Breaking Bad

[Travesty]

I was on another forum the other day and someone posted a thread asking if anyone was going to watch the Breaking Bad finale. Someone responded with this:



I think I had three strokes just reading it. Sadly,this person isn't a troll.

Well, the show isn't that realistic, nor is it trying to be. I always hear people compare the realism to The Wire, and I never understand why? BrBa never tried to be a realistic drama, it was its own thing.

 

[Keyser Soze]

Whoa, that was one hell of a brilliant post, Keyser Soze.

Haha, thanks, I think I just have too much time on my hands!

 

[georgec]

(amazing post)

Well said.

 

[Wolfwood]

Well, the show isn't that realistic, nor is it trying to be. I always hear people compare the realism to The Wire, and I never understand why? BrBa never tried to be a realistic drama, it was its own thing.

I think it just bothered me that they hoped into the middle of a long and thought out storyline and expected it to immediately make sense and then dismiss it when it's not made digestible for them.

I know it shouldn't bother me, but it just did.

 

[Piper Maru]

Do you guys think Huell left the safe house? Or is he still there after all this time surviving off his fat reserves. He's probably pretty thin by now if that's the case lol.

 

[Bruce Malone]

Let me get this out of the way I greatly enjoyed the finale and felt it was a satisfying conclusion.

However did anyone else feel like this might have been the most predictable episode of the series? I felt like everything we saw, people starting last year essentially predicted. Aside from the Gretchen and Elliot angle I pretty much expected really everything that took place in this episode, which is different really for what I'm used to for this show.

 

[Travesty]

Let me get this out of the way I greatly enjoyed the finale and felt it was a satisfying conclusion.

However did anyone else feel like this might have been the most predictable episode of the series? I felt like everything we saw, people starting last year essentially predicted. Aside from the Gretchen and Elliot angle I pretty much expected really everything that took place in this episode, which is different really for this show.

In a sense, sure, it was pretty predictable. I saw many people post theories that were 100% correct. I still enjoyed it, though.

 

[georgec]

Do you guys think Huell left the safe house? Or is he still there after all this time surviving off his fat reserves. He's probably pretty thin by now if that's the case lol.

Once the DEA got wind of Hank's disappearance/death, the agent outside the door probably let Huell go.

 

[Shifty]

That 10 million number tells me that most of the country just wanted to see the series finale to be in on the fad. So glad it ended here, if it had gone on then it would have suffered the same fate every cult show that gets popular suffers. In a way Vince saved us real fans from that. Not to sound arrogant or high and mighty because we watched the whole show and followed it for years but come on...some (or most) people are just groupies.

Bravo Vince.

I'd say 3 million people probably tuned in out of curiosity since the last three had 5.11, 6.37 and 6.58 million. I thought it would top 7 million but 10 is incredible. There was the marathon that aired during the week and weekend that probably picked up some new fans and Netflix viewers may have plunked down to download this year's episodes or watched the marathon.

 

[TheNextNolan22]

Do you guys think Huell left the safe house? Or is he still there after all this time surviving off his fat reserves. He's probably pretty thin by now if that's the case lol.

Once word got out about what happened to Hank, I think they let Huell go.

 

[Travesty]

Huell was left to rot in the safe house for over 9 months. Once he got out, he received $4 million in reparations, and is now rolling on a bed of dollar bills.

 

[PWN3R]

It's been a day now since I watched the Breaking Bad finale, and I'm still in awe. I feel a deep sadness it's all over, mixed with a satisfaction that we now have this complete, beautiful story to treasure forever, safe in the knowledge that Vince Gilligan and co stuck the landing.

This was not a shocking finale. There were no real twists or revelations here, and I don't think there was any need for them. If that's what you expect from a finale, then I would argue that "Ozymandius" is the real finale, with everything that followed acting as an extended victory lap as the aftermath of that most climactic of episodes settled in on us. In "Felina", the focus was much more on inevitability, on things that were set in motion way back at the beginning of the story finally coming to their natural conclusion. No, this wasn't shocking. But by God, it was satisfying.

