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Is Breaking Bad: Ozymandias the best episode of the series? (Analysis and criticism)

In case it hasn’t become clear to you who follow me here at TecMundo, here goes: yes, breaking bad It’s one of my all-time favorite series.

For now, however, I only have one project on the work, which is a narrative and critical analysis of the infamous and controversial fly episode. Yes, the same one that divides fans of the series to this day.

So I thought: breaking bad there are several genius episodes that would yield texts and videos. But which one is at the top of the chart anyway? Yeah, it’s time to talk about the chapter that is considered one of the best, if not the best, in the narrative of breaking bad: Ozymandias.

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“Ah, Jean, but why is Ozymandias the best episode of Breaking Bad? Why is he so good? What’s different about him?

Calm calm. In this text, I have prepared a complete narrative and critical analysis of this incredible chapter, which is a television masterpiece, and I will explain everything about it to you now. Here we go?

Walter completely breaks down in Ozymandias, an episode that is considered one of the best of Breaking Bad.Source: AMC

WARNING: SPOILERS ALERT! IF YOU HAVEN’T WATCHED BREAKING BAD YET, DON’T CONTINUE READING THIS TEXT!

Ozymandias: review and review of the episode of Breaking Bad

Well done, Ozymandias is the fourteenth episode of the 5th and final season of breaking bad. It aired on September 15, 2013, on the AMC channel, the home of the work on TV — currently, it is also possible to watch everything, including the spin-offs, on Netflix.

Oh, and just so you’re aware: Ozymandias is the highest rated episode in the history of breaking bad, with a rounded 10 on the IMDb website. Not even the series finale of the series created by Vince Gilligan managed that mark. Felina, which is the episode that ends the series’ narrative, for example, has a score of 9.9.

In other words… the people spoke!

And there are very strong justifications for Ozymandias to have assumed this position as the best episode of breaking bad. Especially if we stop to evaluate the narrative of the series as a whole.

I watched this episode again to do this analysis and, look, it’s impressive how this chapter is powerful, emotional and, at the same time, ties up most of the loose ends that the plot still had in a masterful (and brutal) way. And it’s all like that, all at once, straight in your face, like a punch or a kick in the ear.

Ozymandias: diving into the best episode of Breaking Bad

Just a quick curiosity before I go into the analysis: Ozymandias was directed by Rian Johnson, who is the same guy who directed the fly episode. That is: the guy who commanded one of the most hated episodes of the series was also the one who gave life to the most beloved chapter of the production. If that’s not poetic in some way, I don’t know what is.

The episode, therefore, begins with a flashback, a scene from the past in which we see Walter and Jesse in one of their first “cooks” in the desert. And the narrative begins that way, in my view, for two reasons.

First, to establish a certain lightness and a little respite before things turn into a real hell on earth. It’s like that breath catch before something important, you know? Basically, it’s like we’re buckling our seat belts before setting off on a long, intense journey.

Second, I believe that Gilligan intended to remind us of how much lighter things actually were in the beginning. Therefore, the scene even has a certain “innocence”, with Jesse and Walter teasing each other here and there, as usual, and with Walter talking to Skyler on the phone, who, at that point in the championship, suspected absolutely nothing.

As much as things were already wrong at this point in history, this cut of the narrative still represented a certain peace for all involved. But of course that wouldn’t last forever.

Gradually, therefore, these elements of the past disappear and give way to what is happening in the present, which has nothing peaceful and innocent about it. Suddenly, we are bombarded by the sounds of gunfire and we are already faced with Jack and his gang shooting in the direction of Hank and Gomez, while Walter and Jesse are there too.

The consequences that Ozymandias brings to the characters of Breaking Bad are irreversible and brutal.The consequences that Ozymandias brings to the characters of Breaking Bad are irreversible and brutal.Source: AMC

Realize, therefore, how brilliant this transition is and makes a very interesting and pertinent counterpoint, showing what has already happened and what is happening. What it was and how it is now. How that apparently more “innocent” past resulted in a disastrous present.

And it is with this idea very well developed in just a few minutes of screen that Ozymandias shows what he came to, pulling us into his plot almost instantly.

After that, we pick up where the story left off in the previous episode, with Hank and Gomez surrounded by Jack’s group, just as Walter is about to surrender after Jesse has betrayed his “mentor”.

The Fall of Walter White

And, as you well know, it is in this episode that the entire house of cards that Walter has built throughout the series comes crashing down. Everything, absolutely everything, goes down the drain and the consequences of the protagonist’s actions have the worst possible outcomes.

It is in Ozymandias that: Gomez dies; Walter loses his money; Jesse is held hostage; the truth about Jane comes to light; Hank dies; Walter kidnaps his own daughter, gives up, then runs away.

In short, it is the exact point in the narrative where Walter finally has his spirit broken and crushed, since, from that point on, things become irreversible. In that sense, it’s amazing how Gilligan has managed to bring together all these very important elements of breaking bad in a single episode without minimizing the unique importance of each of them.

Everything is structured and placed in the right way, at the right time, so that it has its due impact on storytelling. And that, my friends, is not easy to do!

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The first 20 minutes of Ozymandias show all the narrative skill of Gilligan and Johnson when packaging the deaths of Gomez and Hank, the theft of Walter’s money, the kidnapping of Jesse and, of course, the evil icing on the cake: the truth about the Jane’s death.

Therefore, almost all paths that breaking bad followed narratively until then they meet there, in that space, in those 20 minutes, in which the stories of all the characters change, directly or indirectly.

And this sequence ends in a brilliant way, with Walter standing alone in that same scenario of the opening scene of the episode, reinforcing the idea, again, that decisions made in the past led the characters to the consequences of the present.

To top it off, Walter gets into his car, looks in the rearview mirror, directly at us, who are watching, as if we were accomplices in all that carnage. He then adjusts the rearview mirror, perfectly framing Gomez’s and Hank’s shallow graves, and walks away, knowing there’s nothing else to be done.

After that, the narrative keeps up the intense pace and goes on with great sequences, which would also yield more in-depth analysis in their own right. We witness, for example, the confrontation between Marie and Skyler, with the former trying to bring the truth about Walter to light and the latter falling apart emotionally.

A little further on, we follow Walter trying to maintain his composure and forcing his family to flee at all costs. Here, he even shows his controlling and violent side, no longer hiding behind that “nice guy” mask that he had created and that he insisted on wearing in front of his family.

In the same cut, Junior discovers the whole truth about Walter and defends the mother of a father that, until then, he had not yet known. And, of course, we have the family realizing, even if it’s not said in all the words, that Hank died because of Walter.

As a result, the protagonist, completely desperate, kidnaps his baby and runs away with the little one in a last attempt to exert control over those around him. Afterwards, however, he realizes, as I pointed out previously, that the situation is irreversible and that not even all of his intelligence will be able to repair the damage caused.

Ultimately, he returns the child and, in a last “selfless” gesture, he tries to clear Skyler of having any association with him. But as you and I both know, that’s not what will bring redemption to Walter, and if he really wanted redemption, he would have chosen to turn himself in to the police rather than run.

By disappearing, therefore, Walter only shows that, despite all the tragedy seen in Ozymandias, there is only one thing greater than his guilt: his pride, which permeates the entire narrative of Ozymandias. breaking bad.

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