3 Breaking Bad

AMC 2008- 13

High school teacher Walter White (Bryan Cranston) tells his students that he likes to think of chemistry as “a study of change,” which conveniently is the major theme of the crime saga built around him. No series before or since has taken better advantage of the medium’s ability to track a character’s journey over a long period of time, while also crafting the kind of memorable individual installments that distinguish TV from movies. Breaking Bad travels step by agonizing step through Walt’s journey from lowermiddle-class breadwinner to lord of his own crystal-meth empire, where he’s alternately helped and hurt along the way by former student Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul), criminal lawyer Saul Goodman (Bob Odenkirk), calculating kingpin Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito), and even his own victimized wife Skyler (Anna Gunn). And the series is only as thrilling and as devastating as it is because it keeps methodically showing you how Walt and the others got from there to here.