Gangster Genre In Breaking Bad

Elements of the Gangster Genre in television series Breaking Bad

Breaking Bad is a television series that premiered on AMC channel on January 20, 2008 and ended on September 29, 2013, after five seasons. The series follows the main protagonist, Walter White, for two years after he is diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer, while struggling to make ends meet for his family. Walter begins to manufacture and distribute crystal methamphetamine with the help of his former student and current small-scale drug dealer Jesse, in order to secure the financial future of his family. The series is mostly concerned with all the complications Walter’s descent into the world of crime brings, and the consequences of his actions to himself and to the people close

As his greed takes over and he begins to gather power, he becomes unstoppable. His desire to raise his profits prompts him to constantly look for ways to outwit and overpower either his boss or his opponents at all costs. While he has the chance to make millions of dollars in a few months by working for Gustavo Fring in a controlled and safe super-laboratory, his ego does not allow him to be subjected to Fring’s authority. Thus, he orchestrates an elaborate plot to extinguish him, which includes the bombing of a nursing home.

Walter’s wounded ego may be his driving force for transformation

Addiction to Power and Moral Decay

Moral corruption is a notable and recurrent theme of gangster films. The protagonist usually has an initial innocence, or ignorance of the means and ways of the life of crime. He is reluctant to use violence and hesitant to manipulate people, as evidenced in The Godfather and Goodfellas. But as the hero gets more involved with this world, he becomes disillusioned of the usefulness of morality in the conventional

Despite his initial reluctance to get involved with anything located outside his domain, cooking, in the drug business, his inevitable participation in the decision making and the street trade gives him a taste of the power a kingpin can acquire. His initial perception of violence as wrong and acceptable only in the case of self-defense is subject to change in the course of the series. His first two killings take place clearly in self-defense, the first in the Pilot episode with his assailants holding a gun to his head, and the second after days of consideration and hesitation with the victim attempting to kill him. Walter is in deep internal conflict for the killings and the use of violence and afterwards he experiences remorse. From this point in the series that morally ambiguous choices are considered a necessary evil, down to the point that Walt lets his partner’s girlfriend choke on her vomit on purpose, on the justification that she constitutes an obstacle to their flourishing partnership, there is a remarkable transformation taking