Breaking Bad

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Some straight like you, giant stick up his ass, age what - 60? He's just gonna break bad?


Breaking Bad is a show on AMC, which debuted in 2008. There were only 7 episodes made for the first season due to the writer's strike, but it was renewed for a second, full season. The third season premiered on March 21, 2010, and season four premiered on July 17, 2011.

Kindly high-school chemistry teacher Walter White has just found out he has lung cancer after a meager lifetime of playing it safe. His wife is expecting a baby girl and his son has Cerebral Palsy. After going on a ride along with his lovable Jerkass DEA agent brother-in-law, he decides to cook methamphetamine in order to provide for his family. Bodies pile up and dark, violent hilarity ensues.

How awesome is this series? It transformed a man who was best known as a Bumbling Dad into someone considered to have a lock on the Emmy for best actor for as long as the show lasts. Currently at 3 in a row, tying for the record with Bill Cosby.

Should not be confused with Weeds, which started out as a comedy before becoming a bloody drama. Breaking Bad starts out extremely dark, and gets much, much darker as the series continues.

Check out the Character page.


  • Aborted Arc: It seemed that Skyler finding Jesse's website about MILFs would be a plot point out of which Walter would have to weasel out, but in the next episodes, shit grew exponentially and this was forgotten by Skyler.
    • Walter's leg wound from killing Krazy 8 looked like something that would also need explaining, but Skyler never found out about it.
  • Absurdly Sharp Blade: The Cousin's axe falls out of his hands and cuts into the concrete far enough to stay upright. Keep in mind that it wasn't even swung downwards—it just fell about seven feet and landed on the blade.
    • It doesn't land on concrete, it lands on asphalt, which is much softer. Still, not very plausible that it would chunk into the asphalt and remain upright.
  • Abusive Parents: In season 2 Jesse encounters a couple of meth addicts who do nothing but rob people and get high living together in a filthy, dilapidated house - along with their horribly neglected young son. He is suitably disgusted.
  • Affably Evil: Gus is a ruthless drug lord, but most of the time he comes off a polite, soft-spoken, genteel businessman (until you piss him off...). Also, Mike, a personable, world-weary grandfather who'll still straight-up murder you if Gus wants it done.
  • The Aggressive Drug Dealer: Jesse, briefly.
  • Ain't Too Proud To Beg: Both Walt and Gale plead for their lives.
    • While Jesse gets nervous when Mike leaves him with the car after driving him in the desert, he's more interested in defending himself than begging.
  • Alliterative Name: Both father and son are named Walter White. The name was deliberately chosen for its blandness.
    • The writers have confirmed that White was, in part, selected as a reference to Reservoir Dogs as was Pink(man).
  • Analogy Backfire: Hank talks about how he wanted to bring Heisenberg in himself, like Popeye Doyle. Walt points out that in The French Connection, Doyle never successfully arrested anyone.
    • Hank also makes references to Rocky that seem to ignore the fact that Rocky actually loses.
    • Mike telling that five minute story about doing things half-way. Then he's in a position where he has to do the same without realising it, and a kid gets killed because of the decision. Then It Gets Worse.
      • Though it was implied towards Jesse, which the incidents following almost have him in such troubles.
  • And Some Other Stuff: Mostly done quite subtly, we're never shown entire recipes for anything particularly dangerous.
  • Anti Hero, Anti Villain or Villain Protagonist? Where Walt falls is unclear, and he keeps seeming to slip further down the Sliding Scale Of Anti Heroes. Jesse envisions himself as a kind of Anti Villain, but it's probably a pose.
  • Ax Crazy: Tuco. He will take every excuse he can get to beat someone up.
    • The twin Cousins, quite literally. One of them carries around a chromed fire-axe with which they kill several people. And a truckload of people... for one Motormouth seeing their shoes.
  • An Axe To Grind: The Cousins.
  • Apathetic Citizens: Except the criminals, police and young mothers whose children are poisoned.
  • Badass Boast: Walt-"I am the one who knocks!"
  • Badass Bookworm: Walter. Walter, Walter, Walter.
  • Badass Family: The Salamanca family.
    • ... and then there was one.
  • Badass Grandpa: Mike, literally.
  • Bad Boss: Tuco. Shortly after we're introduced to him, we get to see him beat one of his henchmen to death.
    • Gus is a much less psychotic, much more cold-blooded Bad Boss.
  • Bald Of Awesome: Hank was bald from the first episode. Walt shaved his head after his first course of chemotherapy.
    • Mike and Gus.
    • The Cousins combine the Bald look with Goatees and badass suits. Who says evil can't be stylish?
  • Beard Of Evil: Or at least 'Beard of Anti-Hero', which Walt grows once his actions become less and less excusable.
  • Because I'm Good At It. One of the major (if unspoken) reasons Walt continues to cook. When Jesse cooks his own batch of meth crystals, Walter takes offense and examines the crystals, pointing out every flaw in them.
    • He also acts very smug in the Season 4 premiere, when Victor, one of Gus' henchmen tries to cook his own batch of meth.
    • Sky is taking that path too with money laundering and managing firms which would provide this... service.
  • Becoming The Mask: Toyed with throughout the series with Walter.
    • Jesse has his two drug dealing cronies join a 12 step program to sell meth to the addicts. They can't bring themselves to do it, and end up going sober instead.
  • Berserk Button: Walt is incredibly defensive of his son in the first season. Jesse, on the other hand, gets protective of anyone's kids.
  • Big Bad: Surprisingly averted thus far. Flirted with with Tuco and it appears they may be deciding to go this direction with Gus but it hasn't quite jumped to this yet.
  • Big Lipped Alligator Moment: The opening for "Negro y Azul" (a Villain Song for Walt/Heisenberg as his trade is booming, in the style of a mariachi music video). And there are few BLAMs in any medium better than this.
