Breaking Bad - Tow Jockey Five Second Review Hot

We just started the 4th season on Netflix. So far so fucking good.

I will say though, by accident, we missed the first 10 minutes of the 1st episode. We were on extreme pins and needles throughout the whole episode. I said to my wife it's funny that there were no opening credits at all.

I decided to go back and then discovered my error. We watched the first 10 minutes and our minds were BLOWN. I rarely questions story choices and editing in shows of this calibre but it seemed that the episode would have had less impact had we watched it as originally intended.

Anyway, love love love this show.

Stealing someone else's comment: This show will turn you into an alcoholic because you'll need to drink a fifth of Jack Daniels during every episode, just to steady your nerves.
It is fucking amazing to me that they can keep the tension so consistently racheted up during almost every single episode. A simple dinner scene makes me want to pull my hair out. And this show is a master of foreshadowing, which only leaves you consistently wondering, "Ye gods, what on earth is in store for us now?"

Be careful with taking this advice, Repoman, you know how dodgy your tummy can get.......

I'm only on season #1 episode #7 but Breaking Bad is my show of choice right now. So far so good and from what I've heard it only gets better.

I keep hearing good things about this. This has finally persuaded me to try it.

The word that gets tossed around most with this show is "tension" and there's a good reason for that. It's like the entire run keeps on coiling up, only releasing enough to keep the plot advancing and grow the characters. More than any show I've seen, it feels like it's headed for a reckoning. And yes, it's very well-acted. Probably my favorite show on TV right now, with the possible exception of Parks and Recreation.

Between Breaking Bad and Mad Men we really are in a golden age. The second most recent episode of Breaking Bad (the one that aired a week ago last night) is one of the best episodes of any show I've ever seen.

Well done but I'll never watch more than the 10 or so episodes I made it through. Such a fucking bummer of a show. I'll stick to dumb sitcoms and positive escapism thank you very much.

Andy is quite right in this, of course.

All of you with this talk of a "Golden Age" can suck a nut. For every Mad Men and Breaking Bad there's ten 16 and Pregnant, Jersey Shore, Real World, and Charlie's Angels (2011).

Golden age my nut. The golden age is long gone.

Superfly is of course, wrong. His voice should not be heard. His words should not be heeded.

Pete, the dreck will always be with us, particularly given the amount of TV shows there are now. Breaking Bad is a pretty unique high point though, and the past 10-12 years have seen more advancement of TV as an art form than any previous decade. That's what you call a golden age. The presence of bad TV doesn't somehow cancel out the huge amount of amazing TV we have now.

So, let me get this straight...a couple of good shows in a 5-year period makes it a golden age?

No.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Age_of_Television

But someone agrees...

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/7722573/andy-greenwald-don-draper-mad-men- twilight-golden-age-television

Me, I look at BSG, Firefly, Sopranos, The Wire, Oz, and some really great shows that might have me in agreement, but honestly, there's always been some truly excellent shows surrounded by mediocrity. This is no different a time.

First of all, I think there are more than "a couple of good shows." Secondly, five years is a pretty narrow window, which is why I said 10-12 years. But neither of those are my points. My point is that a great time for TV is not an absence of bad shows. It's the presence of amazing ones. The difference is that the great shows aren't the ones topping the ratings anymore, unlike classics like All In The Family and Cheers.

Can someone tell me what else I am missing, as I've not really watched a lot of TV over the past decade or so, but tend to grab TV series in chunks on bittorrent and avoid the cheezy weekly dripfeed (especially annoying when they turn it to shit, like Lost).

Have been enthralled with:

The Wire
The Bridge (original swedish version)
Spiral/Engrenages (original french version)
currently watching Dexter and enjoying it

It's so hard to know which of the hyped series are good, and which are just, well, hyped, so heres a quickfire test for y'all whove logged the tv hours

The Shield
Sopranos
Breaking Bad (I'll take the above article as its good)
Weeds
the one with Broadway in the name
Mad Men

anything else? (I just downloaded Grimm but it looked a bit too cheezy hollywoody for my tastes, but got Spartacus as well, that seemed more gritty)

Battlestar Gallactica (1st 2.5 seasons only!)

Rome (completely awesome)

Mad Men (great)

Sopranos (varies from merely good to awesome)

Weeds (wasn't for me)

Entourage (drama and hilarity mixed)

Arrested Development (omg so funny)

Grimm is great, Lee. Also...

Spartacus Blood And Sand was pretty good and will provide you with hours of masturbational fantasies.

Oz was great if you are into prison shows.

CLASSIC.

Big Bang Theory if you like "smart" comedy. Not quite John Cleese "Fawlty Towers" level of clever, but quite good.

That's it for me. I don't watch TV hardly at all.

Exactly how I felt. I made it almost to the end of the second season, but then I just had to stop.

Sopranos is still the best HBO drama, for me, better than the Wire easily. And actually, I'd put DEADWOOD as second place. Incredible show, I don't even know how this became a "hidden gem" instead of the obvious third in the triumvirate of Sopranos & Wire.

