Breaking Bad breaks series record and finale curse

Arecord number of viewers tuned in to see the fate of Walter White on Sunday’s Breaking Bad series finale.

The last episode, which was praised by most critics and fans, drew 10.3 million viewers, a record for the series, according to AMC, and three times the audience of the show’s midseason finale a year ago.

The previous record was set last Sunday, when 6.6 million viewers tuned at the same time as the primetime Emmy Awards (where Breaking Bad won Best Drama).

The finale was also the most pirated episode ever of the series, with more than 500,000 copies of the episode downloaded within12 hours of the first illegal copy showing up, according to Variety.

And it was a hot topic on Twitter and Facebook, where a reported 3 million people posted about the finale on Sunday.

As to what all the fuss was about, critical reaction was mostly positive, other than some quibbles that loose ends were tied a little too neatly and that Walter (Emmywinning actor Bryan Cranston) didn’t truly get what he deserved.

“The key to a satisfying series finale is to remain faithful to the established tone, to offer viewers a feeling of real closure. So give the producers credit for ending Breaking Bad this boldly, this decisively,” wrote the Star’s Vinay Menon. “Most of the plot loops were hemmed with clever precision in what felt like the fastest 75 minutes of television in history.”

The New York Times said, “Perhaps the best thing about the finale of Breaking Bad is that it actually ended. So many shows, notably The Sopranos and Lost, have gone dark without anything approaching finality. Here, the writers were so determined not to leave unfinished business that the last episode was called ‘Felina,’ an anagram of finale.”

Star readers were also on board with the ending.

More than 62 per cent of almost 3,000 people who took our web poll said the finale was “deeply satisfying,” while almost 23 per cent responded, “It blew me away. I’m still in shock.”

Only 3 per cent agreed with the statement, “I can’t believe I wasted six years of my life to come to this point”; another 3 per cent described it as ho-hum and almost 9 per cent said it held no surprises.