Breaking Bad has always been one of the most intensely moral shows on television, and so it was fitting that this episode ends with the bad people being punished and the good people getting a shot at something better. Lydia, Todd, Uncle Jack and the Nazis all meet a grisly end: the Nazis killed with a classic badass "YEAH SCIENCE!" moment, Jack satisyingly offed in much the same manner as Hank only Jack now in the role of futilely trying to use money as a bargaining chip while Walt has gone on to being unmoved by such offers, Todd getting axed in literally the exact way I wanted him to go after last week - getting choked out by Jesse with his shackles. And Lydia's fate is perhaps most gruesomely rewarding of all in how much is left to our imagination - the series-long Checkov's gun of ricin poisoning finally being unleashed on her ensures that this most odious of villains in all her prim, precisely-manicured ruthlessness will die in heaps of her own vomit and feces, unable to stomach even her vile new-agey tea concoctions.

As for the good folk, Walt Jr inherits a fortune without it coming with the taint of drug money, Marie seems to have found her husband's strength in his absence and will at least be given the comfort of having his body to bury, and Skyler gets a chance to both somewhat reconcile with Walt and be vindicated at last with Walt's acknowledgement that all of this wasn't for his family... it was always for him. A strong contender for my favourite moment of the episode in an episode filled with them.

And then there's Jesse. I've seen some people upset that we have no idea where he goes next as he drives off, screaming in half-insane, feral joy. Does he go on the run? Does he go after Brock? Does he drive himself off a cliff to end the endless sea of pain that is his life? The truth is, it's not important. What's important is that he can make the decision, himself, to do any of these things, or none of them. He can go to Alaska and open a woodshop. It doesn't matter that he's beaten-down, traumatised and penniless, because at last... after being under the thumb of so many people over the course of the series... he's FREE. We don't see where Jesse goes, and can never see what horizon he drives off into, because he drives out of this dark world and into one of his own making. And that in itself was the most rewarding possible resolution the character could have.

And what of Walt? Some have complained that he didn't deserve redemption, and this final episode was undeniably redemptive for him, where even in death he is triumphant. As someone who has been vocal in expression my opinion that Walt had become the villain of his own show and was beyond our sympathy, I was totally happy with this redemptive arc. He got his punishment in "Ozymandius" and "Granite State". He was laid low, and everything was taken away from him. And what made his final journey in this episode so rewarding was that it wasn't some hollow contrition like the Dexter finale where everything is shaped to best suit the protagonist, but rather at last he was making amends and repairing some of the damage done to those he hurt most with his actions before his own inevitable demise.

I'm going to make a reach here, but amidst all the talk of symbolism on the show there's one quite obvious detail that I've not seen discussed. The first time the name "Heisenberg" is used in Breaking Bad, it is in the episode where Walt first shaves his head. In interviews, Cranston talked about Walt's reasoning for this being that "Walt didn't want to recognise the person he saw looking back at him in the mirror." Well, here in "Felina", his hair is back. For the first time since Season 1, Walt recognises himself in the mirror. A lot of fans have got into the rhetoric of the Heisenberg myth: how many times have we heard, "Walt is gone, only Heisenberg remains," or "Walt needs to bring back Heisenberg to kick some ass?" Walt himself bought into this myth, of Heisenberg as this larger-than-life criminal mastermind who was without peer, with him reaching the height of his despicable hubris in Season 5's "Say My Name." But the past couple of episodes have deconstructed that Heisenberg myth, with "Granite State" actively making a mockery of the ritual of putting on the pork pie hat when it can't even get him out his front gate. Heisenberg wasn't some superhero alter ego or dormant alternate personality. It was Walt. It was always Walt. And in "Felina", Walt himself realises that, and we see how resourceful and effective WALTER WHITE is at getting stuff done when he's not making ostentatious displays of his own genius. Heisenberg was well and truly buried by the time this finale began, and this was Walt trying to recapture who he really is, perhaps spurned on by Gretchen's words at the close of last episode.

Are there little things I wanted? Sure. I would have loved a Jesse/Walt Jr scene before all was said and done, even if I can't figure out how they could have done it. And I was itching for some kind of aftermath after Walt's poignant final moments. But I think it's appropriate that the show ends as Walter's life does. We came into this world with him. It's appropriate we leave it with him too.

I'm aware this is a meandering rant, so I'll stop now. To wrap up, all Breaking Bad needed to do to cement its legacy as my favourite TV show of all time was not make a total disastrous mess of the last episode. And this finale was far from a disaster. It didn't do anything fancy, but I didn't want it to. Instead it focused on giving us everything we could want from the end of this story. Thank you Bryan Cranston and all the rest of the impeccable cast. And thank you Vince Gilligan.

I love you.

 

[Keyser Soze]

Let me get this out of the way I greatly enjoyed the finale and felt it was a satisfying conclusion.

