4.13 Face Off Has there ever been a show in the history of television where the creators have been as in love with their characters as they are on Breaking Bad? Which is not to say that they’re a particularly loveable bunch – quite the opposite, in fact, with Face Off cementing Walter White as maybe the most unpleasant protagonist in television history. But there is something about the way this show is written, in the way that every episode, character arc, and season arc is layered with so much care and attention to detail, that it feels as if it is being written by people who are themselves huge fans of the show, people who enjoy being surprised by the characters as much as we do, rather than a bunch of sweating hacks in a windowless room in Hollywood, desperately trying to figure out how they’re going to eke out another 13 episodes from this premise (or, worse still, how they’re going to dig themselves out of a narrative hole of their own making). “Man, that’d be great… hey, what if it’s that that proves to be Gus’s downfall? What if…what if Walt uses Gus’s one emotional connection left against him to bring him down, once and for all?” “Guys… what if Hector blows up Gus with a bomb using his bell as the trigger?” “Oh yeah? Well how about if Gus manages to walk out of the blown up room, but before he keels over and dies, we see he’s only got half a f***ing face. Is someone writing this down?” There’s a real glee about the way Breaking Bad is plotted that is hard to articulate; it’s this element of playfulness than means that its payoffs, when they come, are satisfying in a way that I’ve never experienced in a television show before. And Face Off never stopped paying off, from its opening minutes to the final shot. Walt’s steadily been growing in status as a criminal throughout the series – largely by good fortune, but also due to some clever manoeuvring on his part and ability to think under pressure – but this season he’s been almost totally subjugated by Gus; emasculated in other word. Every time he’s tried to assert his authority he’s been swatted away like a fly. Gus has been in control, and not only that, he’s been consistently outsmarting him. The only road Walt had left to take was to go deeper and darker into the evil, scheming centre of his brain, the part that is growing larger every episode (like a cancer, perhaps?) and come up with something truly diabolical – as diabolical as Gus’s threat to murder his infant daughter. Walt’s increasing lack of humanity towards his fellow human beings has also been heavily foreshadowed this season – he, in all likelihood, sent three innocent cleaning ladies to their deaths by exposing them to the lab just to annoy Gus, and even in Face Off, he risks the life of his sweet, elderly neighbour (played by Vince Gilligan’s mother) by sending her into a house that may be booby-trapped, or filled with hitmen, or worse. Taking these things into account, non-fatally poisoning a child doesn’t seem that out of character for him. The development also puts his hysterical breakdown at the end of Crawl Space into context – I saw someone on Twitter ask whether this would end up being Walter White’s ‘Red Hood’ moment (and if you don’t know what that is, you’re probably on the wrong website). That terrifying primal scream that Walt gave as his efforts to save his family with his money failed, before he succumbed to hysterical laughter, may well have been the last shred of humanity exiting his body. It also makes sense when you note Vince Gilligan’s repeated insistence that this is the story of Mr Chips turning into Scarface – for Walt to become Scarface, he can’t be taking half measures. He has to be as sick and ruthless as Gus was. And he certainly can’t have a boss. A note on Gus’s death scene – some have suggested that his tie-straightening, gory demise was over-the top. Objectively, these people are probably right. But that was possibly my favourite moment of the season, and another demonstration of how perfectly the writers know what pushes the buttons of their audience. For one thing, it was preceded by that glorious spaghetti western aping walk to the nursing home (to the excellent soundtrack of the aptly named Goodbye by Apparat), then that magnificently tense scene between him and Hector – but the kicker is when Gus walks out of the room. The creators have skirted on the edge of believability when it comes to Gus as a machine, a superhero almost. So when he walks out, the immediate reaction as a viewer (I know I’m not alone in this) was that they’d pushed it too far – there’s no way he’d survive that. But as always, the writers were way ahead of us, and we got the perfectly timed camera sweep around to reveal the spectacularly gruesome sight of Gus’s missing face (with some truly impressive CGI, easily the equal, if not better, than the Two-Face effects seen in The Dark Knight), just before he gets in one last moment of dignified restraint – the tie straightening – before collapsing out of frame. This has been a remarkable season, of what is now probably my favourite non-Simpsons TV show of all time. I can see that The Wire is objectively probably better. Possibly The Sopranos, too. But for sheer visceral excitement, nothing has ever come close to Breaking Bad. Maybe nothing ever will. I’m really glad to have had the opportunity to write about it and share the experience with you all. So where are we left for season 5A and 5B? Well, Walt is certainly firmly entrenched in the dark side now, so there’s that. But otherwise we will start the final stretch of the series with pretty much a clean slate, and, somewhat surprisingly, there’s still a lot left to go – two eight episode mini-seasons mean that we’ve nearly a third of the entire series to look forward to. A guy like that – all of a sudden he’s just going to break good? Read our review of the last episode, End Game, here. Follow Den Of Geek on Twitter right here. And be our Facebook chum here.
