You’re a high school chemistry teacher with a family and a mortgage. After inquiring if you’ve ever been a smoker [always a bad sign], your doctor tells you you have six months to a year to live – lung cancer. You’ve always taken the safe course, but this throws you. What do you do? That’s the subject of Breaking Bad [Sunday, 109C], AMC’s new darkly comic drama from X-Files veteran, Vince Gilligan.
In the opening moments of the premiere episode of Breaking Bad – right after the whole desert/RV/tighty-whiteys sequence, if you watch closely, you’ll see a plaque amongst Walter White’s [Bryan Cranston] possessions – a plaque that thanks him for his work on a team that went on to win a Nobel Prize. That he didn’t actually win the Nobel – but had the talent and chose a different path – tells us all we need to know about Walter’s life before the series begins.
At first, Walter goes all quiet; worrying his wife, Skyler [Anna Gunn] – who picks up odd items at yard sales and sells them on eBay. His son, Walter Jr. [R.J. Mitte], has cerebral palsy along with the usual teen angst and, thus, doesn’t really notice the change in his dad. Brother-in-law Hank [Dean Norris] is the kind of loudmouth that makes Walter’s surprise fiftieth birthday about him. He’s also a DEA Agent.
Walter’s always played it safe. Until the cancer diagnosis. Shaken, he decides to take up his brother-in-law’s offer for a ride-along on a DEA sting – not to take his mind off his troubles, but to investigate how a crystal meth lab works! The idea is to leave his family in a better financial situation after he’s gone, but is going to be a ride.
The first his family knows of the real change in Walter comes when they’re shopping for some jeans for Walter Jr. When a trio of bullies make a point of cruelly mocking Walter Jr., dad disappears. He’s gone around the building to come in from the front and comes up behind the biggest bully and takes him down in a really smart way. It’s at this moment that Walter’s new direction becomes permanent.
From the store, it’s not a huge leap to Walter finding the one drug dealer who got away from his brother-in-law’s raid and begins getting set up. From there, each step follows in a crazily logical way until the episode circles back to the opening sequence in the desert.
If you were a fan of Malcolm in the Middle, you may have a hard time seeing Cranston in Walter. His performance is so good that he becomes the character. Walter’s evolution [or is it devolution?] from totally middle-of-the-road, high school chemistry teaching guy to crystal meth manufacturer is amazing to behold.
Even the manner in which he drafts ex-student Jesse Pinkman [Aaron Paul] is remarkable. Once Walter makes up his mind to go for it, nothing is going to stop him – except for, maybe, some “business acquaintances” of Jesse’s who might want a rather large piece of the action – an ill-considered decision that leads directly to that desert sequence.
I strongly doubt that this series is going to go soft on Walter. Creator Gilligan has gone on record as saying that the series would show the consequences of its anti-hero’s actions, and the premiere makes it clear that these will be extremely noticeable. Given that his wife and son are not stupid, we can count on Walter having to go to some lengths to avoid raising their suspicions – if it is already too late.
Like another series, on another network, about a dope dealer, Breaking Bad is filmed in what might be characterized as an unlikely, bright manner – no dark shadows and noir contrasts here. Even the show’s palette is odd. Check out the green leather apron that Walter wears while he’s working in his mobile lab.
Using the pilot as a template, it’s probably fair to say that the series will balance brisk, even manic pacing with character moments that will not just be subtle, but multi-layered. The writing for the pilot is extremely good and establishes the dark tone of the humor right from the opening scenes. The direction does achieve that balance between brisk/manic and subtle that I mentioned above.
The big question is whether the series can manage to maintain its pace, its tone and its intelligence. With Gilligan at the helm, it has a good chance. Which means that AMC had best add a panel to its awards and nominations wall. Mad Men is no longer alone.
Final Grade: A