Arguably the best TV show of all time rings in its best season ever. With tensions at an all time high Vince Gilligan made sure that you would feel that uncomfortableness. After a cliffhanger ending to season 3 we immediately resume to find out that Jesse killed Gale (David Costabille). This is just the first desperate action that Walt (Bryan Cranston) and Jesse (Aaron Paul) take to avoid being killed by Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito). Throughout this season tensions continue to rise between Walt and Jesse, and Gus, which feels like it can and will only be resolved in one drastic measure.
The best season of Breaking Bad pits Walt against Gus after Walt took out two of Gus’s drug dealers and ordered Jesse to kill Gale. We see the degradation of both Walt and Jesse as Walt becomes hostile towards everyone as the only thing he can focus on is staying alive and killing Gus. Jesse starts isolating himself and falls into a deep depression as he tries to deal with the fact that he just killed an “innocent” man. On the other side of Walt and Jesse losing their minds, Gus’s relationship with the cartel starts to become sour as they are aggravated that Gus won’t let them have Walt and that they weren’t able to kill Hank. As all tensions run high, we eventually find out the lengths to which Walt will go to protect his family as he finds out about Hector Salamanca (Mark Margolis) and uses him to kill Gus.
Skyler White, the most…confusing character in this show. I think this is the season that really derails her character. She is so bipolar this season that it’s honestly confusing sometimes. We never know if she is going to like Walt today or not. She forced Walt and Saul to let her be the bookkeeper and launder the money, which I can understand why, but there are other more appropriate ways of protecting your family. Instead of getting away from Walter and his antics, she puts herself closer so that she can make sure everything works smoothly. A good idea before hindsight, but afterwards it just adds a lot of stress to the family and puts her in a position where she has to be the bad guy to her son because of how irresponsible her husband is acting. She just switches a lot this season, which I can find justification for, but I also see why she is more or less an unloved character. However, another side character, Hank, straight made me mad this season. I hated the way he treated Marie for the first half of this season. “Jesus Christ Marie, they’re minerals!” As funny as that part it is, the rest of the rudeness towards Marie seems completely unwarranted and I know Hank’s pride is figuratively and literally shot, so he’s going through a rough time, but I don’t ever remember him apologizing or thanking Marie for everything she did to help him be able to walk again. For the second half of the season, I did like him getting back into DEA agent Hank and almost single handedly taking down Gus’s drug empire. Finally, Saul is Saul, and after four seasons that’s all the character analysis that he really needs.
This is a really rough season for Jesse. He starts isolating himself, trying to distract himself, he’s using again, and it is all driven by something he didn’t want to do. Jesse Pinkman is not a killer. It’s Walt who makes him one. Jesse up till this season has been a very easy person to manipulate and Walt has taken advantage of that. I mean come on, the blowfish pep talk worked? Although this is a tough season for Jesse, I would also argue he grows the most this season. He finally says no to Mr. White when he doesn’t kill Gus, he starts branching out on his own working with Mike and Gus against Walts’ wishes, and this is the first time we really see Jesse stick up for himself and take control of his own actions. I don’t have a whole lot to say about Jesse this season, I feel that there was a lot of character development this season that we see the payoffs of in season five and El Camino, in which I discuss Jesse’s character a lot more in depth.
He is the danger. He is the one who knocks. This season is where we really see the descent of Walter White. He becomes so obsessed with killing Gus that he pays no mind to the repercussions that may come of that. Between Jesse, Skyler (Anna Gunn), and Walter Jr. (RJ Mitte), all of Walter’s relationships degrade. Walter barely sees how much Jesse is really struggling after he killed Gale and the only time he actually cares about Jesse is when it involves him maybe being in danger. I subscribe to the belief that Walter does not actually care about Jesse. He may think that he cares about Jesse, he may see Jesse as a son or protege, but he doesn’t actually care about him. Walter will always put himself before Jesse, he has always and will always put himself above Jesse. Everything has to be about the chemistry genius Walter White. He can’t even begin to see that Jesse does not want to kill, it isn’t something Jesse is comfortable with and the last time he did it, it drove him into a severe depression. With Skyler his relationship has a lot of ups and downs, they’ll go from living apart to having sex and back to Skyler wanting to have nothing to do with Walt, which are signs of a very unhealthy relationship. On top of that, with all the problems Walt is having in his life right now, he forgets about the person he is doing this for, Walter Jr. He isn’t connecting with Walter Jr., instead of being able to get Walter Jr. a meaningful present for his 16th birthday, Walt buys him off with an expensive car, and then on the day of Junior’s birthday Walt is nowhere to be found and instead of celebrating a huge day with his son, his son is taking care of him because he got into a fight with his meth partner because his meth partner won’t kill someone. Like seriously, let’s get our priorities straight.
A show is only as good as its villain. To keep Giancarlo and therefore Gus as a major character on this show was one of the best decisions Gilligan has ever made. Giancarlo Esposito was a perfect casting and I really believe that Gus Fring wouldn’t have been as good of a villain if it wasn’t for Esposito’s ability to portray such a menacing villain. Every scene he was in was a tense mystery. We never knew if he was going to stab his own employee in the neck or if he was going to ask somebody how their fried chicken was. The master of putting up a facade, Esposito’s expressions are dead on and his mannerisms are so on point that I was worried he was just being himself and not acting. As for the actual character of Gus, he was the best antagonist to Walt anyone could have asked for. They are both so calculated and I never thought that Gus didn’t have a plan. He was so meticulous and so careful if it weren’t for Walt and Jesse I really don’t think he would’ve ever been caught. He would’ve been distributing drugs until the day he dies because he was just that good at his job. The only reason Walt beat him was because of how unpredictable Walt is. Walt is still pretty new to this business, so he doesn’t always have the best plans, but sometimes his plans are just so crazy and timed perfectly that they work out. The only reason Gus was so reckless with Hector Salamanca was because he was coming off the euphoria of his twenty year revenge plan working and because of the bad blood between him and Hector, but that also shows how formidable Walt is because Gus made one misstep and he is dead.
As mentioned this is my favorite season, the tension and stakes are at an all time high, and the battle between Walt and Gus is brilliant. When people talk about this show being one of the best of all time this is what they are referring to. Season 2 and 3 have both been leading up to this confrontation and Gilligan and his team executed it perfectly. The story is masterfully done and the only changes I would want to make are more personal than actually thinking that it would make a better story, for example Jesse is my favorite character, so I wish he could’ve been happier this season, but that is just my favoritism. I would do something about Skyler however, because I didn’t like how flip-floppy she was, but I also think it worked with the story, so I can’t say for certain what I would do. Other than that I thought all the other characters and relationships are practically perfect, and it is just one of the best seasons of any show I’ve ever watched. At the end here, I would like to add that they got me at first when Gus walked out of the room that was just bombed, I really thought he survived that and was ready to say that he is just unkillable.
9.5/10☆
9/10😁
To be completely honest, I think the entire series of Breaking Bad is about a 9/10 on the enjoyability ranking and my reasoning for each season will probably be about the same. It’s not a show that relies on getting its audience’s adrenaline running and doesn’t require a lot of special effects. It’s a very grounded show that is well-warranted as being regarded as one of the best TV shows of all time. This season especially puts you on your toes and makes you worry and think, which I know is not what everyone is looking for when watching a movie or TV show, so it got bumped down a bit, and then I also feel it focuses a bit more on Skyler’s story than I wish, especially when it comes to the whole Ted storyline.
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