title: “Breaking Bad Season 4 Episode 13 Review Face Off Season Finale” ShowToc: true date: “2025-07-25” author: “Opal Hedgpeth”
4.13 Face Off Has there ever been a show in the history of television where the creators have been as in love with their characters as they are on Breaking Bad? Which is not to say that they’re a particularly loveable bunch – quite the opposite, in fact, with Face Off cementing Walter White as maybe the most unpleasant protagonist in television history. But there is something about the way this show is written, in the way that every episode, character arc, and season arc is layered with so much care and attention to detail, that it feels as if it is being written by people who are themselves huge fans of the show, people who enjoy being surprised by the characters as much as we do, rather than a bunch of sweating hacks in a windowless room in Hollywood, desperately trying to figure out how they’re going to eke out another 13 episodes from this premise (or, worse still, how they’re going to dig themselves out of a narrative hole of their own making). “Man, that’d be great… hey, what if it’s that that proves to be Gus’s downfall? What if…what if Walt uses Gus’s one emotional connection left against him to bring him down, once and for all?” “Guys… what if Hector blows up Gus with a bomb using his bell as the trigger?” “Oh yeah? Well how about if Gus manages to walk out of the blown up room, but before he keels over and dies, we see he’s only got half a f***ing face. Is someone writing this down?” There’s a real glee about the way Breaking Bad is plotted that is hard to articulate; it’s this element of playfulness than means that its payoffs, when they come, are satisfying in a way that I’ve never experienced in a television show before. And Face Off never stopped paying off, from its opening minutes to the final shot. Walt’s steadily been growing in status as a criminal throughout the series – largely by good fortune, but also due to some clever manoeuvring on his part and ability to think under pressure – but this season he’s been almost totally subjugated by Gus; emasculated in other word. Every time he’s tried to assert his authority he’s been swatted away like a fly. Gus has been in control, and not only that, he’s been consistently outsmarting him. The only road Walt had left to take was to go deeper and darker into the evil, scheming centre of his brain, the part that is growing larger every episode (like a cancer, perhaps?) and come up with something truly diabolical – as diabolical as Gus’s threat to murder his infant daughter. Walt’s increasing lack of humanity towards his fellow human beings has also been heavily foreshadowed this season – he, in all likelihood, sent three innocent cleaning ladies to their deaths by exposing them to the lab just to annoy Gus, and even in Face Off, he risks the life of his sweet, elderly neighbour (played by Vince Gilligan’s mother) by sending her into a house that may be booby-trapped, or filled with hitmen, or worse. Taking these things into account, non-fatally poisoning a child doesn’t seem that out of character for him. The development also puts his hysterical breakdown at the end of Crawl Space into context – I saw someone on Twitter ask whether this would end up being Walter White’s ‘Red Hood’ moment (and if you don’t know what that is, you’re probably on the wrong website). That terrifying primal scream that Walt gave as his efforts to save his family with his money failed, before he succumbed to hysterical laughter, may well have been the last shred of humanity exiting his body. It also makes sense when you note Vince Gilligan’s repeated insistence that this is the story of Mr Chips turning into Scarface – for Walt to become Scarface, he can’t be taking half measures. He has to be as sick and ruthless as Gus was. And he certainly can’t have a boss. A note on Gus’s death scene – some have suggested that his tie-straightening, gory demise was over-the top. Objectively, these people are probably right. But that was possibly my favourite moment of the season, and another demonstration of how perfectly the writers know what pushes the buttons of their audience. For one thing, it was preceded by that glorious spaghetti western aping walk to the nursing home (to the excellent soundtrack of the aptly named Goodbye by Apparat), then that magnificently tense scene between him and Hector – but the kicker is when Gus walks out of the room. The creators have skirted on the edge of believability when it comes to Gus as a machine, a superhero almost. So when he walks out, the immediate reaction as a viewer (I know I’m not alone in this) was that they’d pushed it too far – there’s no way he’d survive that. But as always, the writers were way ahead of us, and we got the perfectly timed camera sweep around to reveal the spectacularly gruesome sight of Gus’s missing face (with some truly impressive CGI, easily the equal, if not better, than the Two-Face effects seen in The Dark Knight), just before he gets in one last moment of dignified restraint – the tie straightening – before collapsing out of frame. This has been a remarkable season, of what is now probably my favourite non-Simpsons TV show of all time. I can see that The Wire is objectively probably better. Possibly The Sopranos, too. But for sheer visceral excitement, nothing has ever come close to Breaking Bad. Maybe nothing ever will. I’m really glad to have had the opportunity to write about it and share the experience with you all. So where are we left for season 5A and 5B? Well, Walt is certainly firmly entrenched in the dark side now, so there’s that. But otherwise we will start the final stretch of the series with pretty much a clean slate, and, somewhat surprisingly, there’s still a lot left to go – two eight episode mini-seasons mean that we’ve nearly a third of the entire series to look forward to. A guy like that – all of a sudden he’s just going to break good? Read our review of the last episode, End Game, here. Follow Den Of Geek on Twitter right here. And be our Facebook chum here.
