of this, namely in the latter two seasons. He fully becomes one in the series finale.
    • Jesse displays some measure of this when he screws his parents over to get his aunt's house back. (How much of this was magnificent and how much of it was bastardly probably depends on what you thought of his parents' earlier actions.) Overall he gives off the impression of someone who could be a Magnificent Bastard if he cared enough to apply himself, but he tends to be a victim of his impulsive nature more often than not.
    • You could make a great case for Saul Goodman as well. He's charming, sly as a fox, and has enough knowledge of the law and business matters to keep Walt's empire afloat through the worst of times.
  • Memetic Badass: Once Better Call Saul reached the end of its run, /tv/ users came to view Walter White as less of a man, and more of a force of karmic justice sweeping down onto ABQ and purging it of its criminal element as well as avenging the lives of its victims.
  • Misaimed Fandom:
  • Moral Event Horizon:
    • Depending on your view of Walt's morality and the severity of his actions, there are a ton of potential moments where he crossed this. For some, it's him letting Jane die by choking on her own vomit. For others, it's him nearly raping Skyler in a fit of adrenaline-fueled mania. Then there are those who think his entire treatment of Jesse constitutes as an ongoing MEH crossing due to all the verbal and mental abuse he subjects him to, as well as a healthy dose of manipulation and gaslighting for good measure. Some also site the murder of the harmless Gale Boetticher as well as using his elderly neighbor as bait to see if any of Gus' men are waiting in his house to kill him. But for all but his biggest defenders, him poisoning and almost killing Brock, a little boy so he could get Jesse to turn against Gus is absolutely the point of no return.
      • But even then, one could argue that the very act of breaking bad itself was when there was no turning back for Walt. Ignoring all the lives ruined by the meth he creates, Walt venturing into the dark and dangerous world of drug trafficking instead of accepting Gretchen and Elliot's offer to pay for his cancer treatments causes an untold amount of misery and suffering for everyone around him, all out of wounded pride.
        • TL:DR - If cooking meth is bad, and murder is worse, then the MEH is crossed in the pilot.
    • Several conversations between Walt and Jesse indicate that they felt completely justified in their actions right up until Jane's death, which they consider (for different reasons) to be the worst thing they've ever done at that point. On Walt's end, it's the fact that Jane's death leads to her air traffic controller father accidentally causing a deadly plane crash in his grief, before nearly committing suicide. On Jesse's end, he got a recovering drug addict hooked back on the hard stuff.
    • If beating Jesse so badly that he had to be hospitalized wasn't bad enough, Tuco definitely crosses this when he beats his loyal henchman No-Doze to death over showing his support the wrong way.
    • Jesse comes dangerously close to crossing it when he starts trying to peddle meth to his addiction support group. While he isn't able to go through with it, those less sympathetic towards him feel that he actually crosses the line for even considering it in the first place.
    • While Gus Fring is the presumed Big Bad of the show, he draws the line at killing children to Walt. However, some episodes later Gus crosses it when he tells Walt that he plans to kill his entire family, infant daughter included, if he continues to interfere with his business.
      • While Gus may not be willing to hurt children unless he's pushed too far, two unnamed drug pushers working for him have no such scruples and kill 11 year old Tomas when Gus orders them to stop using him to sell drugs.
    • As long-established cartel bosses, Don Eladio and Hector Salamanca undoubtedly crossed this at some point in the distant past. But in terms of on-screen actions, there's Eladio's callous murder of Gus' partner Max, and Hector forcing him to look the dying Max in the eye while he slowly bleeds out. From this point on, you'll be cheering on Gus in hopes of him getting his revenge, even if he is the show's current Big Bad.
      • Honestly, Hector could have crossed it even further in the past with his awful parenting. A flashback to the Cousins' childhood shows him almost drowning one of them just to prove a point to both boys, which is a mere snapshot of the abuse that would mold two innocent children into remorseless, sociopathic Mexican Terminators.
    • Todd guns down an innocent child in cold blood. Without even hesitating. That's your first big sign that there's something deeply wrong with this guy.
    • Even Skyler is subject to this. Taking up smoking whilst pregnant is the first step to making her completely unsympathetic.
  • Replacement Scrappy: Gale for Jesse, briefly. Ultimately subverted in that Walt really likes Gale and probably relates to him better than Jesse but decides he has to take Jesse back to keep him under control. As such, to get rid of him, Walter treats him like this.
  • Rescued from the Scrappy Heap:
    • Skyler for a lot of fans in season 3, where she stops her nagging and complaining, and starts helping Walt launder his money. Not that it stopped her from re-entering Scrappy territory, unfortunately.
    • Hank starting in season 2 after he shoots Tuco and slowly starts to have a nervous breakdown. Not only does he show a more vulnerable side, but he undergoes genuine character development leading to him becoming a genuinely heroic detective that you'll find yourself rooting for.