I actually prefer Breaking Bad to The Wire. It's a more watchable show for me, if that makes sense. It's almost just as lean, almost totally void of wasted moments (though the scale is less impressive than that of The Wire). Still need to watch The Sopranos and Deadwood.

Breaking Bad is a bummer of a show though. It goes to some very dark places, and keeps on digging. I can very much see how someone would not like that aspect. And the tension of the show makes it a little exhausting to dig into. But I think that slow pacing is what makes it so special. It would feel cheap to be nothing but shootouts and violence. But it's really a show of quiet moments and sparse dialog. It doesn't waste words, something it shares with Mad Men. And the quietness makes for a show that is much more unsettling. It'll go for the violent outburst when it needs to, but it earns those moments.

I really like Breaking Bad, but I like it less than when it started. My main issue is that Hank is the only likable character on the show, with the possible exception of Mike. I'm okay with characters doing bad things... but when the main character's attitude changes so radically, it's a bit hard to deal with.

I don't think it's been a sudden shift. Vince Gilligan has gone on record saying that part of his goal for the show was to create something where the protagonist becomes the antagonist. I think the transition is basically complete now, and I love how it got there, gradually and as a series of little compromises.

Oh yeah, and Arrested Development is neck-and-neck with the Simpsons, and I never would have imagined I could say those words.

How can none of you mention Community?

Mild spoilers follow:
Personally, I think that one of the show's biggest strengths is that every single character, including Hank, is morally ambiguous. I agree that Hank is portrayed more heroic in Breaking Bad's current run, but he was quite the typical douchebag cop in the early part of the show. Examples: The way he interrupted Walt's 50th birthday party to make everyone watch his drug bust that was being shown on the news. The way he demeaned that poor meth whore, Wendy, forcing her to show her teeth to Walt Jr, and then how he talked to her later, when she was pulled in for questioning. And just the overly macho attitude he has in general, regarding his outlook on the world - Walt Jr isn't handicapped - he broke his leg playing football. In fact, I fervently believe that it's Hank's view of masculinity, which is reflected from society in general, that has compelled Walter to transform himself into a criminal mastermind. Walter White has felt inadequate in the shadow of his brother-in-law and others for so long, that he has determined to make himself into a bad-ass, as he thinks he should be. Hence his self-absorbed proclamations like, "I am the one who knocks!"
It's a tribute to Dean Norris as an actor that he has made Hank so loveable, despite all this.

I would add Justified and Sons of Anarchy to the list of simply amazing television. I am loving Breaking Bad right now, but cannot wait for those two to return.

I quite enjoy Breaking Bad too. My favourite character at the moment is probably Saul the lawyer. I love how they put some hints of a caring, good nature under the sleazy self-interested exterior. I also like how he's written in as both comic relief and shrewd problem solver.

I think the core idea of the show is about a crisis of masculinity. Breaking 'bad' is manning up in the face of threats and insecurities. That's cool and very well done, but it leads to the biggest weakness of the show: that the only decent female character is Hank's wife Marie (and Saul's secretary, but her role is too minor). The other three up to the end of season 4 (Jesse's two girlfriends and Skyler) suck. I especially dislike Skyler. It seems she has no real crucial role in the story, but exists only as an annoying foil to Walt, like they had to keep a wife around to justify the conflict that Walt is going through between civilian family life and breaking bad. She just ends up being annoying with her random emotional outbursts and inability to maintain a realistic perspective on what is happening. Sure, they try to balance the character's naive and dumb emotionalism by getting her to be an advocate of caution, but those two sides of the character don't gel. The problem is that the female characters except Marie are just dumb foils to assist the character development of the men, and are not well developed on their own.

To imagine what's possible, think about how Skyler's character compares to the pinnacle of the crime wife character: Carmela played by the amazing Edie Falco in the Sopranos. Now THERE is a kick-ass, complex and interesting character.

edit: and there's absolutely no chemistry between Skyler and Walt.

Some spoilers below. Read with caution.

I don't think there was ever supposed to be chemistry between Skyler and Walt.

She was one of the chief emasculaters of Walt when the series begins. Hey honey, it's your birthday! Let me give you your cold, passionless hand job as your once a year gift. Reason number one why he takes the path he does.

She was never Walt's first choice. The wife of his ex-partner was his first choice until he was cheated out of her. Or at least from his point of view he was cheated. Another reason he chooses to go down the dark path. To get back the money and respect that was stolen from him.

AND we see that the only reason they got married was that Skyler was pregnant with Walt Jr. (the flashbacks when they are house hunting).

Skyler has always been another compromise in Walt's life.

She acts as an obstacle to the one thing Walt really loves, his son. The one person who has never looked down on him, always loved him, and has always been on his side. Thus he has to deal with and placate her.

Good comment Repoman.

Love love love this show. Probably the best dramatic TV show ever. Just so much tension.