    • "Negro y Azul" is not actually a BLAM. It is a music video for a narcocorrido, a Mexican drug ballads. Though it might seem strange at first, music glorifying and talking about dealers or the Cartel is part of Mexican culture, and makes perfect sense in-story.
  • Big Screwed Up Family: Where to begin? The drug-cooking school teacher, his attempted Stepford Smiler wife, the Gung-ho DEA agent brother-in-law, the kooky kleptomaniac sister... No wonder "Flynn" wants to change his name.
  • Black And Grey Morality: "Heisenberg" vs. the Cartel. And Gus.
  • Black Comedy: Comedy so black, no light can escape it.
  • Blatant Lies: The police are masters of it. Walter and Skyler start going down that road.
  • Bloody Hilarious: In the first season, Jesse tries to dispose of a body using hydrofluoric acid. In a bathtub. It doesn't work out well for the body, the bathtub or the floor underneath. By the time the floor's weakened enough for the remains of the body to fall through, it's no longer recognizable as human. As long as you don't vomit, you'll bust a gut laughing. Also, the head getting crushed by the ATM.
  • Boredom Montage: Used in the episode "Shotgun" when Jesse begins working for Mike.
  • Bottle Episode: "And the Bag's in the River", "Four Days Out" and especially "Fly"
  • Bowties Are Cool: Walter and his "Heisenberg" disguise.
  • Break The Cutie: Poor Jesse.
    • Skyler in the 3rd season.
    • Given how a Season 4 flashback reveals his transformation from a clean-cut Wide Eyed Idealist (by drug dealer standards) to his modern day character, Gus of all people may very well fall under the Blood-Splattered Innocent category.
      • Except while he cared about his partner, we don't know who he was before that.
  • Break The Haughty: Hank, Jesse, Gus and Tio.
  • Bribe Backfire: Walt and Jesse's first meeting with Saul.
  • British Brevity.
  • Broken Base: Over "Fly". Much of the fandom seems to think that it's either the best or the worst episode of the show. It's either a brilliant character study, or a pointless Filler episode.
  • Buffy Speak: Jesse, surprisingly. Despite having been a high school washout, much of what he says would sound fairly intelligent if it weren't for his particular style of vernacular, yo.
  • Bunny Ears Lawyer: "Better call Saul!"
  • Butt Monkey: Jesse's first scene is him falling out a window with no pants on. His humiliation grows with his success. Walt has been the Butt Monkey his whole life, but the events of the show make him more assertive and aggressive. Which is not really a good thing, it turns out.
  • Call Back: In episode 2, Jesse fails to appreciate how important a plastic bin is when dissolving a body in hydrofluoric acid. Three years later, he finally gets to do it properly, saying "Trust us" when Mike questions if it'll work.
    • When Walt serves Krazy 8 a sandwich, Krazy 8 plucks off the crust, which Walter makes a point to cut off when he gives him another sandwich. Ever since killing Krazy 8, when Walt makes a sandwich, he cuts off the crust.
    • A season after they needed it, Jesse tells Badger that the RV should have "one of those buzzers that tells you when you leave the key in the ignition".
  • Call Forward: Jane in "Abiquiú". "I think I just threw up in my mouth a little"
  • Car Fu: Delivered by Walt to two child-murdering dealers.
    • Hank cripples one of the Cousins with it, with just one minute's warning.
  • The Cartel
  • Cerebus Syndrome: A rare case of the show starting out as a black comedy and the comedy getting blacker and blacker and slightly more sparse in favor of the drama to the point where a small group of fans complain that the show has lost its humor.
    • Though it gets funnier (in the Black Comedy part at least) in season 4.
  • Chekhov's Bullet
    • Also see the season 4 premiere we get Chekhov's Box Cutter and the final shot quit possibly gives us Chekhov's Folder.
    • Walter's gun, literally, throughout all of Season 4. It is however used as a prominent prop in various scenes where its presence alone has either thematic or plot-relevant resonance. However, he doesn't actually use it until the end of the final episode.
  • Chekhov's Gunman: Seemingly one-shot characters would routinely come back with more importance to the story, such as Skinny Pete and Badger.
  • Chekhov's Lecture: Walter's boring lecture on mercury (II) fulminate, see below.
  • Children Are Innocent: Played with. Tomas is an 11-year old murderer, but he was coerced into it.
    • However, that child of the two meth-addicts may be playing it straight.
  • Clark Kenting: Walter becomes Heisenberg by putting on just his hat, and sometimes black sunglasses. Doesn't fool anyone that knows him.
  • Cleanup Crew: Mike for both Saul and Gus.
  • Cliff Hanger: The end of season 3, famously, but no episode of Breaking Bad ends with a nice, pat ending.
  • Color Wash: Mexico is (almost) always orange-coded for your convenience.
  • Completely Different Title: In Russian, it became "In all hardships".
  • Completely Missing The Point: Walter, either intentional to save face or comically.
  • Confess To A Lesser Crime: In the first season, Skyler confronts Walt about his odd behavior and consorting with Jesse Pinkman. He tells her he's been buying pot from Pinkman. She immediately confronts Pinkman at his house.
    Jesse: "And why'd you go and tell her I was selling you weed?"
    Walt: "Because somehow it seemed preferable to admitting that I cook crystal meth and killed a man."
    • Skyler explains away all of Walt's bizarre behavior and sudden, inexplicable funds with an elaborate lie about a card counting spree in underground casinos.
  • Consummate Liar: Walt.
    • As of late, Skyler has become one. Perhaps even better than Walt.
    • So's Skyler's sister.
  • Continuity Nod: The teddy bear eye in season 2, and Walt's method for [[disposing of a Body[[ with acid in the season 4 premiere.
  • Contrived Coincidence: Everything involving the midair collision in the season 2 finale.
