Why Breaking Bad Became A Meme

Thank you everyone who watched and enjoyed the video! I really appreciate all of the feedback and it’s kinda wild to see how many people ended up watching the show BECAUSE of the memes. I never expected that.

🚨 Also, for those of you who have NOT finished the show yet, there are SPOILERS in this comment section. Proceed at your own discretion 🚨

Thanks again 🙏🏻

Comedy (or a meme) is tragedy plus time

Man, you’re a genius…

i wish i could have submitted some better memes for the examples. Super educational tho

It’s full of awkward cringy but funny dialogue. That’s why

Scenes that leave the largest impact and people feel the strongest about are usually the exact same scenes that get meme'd the hardest. In essence, as a show-runner, it's exactly what you'd want because people will keep your show alive in perpetuity constantly drawing more eyes toward the show that the one funny picture came from. And it never actually ruins the show in any fashion simply because once you are in the moment of watching it, specifically for instance the shot of Walter breaking down after Hank is killed, that scene is so strong the meme doesn't actually cross your mind and the fact the meme doesn't actually hint at the context in any fashion, so you have no idea why does the funny bald man fall to the ground, but when you are there after all those episodes, it hits like a bag of bricks. I know it did with me since I was that exact case, I kept seeing that gif of Walter and eventually I just went, alright let's give this a watch, let's see what's this about. And it basically became my favorite show I binge watched from start to finish.

something isn't truly successful until it gets memed.

Yeah I watched both Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul WELL after all the memes were big and done to death, and it did not hurt the show in any way. The writing, acting, music, sound design, editing and physical sets, makeup and wardrobes, everything is just perfect.

I often just used the memes as "checkpoints" with my friends, saying when I made it to certain parts, like 207 of BCS, Inflatable, when Jimmy walks into Davis And Main with his salmon suit in slow motion, I told my friends "I made it to the funny"

The memes got me into this show and I can say they definitely have not ruined it.

It is interesting to see how memes have changed over time and their impact on culture. My mom sends me memes. I would never have thought that would happen when I was a kid.

There's a scene in Breaking Bad that I think perfectly encapsulates the reason why the type of humor derived from Breaking Bad memes is so potent; the Pizza on the Roof scene.

In Season 3, Episode 2, Walter has confessed his double life to Skylar, who is horrified, and wants nothing to do with him. But neither of them have explained the situation to Walter Jr. yet, and so up until this point, Walter Jr. is angry at Skylar, blaming her for everything. Walter tries to force Skylar into a situation where the 3 of them can sit down together, as a family, mend bridges, and maybe talk things over (most crucially, he wants to do this in his own home). To this end, Walter buys a pizza; a classic, low-effort, shareable, family treat. Skylar completely rebuffs his efforts, and in anger over his rejection, and the growing rift between himself and his family ,Walter throws the entire, uncut pizza onto the roof, before angrily driving off.

It's considered to be one of the funniest moments in the entire series, and it's not a mystery as to why; dropping the pizza on the ground, throwing it out, or simply keeping it to eat alone are 3 completely valid alternative endings to this scene. All 3 of these scenes are entirely mundane, and could well happen in any other situation. We might have expected Walter to pick any one of them, but instead, he angrily throws the pizza onto the roof of his own house, and storms off, with hardly a second look over his shoulder. It's such an absurd and unexpected ending for the pizza, out of all the possible options, yet it perfectly, and authentically, resolves the emotional stakes of the scene; Walter is angry, certainly angry enough to throw something, and he definitely doesn't need a giant, family-sized pizza to himself, especially since he only bought it to share with his family. it is definitely a thing he could do . But, because it's such an unlikely and unexpected end result, and because of the innately ridiculous and humorous image of a pizza on a roof, we laugh. It's an incredibly funny visual gag in an episode; and a series; otherwise filled with dark, serious and dramatic content.

Comedy, at it's core, is much like a magic trick; it relies on its ability to surprise the audience to be effective. It's all about subverting your expectations. Your brain is constantly working to try predict the immediate future, whether you realize it or not; it's an evolutionary thing. Being able to anticipate things that may be about to happen to you, good or bad, is advantageous, and was naturally selected for us. When our predictions are wrong, we can have a variety of different reactions, depending on the situation; when we predict something incorrectly, and it turns out the correct answer was unknowable, nonsensical, or just really esoteric, we usually respond with confusion and frustration. When it turns out our prediction is wrong, because the truth was something slightly different from what we expected, or that it was slightly more interesting or complicated than we realized, we react with curiosity, fascination, and satisfaction. And, of course, when the result is something that, on the surface, seems ridiculous or silly, but in reality, is a completely logical extension of our original prediction or theory base, we laugh. This is what all comedy is derived from; something unexpectedly silly, something we likely didn't see coming, though we tell ourselves that we should have in hindsight. Finding things that are odd, strange, incongruent, silly, whimsical and absurd, in places where such things shouldn't be.

