There was once a show about a man
who sold methamphetamine,
murdered his enemies and lied to his wife.
He threatened her, assaulted her,
and stole her baby daughter.
"I don't accept that.
You're my wife."
"I'm not your wife.
I'm your hostage."
Of course audiences were overcome
with sympathy and righteous anger
for this poor woman.
Just Kidding -- they were not.
Some of them absolutely hated her.
“I have never hated a TV-show character
as much as I hate her,”
one person posted about Skyler White.
The vitriol even got directed at
the actress who plays Skyler, Anna Gunn.
She wrote an op-ed for The New York Times
which quoted the post:
“Can somebody tell me where I can find Anna Gunn
so I can kill her?”
So why was Skyler so easy for many to dislike --
and why did she arouse so much anger
in some viewers?
"For a fired school teacher who cooks crystal meth,
I'd say you're coming out pretty much ahead."
Let’s take a look at the character’s journey
and how the writers of Breaking Bad
held a mirror up to us
by masterfully manipulating our evolving feelings
toward Skyler White.
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"Look at that."
"That is veggie bacon, believe it or not.
Zero cholesterol and you won't even
taste the difference."
Skyler is the show's most consistent
opposing force to Walter,
so the writing set her up as a kind of his antagonist
to frustrate the viewer by getting in Walt's way.
"I don't want them dicking you around tonight.
You get paid till 5, you work to 5, no later."
In the beginning, we’re led to, on some level,
blame Skyler for how disappointing Walt’s life is.
Her micromanaging juxtaposed with
his free-wheeling criminal shenanigans
makes her appear petty, even mean-spirited.
"Did you use the MasterCard last night?
Ah, $15.88 at Staples?
Walt, the Matercard's the one we don't use."
So this is the portrait of a woman
who is so caught up in the minutiae
of deadening middle age logistics
she can't even take a break for sex
on her husband’s birthday.
"Yes, fifty six!
Oh!"
It feels like Skyler is partly responsible
for Walter being the sad, pushover man we meet,
"Surprise!"
"Oh, you're so very late!"
So the show uses this starting point of Skyler
to sneak up on the viewer.
Just one episode in you might find yourself
siding with a man who committed murder,
while at the same time being annoyed
by his wife for being "a nag."
"So right now, what I need is for you
to climb down out of my ass.
Can you do that?
Will you do that for me, honey?"
Whereas if we look at the actual facts,
this response is hardly fair.
The thing Skyler mostly nags Walt about
is finding money for his treatment.
"Skyler, it’s charity."
"Why do you say that like
it’s some kind of dirty word?"
And that makes him furious because it reminds him
of his inability to provide for his family.
"I don’t like the way you talk about
my private affairs."
Unlike Walt, Skyler is not at all prideful.
"Got myself a job today."
"As big as you are?"
Vince Gilligan, the creator of “Breaking Bad,”
knew Skyler had to be strong-minded
and strong-willed from the get go,
so that she’d be a worthy opponent
for Walt later on.
If Skyler were weak and helpless, it would be harder
to get the audience on Walt’s side
when he’s mistreating her.
"You have to tell me what's really going on right now."
"Tell you what?"
The lesson here is that it takes two
to create the dynamic of any marriage.
"Joan Epperman, you know Joan, suddenly has to
go through all these photos and turn them down,
because they show cleavage."
"Did you get enough pancakes, sweetie?"
The viewer might subtly blame Skyler
for Walt’s sad state,
but really Skyler is hurting Walt’s pride
not through anything she does,
but simply through her very existence.
She IS strong and capable,
and so he seems LESS so by comparison.
"Since you're scheduled for surgery,
I just thought it might be a good idea
to have some money coming in."
"Well, Skyler, we need to think about
what's best for the baby."
No one likes the person who says
"I told you so,"
and in Breaking Bad that person
is most often Skyler.
"The worst thing you can do is shut me out."
"Apologize!"
"People go to prison for this."
She is always right.
Like the Virgin Mary, she wears mostly blue,
and she's often seen cradling Holly.
Yet the viewer wants Skyler
and morality to fail.
"If you don't get out of here right now,
I'm going to call the police,
and I'm going to tell them everything."
Every time Skyler tries to call the police
or convince Walt to stop,
many of us are likely thinking:
“No, Shut up Skyler, Let him do his thing.”