    • The girl Jesse met at AA knowing about one of his friends' murder.
  • Crime Time TV
  • Cross Referenced Titles: "The Cat's in the Bag..."/"...And the Bag's in the River", "No Mas"/"Mas", "Half-Measures"/"Full Measure".
    • Not to mention the "737"/"Down"/"Over"/"ABQ" foreshadowing.
  • Cycle of Revenge: Between Gus, the cartel and Walt & Jesse. The cartel holds the biggest hand on starting, finishing and generally keeping these alive, though.
  • Damn It Feels Good To Be A Gangster: For Walt, it really does.
  • A Day In The Limelight: "Hermanos" in season 4 for Gus. The episode focuses more on him than any other character and gives a look into his Mysterious Past and provides a lot of subtext for his relationship with the Cartel, Tio in particular.
  • Description Cut: Done several times; one particularly notable one involves a couple of addicts who have stolen an ATM machine saying that they've committed a "victimless crime", followed by a cut to a shot of the clerk at the store from which they stole the ATM lying shot to death in a pool of blood.
  • Despair Event Horizon: Walt seems to have reached one in the beginning of the episode "Salud", after getting the shit beaten out of him by his surrogate son Jesse. However, his real son helps him through it.
  • Determinator: The cousins. One of them unhooks himself from his IVs and crawls out of a hospital bed trying to get at Walt.
  • Diabolus Ex Machina: Not related to the main plot, but honestly, can you say anything else about the end of "ABQ"?
  • Directed By Cast Member: Bryan Cranston directed the Season 2 and 3 premieres.
  • Disabled Snarker: Walt Jr.
    • Tito has his moments, even if he can't talk.
  • Disposing Of A Body: See 'Bloody Hilarious'.
  • Distaff Counterpart: Skyler's lawyer to Saul.
  • Divorce Assets Conflict: Skyler wants to take the house and the kids, threatening Walter to give him to the police if he doesn't leave it like that. Walt almost buys it, but Saul convinces him she's bluffing, so he takes her bluff, which ends with a distraught Skyler threatening with her eyes that she'll do it, trying to explain to a cop why she wants her non-abusive husband out of her house, while he gently takes care of his little girl. After that, he gets to stay in his house, with his kids they start getting close again.
  • Don't You Dare Pity Me: Walt's got Pride. A lot of it. So when a former friend (who made a lot of money off of his accomplishments) offers to pay for some of the essentials he's already claimed she's been paying for he takes umbrage. She reacts in utter shock that he's become such a stranger, and the only thing she can think of is how sorry she feels for him. This makes him more mad and he delivers a devastating Precision F Strike.
  • Do Not Call Me Paul: Walt Jr. prefers to go by 'Flynn', for some reason.
    • Until his parents' separation, at which point he sides with his dad and demands to be called Walt Jr.
  • Don't Come A-Knockin': The innocent kind. Jesse has a car that "bounces", lampshaded some episodes after it's initially appearance in the series. In a How We Got Here preview, the car is seen bouncing in the desert. Being Breaking Bad, we're pretty certain it's not sex since then.
  • Dramatic Irony: Is Hank talking about "Heisenberg"? If so, this trope is in action. Double points if Walt is in the room.
  • Dropped A Bridge On Him: Combo, seemingly, but the circumstances behind his death come back in a huge way in Season 3.
    • Gus does this to pretty much the entire governing body of the Mexican cartel in the Season 4 episode "Salud".
    • Hank's pre-wedding jitter Hank still doesn't seem to understand...
  • Drowning My Sorrows: Walt dealing with the awful news that his cancer is in remission. Dragging his underage son into his tequila-slugging match is something of a Kick The Dog moment.
    • Then later he does it with Jane's father.
  • Drugs Are Bad: Jesse is demonstrative of how drugs make you dependent on them. Throughout the series, he has lost his family, his girlfriend, his home, his dignity, killed Gale, and almost died several times. All due directly to drug use and drug trade/production. He uses the drug to cope with the problems (which stem from the drugs in the first place) which locks him into a downward spiral.
    • Then again, if you ask him, it's Walter's fault. And he technically did much of those things for money, not drugs.
    • Additionally, there's a scale of drugs. Up to meth, they're portrayed as doable, from cocaine and heroine up, are portrayed as life endangering.
    • Then again, let's not forget the numbers of lives literally lost because of the trade.
  • Dumbass Has A Point: Jesse personifies this trope with his genius moments but otherwise really dumbass behavior. Walter has his moments too.
    • Marie about Walter having a say about his own goddamn disease.
  • DVD Commentary: Jumps back and forth between being incredibly amusing and informative as all the cast and crew riff on each other giving anecdotes, and awkward congrats sessions. In particular the creator, Vince Gilligan, is such a nice man that he pretty much makes sure to congratulate everyone for everything.
  • Dyeing for Your Art: Bryan Cranston shaved his own head on camera for Breaking Bad, though the scene was cut out.
  • Early Installment Weirdness: Bryan Cranston's Bald Of Awesome and Beard Of Evil are now iconic for the show, so people might be a little startled to see him with a full head of hair and a particularly bad mustache in the first few episodes.
    • Since scenes from then are still used for flashbacks, the surprise that you got used to the two is also quite big.
  • Enemy Mine: Walter and Tio at the end of season 4.
  • Enforced Method Acting: The scene where Walt comes into the kitchen after shaving his head was actually the first time Anna Gunn and RJ Mitte had seen Bryan Cranston with his shaved head; Gunn had specifically avoided meeting with him until then to help her reaction.
