"...and have an A-1 day."

[Judge Olde]

I thought it was a fantastic ending to a fantastic show. I thought it was a [spoiler]nice ending for Walt, diving to save Jesse & catching one of his own bullets in the process.[/spoiler] I would like to have seen more of Breaking Bad, but having just watched the continued decline of Dexter, I'd rather see shows end with a bang, rather than a whimper or in Dexters case, a long drawn out death rattle ...

[Proteus4]

I've been watching it from the start but my wife couldnt bare to see Hal from Malcolm In the Middle  do bad things  so she stopped watching .  I watched on, naturally, and it is without doubt my favourite show of all time.  I think for me it was a black comedy which made the plot twists and contrivances fine - right from the start it never set out to be ultra realistic in tone.

Anyway, about two weeks ago wifey and me started watching from the start again as she finally accepted that she might be missing something wonderful - so we've got up to episode 12 of season 3 where [spoiler]walt shoots the drug dealers in the head after running them over with his people carrier[/spoiler].  I cant wait for her to see next episode where [spoiler]Jesse shoots Gale[/spoiler]!!! So exciting.

I thought that season 4 was awesome, but that Walt becoming a trully bad villain in the first half of season 5 was almost too quick or too rushed.  nonetheless, the final 8 episodes are perfect and the final episode was the perfect pay off for all those years.  the writers did not drop the ball once.

One of the big thing i never quite appreciated the first time watching it all is just what a fantastic actor Aaron Paul is.  How did i miss that?  He has excellent comic timing, has a great feel for the tragic, he is the emotional core of the show.  He is the only one who stood up at any point and said [spoiler]"This is totally fucked up - we cant go round killing kids and shit"[/spoiler] or something like that anyway.  Love him.

As for Dexter??  holy god I was gauging my eyes out in desperation by the end of it.  the whole last 2 or 3 years of it were total drivel.  I only kept on watching out of loyalty.  what a disappointment.

Dave

[Dodsy]

Has anyone else seen the (somewhat out there) theory that [spoiler]Walt dies in the car at the begining of the finale and the rest of the episode (from the keys falling into his lap onwards) is a diying mans dream?[/spoiler] It real mindblower and gets you looking at the finale in a whole different light.

I'll post a link here but PLEASE don't click it unless you've seen the last episode: http://www.bleedingcool.com/2013/10/04/norm-macdonald-tells-you-how-breaking-bad-really-ended/

[Definitely Not Mister Pops]

Yeah, I've seen that. Doesn't really stand up. [spoiler]Skyler tells him about the masked men that broke in, and he finds out that Jesse was being held prisoner and forced to cook.[/spoiler] Walt had no way of knowing these things, so why would they be in his dream?

[JOE SOAP]

There's absolutely no thematic or narrative reason for the end of Breaking Bad to be interpreted as a dream/fantasy sequence. It's not Twin Peaks, The Prisoner or Lost where - from the very beginning - reality distortions and parallel realities are part of the fabric and meaning of the show. There's also no implicit or explicit story device used to even hint that it's a dream. Even presuming it's true, what value or meaning would it add to the story?

None at all.

The series' end is as obvious and inevitable as Walt's cancer but Walt being Walt beat it to the punch. The dream sequence interpretation renders all the personal battles he won and lost in those final moments a dramatic novelty which belittles the story; great writing, acting, directing etc. It also misses the point.

The end has a certain mood that is zen-like : everything feels predestined; marking time while Walt puts all his ducks in a row. The meditative, deliberate pacing shouldn't be mistaken for a dream, but the natural end of a long journey, as Walt finally accepts who he is and his fate.

For it to be literally all a dream is an undue interpretation by people acting clever.

[Graff Vynda K]

Has anyone else seen the (somewhat out there) theory that [spoiler]Walt dies in the car at the begining of the finale and the rest of the episode (from the keys falling into his lap onwards) is a diying mans dream?[/spoiler] It real mindblower and gets you looking at the finale in a whole different light.

