Breaking Bad
Our Review
The most complete drama in television history. Vince Gilligan’s story of Walter White — a dying chemistry teacher who starts cooking meth and discovers he’s good at something terrible — is the medium’s great character tragedy: a man’s transformation from Mr. Chips into Scarface, executed with 62 episodes of Chekhovian discipline. Nothing is wasted; the bear in season 2, the Lily of the Valley, the machine gun in the trunk — the show plays fair with every setup.
Bryan Cranston is operatic as Walt, a man who lies so long he forgets he’s lying (“I did it for my family” is the show’s central deceit). Aaron Paul’s Jesse Pinkman is the soul — the junkie who feels everything Walt can’t, whose suffering becomes the show’s moral meter. Giancarlo Esposito’s Gus Fring is TV’s coldest villain, the chicken man who walks out of an explosion and adjusts his tie. Ozymandias is the single best episode of television ever aired; the entire final run is a masterclass in tension and payoff.
Verdict: Watch this not that — this is the one. The top of the mountain.