  • Epic Fail: Walt's hilarious attempt to shatter a glass office door with a potted palm tree; the only thing that broke was the tree. Well, and Walt's composure. Oh, and then he got dragged outside by security guards
    • Walt discovers a housefly in the meth lab. He begins trying to swat the fly, but it's just too fast for him. Growing increasingly frustrated, he spots the fly on the ceiling and throws his shoe at it--and ends up breaking an overhead light, raining glass down on himself. His shoe gets stuck in the light fixture. THEN, he goes up on the catwalk to dislodge his stuck shoe... and falls off the catwalk, landing painfully on the floor. Just to make things worse, the fly then lands on his glasses.
    • Saul actually uses the expression when Walt suggests a hitman for Gus. The reason however is beyond Walt's grasp, so he has an excuse: all the hitmen Saul knows are in Gus' "circles" and probably all under his pay. And then there's Mike...
  • Empathy Doll Shot: The teddy bear in the pool, as well as a doll in the background of a derelict junkie house.
  • Even Bad Men Love Their Tio: Tuco.
    • Tio reciprocates those feelings and sends home for Tuco's cousins...
  • Face Framed In Shadow: Very often; numerous important conversations have the lighting do this for both characters, switching back and forth between shots of their faces.
  • Face Heel Turn: The whole series is one big one for Walt.
  • Facepalm: Everyone in the room with Tio.
  • Fake American: Walt's former friend Elliot is played by Brit Adam Godley with a flawless accent.
  • Family Unfriendly Aesop: In-universe examples:
    • Walter making Walter Jr. drink.
    • (Possibly) Tio teaching the cousins about blood ties the hard way: by answering one's request to kill another (request out of anger, but he knew they'd get in a point of power where this could become too real later on) and keeping him under the water for over a minute, until his brother reacted decisively. The old fart was pleased.
  • Fanservice: Jane does quite a bit of it in the second season.
  • Fan Disservice: The wives giving hand-jobs to their over-40ish husbands, which is frankly a little gratuitous and done for a few cheap jokes. A more tragic example was Hank's bed-stricken toilet duties.
  • Filler: Walt and Jesse spend an entire episode trying to kill a fly. There's a lot of characterization going on, but this is probably the closest this series is ever going to get to a pure filler episode (and textbook Bottle Episode).
  • Fire Forged Friends: Walt and Jesse.
  • First Episode Spoiler. Walt's condition and his Heel Face Turn.
  • Flat What: Mostly Subverted or even Double Subverted: When the characters are caught red handed, they usually go "What?", although it's the truth. But they are actually surprised that they've been found out.
  • For Want Of A Nail / Shaggy Dog Story: Poor Walt.
  • Foreshadowing: Several Cold Opens in season 2 reveal progressively more of a mysterious crime scene, the circumstances of which are not revealed until the finale.
    • A lot of the chemistry classes in the first season (like the one about explosions).
    • "Lie on your side, or you might choke."
    • The water heater. Walt Jr. mentions it in the first episode of the first season, and its breakdown in Season 2 starts Walt Sr. on a home repair spree.
  • Fridge Brilliance: A detail that bothered me in the otherwise perfect second season finale is the strange overreaction Walt has to the cash register sound his son's computer is giving off. Upon later viewings I realized that it is not only a matter of his pride being hurt, but the fact that it is the exact same sound of Tuco's uncle ringing his bell.
    • After watching the dramatic death of Gus in the fourth season finale, I thought that Gus walking out of Hector's room with half of his face missing was unusually out-of-place for an other-wise realistic show. However, as others have mentioned, it is a very symbolic shot. Gus presented himself to society as an honest, upstanding man. However, he was in reality a morally bankrupt, evil drug lord. The grotesque mangling of his face reveals what lies beneath his facade of kindness and generosity: a monster. Yet, at the same time, the part that remains undamaged still serves to show that facade he had put up for society to see. Moreover, we see workers in the retirement home look in horror at him, realizing what he truly is. Brilliant!
      • Further brilliance- Gus having half his face blown off also calls back to the half-burned teddy from the air crash.
    • Walter wanted to die at a certain time. If he would have shat up about that Blood from the Mouth, he may have actually gotten his way pretty soon.
  • Functional Addict: Jesse. Complete with a downward spiral into heroin addiction, rehab, and then later getting back on the meth.
  • Genius Bonus: Heisenberg. If you paid attention in chemistry, this would bring to mind the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle.
  • Genre Savvy: Sleazy criminal lawyer Saul Goodman. When Walt and Jesse kidnap him, he initially begs for his life. But once he realizes that they're not the drug dealers he thinks they are he starts calmly talking shop. He even asks them why they don't just kill the dealer they want him to defend.
  • Gilligan Cut: After Marie's bet with Hank over whether he can still get erect after being hospitalized. Also a Crowning Moment Of Funny.
  • Gorn: Not every episode, but at least once or twice a season something mind-blowingly gruesome happens. Usually this trope is used in conjunction with Crowning Moment Of Funny (see the entry for Bloody Hilarious).
  • Growing The Beard: Many people agree that while it was tightly plotted, compelling and contained an incendiary performance from Bryan Cranston, Season 1 suffered from having its run truncated by the Writers' Strike. Season 2 picked up at exactly the point Season 1 left off and went on to exceed all viewer expectations, not only developing Walt and Jesse as characters, but giving ostensibly ancillary characters (from Hank, Skyler and even Tuco) an unexpected depth. Add to this the addition of Bob Odenkirk as Saul Goodman, and Breaking Bad became must-see television.
    • The pace of the show markedly picks up from the beginning of season 2, with every episode feeling like an 'end of season cliffhanger'. While season 1 was great, season 2 onwards is as addictive as, well...crystal meth.
    • Also a literal example, as Walt grows himself a suitably villainous goatee towards the end of the season.
  • Happy Marriage Charade: Walt and Skyler show signs of this even before Walt "breaks bad"; Hank and Marie soon have this.
  • Heel Realization: Jesse in the third season premiere. "I'm the bad guy". Then he realizes too late that he might not be.
  • Hell Is That Noise: I'd like to thank Breaking Bad for ruining the simple call bell. Now I can't play Pit anymore!
