Figure 2: Flashback to ‘Pilot’, when Walt is rehearsing his lie to tell his wife, Skylar.
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Perhaps it’s Gilligan’s way of foreshadowing how the series will ultimately end where it had all once started, which was Walt’s cancer diagnosis. It’s also no coincidence that the opening scene in ‘Ozymandias’ is the same exact location as the one shown in ‘Pilot’. As viewers, it’s scenes like these that leave the most impression – and by juxtaposing Walt’s violence of the later seasons with the harmless man he once was through the flashback scene (Figure 2), Gilligan portrays how Walt’s properties have changed as the transformative reaction took place. One can immediately spot the difference in posture that hint at Walt’s transformation. The same man is seen whipping out a pistol and shooting a drug dealer in the head, because he has been causing trouble in a Walt’s neighborhood. Compare this to the still below in Season 3 Episode 12, ‘Half Measures’. As an audience member, this poor man’s stuttering remarks and hunched posture suggests him probably never having lied before to his wife. Figure 2 is a screenshot after the scene in the RV, which portrays Walt meandering around the RV while rehearsing a lie to tell his wife, Skylar, that he had to look over the car wash for his boss. Yet, the flashbacks demonstrate who Walt once was: a rather timid man who barely feeds his family as a high school teacher and working a second job at a car wash. Right around from Season 3, things get bloody and there are many gory, and violent scenes that demonstrate Walt’s insanity as he tries to cling onto his fleeting power and thirst for money in the drug scene. Gilligan does an incredible job of framing this “chemical equation” metaphor to the plot of Breaking Bad by not only utilizing these flashbacks, but also using these to emphasize the passage of time, and how much has changed in Walt’s life in just one year. Figure 1: Flashback to “Pilot”, when Walt and Jesse cook their first batch of meth With this interpretation, Gilligan implies that the whole series is one dynamic chemical reaction in itself – the reactants are Walt’s cancer diagnosis and his subsequent decision to cook meth to gather funds to provide before his inevitable death, and the products of this reaction are the consequences of Walt becoming the best meth cook of the drug scene in both Mexico and the States. After boiling a solution in a flask, Walt tells Jesse: “the reaction has begun.” Certainly, the beginning of this chemical reaction is what grants their first meth yield – but Gilligan extends this chemical reaction to Walt and Jesse’s relationship as meth cooks, as well as a tumultuous father-to-son dynamic that will form as the show progresses. Yet, the two team up for their shared personal interest that is money.
Back then, Walt’s relationship with Jesse isn’t far too great: Jesse remembers Walt as an anal teacher who taught a subject he had absolutely no interest in, and Walt remembers Jesse as the ignorant student whom he failed back in high school. In ‘Ozymandias’, the opening segment is a flashback to Walt and Jesse’s first meth cooking session – a scene from Season 1 Episode 1, ‘Pilot’. It is through the other characters’ reactions that serve as the true reflection of Walter White, as he begins to grow blind to what really matters to him and realize the destruction he has created.Įach episode opens with an introductory segment that Gilligan uses to either foreshadow, hint, or remind the audience that may serve an important factor in shaping the story to be explored in the episode. Secondly, Gilligan focuses on facial expressions – emotions and reactions that each character portray to the numerous accusations, mishaps, and turmoil. First, it emphasizes the overall transformation of Walt as he becomes Heisenberg, which creator Vince Gilligan does by accentuating the passage of time through various cinematic and narrative techniques. I would go so far to say that it is the most important episode of Season 5 for several reasons. Of all the episodes, one that stood out from the rest was ‘Ozymandias’, which is the 14 th episode of Season 5. With each season, I understood the characters much more deeply than I would with a movie, and even began to grow fond over them – in many ways, it was of similar experience to reading a series in novel form.
#Walter white ozymandias tv
To preface, Breaking Bad was the first ever TV show I ever watched in its entirety, and I was quite frankly impressed. After finishing all five seasons of Breaking Bad in the span of just a week (maybe actually a little less…), I finally understood what it felt like to fall victim to binge watching a TV series: a combination of sleepless nights, completely losing sense of the passage of time, and (futilely) attempting to find the most comfortable position to place the laptop in bed.
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