Let’s talk ‘Breaking Bad’ at Verdicts
July 17, 2012, 10:45 am
Posted by Mollie Wilson O'Reilly
Hello all – I’ve proposed a kind of summer-book-group-for-television over at Verdicts, and I thought I should repeat the invitation here at dotCommonweal in case you haven’t visited our arts-and-culture blog lately.
Are you addicted to Breaking Bad? Wondering how you’ll make it to next Sunday night without another fix? Join us at Verdicts to discuss the important questions, like: What exactly was going on in that pre-credits scene of Sunday’s episode? How far into the future were we looking? Will we see a teaser like that every week, sort of like the stuffed-animal-in-the-pool of season 2? And how come nobody ever swims in that pool, anyway? It seems like a nice way to cool off after a long day of desert drug dealing.
Mollie,
Thanks for the tip. Looks worth checking out. But if verdicts is about culture, why no talk about one of the most stirring cultural events in the last twenty years in New York . The coming and now, sadly, going of Jeremy Lin. Lin made 600 million dollars for the Knicks and they are calling their destructive move about money. Just shows how inherited money oftentimes breeds imbeciles. http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/16/keeping-lin-should-make-financial-sense-for-the-knicks/?ref=sports
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/18/sports/basketball/knicks-lin-rockets-offer-sheet.html?_r=1&hp
My wife and daughter are huge fans of the show. I have seen some episodes and it has actually helped me to have some ethical conversations with my daughter around moral choices. She is firmly in the Walt camp and thinks he is just way cool!
The scene where Walt allowed Jesse’s heroin addicted girlfriend to choke on her vomit caused us to have some interesting conversations on the sin of omission and moral choices. She felt that it just happened too fast and Walt was thinking but by the time he could have acted it was too late. It was not deliberate in the full, conscious sense. Hmmmm….already learning to make excuses for her allies.
The acting in that scene and the look on his face is fantastic. It reveals layers and layers of conscience and twisted conscience.
In just the few episode that I watched the level of nuance and non-verbal communication is just pitch perfect. The characters are portrayed with such interesting levels of complexity.
Sheesh, i guess I am going to be spending overtime on Netflix now so I can be in the loop.
George: it’s time well spent! You won’t be sorry. Like your daughter, I find myself tempted to root for Walt, and make excuses for him, even as his behavior gets more and more inexcusable. I think it’s great that you’re discussing it with your daughter.
i love this show. i just watched all four seasons. the last couple weeks. its on netflix. very addictive. for me anyway. now i have to be patient and wait for season 5 to come out on netflix. i love this show. all the little twists and turns. like the brother in law, dea. cuts off the drug lords legs with an ax. and in return,, he gets shot and is paralized and cant walk. get it? and the first series was very exciting and even funny in some places. the beginning was like laural and hardy try to sell meth. only way more deadly.
Phyllis,
You sound like you love a guy getting his legs chopped off. Hmmm. Did you get to watch? (OK, jes kiddin’.)