Breaking Bad Season 4

Year: 2011

Grade: A

Country: USA

Director: Gilligan

Review

this season gets a little outlandish with some of the plot. things are almost ridiculously tense. it’s contrived hysteria at times, but i mean that in a good way. the writers do a good job of ratcheting up the drama without straying too far into absurdity.

in gus, walt finally has an adversary worthy of his intelligence. much of the series walt is obsessed with the fact that he’s underutilized in this regard so it’s nice, in a way, to see him finally challenged to the fullest. his potential is being realized and i guess that’s all any of us can hope for, but it so completely destroys everything around him – his family, jesse, the community, order – that it’s also depressing. hank’s idleness is similar – he’s bed-ridden and unable to fulfill his potential until he goes out with walt looking for heisenberg and breaks the law in his pursuit of his white whale.

i’d like to think that walt and jesse can return to some normalcy in the final season, but they’ve passed the point of no return. walt is far too tenacious to give up and there are loose ends that will surely bite them next season. ted’s death may haunt skyler, the cartel wanting a piece of jesse (who helped gus in his overthrow), etc. at the end of the season it looked like maybe they were done with the business, but the business may not be done with them.

Watched on TV