So, what does that title mean? Whatever it means, it captures the curve of Walter White from good to bad, from teacher to killer in some elusive way. I’m in the middle of a marathon catch up, starting season 4 and watching Walter and Hank swap positions as tough guy, Walter and Jesse become “family” more than he is with Walt Jr., watching Skyler drift further into this dark underworld, for, like Walk, very good but perhaps ultimately poisonous reasons. It all has feel of an epic Russian novel, with a denser, tighter trajectory than The Wire or Mad Men as characters actually evolve and chanage in significant ways. To see Walter get a handgun, conceal it, drive to Gus’s house, and, before leaving his car for what he imagines will be a fatal confrontation, put on his black hat and run his fingers along the rim captures perfectly the Jekyll/Hyde transformation that he knowingly enacts, with greater and greater ease. Are we all Walter Whites? Is that part of the appeal?
More later, when I’ve caught up to the finale.