  • The Scrappy:
    • Oh lord do people hate Skyler...
    • Also during the first season Hank was a greatly disliked but after about the second episode of season 2 he gained some Hidden Depths, is now an Ensemble Darkhorse and Rescued from the Scrappy Heap.
    • Marie is easily the most annoying character on the show thanks to her entitled behavior and kleptomaniacal tendencies. Especially since she has an annoying habit of talking and talking AND TALKING when it's long past time for her to just shut the fuck up. Being Out of Focus is just about the only thing that keeps the fanbase from bitching about her more than they do about Skyler. It must run in the family.
  • So Cool Its Awesome: "Suburban dad and chemistry teacher becomes a meth cook" is a premise that's every bit as outlandish as it is awesome.
  • Some Anvils Need to Be Dropped: Drugs Are Bad. Very, very bad. They will ruin your health, your hygiene, and your life. And even the smartest people make the dumbest decisions when they're chasing their next high. While it doesn't make it right, the lives and families we see destroyed by drug use make it easy to see why Hank and his DEA buddies are so gung ho about punishing even the smallest drug-related infractions.
  • Tear Jerker:
    • During the I.F.T. episode, Jesse repeatedly calls Jane's voice mail just so he could listen to her voice. The Tear Jerking moment happens when the voice mail is finally disconnected. The look on Jesse's face, knowing that he will never hear her voice again...*cries*
    • And for that matter, Jane's death.
    • The entirety of "ABQ" is pretty depressing. But two things in particular stand out. The first is the scene where Walt finds Jesse in the drug den and Jesse breaks down in tears over Jane's death. The second is the utterly devastated look on Donald Margolis's face when he see's his daughter's corpse.
    • Walt's Speech during "Fly". He admits that he should have died, and at the end, he basically says that if he had died while listening to his wife and daughter on the baby monitor, then it would have been perfect. A tear falls from his eye when he finishes.
    • "You don't have to do this."
    • Walt crying to his son in "Salud".
  • Too Cool to Live: Tortuga. A smartass DEA mole played by Danny Trejo? Awesome! A shame he only existed to show the ruthlessness of the Salamanca Twins. At least he left us with one of the most creative cartel killings in the history of television.
  • Unintentionally Unsympathetic: This is one of the reasons why Skyler's so hated. While it's hard to find fault in her being upset with Walt for the dangerous criminal lifestyle he leads, she does everything in her power to make it hard to truly sympathize. To get back at Walt for what she assumes is him cheating on her, she endangers her baby's health by smoking while pregnant, and runs the risk of tearing the family apart by having an affair with a man she's barely even attracted to. And when she demands to be let in on his illicit activities and starts laundering his money, she loses any moral high ground she might have had and still has the audacity to shame Walt for killing someone who was perfectly willing to kill not only him, but his entire family (infant daughter included). So not only is she a major Hypocrite, but she even comes off as a Dirty Coward who is too spineless to stand up to Walt in a meaningful way aside from making a half-assed attempt at killing herself to escape from a criminal lifestyle she had willingly participated in.
  • Wangst: Skyler at times. Yeah, it sucks to be married to a meth cook. But when you want in on his criminal empire and get put in charge of laundering his money, you shouldn't be surprised when he ends up being forced to kill shady people in the industry who want to kill him and his loved ones. Marie is just as bad when it comes to needlessly whining and complaining.
  • What an Idiot!:
    • Ted. "I just received a mysterious inheritance equivalent to the amount of back taxes I owe. What should I do with it? I know! Buy an expensive car and 'hold out for a better deal.'"
    • Gale. What kind of moron leaves his notes for cooking meth lying around in his apartment? Sure, it didn't cause him any problems in life, but the notes did lead to a trail implicating Gus' role in the drug trade after his death.
    • Jesse, Jesse, Jesse. His poor decision-making makes life difficult for himself and Walter time and time again. Burning a massive hole in his bathroom by dumping acid in his bathtub in complete defiance of Walt's instructions is merely the tip of the iceberg! It's at least justified in his case, though, since he's a junkie who may or may not have some sort of learning disability.
  • The Woobie: Jesse, among others.
    • Apparently, Walt thinks of Jesse as being a Woobie. According to Bryan Cranston on Inside Episode 12, in Walt's mind if something were to happen to Jesse, it would be like stabbing a puppy with a pitch fork.
    • Gale, poor Gale. Meth cook he may have been, he was a gentle soul and Adorkable geek who died a pointless death that could have been avoided if it wasn't for Walt and Jesse's terrible decision making.
    • Walt himself starts as this, then becomes progressively less sympathetic as the show goes on.
    • The little boy in "Peekaboo". His parents are junkies who care more about getting high than taking proper care of their son, meaning that he's perpetually covered in dirt and living in a house that looks like a condemned building.
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