Chuck Klosterman X: A Highly Specific, Defiantly Incomplete History of the Early 21st Century

by Chuck Klosterman

Breaking Bad is not a situation where the characters’ morality is static or contradictory or colored by the time frame. Instead, it suggests that morality is continually a personal choice. When the show began, that didn’t seem to be the case: It seemed like this was going to be the story of a man (Walter White, portrayed by Bryan Cranston) forced to become a criminal because he was dying of cancer. That’s the elevator pitch. But that’s completely unrelated to what the show has become. The central question on Breaking Bad is this: What makes a man “bad”—his actions, his motives, or his conscious decision to be a bad person? Judging from the trajectory of its first three seasons, Breaking Bad creator Vince Gilligan believes the answer is option #3. So what we see in Breaking Bad is a person who started as one type of human and decides to become something different. And because this is television—because we were introduced to this man in a way that made him impossible to dislike, and because we experience TV through whichever character we understand the most—the audience is placed in the curious position of continuing to root for an individual who’s no longer good. And this is not a case like J. R. Ewing or Al Swearengen, where a character’s over-the-top evilness immediately defines his charm; this is a series where the main character has actively become evil, but we still want him to succeed. At this point, Walter White could do anything, and I would continue to support his ...