  • Hello Attorney: Skyler's lawyer.
  • Heroic Blue Screen Of Death: Jesse in the Season 4 premiere, too shaken up to even flee the crime scene.
  • Hidden Depths: Hank in Season 3. Jesse's soft-heartedness is also unexpected for Walt as well as the audience.
  • Hidden In Plain Sight:Walt, Gus and Jesse supposedly. Deconstructed as this makes them very vulnerable and very open when faced with close scrutiny.
  • High Concept.
  • High Octane Nightmare Fuel (and possibly Truth In Television): The Cartel. "What's the matter Schrader? You act like you never saw a severed human head on a tortoise before! Then KABOOOOOOOM.
    • Walt strangling Krazy-8 with a bike lock.
    • Tuco punching his henchman to death for talking out of turn.
    • us in Box Cutter, climaxing with him slitting Victor's throat with the titular instrument. "Get back to work."
    • The last five minutes of Crawl Space. Oh, God, that laughter...
    • Gus calmly adjusting his tie with half his freaking face blown off.
  • Holy Shit Quotient: All the freaking time.
  • Hollywood Acid: Hydrofluoric acid, used more than twice in the series to dispose of bodies by Walt and Jessie. Hydroflouric acid is highly corrosive and will dissolve a human body completely. Its effects are portrayed more or less realistically, though the handling of it is not (see below).
  • Hollywood Science: Hydrofluoric acid will kill you dead if you breathe the gas it produces or get any on you. Fuck aprons, this chemist wouldn't touch it without a full body suit. Or at all. Sodium hydroxide would work much better.
    • Mercury-(II) Fulminate is normally a powder. Bearing in mind that Walt is meant to be a badass crystallographer, so maybe he knows something I don't, but even assuming he could make it into crystals and somehow not accidentally cause a reaction AND somehow make it potent enough to wreak that much havoc, he'd still be dealing with lungfuls of poisonous gas.
      • Walt suggesting he's gonna make phenylacetone in a tube furnace like it's the most natural thing in the world. Golly. Not how I'd do it if I was short on pseudoephedrine.
  • Hollywood Hacking: Skyler tracks Jesse's number through a website and somehow ends up on his homepage.
  • Hollywood Silencer: Averted.
  • Hope Spot: Anytime it looks like something good is about to happen to the main characters... it isn't.
  • How We Got Here: The episodes "Pilot", "Crazy Handful of Nothin'", "Grilled", "Breakage", "ABQ", and "Bug".
  • Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: Several season 2 episodes basically clue the viewer in on the initially out-of-the-blue disaster which closes the season.
    • "I.F.T", "I fucked Ted."
  • Idiot Ball: Walt and Jesse trade the ball back and forth, but the crowning moment comes when Walt confronts the police officer during a routine traffic stop.
  • The Igor: Jesse; Gale.
  • Important Haircut: "Badass, dad!"
  • Incurable Cough Of Death: Subverted; in the episode where he starts coughing up blood, it turns out that his cancer is going into remission and that was just a relatively minor secondary condition.
  • Indy Ploy: Walt's "thinking on his feet" attempts to obscure the truth about his second life, mostly to his wife. She's too smart to fall for that after a while though.
    • He does it to Hank too, in the second season when he ruins their sting operation by driving in front of Hank and asking him mundane questions. In season three, where he pulls some SPECTACULAR shit out of his ass to get Hank away from the RV in the salvage yard.
    • Walt in just about any situation he's put. It mostly works, except slipping poison to Tuco.
  • Insistent Terminology: Hank's collection of minerals, not rocks.
  • In Vino Veritas: Walt lets it slip that he has a second cell phone whilst under the influence of anesthetics prior to his cancer surgery, thus beginning the unraveling of his web of lies.
    • And again inadvertently tips Hank off (out of Pride, what else?) that Gale is not Heisenberg while drunk. He has to spend a good part of the season cleaning up after (or before) Hank so he won't catch on.
  • It Got Worse: This is pretty much the show's M.O.
  • It Will Never Catch On: When Gus and his brotherly friend pitch the idea of mass producing meth to a mafia don in Mexico in a flashback to the 1980s, the don and his associates laugh it off.
  • Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Walter's brother-in-law, Hank, is a loud and lewd DEA agent. Obnoxious and self-absorbed, he overshadows and emasculates Walt in the early episodes. He turns out to be a good guy (and a good cop) at heart though.
    • Jesse is an abrasive, thickheaded junkie, but underneath it all he's far gentler than Walt.
  • Jitter Cam: Practically any tense but otherwise motionless dialogue scene in Season 3 at the time of this writing. Seriously, two characters start talking and the frame reacts as if a small earthquake just started.
    • This is due to the fact that 'Breaking Bad' is shot mostly on handhold cameras, with the camera operators told to be as still as possible when filming.
  • Justified Criminal: The main crux of the series, though Pride is a big factor too, showing Justification really only exists in Walter's mind. The show is arguably a Deconstruction of this concept.
  • Kick The Son Of A Bitch: Normally the Big Bad poisoning about a dozen unarmed people in one sitting would be harrowing but when it's the governing body of the Mexican cartel its hard not to give him a pass.
  • The Last Of These Is Not Like The Others: In Fly Walt tellingly adds the birth of his daughter as an after-thought, seeming to place more importance on the first million he made as a reason to have not dropped dead.
  • Leaning On The Fourth Wall: "High school teacher turned meth dealer, brother-in-law's in the DEA? That'd make one hell of a story..."
  • Living MacGuffin: The Twins. The first half of the Season 3 frames their revenge quest as a major plotline, but it turns out to be a red herring from what the season is really about.
  • Locked In A Freezer: "4 Days Out", where Walt and Jesse are lost in the desert with no water and a flat battery.
