Tuesday, October 8, 2013

Breaking Bad's Walter White in a Freudian Tailspin

Ok lets get real. The amount of Freudian concepts in the hit show Breaking Bad is more than obvious.
 
From the start of the show, when Walter White (the soon to be drug kingpin) gets diagnosed with cancer. He responds to the ordeal initially with massive repression. Walter hides this horrible news from his wife for over 3 episodes. Going about his daily business like absolutely nothing has happened. In fact, he overcompensates by being especially loving towards his family in order to keep them from the truth. This is a classic case of denial and repression.
In fact, the theme of repression only gets deeper throughout the show. After Walt has killed multiple people and destroyed so many lives, his motto throughout it all is that he's doing it for his family. Even as his wife leaves him, his children turn to hate him, and his quiet life crumbles around him, he chooses to stick by this one concept keeping him going. Only until the very last episode (SPOILERS!) does he admit "I did it for myself..I liked it"
So why did Walter take so much joy out of destroying everything he claims to have loved? This has to do with the ID and Superego. Walter in the first season is constantly berated by his D.E.A. brother-in-law and successful ex-partner to live a little. Then, when asked by his partner Jesse why a high school chemistry teacher would want to do such a thing, he replies "I am alive". After being diagnosed with cancer in the first episode, Walt is shedding his Superego and the need to conform. He in some way, has been set free to fulfill the desires of his ID. To be the violent drug-lord self he was meant to be.
The pull between Waltz ID and Superego is so large that he even creates an alternative identity for himself. Hence, Heisenberg is created. This alternative identity gives him the space to be morally corrupt without it leaking into his identity as Walter White.
Lastly, On a darker note, every time Walt has killed a member on the show, he ends up adapting one of their traits. His first victim cut the crusts off his sandwiches, and his second kill ordered his drinks on the rocks. One could interpret Walt's adaption of these traits as Freudian slips. These little ticks are the only thing that slips into his regular life after killing the victims. it could be a way to cope with the killing, or a way for his conscious to slip out of a very repressed mind.
 

1 comment:

  1. Yes, I haven't watched a lot of the series (I know, I know, I need to!), but I get the sense that we Walt is also a Freudian father figure--so creating a double for him, splitting him into a good and a bad father, makes a lot of Freudian sense too.

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