“Breaking Bad” fanatics were expecting no less than a satisfying end to the hijinx of high school chemistry teacher and drug kingpin Walter White, and man, did they get it in Sunday’s series finale, and more! Here are the highlights: (Spoiler Alert!!)
1. Walter is dead.
2. Todd and Uncle Jack and the whole crew? Dead.
3. Madrigal executive and drug traffiker Lydia was on the receiving end of Walt’s vial of Ricin. (She’ll soon be dead).
4. Skylar, Marie, Walt, Jr. and Holly-all still alive.
5. Huell may possibly still be alive in the hotel room, waiting for Hank and Gomey.
What about the money?
Walt’s cash, a little more than $9 million, is set to end up in the hands of his family, but, since they didn’t want his ill-gotten gains, he couldn’t give it to them directly. The police would have confiscated it as crime money, anyway. So, Walt tracked down his Gray Matter partners Elliott and Gretchen, and unloaded the cash into their living room. He then made them promise they’d use their net worth and philanthropic reputation to get the money to Walt Jr. under the guise of a trust. And Walt’s final words? They were to former cohorts Elliott and Gretchen, who it had been hinted throughout the series had unclean dealings in the dissolution of their partnership with Walt: “Cheer up, beautiful people… this is where you get to make it right.”
However, he didn’t trust that they’d do it. So he hired two “hit men”, who were actually Skinny Pete and Badger in hoods, to make the Schwartzes think they’d be killed if they didn’t find a way to get Junior to take the money from them.
So, did Walt get his revenge?
Oh, yes he did. Walt, who was wisely counting on the meticulous habits of Lydia, staked her out at her Tuesday-morning-at-10AM spot, which was the café where she had met him so many times, to drink her tea with stevia. He surprised her, as well as Todd, when he pulled up a chair and sat at their table. He was there (presumably) to pitch them on his new idea of how to make high-quality meth without the methylamine.
At the end of the episode, when Walt answered a call Lydia was making to Todd, what Walt was really up to at the café was revealed. He had replaced the stevia in her packet with Ricin. She was having flu symptoms that were actually the effects of the Ricin, working its way through her system.
But, what about Todd?
That M60 was connected to an automatic door-opener system Walt had configured to oscillate, while the automatic weapon unloaded its ammo. After sneaking into Todd and Uncle Jack’s compound, as well as making them think he was there because he was angry they’d never killed Jesse, he gathered them all up, including Jesse, into one room. Then he used his car remote to launch the weapon, thereby taking Jack’s minions out while he dove on top of Jesse on the floor.
By the time the M60 was empty, Walt and Jesse were still alive, but Walt had been badly wounded by the gun. Uncle Jack was dying but Walt took care of business with a shot to the head. Todd was looking out the window, which provided an opportunity for a shackled Jesse to wrap his chains around Todd’s neck and strangle him. Jesse had finally gained retribution for the deaths of Drew Sharp and Andrea.
Then, Walt passed a gun to Jesse, giving his former student and partner the chance to kill him. Jesse refused and drove off, as fast as he could, out of the compound.
Walt even made things right with his family in the end.
He made his way back to Albuquerque from New Hampshire with a stolen car, got a new car, bought that M60 gun, and paid a visit to Skyler and gave her his lottery ticket, the one with the coordinates to his money hideaway in To’hajiilee. The ticket not only would allow her to lead the authorities to Hank and Gomey’s bodies, but provide her a tool to get the police off her back.
He said goodbye to Holly and watched Junior get home from school. And finally, he gave Skyler something she valued more than all his millions, because he admitted what had become clear to everyone throughout his years of mayhem. He wasn’t, in fact, doing it all for the family.
“I did it for me,” he told Skyler. “I liked it. I was good at it. And I was really… I was alive.”
Walt then made his way into his meth lab, and gazed at the lab supplies that got him through, as sirens blared and cops made their way towards the lab. Walt dropped to the ground, as police entered the lab and surrounded him, but he went out on his own terms. He was his lab, surrounded by his equipment, and by his own hand.
Perfect ending to a perfectly insane show.
Image via youtube