  • Lonely Together: Tragic example between Walter and Jane's father. They meet at a bar after both losing their "children" to each other (unbeknown to either of them). They console each other without ever finding out that they know each other, only for a tragedy to open Walter's eyes to the enormity of the coincidence.
  • Lovable Coward: It was good to see Saul stand up to Mike. For about three seconds.
  • Love Makes You Evil: The central premise of the show, with a side order of crazy.
  • MacGyvering: Walt makes what looks very much like thermite out of an Etch-a-Sketch And Some Other Stuff. Presumably just aluminium, but it's still cool...
    • If the other stuff was iron oxide, he made thermite. The powder in an Etch-a-Sketch is aluminum, and it just needs to be mixed with the right amount of iron oxide.
    • The makeshift battery made from sponges, bolts and brake pads was pure grade-A vintage MacGyvering.
  • Marijuana Is LSD: Jesse sees two men in white shirts who want to talk to him about Jesus as hulking, leather-clad thugs with machetes and hand grenades after smoking methamphetamine. Which isn't a hallucinogen. Possibly justified, since his general state of emotional trauma is prone to incite hallucinations even without drugs (which certainly don't help).
  • Midair Collision: Season 2 finale.
  • My Rule Fu Is Stronger Than Yours: Hank vs. the Junkyard owner while Hank is trying to break into the RV, which contains Walt, Jesse and their meth lab.
  • Naked Apron: Walt (though with underwear) in the Pilot. He still gets confused for being a nudist, though.
  • No Holds Barred Beatdown: Tuco is very fond of this.
    • In season 3, Hank did this to Jesse. Boy did he EVER do this to Jesse.
  • No Mr Bond I Expect You To Dine: Gus invites Walt to his house to cook dinner with him in one episode. Which at the time seems harmless, but in retrospect...
  • Oblivious Guilt Slinging: So very, very much of it.
  • Obfuscating Stupidity: After the CID catches onto Ted's book cooking, Skyler saves him from prison time by acting like a Dumb Blonde who hopelessly screwed up the company's ledgers completely by accident.
  • Oh Crap: Walt and Jesse when the discover that Krazy-8 wasn't killed by the fluorine gas.
  • One Scene Wonder: Old Joe, the owner of the junkyard where Walt wants to dispose of the RV. When Hank gets mixed up in the action, he stalls him long enough with some pretty extensive knowledge of law.
  • The Oner: In the final scene of the episode "Bug," Jesse begs Walt to teach him the full formula, going through a long, tortured explanation of how Gus wants him to teach it to the Cartel in Mexico, all shot in one take. Quite an acting tour de force by Aaron Paul.
  • Only A Flesh Wound: Averted. Injuries and healing times are depicted generally quite realistically on this show. Hank's road to recovery is unusually (but realistically) long and grueling.
  • Only Sane Man: Walt thinks he's this, because he's the only one who hasn't forgotten the drug business is just that, a business.
    • In reality, Gus and Mike are likely the only sane characters at this point in the show.
    • On the good guys' side, the lawyers of Walt, respectively Skyler. While they tend to disagree on the steps that should be taken, they both give sound advice on what they think is right to handle the situations.
  • Out Of Genre Experience: YMMV but the scene in the season 3 finale where Mike has a shootout with the Cartel comes out of nowhere, is staged like and feels like a scene from an action movie and not a prime time crime drama as beholden to being realistic as Breaking Bad.
  • Pacman Fever: Averted in one episode. Jesse plays Sonic And Sega All Stars Racing with a girl in a realistic manner; i.e., no button-mashing.
    • Averted again in Season 4 when Badger and Skinny Pete discuss differences in the zombies of Resident Evil and Left 4 Dead with actual references to the games' content.
  • Parodic Table Of The Elements: The logo plays with the periodic-table boxes for Bromine (Br) and Barium (Ba). An element is also highlighted in each actor's name in the opening credits.
  • A Party Also Known As An Orgy: Jesse holds quite a few of these. In Season 4 he has a constant, increasingly out of control party at his house 24 hours a day because he can't stand being alone for even a few hours.
  • Perpetual Poverty: After a series and a half, all Walt and Jesse have to show for their trouble is more debt. Subverted as they get back on track and Walter gets his dream sum only one-two episodes after.
  • Pet The Dog: Walt and his relationship with Jesse. Jesse has a few moments too.
  • Playing Both Sides: Gus is in with The Cartel but isn't afraid to set the authorities on them to safeguard his dominance in his territory.
  • Playing Against Type: Bryan Cranston.
  • Playing Sick: Walt's fugue state.
  • Pride: Walt's biggest failing. The whole source of this mess even beyond his cancer. If not for his pride, he would have been a rich and successful, award-winning chemist, and none of the events of the show would ever have happened.
    • Even in his on-screen appearances, he does a lot of mistakes, probably the biggest so far being to get into business with Gus out of pride of his formula when he had his goals set.
  • Precision F Strike: "I fucked Ted."
    • Again in Season 4. "Get the fuck out of here and never come back."
  • Pretty Fly For A White Guy: Jesse.
  • Pretty Little Head Shots: Averted; use a hollow point and it gets messy.
  • Previously On: Used to recap events seen in previous episodes, as well as give us brief events that are never seen in the show.
  • Protagonist Journey To Villain
  • Punch Clock Villain: Mike- loving grandfather and hitman for the Meth King of South-West USA. Don't make him beat you till your legs don't work. Walt (arguably) becomes one as a clock-in and clock-out meth manufacturer for Gus.
    • Lampshaded by Jesse. As they walk in to the industrial laundromat that houses their hidden meth lab, he sees the line of workers punching a clock and says, "I'm surprised he doesn't make us do that."
  • Pyrrhic Villainy: Ok, so Walt has his money, earned it his way and has survived. But in the process he's killed several people, put massive amounts of drugs on the street, become permanently entangled with dangerous organized crime, and caused the wife and family he was earning the money for to leave him.