The show from the start is telling us
that Skyler is virtuous --
she’s right --
but it’s also making us dislike her
for being virtuous.
Because we, like Walt, are so enjoying
this path of embracing what’s wrong --
that is, breaking bad.
The writers throw in a lot of small details
that make it easy to dislike Skyler
for specifically feminine sins.
In early seasons, most of her scenes
pointedly see her doing something
traditionally linked with feminine vanity --
putting on lotion, taking a bath,
brushing her hair.
So an impression is built up
that Walt is out providing for the family
at great personal risk,
while Skyler is at home complaining.
"So where have you been this time?"
And later on Skyler commits
more specifically feminine sins --
like smoking while pregnant.
"Perhaps you might know something about this."
"Perhaps I don’t, Walt.
Perhaps I smoked them in a fugue state."
Viewers want to see Walt take risks,
be powerful and provide for his family,
largely because we’ve been socially conditioned
to think of these things as male duties,
even male birthrights.
"You know why I do this.
I want security for my family."
The story is infused with our social assumptions
about emasculation and reclaiming lost masculinity --
"You're gonna man up, or you're gonna puss out?"
part of what’s happening as Walt become Heisenberg
fits this narrative that he’s finally becoming
a “real” man.
Meanwhile, Skyler is failing in her role
as a “real” woman --
by getting in the way of that manhood,
and by not embodying supposedly feminine qualities
like being submissive, caring and sweet.
"Well I tell you what, why don't you do
the grocery shopping,
and then you can get whatever you want."
So the writers use our shared gender baggage
to manipulate us into some very questionable identifications
that we need to revisit later on
as things keep going south.
At the same time, this strategy of villainizing Skyler
partially backfired on the writers --
because not everyone did revisit
why they’d been so quick to blame her.
At times, the show made it too easy
to glorify Heisenberg-Walt,
and those viewers who took it too far --
like, um, for example, threatening Anna Gunn --
were seeing no problem with the misogyny
underlying that intense resentment for Skyler.
"Once again he'll blame his bitch mother
for taking away what his loving father has given him."
In Season 3, the audience’s dislike of Skyler
is expressed through Walter Junior.
"Mom, why do you have to be such a, a bitch!"
"Hey, hey."
It’s as if the writers decided
“Hey, now we’ll show the audience
how their dislike of Skyler
looks from the outside."
Skyler is doing everything she can
to protect her son from finding out
about his father’s activities,
"I don't want my son to find out
that his father is a criminal.
which is also protecting Walt.
But Walter junior only sees fault in his mom’s actions.
Even when he gets a version that’s closer to the truth
about his dad,
Walter junior reacts with absolutely
no judgement for Walter,
but only admiration.
"Dad, you’re such a stud!
How much did you win exactly?"
If before Skyler's hated for being strong,
in season 3 she starts getting blamed
for being weak and not leaving Walt.
But actually, the first thing Skyler does
when she learns that Walt sells drugs
is find a divorce attorney.
"Do you feel you have a good understanding
of your husband’s financial situation?"
It’s just that getting divorced
turns out to be very complicated.
Skyler initially has no intention
of using Walt’s drug money,
but she's already been unknowingly using it.
"Skyler, how do you think we’ve been paying our bills
the last six months?"
Then, Hank is attacked by the murderous cousins,
and Skyler makes the decision to knowingly
use Walt’s money to pay for treatment.
"You will take our money.
Use it to take care of Hank."
This decision invited a new wave
of hate against Skyler,
as viewers accused her of being hypocritical.
And it does seem Skyler is seduced by the money.
As Saul puts it,
"I guess when people see those zeros
dance before their eyes,
it’s kind of like highway hypnosis."
But Skyler’s hypnosis also mirrors the moment
when Walt first sees a similar volume of cash
in season one.
For both, it's a turning point,
and not for the better,
but Walt is often admired by viewers
for his desire and ability to earn money.
"I'm in the empire business."
So the question remains --
why do we blame Skyler for the things
we excuse in Walt?
The money's also not the only reason
for Skyler’s eventual acquiescence to Walt.
For most of season 3, She's unwillingly
forced to interact with him,
because he literally refuses to leave.
Walt breaks into their home,
"We can’t arrest a man for breaking into his own house."
but when she tries to call the cops of him,
this only makes her son angry at her.
