One Breaking Bad Decision Had The Writers Worried About Vince Gilligan's Sanity
Ten years ago, "Breaking Bad" concluded one of the best runs in television history in pitch-perfect fashion. The final episode, "Felina," wrapped up Walter White's story in a pretty badass way by having the brilliant teacher-turned-meth-dealer shoot up Uncle Jack and his gang to free Jesse. It paid off a moment from the season's first episode, in which we see Walt buying an M60 machine gun, yet we don't have any idea what he plans to do with it. As it turns out, the writers had absolutely no idea either — at least not at first.
/Film's own Devin Meenan recently spoke with series creator Vince Gilligan in honor of the tenth anniversary of the "Breaking Bad" series finale. During the conversation, they discussed the plotline involving that M60 machine gun. According to Gilligan, they wrote themselves into a corner. Gilligan and the other writers had a really hard time figuring out what to do about that gun. So much so that it made Gilligan look downright crazy. Here's how he tells it:
"There were times I was literally standing in the corner of the writers' room, slowly banging my head against the wall, trying to make the ideas loose and jar them loose and make them come out of my brain. And I think everybody was a little worried about my sanity at that point."
Even though Gilligan thought about abandoning this thread, the writers wouldn't let him off the hook "'Okay, but why?'" Gilligan added. "'Because we did the thing with the machine gun and you have to pay it off.' It's the old Chekhov thing."
So it was back to beating heads against walls for a while.
The solution? Kill some Nazis
The writers and Gilligan worked through several abandoned ideas. At one point, they considered having Walt use the gun to break Jesse out of prison. Though, for somewhat obvious reasons, they diverted away from that thought. "Do we want to see Walt break into a jail and shoot down a bunch of cops? Probably not," Gilligan said. Walt was a terrible person but he also wasn't the type to gun down a bunch of cops on the right side of the law in cold blood.
On the other hand, Walt had no compunction about killing some Nazis. Fortunately, "Breaking Bad" season 5 introduced us to Todd, played by Jesse Plemons, and Uncle Jack played by Michael Bowen, along with the rest of his criminal gang. They took Jesse hostage and, as Walt's final act of trying to set things right, he set up the gun in the trunk of his car and mowed them all down. "Who doesn't love seeing a bunch of Nazis getting mowed down with a machine gun?" Gilligan questioned.
It was a decision that paid off the plot thread and led to a very satisfying conclusion for both Walter White and Jesse Pinkman. Fans loved it, critics loved it, and a decade later it's viewed as one of the best finales in TV history. Sure, things worked out, but Gilligan also warned that this situation went against his best instincts as a writer, and it taught him a valuable lesson:
"We always endeavor to tell [the story] organically, but the most inorganic thing we ever did, and I take full responsibility for it, was this inorganic bit of business with the machine gun not knowing how that paid off. That is the essence of inorganic storytelling, and I learned a valuable lesson from that. Don't do that to yourself in the future."