However did anyone else feel like this might have been the most predictable episode of the series? I felt like everything we saw, people starting last year essentially predicted. Aside from the Gretchen and Elliot angle I pretty much expected really everything that took place in this episode, which is different really for what I'm used to for this show.

In the old Greek tragedies, the beginning would be a prologue, where the chorus would tell the audience what happens at the end. Shakespeare took cues from that in some of his own tragedies, such as telling the audience at the beginning of Romeo & Juliet that both the lovers would die. The thinking was that it wasn't the shock of the ending that would emotionally engage the audience. Rather, it was the specifics of how they got to that inevitable ending they all knew was coming, a technique caled "dramatic irony." To apply all that to Breaking Bad... I think we all knew how the show would ultimately end, and Season 5's opener made that ending all the more overt. The mystery and suspense came in how we got to that point, and so with "Felina" was the joy in seeing the inevitable come to pass.

 

[Bruce Malone]

The only real "WTF!?" moment I got (which is something I've gotten often especially this season) was when the lazer dots hit Gretchen and Eliot.

The rest were almost a check list of what we sort of predicted.

Walt poisons lydia with ricin. Check.

Walt uses M60 to take out nazis. Check.

Walt goes to rescue Jesse. Check.

I had my expectations in check because I knew according to Vince Ozymandias was his favorite episode. I probably wouldn't rank this particularly high in my single episode ratings but looking at it as an overall conclusion I did like it though.

In the old Greek tragedies, the beginning would be a prologue, where the chorus would tell the audience what happens at the end. Shakespeare took cues from that in some of his own tragedies, such as telling the audience at the beginning of Romeo & Juliet that both the lovers would die. The thinking was that it wasn't the shock of the ending that would emotionally engage the audience. Rather, it was the specifics of how they got to that inevitable ending they all knew was coming, a technique caled "dramatic irony." To apply all that to Breaking Bad... I think we all knew how the show would ultimately end, and Season 5's opener made that ending all the more overt. The mystery and suspense came in how we got to that point, and so with "Felina" was the joy in seeing the inevitable come to pass.

I agree for this show it was more about the journey per se than the destination. To me I think ozymandias was sort of the real cap to this story, as in we knew from that point walt would never really succeed at what he had planned all that time earlier.

 

[TheNextNolan22]

Yeah, Ozymandias felt like the true finale and these past 2 episodes just prolonged it. Felina will definitely be high among my favorite episode list, but Ozymandias might be favorite.

 

[Still Wynning]

Let me get this out of the way I greatly enjoyed the finale and felt it was a satisfying conclusion.

However did anyone else feel like this might have been the most predictable episode of the series? I felt like everything we saw, people starting last year essentially predicted. Aside from the Gretchen and Elliot angle I pretty much expected really everything that took place in this episode, which is different really for what I'm used to for this show.

Predictable as it may be, I just saw everything in this episode as coming to its most logical conclusion. In that sense, it was very satisfying.

It's like eating your favorite dish. Do you know what you're getting? Sure.

Is it still delicious and satisfying as hell? Absolutely.

 

[Broseph44]

It's been a day now since I watched the Breaking Bad finale, and I'm still in awe. I feel a deep sadness it's all over, mixed with a satisfaction that we now have this complete, beautiful story to treasure forever, safe in the knowledge that Vince Gilligan and co stuck the landing.

This was not a shocking finale. There were no real twists or revelations here, and I don't think there was any need for them. If that's what you expect from a finale, then I would argue that "Ozymandius" is the real finale, with everything that followed acting as an extended victory lap as the aftermath of that most climactic of episodes settled in on us. In "Felina", the focus was much more on inevitability, on things that were set in motion way back at the beginning of the story finally coming to their natural conclusion. No, this wasn't shocking. But by God, it was satisfying.

Breaking Bad has always been one of the most intensely moral shows on television, and so it was fitting that this episode ends with the bad people being punished and the good people getting a shot at something better. Lydia, Todd, Uncle Jack and the Nazis all meet a grisly end: the Nazis killed with a classic badass "YEAH SCIENCE!" moment, Jack satisyingly offed in much the same manner as Hank only Jack now in the role of futilely trying to use money as a bargaining chip while Walt has gone on to being unmoved by such offers, Todd getting axed in literally the exact way I wanted him to go after last week - getting choked out by Jesse with his shackles. And Lydia's fate is perhaps most gruesomely rewarding of all in how much is left to our imagination - the series-long Checkov's gun of ricin poisoning finally being unleashed on her ensures that this most odious of villains in all her prim, precisely-manicured ruthlessness will die in heaps of her own vomit and feces, unable to stomach even her vile new-agey tea concoctions.

