Caemeron Crain
3. Skyler White (Breaking Bad)
I know a good number of people didn’t like Skyler in Breaking Bad. The show sets us up to follow the adventures of Walter White, and even though the title of the thing tells you this is a story about how he gets morally worse and worse, it can be hard to avoid the temptation of rooting for him as events progress. And from that point of view, Skyler can come across as a bit of an antagonist standing in the way of Heisenberg’s goals.
But let’s be honest: Walter White is a bad person, and he becomes progressively worse over the run of the show. Again, that’s not a secret—it’s the premise. Breaking Bad is a great show, but it isn’t some kind of hero’s journey. It’s about how a seemingly decent man can go down a path of perdition.
Skyler is in the middle of all of this, and while it might seem like she is defined more as a wife than a mother, it is her concern for her children that keeps her from turning on Walt. It is at this level that she is most understandable, if you take up her perspective on events. Her husband has become a monster (and perhaps he always was on a certain level). Why does she stay with him, and even help him? It’s for her kids.
He abuses her—he rapes her, even— but she wants to protect her children from what their father has become. She’s become trapped in a terrible situation, and it’s hard to see how ratting Walt out would help her. Plus who knows what he would do?
It’s no wonder that Skyler jumps into the pool when she does. I don’t know that she was seriously attempting suicide, as you’d probably need a bit more than force of will for that to work in this way, but her desperation is apparent in that moment.
If you’re a fan Breaking Bad (as you should be), I urge you to watch it again and try to take it from Skyler’s perspective, or really from anyone but Walt’s.