  • The Quiet One: Walt starts out as a man of few words and even fewer actions, but subverts this later on when he becomes comfortable with his new lifestyle. Gus is even quieter, showing himself as calm and collected, and why he's truly the Boss of New Mexico.
  • Rage Against The Reflection: Walt, after finding out he's in remission.
  • Ralph Wiggum: Badger, described by his creators as 'Jesse's Jesse'.
    • Also, that one guy at Jesse's house party who keeps rambling incessantly about shit nobody cares about... and he isn't even talking TO anyone, he's just sitting there babbling!
      • Crystal Methamphetamine, ladies and gentlemen.
  • Ramming Always Works: Hank only has a few seconds to react before he's about to be shot, so he just puts the SUV in reverse and rams the guy. It works.
    • Walt saving Jesse.
  • Real Life Relative: Tuco's cousins Leonel and Marco Salamanca, who are played by real-life brothers Daniel and Luis Moncada.
  • Real Life Writes The Plot: The house used as Jesse's house was sold during season two, so they made do with a set of the kitchen for a couple episodes (with the RV blocking the view out the window) before Jesse's parents kick him out. In the next season, they were able to use it again and Jesse moves back in.
    • Krazy-8 was going to be killed in the pilot, but was kept around for two more episodes just because everyone loved working with the actor so much.
  • Reverse Whodunnit: Heisenberg.
  • Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Every main character has been through this at least once: Walt to Tuco for beating Jesse, Jesse with the two drug dealers that killed the kid and his friend, Gus for Gale though he calms himself down by killing one of his henchmen, Hank on Jesse, Jesse on Hank, the Cousins...
  • Running Gag:
    • Gus keeps suggesting to have people killed. First about Badger, then subtly to Walt about Jesse.
  • Sarcastic Confession: In the 3rd season premiere, brother-in-law Hank is helping Walter move out of his home after a falling out with his wife. One black duffel bag is heavy, and Walter isn't supposed to do any heavy lifting. Hank insists, and feels the heft. "What have you got in there, cinder blocks?" Without a drop of Irony, Walter replies, "Half a million dollars in cash." Hank only chuckles and says, "That's the spirit."
    • Happens AGAIN in season four, when Hank speculates that the "W.W." dedication in Gale's notebook is "Walter White". Walt jokingly "confesses".
  • Science Antihero: Think MacGyver turned evil with cancer and having to provide for his family through the only thing he knows.
    Tuco: What was that stuff?
    Heisenberg: Fulminated mercury... a little tweak of chemistry.
  • Scenery Porn: Makes you want to live in New Mexico.
  • SeriesFauxnale: The fourth season's ending.
  • Serious Business: You can't have a fly in your meth lab, it taints the product.
  • Shouldn't You Stop Cooking?: Thoroughly explored with Walt. Once he achieves his original goal, he attempts to make good on his initial promise to get out of the business. Of course, his cancer temporarily going into remission means he's not going to die when he expected to (a rare case where somebody gets upset that they're not dying of cancer) and Skyler doesn't just accept the "I did it for my family" motive at face value. He goes back to cooking at one point because being the world's best meth cook is the only thing he still has pride in.
  • Shout Out: Gomey tells Hank that the blue meth has shown up as far away as Farmington.
  • Sliding Scale Of Idealism Versus Cynicism: Definitely towards the cynical side.
  • Snowball Lie: Pretty much every lie Walt feeds Skyler.
  • Sophisticated As Hell: Jesse, occasionally. "It's totally Kafkaesque, yo!"
  • Soundtrack Dissonance: This show is quite fond of this trope. Used to great effect in Half Measures, in which The Association's bouncy sunshine pop song Windy plays over a montage of Wendy the hooker's sad daily routine.
  • So... Yeah: Walter finishes some of his sentences with "... Yeah", sometimes in his this way.
  • Stealth Pun: Saul Goodman = S'all Good Man! Explicitly lampshaded in one of the 'Better Call Saul' promos for Season 4. Badger ends his account by saying that 'S'all good man, cause I called Saul Goodman.'
  • Sticky Fingers: Marie, who has a compulsive habit of stealing things to deal with stress.
  • Suspicious Spending: Walt's attempting to justify his ability to pay his medical bills is a continuous problem. Finding ways to launder the money from his booming drug trade accounts for much of the conflict in many episodes.
  • Taking The Heat: Edward James Kilkelly does this for money. ("The outside hasn't been too kind to old Jimmy").
    • Posthumously, Gale. Hank seems to believe Gale is--or rather, WAS--Heisenberg.
    • Also, a mild case in Episode 4 of Season 1. Jesse visits his parents for the nth time, wanting to stay on the condition of staying clean. In the end, a cleaning lady finds a joint hidden in the house and Jesse gets kicked out in the coldest way possible. Turns out, the joint belonged to his brilliant kid brother and Jesse took the fall for him.
  • Tear Jerker: During the I.F.T. episode, Jesse repeatedly calls Jane's voice mail just so he could listen to her voice. The Tear Jerking moment happens when the voice mail is finally disconnected. The look on Jesse's face, knowing that he will never hear her voice again... *cries*
    • And for that matter, Jane's death.
    • Walt's Speech during "Fly". He admits that he should have died, and at the end, he basically says that if he had died while listening to his wife and daughter on the baby monitor, then it would have been perfect. A tear falls from his eye when he finishes.
    • "You don't have to do this."
    • Walt crying to his son in "Salud".
  • Teeth Clenched Teamwork: Walt and Jesse. They do get better over time though. And then a whole lot worse.
  • Tempting Fate: When she says "Call me a skank one more time", it is not an invitation.
  • There Are No Therapists: Shouldn't Hank have had a mandatory psych evaluation after his many violent job incidents? Eh, he's probably fine.