As for the good folk, Walt Jr inherits a fortune without it coming with the taint of drug money, Marie seems to have found her husband's strength in his absence and will at least be given the comfort of having his body to bury, and Skyler gets a chance to both somewhat reconcile with Walt and be vindicated at last with Walt's acknowledgement that all of this wasn't for his family... it was always for him. A strong contender for my favourite moment of the episode in an episode filled with them.

And then there's Jesse. I've seen some people upset that we have no idea where he goes next as he drives off, screaming in half-insane, feral joy. Does he go on the run? Does he go after Brock? Does he drive himself off a cliff to end the endless sea of pain that is his life? The truth is, it's not important. What's important is that he can make the decision, himself, to do any of these things, or none of them. He can go to Alaska and open a woodshop. It doesn't matter that he's beaten-down, traumatised and penniless, because at last... after being under the thumb of so many people over the course of the series... he's FREE. We don't see where Jesse goes, and can never see what horizon he drives off into, because he drives out of this dark world and into one of his own making. And that in itself was the most rewarding possible resolution the character could have.

And what of Walt? Some have complained that he didn't deserve redemption, and this final episode was undeniably redemptive for him, where even in death he is triumphant. As someone who has been vocal in expression my opinion that Walt had become the villain of his own show and was beyond our sympathy, I was totally happy with this redemptive arc. He got his punishment in "Ozymandius" and "Granite State". He was laid low, and everything was taken away from him. And what made his final journey in this episode so rewarding was that it wasn't some hollow contrition like the Dexter finale where everything is shaped to best suit the protagonist, but rather at last he was making amends and repairing some of the damage done to those he hurt most with his actions before his own inevitable demise.

I'm going to make a reach here, but amidst all the talk of symbolism on the show there's one quite obvious detail that I've not seen discussed. The first time the name "Heisenberg" is used in Breaking Bad, it is in the episode where Walt first shaves his head. In interviews, Cranston talked about Walt's reasoning for this being that "Walt didn't want to recognise the person he saw looking back at him in the mirror." Well, here in "Felina", his hair is back. For the first time since Season 1, Walt recognises himself in the mirror. A lot of fans have got into the rhetoric of the Heisenberg myth: how many times have we heard, "Walt is gone, only Heisenberg remains," or "Walt needs to bring back Heisenberg to kick some ass?" Walt himself bought into this myth, of Heisenberg as this larger-than-life criminal mastermind who was without peer, with him reaching the height of his despicable hubris in Season 5's "Say My Name." But the past couple of episodes have deconstructed that Heisenberg myth, with "Granite State" actively making a mockery of the ritual of putting on the pork pie hat when it can't even get him out his front gate. Heisenberg wasn't some superhero alter ego or dormant alternate personality. It was Walt. It was always Walt. And in "Felina", Walt himself realises that, and we see how resourceful and effective WALTER WHITE is at getting stuff done when he's not making ostentatious displays of his own genius. Heisenberg was well and truly buried by the time this finale began, and this was Walt trying to recapture who he really is, perhaps spurned on by Gretchen's words at the close of last episode.

Are there little things I wanted? Sure. I would have loved a Jesse/Walt Jr scene before all was said and done, even if I can't figure out how they could have done it. And I was itching for some kind of aftermath after Walt's poignant final moments. But I think it's appropriate that the show ends as Walter's life does. We came into this world with him. It's appropriate we leave it with him too.

I'm aware this is a meandering rant, so I'll stop now. To wrap up, all Breaking Bad needed to do to cement its legacy as my favourite TV show of all time was not make a total disastrous mess of the last episode. And this finale was far from a disaster. It didn't do anything fancy, but I didn't want it to. Instead it focused on giving us everything we could want from the end of this story. Thank you Bryan Cranston and all the rest of the impeccable cast. And thank you Vince Gilligan.

You my friend have nailed it, and you're my new best friend haha. Bravo sir.

 

[scatterax]

In a sense, sure, it was pretty predictable. I saw many people post theories that were 100% correct. I still enjoyed it, though.

The fact that this was the one time what everyone thought would happen actually did was a surprise by itself. Very meta Vince. Clever twist lol.