A meme about Walter White and Jessie driving like crazy people through a green-screen/rotoscoped Mario Kart map is completely ridiculous, and incongruous with the core themes and material within Breaking Bad. But, seeing what is normally a self-serious, drama series, playing over the colorful and whimsical landscapes of the Super Mario world is hilarious in and of itself, because it subverts the expected emotional stakes of the original scene. But, the fact that there is so much footage to draw upon; scenes of Walter and/or Jesse driving aggressively, looking over their shoulders, throwing things in and out of windows, and seeing how all of this footage lines up surprisingly well with what you would expect in a typical Mario Kart game, accentuates the humor; the logical fulfilment of a punchline to a completely absurd premise.

TL:DR, The best comedy surprises you. It comes from places you don't expect to find it. And the best jokes, however ridiculous and absurd their punchlines may be, actually make perfect sense, when you examine the logic behind them.

As a person who saw it after the memes, I would say it has not been ruined. I just see those memes and I’m like “hey, that’s the meme!” And I move on. It has become my favorite show because of the memes, but mostly from the drama.

The only scene the memes ruined was Walt’s 😦 moment. I can’t 😂😂😂

Wait, the actors "memes" are not cringe?

Gen Z has taken over baby

Can someone explain all the Mike memes and why his voice has changed to ‘waltuh’ ?
Thanks in adv

i watched BB and BCS over the last month and to be honest I laughed my ass off when walt finds out skyler gave away the money to Ted and when he lies there and screams in pain and agony.

The number 1 reason I watched the show in the instant place

A step toward immortality.

I gave a shot to breaking bad around the time it started and it didn't really hook my 10-12 year old brain so i just watched a season or two and forgot about it. But the surge of memes over the last couple years actually prompted me give it a proper watch and i enjoyed it a lot, and i can assure you that the memes had zero effect on my perception of the show.

Breaking bad is mid and overrated af

Personally I interpreted it as zoomers not knowing how to process drama properly, so they make a joke out of it to avoid having to directly deal with it.

Mfw the guy making a doc on Breaking Bad memes completely ignores breaking bad comics

Personally the only scene the memes "ruined" for me is the one when Hank dies. I remember the chils down my spine the first time I saw that. Not so long ago, about 6 month before, I watched the entire series and when I reach that scene I was laughing my ass off, I was completely out of the atmosphere lol

This guy sounds like Todd Alquist

If its successful and has good clips, memes are inevitable

I was casually watching the video and when the Saul meme clip came up I fucking lost it. I can’t I die of laughter every time

It's not a meme waltuh

Golden age from a zoomer perspective maybe. I can't speak for other millennials but the silver age as you call it was the golden age, the absurdist stuff now is too nihilistic.

I've only began watching breaking bad recently, mainly because I was in kindergarten with it first came out. The memes have actually made it harder to get the gut punch of certain scenes because instead of going "holy shit skyler's having a meltdown" I'm like "haha its the funny shut up meme". It's still great but it breaks the immersion each time a memed scene comes up

Most things become memes when they’re bad or embarrassing, but there’s sometimes the rare shining example of something becoming a meme because it’s brilliant.

Breaking Bad is one of those rare amazing things.

Sumarized in 4 words: it's the internet








duh

The reason people laugh at what could be considered as inappropriate times is because of what laugher actually is. In escence, it's the human defence mechanism against depression. Some people say that laughter is the best medicine, but people have abused that to artificially create dark situations which manipulates the brain into laughing and releasing the endorfins that come with it. Kinda like drugs.

Yeah the one in the thumbnail is the only one that even slightly messed with the actual experience of the show. More often, seeing the context is like a revelation lmao

as someone who just finished brba for the first time, i remember being like "oh my god its the meme'' then getting hit in the gut with emotions knowing the background of said scene now

that end lmao, was not expecting that

The funniest part of the Saul Goodman face meme is that it is not in the show. I thought that it was the intro sequence at first. But it's not. It's just an gif of a camera zooming in and out of a 3D render of Saul's face with the theme blaring in the background

Well Oppenheimer did redeem Werner Heisenberg a little bit 😅 but we did have another Werner in Vince's universe hus mame was Werner Zeigler and he died for no reason 😅

Not sure if they hurt the show? All the memes made me illegally download the show from random telegram groups.

The part where Walter punches the tree made me laugh way too hard.

I remember like 2 years before i watched the show, I searched up the meme of walt falling and i got spoiled of what happened and didn't realize until i saw the scene lol

I think the worst kind of brba memes r the misogynistic one's (duh) it truly shows you how many viewers misunderstood Skyler's character n motive's (even tho they're extremely obvious???)

Memes are the greatest art form of the early 21st century.

The memes made me watch the show, and the show made me enjoy the memes. The cycle repeats.