"Now, say my name..."
"JOHN CENA"
MEMES GALORE
"You're god damn right..."
Hello, internet! Welcome to Film Theory
a daily part of your balanced breakfast!
"Where's breakfast...?"
So go ahead, pour yourself some cereal and double-check your stevia for ricin
'Cause today, we're forever changing the way you look at the final scenes
of one of the greatest television shows of all time
As such consider this your [SPOILER ALERT]
Now breaking bad, is one my favorite television shows
one that truly pushed storytelling on TV
Main character Walter White's transformation
from a Mr.Rogers-esque chemistry teacher
to a meth kingpin of Scarface level proportions
is perhaps the most memorable character arc in television history
and what other televised drama can attest to starting so many memes from;
"I am the one who knocks"
To my personal pick...
"Yeah, science!"
The characters, the acting, the pacing, the artistic camera shots
everything about this show was perfect
Well, except for one thing: The ending.
Admittedly ending such an incredible show was an impossible task
There was no way it could satisfy everyone
I mean, Walter White was a character you either
love to hate, hated to love, love to love, or hated to hate
there was no middle ground with this guy; and after six (or I guess five and a half)
mind-blowing seasons, Breaking Bad ended with what a lot of people thought was a
cop out after getting complete closure apologizing to his wife Skyler
ensuring his children get the remainder of his drug money, killing off the rest of the
bad guys and rescuing his partner Jessie
Walt dies from a combination of a gunshot wound to the abdomen
and his returning cancer
all while surrounded by his beloved meth-making equipment, ensures the problem
a lot of people had with his ending is that Walt gets everything;
He wins!
there is no punishment or atonement for all of the awful things he
does throughout the series and let's be honest he does a lot of awful things
sure you may say, "Oh, he dies!" but he dies on his terms
it's a complete victory for Walter White and that understandably frustrated people
But what if I told you there was more to the story that Walt will face
trial and punishment for his crimes that the ending wasn't as clichéd and
clean-cut as we've all been assuming the last couple years
in short are we really sure that the man known as Heisenberg is dead in that final shot
'cause let me tell you: I've run the numbers, and he's not. I mean yeah,
He does get a gnarly stomach wound; collapses and lies motionless on the floor
for about 20 seconds as we hear some appropriate blue meth inspired a jab
but is that enough for us to hang our theorists' coats up and accept that he's dead?
NOT A CHANCE!
"You're god damn right"
Oh... gets me every time.
ok, so what am I talking about? well, according to the University of Maryland Medical Center
the three most important factors for determining a person's odds
of surviving a gunshot wound are:
1. The location of the injury;
2. The amount of blood lost; and
3. How quickly the victim is transported to a hospital
so let's take them point by point;
but before we dive into the location of the injury,
we first need to discern the nature of the injury itself, and I know what you're thinking:
"It's a bullet in his stomach, right?" well, not exactly.