 

[Broseph44]

Predictable if done right is perfect. And Breaking Bad did it right. Dexter could have learned something from BB. Dexter finale and the whole final season should have been predictable. Would have been better than the garbage they fed us all season long, culminating with a pile of **** for the finale.

 

[Bruce Malone]

In a sick sort of way. If I had to choose the point where this show would have had its finale it would have been in crawl space. With this is as the last shot of the whole show.

Don't get me wrong though I'm very happy where the show went, just a little thought of mine.

I did notice an homage to it in the actual last shot of the finale though.

 

[georgec]

I can't wait for the Canadian adaptation.

 

[TheNextNolan22]

Saw this on Tumblr and....man, it hit me.

In the pilot, Walt is turning 50 years old. One day later, he is diagnosed with cancer and the doctor gives him “two year tops”. In the finale, Walt is turning 52. in the morning after his birthday, he dies. Talk about coming full circle.

 

[Hush]

It's been a day now since I watched the Breaking Bad finale, and I'm still in awe. I feel a deep sadness it's all over, mixed with a satisfaction that we now have this complete, beautiful story to treasure forever, safe in the knowledge that Vince Gilligan and co stuck the landing.

This was not a shocking finale. There were no real twists or revelations here, and I don't think there was any need for them. If that's what you expect from a finale, then I would argue that "Ozymandius" is the real finale, with everything that followed acting as an extended victory lap as the aftermath of that most climactic of episodes settled in on us. In "Felina", the focus was much more on inevitability, on things that were set in motion way back at the beginning of the story finally coming to their natural conclusion. No, this wasn't shocking. But by God, it was satisfying.

Breaking Bad has always been one of the most intensely moral shows on television, and so it was fitting that this episode ends with the bad people being punished and the good people getting a shot at something better. Lydia, Todd, Uncle Jack and the Nazis all meet a grisly end: the Nazis killed with a classic badass "YEAH SCIENCE!" moment, Jack satisyingly offed in much the same manner as Hank only Jack now in the role of futilely trying to use money as a bargaining chip while Walt has gone on to being unmoved by such offers, Todd getting axed in literally the exact way I wanted him to go after last week - getting choked out by Jesse with his shackles. And Lydia's fate is perhaps most gruesomely rewarding of all in how much is left to our imagination - the series-long Checkov's gun of ricin poisoning finally being unleashed on her ensures that this most odious of villains in all her prim, precisely-manicured ruthlessness will die in heaps of her own vomit and feces, unable to stomach even her vile new-agey tea concoctions.

As for the good folk, Walt Jr inherits a fortune without it coming with the taint of drug money, Marie seems to have found her husband's strength in his absence and will at least be given the comfort of having his body to bury, and Skyler gets a chance to both somewhat reconcile with Walt and be vindicated at last with Walt's acknowledgement that all of this wasn't for his family... it was always for him. A strong contender for my favourite moment of the episode in an episode filled with them.

And then there's Jesse. I've seen some people upset that we have no idea where he goes next as he drives off, screaming in half-insane, feral joy. Does he go on the run? Does he go after Brock? Does he drive himself off a cliff to end the endless sea of pain that is his life? The truth is, it's not important. What's important is that he can make the decision, himself, to do any of these things, or none of them. He can go to Alaska and open a woodshop. It doesn't matter that he's beaten-down, traumatised and penniless, because at last... after being under the thumb of so many people over the course of the series... he's FREE. We don't see where Jesse goes, and can never see what horizon he drives off into, because he drives out of this dark world and into one of his own making. And that in itself was the most rewarding possible resolution the character could have.

And what of Walt? Some have complained that he didn't deserve redemption, and this final episode was undeniably redemptive for him, where even in death he is triumphant. As someone who has been vocal in expression my opinion that Walt had become the villain of his own show and was beyond our sympathy, I was totally happy with this redemptive arc. He got his punishment in "Ozymandius" and "Granite State". He was laid low, and everything was taken away from him. And what made his final journey in this episode so rewarding was that it wasn't some hollow contrition like the Dexter finale where everything is shaped to best suit the protagonist, but rather at last he was making amends and repairing some of the damage done to those he hurt most with his actions before his own inevitable demise.

