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‘Breaking Bad’ Review: Aaron Paul Shines In ‘Confessions’

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Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul) - Breaking Bad _ Season 5, Episode 11 - Photo Credit: Ursula Coyote/AMC

So everyone, I have a confession to make, I didn’t want to like Breaking Bad.  I thought that it was an overrated critical darling that people just overly hyped up for the sake of sounding better than the rest of us who overindulged ourselves on the soaptacularness that is Revenge, Pretty Little Liars, etc.

But as I finally sat down to watch the series I found that it was good, no, scratch that, it was PHENOMENAL, and pretty close to flawless. So, I found myself utterly hooked to my screen as I binged on every ounce of Breaking Bad that AMC would hand out. This of course led to this week’s dose as once again the crap hit the fan in last night’s breathtaking installment as Jessie’s world came crumbling in around him as Walt’s lies began to be exposed.

Much like “Buried” focused a majority of its time on Skyler, “Confessions” allowed Jessie his own time to shine.  “He really did a number on you, didn’t he?” Hank asked Jessie in the interrogation room.  It was then that a reflective Jessie really began to understand what he had been through these past few years. Thankfully Saul busted in and helped get Jessie out of the police department where he got to meet with Walt.

It was during his interaction with Walt that Aaron Paul showed us why he is the BADDEST as he demanded and deservedly got all of our attention when he proclaimed “”Would you just for once stop working me? You’re acting like me leaving town is all about me and turning over a new leaf, but it’s really about you. You need me gone. … Just tell me you don’t give a sh-t about me, and it’s either this or you’ll kill me the same way you killed Mike.”

Paul’s performance was truly breathtaking as he showed the vulnerability of a man who has been through everything and come out the other side. He is trying so desperately to atone for his sins, but is, and possibly will forever be, unable to do so.

Well things continued to go from bad to worse for Jessie as he decided to let Saul give him a new identity, it was only afterwards that he realized that Walt stole the ricin cigarette and is the reason that Brock died.  This led to another stellar performance as Jessie beat the ever living daylights out of Saul before rushing to the White household, gas can in hand and began soaking the place is gasoline.

Meanwhile Walt had a few other things on his mind, like manipulating the crap out of his brother-in-law.  He filmed a little bit of a confession, in which he tied all of the pieces of the puzzle back on Hank, in order to make him look like the guilty party. So if Hank tried to take him down, or Walt ended up ‘dead’ all it would take is for Skyler or someone else (such as Saul) to release this confession and Hank’s life will be completely decimated for something he didn’t even do. Check and mate.

Overall, “Confessions” was a great building block to the final battle. You can tell with each passing episode the pieces of the puzzle are continuing to fall into place. Jessie and Hank are determined to take down Walt and make him pay for his actions, the only problem is that Walt continues to be one step ahead of them at all times. With the chemotherapy taking its toll however, how long is it until they will get the upper hand on the great and powerful Heisenberg?

My one hope for the next episode is we get more cast integration. I love having the focus on an individual character and their reaction and fall out from everything that has occurred, but I am ready for everything to come together and for some vision of the finale to start forming, because as it stands I have absolutely no clue as to how this series is going to come to a close, but then again those types of endings are always the best, and I cannot wait to see what is going to happen next.

Johnathon K.
Johnathon K. is a staff writer for TV Source Magazine. With a love of soaps, the Super Sentai Series and gaming, John's passion comes through in his writing and as a featured host of the TV Source Podcast, where he also serves as producer. In 2019, John launched his own podcast series "Our Take Media" which gives his take on various things in TV from soaps to reality television.

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