Saturday Night at Chess Cinemas

I am eagerly anticipating the next season of Breaking Bad on AMC in July, which I consider to be the best television series in at least five years (Other shows not far behind include: Justified, Rescue Me, The Wire, Deadwood, Sons of Anarchy). Breaking Bad is set in modern-day Albuquerque, New Mexico, and centers around a high school science teacher who looks to make as much money as he can by cooking crystal meth for his wife and cerebral palsy afflicted son before he dies of cancer. Even though his cancer goes into remission, Walter White (played by Bryan Cranston) remains heavily involved in the meth business, dealing with assorted bad guys along the way.

What makes the show great is the level of sophistication of the criminals. This is not some formulaic show by any stretch, with mindless violence and writing that condescends to any thinking viewer. Instead, the writing and acting is focused on the subtle aspects about a criminal enterprise.

The following scene is from an episode late in season three entitled, “Half Measures,” Mike (played by Jonathan Banks–The right hand man of the head boss of the criminal enterprise) pays a visit to Walter White’s house to let him know that White’s cooking assistant druggie (Jesse Pinkman, played by Aaron Paul) needs to go, since he has been disrupting the operation with his erratic behavior. Seeing as White feels loyalty to Pinkman as the latter was his student many years ago, and the two have a long history, he is reluctant to sign his death warrant.

However, in what is one of the more memorable monologues in television history, Mike delves into his own background, before he himself became involved in criminal enterprises, in order to drive home a crucial point.

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