let's recap the final showdown Walt comes to the neo-nazi compound with an
automated remote-controlled turret built into its trunk
he tackles Jesse to the ground click the button the trunk pops open and a mirage
of bullets killed almost all the neo-nazis inside but we are most
interested in is near the end of the attack when walt gets hit by *SOMETHING*
I mean it's kind of hard to tell honestly all we really do is see him
grunts now we know from the opener of season 5 episode one that won't purchase
an m60 machine gun with 7.62 millimeter NATO rounds pretty heavy-duty machinery
is evidenced by the fact that it blasted through the side of the trunk and the
wall of the neo-nazi rec room like it was nothing but let's look at the set up
here
it's highly unlikely that Walt was actually hit by one of these bullets
1. walt is too low to the ground
Walter's hoopty of death is a fifth-generation cadillac deville which
according to the manufacturer's stands exactly fifty six point seven inches
tall or about 1.4 meters
if we take this photo of Walt standing outside the car and apply some basic
algebra and pixel counting we can conclude
that the trunk is 42.5 inches off the ground or slightly over one meter
the m60 shoot slightly lower than the exact height of the trunk let's just say
it's an even 39 inches about one meter just to be safe
considering that the average width of a human being is about 9.5 inches or 24
centimeters even if Walt and Jesse were planning on top of each other toe to toe
forehead to forehead they would still be far lower than the line of fire
I mean you can even see the difference from the bullet holes in the wall
compared to their relative position on the ground so obviously it's not a
direct bullet hit maybe it's a ricochet seems like a solid possibility except
for one thing
according to my research it seems that higher powered bullets like a 7.62
millimeter nato round 10 not to ricochet the usually either crush into the object
they hit or break apart
ricochets are much more common with low caliber ammunitions such as a 22 or 177 most
likely culprit for injuring Walt then is either shrapnel or a broken piece of a
bullet entering from Walter side
why the side well because throughout the ensuing scenes we get a pretty good
glimpse at the front back wall jacket and there simply aren't any holes to the
right side is the only option
ok so we have a piece of shrapnel entering waltz love handle knowing this
let's look at our medical criteria number one the location of the
we never actually get to see the wound itself only the blood stain on the lower
right side of his shirts which is such a shame because i really love that shirt
on walt ;_; given the radius of the blood-stained we can only make an
educated guess as to where the entrance wound is the biggest risk associated
with a bullet wound to the abdomen is hitting either the lower aorta or some
of the major blood vessels
if such was the case though Walter would have keeled over and bled to death
VERY quickly but that's not what happens Walter walks talks and even
tells Lydia that he murdered her with relative grace for over 10 minutes
now you could potentially right off a lot of Walt's mobility as shocked but
even shock can't keep you alive for 10 minutes if a vital organ has been hit
your body now given the location of blood and waltz shirt it's likely that
the shrapnel got lodged somewhere in his large intestine and believe it or not
this is actually good news
quotes the main concern with gunshot wounds that involve the intestines or
stomach is not bleeding but infections that result from spillage of the
contents of those organs(EW!) and quotes in other words you were dead but it takes
days to die from your womb a study conducted by the medical journal the
annals of surgery looked at victims of gunshot wounds to the abdomen over a
period of five years between 1983
and 1987 the survival rate among victims that had no vital organs
hit was an astounding 88.3 percent that's incredibly high and with medical
technology having only gotten more advanced over the last 30 years Walt
would have a real chance at survival which means we should move on to the
second criteria amount of blood lost now blood loss is likely the factor that
causes wall to collapse onto the ground and stare blankly up at the ceiling
but the big question here is whether he died due to the blood loss or merely
passed out
well let's take a look although we can't realistically measure the amount of
blood that's ripped onto the ground or absorbed onto waltz clothes we can draw
some encouraging conclusions due to the fact that there's no blood on the other
side of his shirts which means the bullet didn't go through him
exit wounds leave a much bigger hole than entrance wounds thereby leading the
victim to bleed to death much faster
in other words this fact buys Walt some valuable time
now one thing that I haven't brought up that I'm sure it's on the tip of all
your theorists tongues is that Walt's lung cancer is back there by making his
body more fragile and perhaps more sensitive to blood loss but get ready to
HAVE YOUR MIND BLOWN
because there's research to suggest the exact opposite that his cancer would
have increased his chances of survival
there's actually a significant amount of research that suggests that people with
pancreatic cancer multiple myeloma and most importantly for our purposes
lung cancer are all more likely to form blood clots
according to dr. Jean Connors at the dana-farber cancer institute for reasons
not quite known the normal human body will keep a balance between Pro clotting
and anti-clotting activity
apparently cancer skews that balance in terms of pro clotting increasing
inflammation and compression of blood vessels creating more coagulation and
actually lessening internal bleeding
long story short there's actually a high probability that Walt's cancer is
limiting the amount of blood he's losing in these crucial minutes so we have not
a full bullet but a smaller piece of shrapnel entering waltz body in an area
with non essential organs walt's slow tour about the compound showing that the
injuries not really that critical in a situation in which blood loss is slowed
the only an entry wound it being in the intestine and Walt having cancer
that brings us to the final criteria of determining the likelihood of survival
speed at which the victim gets medical attention. If walt were alone somewhere
in the New Mexico desert this would be an open and shut case you would have
bled out and died but the final shot shows us a unit of police officers
descending on him almost immediately after he collapses.