    • He explicitly states a shrink would end his career. Probably wrong, especially if it's mandatory. On the other hand, he could've pulled some strings to get out of it, although it's hard to think someone would overlook this in his file, than, let's say, ending his career because he had mandatory counseling...
    • Lampshaded hilariously by Skyler's lawyer (paraphrased):
      I probably cost twice and have half the training of a normal therapist.
    • As her opposite, Saul acts as this for Walt and Jesse and would probably be appalled if any of them actually got professional help.
  • This Is For Emphasis Bitch: Jesse lives by this trope.
  • Those Two Bad Guys: The Cousins. Except that they don't talk much
  • Title Drop: In the first episode and in one of the webisodes.
  • Tom Hanks Syndrome: Before this, Bryan Cranston was best known as the dad from Malcolm in the Middle.
  • Took A Level In Badass: Basically the whole point of the show.
  • Trauma Conga Line: Everybody. If they're not dancing the Conga, then they're playing the tune.
  • Tropaholics Anonymous: In Season 3 Jesse and his cronies attempt to sell methamphetamine to people at recovery meetings. In the end, none of them can bring themselves to do it.
    • "It's like shooting a baby in the face". In fact "Brandon" and "Peter" end up quite enjoying the recovery program rather than doing what Jesse told them.
  • True Companions: Walt and Jesse.
    "I've got this... nephew..."
    • Jesse and Mike seem to have potential for this, assuming Mike survives his gunshot wound.
    • Tuco, Tio and The Cousins make up an evil version.
  • Truffaut Was Right: Drugs Are Bad, m'kay... but a guy in a gas mask pouring a beaker of pure Mad Science into a bubbling flask of Technicolor Science with thick white clouds of Deadly Gas pouring over the sides, all mixed into a Hard Work Montage set to funky music... that's pretty damn cool.
  • Ultimate Evil: The cartel. We rarely get exposition on how they relate to the story, and we often see the results of their acts rather than such acts themselves (like the tortoise incident). It's only in season 3 where they start taking an active role in the plot and we begin seeing glimpses of the inner workings of their organization.
  • Unknown Rival: Walt and Skyler's lawyers to each other, giving completely opposite advice to each of them.
  • Unflinching Walk: The Cousins. No matter what's happening.
    • To point that out: after an explosion that should have jittered them at least a little.
    • Walt does one after blowing up a Jerkass lawyer's car.
  • Vanity License Plate: KEN WINS.
    • LWYR UP
    • The Cap n
  • Verbal Tic: Yo, Jesse, yo. Bitch. "Yeah... Yeah"
  • Villain Song: Negro y Azul for 'Heisenburg'.
  • Villain With Good Publicity: Gus, a firm believer in 'hiding in plain sight'.
  • Villainy Free Villain: Skyler's role as an antagonist early on stems purely from her concern for Walt's health and her wish for him to be honest with her.
  • Vomit Indiscretion Shot: Walt's son pukes in the pool sick on tequila with Walt and Hank. It's Walt's fault. Then there's Worst Aid...
  • Watering Down: Jesse initially spiked his meth with chili powder before Walt put a stop to that.
  • What Do You Mean Its Not Heinous: The juxtaposition with meth and other class A drugs only makes Skyler's horror at Walt smoking pot look even more naive. On the other hand, that could be the point - emphasizing the rift between her own and her husband's worlds.
  • Wham Episode: "Crazy Handful of Nothing", "Phoenix"
  • Wham Line:
    Skyler: Walt, where's your cell phone, did you bring your cell phone?
    Walt: {While high} Which one?
    • And
    Hank: Since when do vegans eat fried chicken?
  • What Do You Mean Its Not Awesome?- The fly falling to the ground dead at Jesse's feet in slo-mo.
  • What The Hell, Hero?: Walt's entire life has become this trope.
  • Who Watches The Watchmen:
    Skyler: Someone has to protect this family from the man who protects this family.
  • Why Dont You Just Shoot Him: Subverted with Gus through season 4. Walt can't get close enough to shoot him, can't hire a hitman, and can't hope to be left alive if he shoots him and Mike is around.
  • Womens Mysteries: When Skyler is detained by a jeweler on suspicion of shoplifting, she fakes going into labor to scare them into letting her go. Or possibly just to get her to stop Lamaze-ing at them.
  • World of Bald Awesome Badasses: After Walter shaves his head, more and more shaved-heads appear, most of them Badass awesome.
  • Worst Aid: Walt just let Jane choke on her own vomit, even when he had a chance to prevent it from happening.
  • Written In Infirmity: Subverted. RJ Mitte has mild cerebral palsy in real life but Walt Jr. was conceived from the start as having it, and Mitte had to learn to walk with crutches and speak less clearly to portray the level of affectation that the show's creator had in mind.
  • X Meets Y: This show is good and creative enough that you can't really define it that easiest, but Vince Gilligan describes it as "Mr. Chips Meets Scarface". Alternately:
  • Xanatos Roulette: Brock's poisoning. Walt did it, hoping that Jesse would blame him, but that he could convince Jesse that Gus had planned the whole thing, right up to Jesse holding a gun to his head.
    • Gus' wholesale poisoning of the cartel]] in "Salud" also depended on a lot of luck.
  • Xanatos Speed Chess: The Season 3 finale Full Measure is basically a protracted game played between Walt and Gus.
    • And the entire of the 4th series.
  • Xanatos Sucker: Walt, Jesse and even Tio pass to each other the Idiot Ball from time to time. Jesse holds on the tightest to it and becomes Walt's, respectively Gus' tool in season 4.
  • You Fail Law Forever: In-universe example: Badger is tricked into believing the urban myth that undercover cops have to identify themselves as such when asked.
  • Your Head Asplode: When it's shot with a hollow point bullet, it does.
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