I'm going to make a reach here, but amidst all the talk of symbolism on the show there's one quite obvious detail that I've not seen discussed. The first time the name "Heisenberg" is used in Breaking Bad, it is in the episode where Walt first shaves his head. In interviews, Cranston talked about Walt's reasoning for this being that "Walt didn't want to recognise the person he saw looking back at him in the mirror." Well, here in "Felina", his hair is back. For the first time since Season 1, Walt recognises himself in the mirror. A lot of fans have got into the rhetoric of the Heisenberg myth: how many times have we heard, "Walt is gone, only Heisenberg remains," or "Walt needs to bring back Heisenberg to kick some ass?" Walt himself bought into this myth, of Heisenberg as this larger-than-life criminal mastermind who was without peer, with him reaching the height of his despicable hubris in Season 5's "Say My Name." But the past couple of episodes have deconstructed that Heisenberg myth, with "Granite State" actively making a mockery of the ritual of putting on the pork pie hat when it can't even get him out his front gate. Heisenberg wasn't some superhero alter ego or dormant alternate personality. It was Walt. It was always Walt. And in "Felina", Walt himself realises that, and we see how resourceful and effective WALTER WHITE is at getting stuff done when he's not making ostentatious displays of his own genius. Heisenberg was well and truly buried by the time this finale began, and this was Walt trying to recapture who he really is, perhaps spurned on by Gretchen's words at the close of last episode.

Are there little things I wanted? Sure. I would have loved a Jesse/Walt Jr scene before all was said and done, even if I can't figure out how they could have done it. And I was itching for some kind of aftermath after Walt's poignant final moments. But I think it's appropriate that the show ends as Walter's life does. We came into this world with him. It's appropriate we leave it with him too.

I'm aware this is a meandering rant, so I'll stop now. To wrap up, all Breaking Bad needed to do to cement its legacy as my favourite TV show of all time was not make a total disastrous mess of the last episode. And this finale was far from a disaster. It didn't do anything fancy, but I didn't want it to. Instead it focused on giving us everything we could want from the end of this story. Thank you Bryan Cranston and all the rest of the impeccable cast. And thank you Vince Gilligan.

Yep, that's what I was gonna say.

 

[TheNextNolan22]

“Walt’s unplanned self-sacrifice in shielding Jesse from the bullet not only exposed what humanity was left in Walter White, but underlined the significance of their relationship, no matter how fractured. “[When] he hears that the blue meth is still out there, that Jesse is still cooking, it’s like, ‘That bastard! He convinced them to be a partner with him, he’s still cooking! I’ll kill everybody!’” says Cranston. “And then when I see him, the shred of humanity left in Walter White is exposed at that moment and he acts. So if there’s any redeeming quality to him from the standpoint of the audience, it’s that moment. He even allows Jesse to kill him. Jesse has the gun and he points at me, and he says, ‘You want this?’ And I go, ‘Yeah. I think it’s fitting. Go ahead. You need to do it, go ahead. It’s okay.’ And then he says, ‘If you want this, then do it yourself. I’m not going to do it for you.’ At least there was some conclusion to their association. Their friendship did matter. And it was because of that history and friendship, that was the basis of his impulsivity. Because otherwise it would just be, ‘Jesus, look at that guy, that poor bastard,’ but I’m not going to risk my life for some stranger. There is more than familiarity. It’s deep-rooted. And it’s so true. Because sometimes you don’t know the depth of what you feel until you’re tested. That’s why I think it’s a satisfying ending. It’s still true to Walter White. Because he always possessed that. But it’s not saccharine sweet. It’s not done out of ‘Ohhh, Jesse.’ It’s just … ‘Jesus.’ If anything, it makes me hate Jack even more for his brutality.”

-Bryan Cranston.

 

[Brother Jack]

I would argue the finale was not redemptive for Walt. If redemption was really what he wanted (and by extension, Vince Gilligan) he would have turned himself in to the police and sold Lydia and the Nazis out, thereby protecting his family even if they got none of his money. And even then, that wouldn't have been enough. We're talking about a guy who indirectly caused a plane crash that killed 160 people. No amount of saving Jesse at the last minute or giving Skyler a possible way out of trouble was going to change that.

What we have instead is a recognition. The scales have fallen away from Walt's eyes and he's finally able to see himself for what he is and admit why he did it all. There's no apologies or goodbyes, just an acceptance that his own selfishness destroyed everyone around him and, finally, himself. The only thing left for him was to tie up loose ends and dispense a measure of justice before it was over. What we're left with is an odd sense of simultaneous victory and defeat. Junior will still (most likely) get the money but he'll never know it was from his father and presumably spend the rest of his life thinking he was a complete monster.

What a legacy to leave behind.