Good series finale. I thought the half face thing with gus was a little cheesy (I mean, you get half your body blown off and you smoothly walk out and adjust your tie? Aside from that small thing though great ending), but I guess they wanted fans to know with out any doubt Gus was done. I think next season I would like to see Walt reach the height of his evil success and then have it all come crashing down like Scarface or Goodfellas. Also, I think I would like to see Hank and Walt finally become enemies and have all the secrets and consequences finally exposed and come to a head.
The half faced thing was cheesy but not relevant to the story, so it was a perfect spot to insert something cool but unrealistic. I'd like to thing I'm good at figuring stuff out and recognizing tropes, but the wheelchair bomb I did not see coming until they showed it on the screen. Even when Hector was ringing the bell I didn't catch on. Very cool. The whole poisoning thing was very confusing and contrived and was far too dependent on people reacting in a very specific way to be a plausible plan for Walt. But in the grand scheme of things, it can be overlooked. Only other thing that would have been nice is some kind of cliffhanger for the next season. Like an epiphany from Hank or something. You have to wonder how it will all play out now that Walt and Jesse no longer have any kind of logistical infrastructure. If he just seamlessly takes over Gus' operation that would be kind of lame.
Spoiler That was such a great episode but fell short with last year's season finale. I would have hated it but it would have been amazing if they ended either right before Hector rang the bell when he changes is facial expression or right when the explosion happened. Would have been worst/best cliff hanger. Overall happy with the story and not sure where they can go from here? The only things are Mike, Walt's poisoning of the boy, and whoever is connected to Gus in Chile. Still, can't wait to see how it unfolds. *edit- Not sure if Gus missing an eye is connected with the eye that has shown up in previous episodes or just a coincidence. And best drama argument is valid compared to other cable television but compared to the Wire, it's not even close. The Wire has yet to be beaten in regards of writing. I'd say Sopranos follows closely in second and then maybe Breaking Bad?
Not reading through this thread because of spoilers. Just finished season 3 today, where can I watch season 4 online
Wow good catch to whoever posted that picture of the gun walt was spinning a few episodes before the finale.
If you want any more confirmation that the series really needs to be over right now, read this interview in the NYT I do have faith that the writers will do a decent job with the rest of it. But at the same time, I can't believe that it's all going to matter, that everything is meticulously laid out, the same way I could depend on The Wire. On the other hand, I will readily admit that Breaking Bad might be the best directed show of all time. Knowing they got the Walking Dead guys to do that impressive Pollonator shot is awesome, and how they play with shadow, odd camera angles and color is simply awesome. It's probably no coincidence that I can quote verbatim lines from the Wire, but Breaking Bad produces images that stick in your mind forever. If the Wire is Rick Astley, Breaking Bad is 2Girls1Cup.
The music in this one was just top notch in setting the mood. And how about the fantastic cinematic foreshadowing of Gus' demise, showing him with half a face a few scenes before it took place, just brilliant!
I would of picked Three Times One Minus One Spoiler <iframe src="http://www.funnyordie.com/embed/65bc7b80d2" width="640" height="400" frameborder="0"></iframe><div style="text-align:left;font-size:x-small;margin-top:0;width:640px;"><a href="http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/65bc7b80d2/mr-show-three-times-one-minus-one-from-thaffner" title="from thaffner">Mr. Show- Three Times One Minus One</a> - watch more <a href="http://www.funnyordie.com/" title="on Funny or Die">funny videos</a> <iframe src="http://www.facebook.com/plugins/like.php?app_id=138711277798&href=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.funnyordie.com%2Fvideos%2F65bc7b80d2%2Fmr-show-three-times-one-minus-one-from-thaffner&send=false&layout=button_count&width=150&show_faces=false&action=like&height=21" scrolling="no" frameborder="0" style="border:none; overflow:hidden; width:90px; height:21px; vertical-align:middle;" allowTransparency="true"></iframe> </div> That is Saul Goodman and Tobias Fumke.