Are they DA, Albuquerque PD? If we zoom in on the arm patch the shape and color
definitely indicate that it's Albuquerque PD.
According to code 02 - 11 of the Albuquerque Police Department procedural
orders manual : "department policy is to ensure that medical care is
provided to arrested persons intoxicated persons when such care is needed based
on approved medical and legal procedures" Do not only are the police obligated to
give Walt medical attention but let's not forget that the walter white case is
a national story
they want Walt the sea trial they want Walt to live so that he can confess to
all the unsolved murders he's been involved with it is in their best
interest to keep him alive so that these
cases can be concluded.
Add to that the fact that it's reasonable to assume that there's a
standard-issue trauma kit and at least one of those cop cars and most every
police officer is trained to dress a gunshot wound it's a waltz bleeding
would have been significantly reduced as soon as a minute after he collapsed and
if you're looking at this from a timeline standpoint he literally just
collapsed we even see the police cars rushing past seconds before he falls to
the ground and here's a big piece of evidence for you.
Why are the cops even there ? Who called them ? The pile of dead neo-nazis
certainly didn't, Walt and Jesse didn't do it, the most likely cases that someone
nearby heard the m60 gunshots and called the cops.
What that tells us is that although we have never given a real location for
Jack's neo-nazi de Kamp it means we're close to civilization based on the
length of that last seen it took 10 minutes for the cops to arrive at the
location that also means that there's likely a hospital in that vicinity so
looking at all the pieces of evidence considering the wound didn't hit any
vital organs was a smaller piece of shrapnel didn't leave an exit wound that
clotting was increased due to cancer and that help was on the scene immediately
after
collapse and Walt got medical attention somewhere in the realm of 20 minutes
from the time he was shot there is a high probability that Walt survives this
last scene of Breaking Bad but you don't have to believe me or all the research i
did just trust the creators of the show
if you look really really closely at that final moment you see the officer
reach out and check for Walt's pulse and then the scene cuts out before we get
his reaction.
We don't actually see the results of that test! Think this was a coincidence ?
Heck no! It was a purposely done moved by a creative team who thought through
every last detail of every shot in this show.
What seemed like a clear-cut and kind of clichéd ending is actually open to
interpretation.
We just saw the easy obvious answer but by doing the research you see that
there's a lot more ambiguity to that final scene and that I only have one
thing to say.
"Yes science!". And before I sign off if you want more fun and fascinating Breaking
Bad analysis click on the eye icon in the upper right part of the screen to
check out my friends over at the wisecrack channel who are doing an
incredible five part series exploring the hidden meaning of each season of
Breaking Bad.
Relive all the mag
it's a tidy whitey goodness with their hilarious and thought-provoking show
earthling cinema show your theorists bride telling Matt Pat section
I don't know leave some sort of trolling comment about how Walt is it dead
also if I was you I'd probably subscribe while I was over there but you know
you're called your prerogative
and with that being said remember THAT'S JUST A THEORY A FILM (tv?) THEORY
you know what the coolest thing about all of this is it leaves open the
possibility of seeing Walter White's trial appear on better call Saul would
that be incredible to see the return of these characters
ah make it happen skillion make it happen please
here click the bag of blue meth to check out that Breaking Bad miniseries i
mentioned over on the wisecrack channel or if you want something truly scary
click the Terminator to see how will all be slaves to computers within the next
30 years
fair warning the future gets intense and you'll never look at your laptop the
same way again
now if you'll excuse me all this breaking bad talk has got me a hankerin
for some delicious
fast food chicken like el pollo loco or something
don't know why exactly huh strange.