"You called the cops on dad?"
Skyler is completely helpless --
a hostage in her own house.
And she begins to show clear symptoms
of Stockholm Syndrome.
"We have a history.
He's the father of my children,
and maybe what he did, he --"
"He did it for the family.
Right?"
And eventually she falls into the same trap
that Walt does in Season One --
the trap of believing her own lies.
"I think that -- he earned it gambling.
Walt and I, uh --
we've had our problems lately.
You know that.
And, uh, what it all came down to
really was money.
For better or worse, he wanted to provide."
But these lies aren't hypocrisy;
they're self-preservation --
she’s trying to make an unliveable situation livable.
"Someone has to protect this family from the man
who protects this family."
Season 4 Skyler is in full-blown accomplice mode,
and not surprisingly, she's really good at it.
"If you're gonna launder money, Walt,
at least do it right."
She manipulates Bogdan into agreeing
to sell the car wash.
"He'll call.
Ahem.
Just wait."
She's so thorough that she prints out an entire script
to make sure that their gambling story
holds up for Hank.
"The next logical question Hank will probably ask is:
'Where are you getting the money?'
To which I’ll say: 'We want to tell you
the whole story,
it’s a doozy, so hold on to your hats.'"
But when Hank compliments Gale Botticher,
Walt almost undoes the cover up Skyler's worked on,
just because his professional pride is wounded.
"Genius?
Not so much.
To my eye, all this brilliance looks like nothing more than
just simple rote copying,
probably of someone else’s work."
So Skyler turns out to be better
at Walt’s game than he is.
"How did Hank find out?"
"It was me.
I screwed up."
Skyler’s altercation with Ted Beneke
repeats this same situation.
Skyler provides Ted the money
he needs to pay the IRS,
but he immediately spends it on flashy purchases.
"Three hours after leaving my office."
"He bought a Mercedes SL550."
While all of Skyler’s actions are calculated
to help herself and others,
the men in her life are primarily occupied
with their own self-image.
"So buying that car?
That was protecting your family?"
At every turn, Skyler has to navigate the prejudice,
unfairness and at times idiocy of a world
that is built to accommodate men
with big, fragile egos.
At the end of Season 4, Skyler comes to know firsthand
that Walt is more than capable of murder.
"You're gonna show some kind of mild relief
that I’m alive?"
"I am relieved, Walt.
And scared."
"Scared of what?"
"You."
"Say hello to my little friend!"
For those who are still wondering why
she doesn’t go to the police at this point --
the answer is pretty obvious.
"All I can do is wait."
"Waiting for what?
What are you waiting for?"
"For the cancer to come back."
Because of the Breaking Bad tone,
the circumstances of Skyler’s abuse
may feel mythical and slightly comical in some ways,
but the feelings portrayed by Anna Gunn
are very real and tragic.
"I can't go to the police,
I can't stop laundering the money,
I can't keep you out of this house,
I can't even keep you out of my bed."
Breaking Bad eventually pushes us to wonder
if we might have chosen the wrong side.
Anna Gunn wrote that she came to conclude
people's hatred of Skyler had
"a lot to do with their own perception
of women and wives.
Because Skyler didn't conform to a comfortable ideal
of the archetypical female,
she had become a kind of Rorschach test for society,
a measure of our attitudes toward gender."
The way each of us reacted to Skyler may have said
more about us than it did about the character.
Yet it became clear that because viewers tended
to see Skyler as an obstacle to Walt's plans,
her character inspired sympathy most
when Walt did not.
The more invested we are in Walt,
the more inclined we are to judge Skyler unfairly --
and the more horrified or disillusioned
we get with Walt,
the more we can acknowledge the terrible life
that Skyler's persevering through.
So the writers masterfully played us
when it came to this couple --
not once, but twice.
They gave us a man who was turning
irredeemably evil, fast --
and somehow they got us on his side
and made us stay on his side much longer
than seemed possible.
And they gave us a woman
who was strong, mistreated
and trying to keep her family alive.
They gave us all the facts,
and somehow, we ignored them.
"You need to understand--"
"If I have to hear one more time
that you did this for the family --"
"I did it for me."
Hey guys, it's Susannah and Debra here.
Thank you so much for watching.
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