Breaking Bad - review

If at all there is a drama series that i've mentioned repeatedly on this blog that would be FRIENDS, followed closely by 24 and How i met your mother with a few passing references and a dedicated post review. Apt to the title, breaking the tradition for Breaking Bad drama series with a second post dedication.

As mentioned in my prior post which was a result of the impact of watching season one of that series, had decided then itself that this is going to take more than a couple of posts to cover. With only the final season left, after a binge watching across 40 episodes back to back, mind is literally reeling with after effects. Considering that there are only 13 episodes per season, with the story running in linear from a start to finish mode, wonder if the production house shot the whole 5 seasons in one shot and teased the audience with a bakers dozen per year!! Every season finale is nothing short of a blockbuster festival release movie of its own with pulsating finishes. If season 1 saw the rise of Heisenberg, season 2 ends with an atrociously original plane crash, dumping debris throughout, season 3 has the nail biter of all finishes with a did-he or didnt-he pull the trigger ending and season 4 having the mother of all ending in a suicide bomb blast of a revenge attack, conveniently removing the villain and an evil twist on the lead character.

Like any eager kid, saving the last bite of their favourite chocolate bar, resisting the urge to finish it, just to prolong the taste and enjoy its presence as much as possible, i've left the final season on the back burner. The series is an unapologetic take on human errors and on every deadly sin possible. What appears as a last ditch effort on season one by an under achiever on brink of death, taking on to the dark side of drugs, to protect the future of his family, which slowly grows into an death grip on himself. The murders he commit appear so natural and needed and are justified as neck of moment acts done out of fear, becomes more regular and gruesome when greed slowly takes over necessity. The junkie side kick, who was an aberration of a being initially blossoms into a caring human, of course the care is restricted only to those he love and true to the nature of the story, he doesn't give a damn about the society he is spoiling, for he himself is a by-product of the dysfunctional system. There are lot of dad characters in the series with the best of lot being the dad of the junkie girlfriend. His painstaking efforts to rehabilitate his over independent daughter, only to be dashed down by the junkie hero, who falls for her needle over syringe in love. Her untimely death due to drug overdose hurts him so much that, he messes up at work, causing the disastrous air crash one could ever imagine. On a side track it brings to light the stressful life of air traffic controllers and the enormous pressure they are always under. Again, a small..sorry..single.. human error causing significant damages to the society. The wife of the chief protagonist (or should i say antagonist??) is another glorious example of good going bad. To take revenge on her faltering husband, she sleeps around with her boss, only to realize he is no saint either, when she realizes he is fudging his accounts. It slowly pushes her onto the dark side and looking at the tonnes of money made by him, she becomes an willing accomplice. Not that the story is full of bad characters. There is this, police office, who is more honest than vijaykanth married to the sister of the lead character's wife, who incidentally is a kleptomaniac. Except of the encounter killing, that he had to undertake in self defence, which troubles his psyche causing anxiety disorders, he is the only law abiding character in the whole movie. And interestingly his spouse is a nurse beleaguered by small time thieving as an illness.

The thread of fallen humans is intact throughout the series in every single character. No one is perfect and no one is pious. Every single character worth their salt, has some or other shady skeleton on their closet. With the series moving from one episode to other in the most convincing manner possible, it looks more like a candid set up of a true character in a real society and not like a story at all.

Gils verdict:  Watching Breaking bad is the 8th deadly sin. Not watching is a deadlier one.

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