![\"Breaking](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/SEI_264612645-d122.jpg\")
\n\t\tNobody\u2019s done it better\u2026(Picture: Netflix)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\tNobody\u2019s done it better\u2026(Picture: Netflix)<\/p>\n
Do you want to know how to make a truly great drama? Well, to quote a man who once accidentally ran to Windsor, \u2018the secret ingredient is crime<\/a>\u2019. \u00a0<\/p>\n Yeah, I know heartbreaking stories of divorce<\/a> can be sad, we\u2019re all partial to a bit of romance now and again, and who doesn\u2019t love a spy thriller, but all of these genres can be improved by crime.\u00a0<\/p>\n Don\u2019t believe me? Well, just look at the three shows regularly named the best in the history of television \u2013 The Sopranos<\/a>, The Wire, and Breaking Bad<\/a>. \u00a0<\/p>\n What do all three have in common? \u00a0<\/p>\n They\u2019re all about bad men (and occasionally women \u2026 but mostly men now that I think about it) doing bad things<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Of this triumvirate of transgressive TV, my favourite is probably Breaking Bad, in large part thanks to its greatest ever episode, which aired 12 years ago today. \u00a0<\/p>\n \t\t I\u2019m writing, of course, about Ozymandias<\/a>, the fourteenth episode of Breaking Bad\u2019s<\/a> fifth and final season.\u00a0<\/p>\n This mind-blowing episode saw Walter White (Bryan Cranston<\/a>) finally get his comeuppance as his grand schemes are brought to ruin by the combined efforts of his brother-in-law Hank (Dean Norris) and the neo-Nazis he foolishly partnered with (Rule number one: never trust a Nazi). \u00a0<\/p>\n This is no triumphant and cathartic fall from grace where we get to revel in the bad guy\u2019s downfall. \u00a0<\/p>\n It\u2019s a tragedy where Walt loses everything he\u2019s been working towards. \u00a0<\/p>\n His fortune is stolen, he\u2019s ripped from the heart of his family, and worst of all, there\u2019s no road back for him. \u00a0<\/p>\n \t\t It\u2019s genuinely a sensational chapter in Walt\u2019s transformation from Mr Chips to Scarface. \u00a0<\/p>\n Now gallons of digital ink have been spilt by journalists and critics gushing about this episode. \u00a0<\/p>\n Even the biggest contrarian in a country solely inhabited by contrarians (I think it would be called Contraria) would struggle to find a flaw in Ozymandias.\u00a0<\/p>\n Indeed, it remains the only Breaking Bad episode to have an IMDb aggregate rating of 10\/10, and it regularly tops lists of the best TV episodes ever. \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n What makes it so special? Well, critics and academics love everything about it, from its tragic twist, the acting, and the clever literary reference it makes to a once-great pharaoh brought low. \u00a0<\/p>\n Yet, if you were to ask me what makes this such a special episode, it\u2019s that in a regular series, Ozymandias would be the grand finale.\u00a0<\/p>\n A final disastrous chapter where Walt ran out of road, and the audience was taught some tawdry lesson about \u2018drugs being bad\u2019 and \u2018crime never paying\u2019.\u00a0<\/p>\n But Breaking Bad is better than that because Ozymandias isn\u2019t the story of how Walter White lost it all. It\u2019s about the death and ruin of his criminal alter-ego, Heisenberg. \u00a0<\/p>\n \t\t You see, throughout the fifth season of Breaking Bad, Walter White\u2019s civilian identity had been completely subsumed by his criminal persona, Heisenberg. \u00a0<\/p>\n Walt had gone from a kind man, willing to sacrifice his own morality for his family, to a ruthless kingpin obsessed with money and power. He\u2019d lost himself and with it the audience\u2019s sympathy.\u00a0<\/p>\n Ozymandias then serves to destroy the Heisenberg persona, allowing Walt to reemerge in the final episodes, not quite as a hero but as a man we can sympathise with. \u00a0<\/p>\n Without this brutal chapter, the final two episodes would have felt hollow and empty. \u00a0<\/p>\n Like the Neo Nazi\u2019s attempts to replicate Walt\u2019s blue meth, they\u2019d have offered an inferior, empty buzz instead of the cathartic high we\u2019d become addicted to. \u00a0<\/p>\n Got a story?<\/strong><\/p>\n If you\u2019ve got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the Metro.co.uk<\/a> entertainment team by emailing us celebtips@metro.co.uk, calling 020 3615 2145 or by visiting our Submit Stuff<\/a> page \u2013 we\u2019d love to hear from you.<\/p>\n Arrow Arrow Arrow![\"Breaking](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/SEI_264612641-f88a.jpg\")
\n\t\tSorry, Walt (Picture: Netflix)<\/p>\n![\"Breaking](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/SEI_264612642-7677.jpg\")
\n\t\tJesse has defintiely had better days (Picture: Netflix)<\/p>\n![\"Breaking](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/SEI_264612643-06e4.jpg\")
\n\t\tWalt early ended the day from hell with kidnapping (Picture: Netflix)<\/p>\n
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