One thing I didn't get was in the previous episode why did Walt panic about Gus going to kill him. Gus told him in the desert that if Walt kept on interfering he would kill his family. But that is only if he kept messing with Gus' business. Otherwise he and his family would be safe. So why did Walt go and call the DEA about this? Also didn't understand how Walt went about poisoning the boy? How did he have access to the kid?
When Gus straightened his tie I thought he was a T-800 and said WTF is this stupid ****. Thought this was a okay season, but my least favorite.
Walt went to the DEA b/c Gus made it clear he was going to have to kill Hank to get him to stop meddling in his business. Walt begged him not too, and finally Gus gave the "come to Jesus" speech with the "i will kill your infant daughter" line. Walt had to tell the DEA or have Hank's blood on his hands... once he did that, he knew his nuclear family was Gus' next target and rushed to get them to safety... but alas Skylar gave the money to Ted... and we see the death of Walter White (cackling under the house with that coffin looking shot at the end of 411) and the rebirth of Heisenberg. The more I think about it, when Walter says "I won" on the phone to Sklyar, I think it has a double meaning... obviously Walt beat Gus, but more subtely Heisenberg won over Walter White, and he has officially broken bad 100% now.
I have a slightly different take on it. Just look at all the gambles Walt took when he launched his final master plan. Poisoning Brock without killing him, taking out Gus, Tyrus and Hector all at once in a public place without hurting any civilians, begging Jesse to blow his head off in an attempt to earn his trust again (without Jesse actually pulling the trigger), keeping Hank alive and simultaneously off his trail. There were just so many individual situations, all of which Walt absolutely had to "win", in order to truly say "I won..." when it was all over.
Yeah I would agree with that. I would probably put Mad Men slightly ahead of BB based on the strength of MM's 4th season compared to BB..
Jesse pissed me off the first 2 seasons, but the last two he ended up being the more likeable one most of the time. Walt can be a real asshat sometimes. And skylar? Wow, that women is r****ded.
I can't believe people can say for certain that walt poisoned Brock. If Gus hadn't known about Walt's plans from the very beginning it would be an inconsistent plot. -Apparently the second saul and mike suspect wife trouble they bug his house and over hear everything. Hell, Gus ended up installing a camera in the lab, and those were just the ones they could see. Given the trouble Jesse and Walt have given him by collaberating together I highly doubt that for a man who takes precautions and measures to the point he does, he would be so careless. The scene where walt and jesse are outside the laundry lab and walt tries to ask him if he poisoned him in code words and proceeds to smoke a cigarrette is what gave it away to me. The camera behind them makes a scene. Whats Walt, a guy with lung cancer doing smoking a ciggerette especially if he didn't smoke in the first place. Gus knew about everything all along his character exercises caution and witt to a great degree and I'm guessing he kept and even closer eye on things especially after they got away with killing the replacement "cook". After all that happened remember the series of events with Mike? They never let us in on the whole convo between the two but Its obvious he was trying to figure out if Jesse could be trusted. And after he saw Jesse hadn't poisoned him, he decided he could be trusted.
i don't get what you're trying to say - are you implying that gus poisoned brock? i think the show gave us a definitive answer on that when jesse explained that the doctors said it wasn't ricin, but the berries from the lily of the valley flower. so the only options are that brock randomly ate some of those flower berries and poisoned himself, or walt did it. the show provided too deliberate an explanation and spent too much time setting up the clues for it to have been a random act. we had (1) walt spinning the gun and having it point toward the flower, right before brock is poisoned and brings jesse into "i'm going to kill whoever did this" mode, (2) jesse's explanation from the doctors in the final minutes of the season finale, and (3) lastly, the very deliberate close-up of the lily of the valley flower sitting in walt's backyard as the closing shot of the entire season. while there's a chance the writers did all this just to mess with us, i'd say it is more likely than not that walt did indeed poison brock (and this coming from someone who, prior to the season finale, did not for one second buy the speculation that walt, rather than gus, had poisoned brock).