I'll post a link here but PLEASE don't click it unless you've seen the last episode: http://www.bleedingcool.com/2013/10/04/norm-macdonald-tells-you-how-breaking-bad-really-ended/

Well, look who's come up with that idea...that IS Norm McDonald (for UK listeners, just look him up on You Tube); not the most reliable source of pop-cultural analysis...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8LqozaaB7s

[JayzusB.Christ]

For it to be literally all a dream is an undue interpretation by people acting clever.

Aye.  Just watched the last episode, and heard about the theory.  What fresh twaddle is this?
Walt is easily smart enough [spoiler]to set all this up; he's already wiped out an entire drug empire single-handedly and avoided arrest for two years.[/spoiler]  In the case Taxi Driver and King of Comedy I'll accept the dream-sequence ending theory, but as for Breaking Bad:  no chance.

[radiator]

For it to be literally all a dream is an undue interpretation by people acting clever.

Aye.  Just watched the last episode, and heard about the theory.  What fresh twaddle is this?
Walt is easily smart enough [spoiler]to set all this up; he's already wiped out an entire drug empire single-handedly and avoided arrest for two years.[/spoiler]  In the case Taxi Driver and King of Comedy I'll accept the dream-sequence ending theory, but as for Breaking Bad:  no chance.

Yep I thought that theory was a load of bollocks too - and it's been shot down by Vince Gilligan himself. I remember people saying the same thing about the ending of The Dark Knight Rises, and thought that was bollocks too - you could say 'the ending was a dream' about literally anything - it isn't clever.

[shaolin_monkey]

Except that one time in Dallas!

[JOE SOAP]

Except that one time in Dallas!

...and that time in St. Elsewhere where in the final scene of the final episode was revealed that the entire series took place in the mind of autistic child Tommy Westphall* while he stared at a snow-globe that contained a model of the hospital.

*Son of Dr. Westphall in the series who in 'reality' was a construction worker rather than a doctor.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbjujMc5rGY&t=43m30s

[Frank]

... and every story anyone wrote in primary school. I thought the writing on the second half of season five was tighter than it had ever been, but that final episode sometimes felt like a DVD extra or an epilogue, rather than a grand finale. Maybe that's why some moon calves resort to outlandish but really quite dull theories.

The dramatic resolution to everything the series had established was[spoiler] the three-way confrontation between Walt, Hank and Jesse at the site of their first cook and on top of Walt's precious horde of gold[/spoiler], but if it had wrapped there I'd have missed out on [spoiler]the hilarious reveal of the identities of "the two best hitmen in New Mexico"[/spoiler].

<mod edit - added another spoiler tag!>

[TordelBack]

Watching it I was surprised that Walt[spoiler] won on two fronts in the end. Not so much killing 'Death' and those bloody Nazis, which I was literally thumping the table in frustrated anticipation of, but getting a wodge of money to Flynn and presumably Holly after all[/spoiler].  I was torn between wanting to see the wages of sin paid out, and wanting Walt to have at least some solace as he checked out.  On reflection, I am more than happy that the old bastard got something right.

My only real reservation about a satisfying conclusion to a masterful series is that Jesse, Marie and Flynn didn't get enough to do and say in the final episodes. 

And yes, the 'hitmen' setup, while we twigged what it was but not who was doing it, was a moment of inspired genius as great as anything else in the whole run.

[Frank]

<mod edit - added another spoiler tag!>

[spoiler]Sorry, Rich; that was particularly dense of me[/spoiler].

[Richmond Clements]

<mod edit - added another spoiler tag!>

[spoiler]Sorry, Rich; that was particularly dense of me[/spoiler].

[spoiler]No worries - it's what I'm here for![/spoiler]

[shaolin_monkey]

<mod edit - added another spoiler tag!>

[spoiler]Sorry, Rich; that was particularly dense of me[/spoiler].

[spoiler]No worries - it's what I'm here for![/spoiler]

[spoiler]Oy! With all this malarkey how are the rest of us supposed to tell what's a real spoiler and what's just you two mucking around?!?  Oh, and in BB the pink teddy is Hanks, Walt makes inventive use of a snake, vacuum cleaner and kids chemistry set, and Jesse loves Star Trek.[/spoiler]