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Breaking Bad
SERIES: AMC, Sunday 10:00p (60 minutes)


9.5

based on 27 reviews
read critic reviews
how did we calculate this?

based on 66 votes
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Starring Bryan Cranston, Anna Gunn, Dean Norris, Aaron Paul, and RJ Mitte

A chemistry teacher decides to start a Meth lab.

GENRE(S):	Drama
CREATED BY:	Vince Gilligan
FIRST AIR DATE:	January 20, 2008

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

New York Post Linda Stasi

The acting is as good as you'll see on TV (take a hard look at the genius of RJ Mitte, who really does have CP). And the script and plot are as out-there as creator/writer/producer Vince Gilligan's other series, "The X-Files."

USA Today Robert Bianco

Bad brings new life and depth to an old one: Malcolm in the Middle's Bryan Cranston, riveting and remarkable as a chemistry teacher who finds a more commercial use for his skills.

Entertainment Weekly Ken Tucker

Breaking Bad mixes desperation and deviousness to yield a volatile, valuable product.

Hollywood Reporter Barry Garron

Give Gilligan credit for a pilot, written mostly as one long flashback, that is suspenseful and surprising. Cranston is always fun to watch and Bad is no exception. What's more, a strong supporting cast suggests there is a lot of room for this series to grow.

LA Weekly Robert Abele

What this sharp if unsettling show wants to meet head on is middle-class angst, the quiet desperation that starts to unravel in the upstanding when their obligations suddenly seem insurmountable--or what happens when the folly of controlling one's destiny starts to resemble the riskiest of lab experiments.

Newsday Diane Werts

Creator Vince Gilligan ("The X-Files") never loses touch with the mundane reality that so brilliantly magnifies its absurd horrors.

San Jose Mercury News Charlie McCollum

Occasionally, something will pop up to remind us of just how good television can be when smart writers come up with an intriguing concept and execute it well. A case in point is Breaking Bad, an edgy, challenging new series.

Variety Brian Lowry

Series creator Vince Gilligan brings a quirky sensibility to the pilot, and the show grows increasingly rich and absorbing in the second and third hours.

Los Angeles Times Robert Lloyd

It's very good, although as sad and disturbing as the mustache implies.

Time James Poniewozik

It's an uneven Coen Brothers--like mix of dark comedy and darker moral drama, but Cranston is amazing as a desperate, conflicted gangsta-nerd.

TV Guide Matt Roush

Grisly and wacky, suspenseful and sorrowful, this darkly compelling cautionary fable of very abnormal chemistry is infused with a Coen Brothers-like flavor of macabre humor.

Philadelphia Inquirer Jonathan Storm

It's unpredictable and stimulating, like the drug that White manufactures, but it produces a much safer high.

Detroit Free Press Julie Hinds

It sets up a scenario that sends Walt, played by Bryan Cranston ("Malcolm in the Middle"), on an unpredictable, surprisingly fun-to-watch journey that frees him from his law-abiding past.

San Francisco Chronicle Tim Goodman

Breaking Bad promises seven compelling and unique hours of drama.

Chicago Tribune Maureen Ryan

The show, so far, doesn’t have quite the right ingredients--it could use something more combustible in the mix.

Philadelphia Daily News Ellen Gray

Breaking Bad is a bit of a load, more weighted than wacky, and surprisingly predictable for a show whose main character is first discovered wearing a gas mask but no trousers.

Newark Star-Ledger Alan Sepinwall

Cranston's performance alone is enough to keep me watching for a while, but I'd like to see something resembling a completed formula, and soon.

The New York Times Alessandra Stanley

It’s the pacing that makes Breaking Bad more of a hard slog than a cautionary joy ride. It has good acting, particularly by Bryan Cranston (“Malcolm in the Middle”), who blends Walt’s sad-sack passivity with glints of wry self-awareness.

New York Magazine John Leonard

Not enough of Breaking Bad was available for preview to decide whether the supporting cast will eventually satisfy as much as "Weeds" regulars like Elizabeth Perkins, Kevin Nealon, Tonye Patano, and Justin Kirk, but Cranston’s Walter is already a winner.

The New Yorker Nancy Franklin

Breaking Bad is very well done, but it has a bleakness that seems to be manufactured for no good reason. In its spiral down toward nothingness, Breaking Bad pulls viewers down with it, just because it can.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Rob Owen

In such rare instances [in the second episode], Breaking Bad achieves a perfect moment of nerdy believability, but too often the series fails to provide details that would help explain its characters' illogical choices.

Washington Post Tom Shales

Viewers who like to tiptoe over to the dark side now and then--at least once a week--are bound to find Walt White's wonderland of woes worth a visit or two, or many more.

New York Daily News David Hinckley

Based on Sunday's opener, Breaking Bad falls around the middle of the pack in the new wave of cable dramas. It's no "Mad Men."

Boston Globe Matthew Gilbert

You can feel creator Vince Gilligan (of "The X-Files") straining to build an emblematic American fable and forgetting to fill in his story with particularities and believable motivations.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Melanie McFarland

Breaking Bad is a show constructed around a self-conscious edginess. You have to push past this edge and be willing to step inside before discovering any depth.

Slate Troy Patterson

Its achievement rarely matches its ambitions, but the effect is still pretty dope.

Chicago Sun-Times Doug Elfman

Breaking could be a good study of acting, since Cranston and Aaron Paul (as his partner, Jesse) get under the grimy skin of their characters. But there's not enough of the good stuff, like writing, directing, mood, cinematography--you get the point.

The average user rating for this tv show is 9.5 (out of 10) based on 66 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Robert B. gave it a9:
Best part of this is that they get the chemistry rightas opposed to a lot of crime shows. Great if a little slow paced.

Brendan D. gave it a10:
I think this show is fantastic. The acting is great, its very well written, its full of a quality mix of drama, action, and dark comedy with a compelling story line. I really hope there will be a second season, because my only complaint is that the first season was so short!

Katie Y gave it a9:
Breaking Bad is a very innovative television show. It takes a very taboo subject like cooking drugs and it makes it appealing. The characters are very developed and the plot line is very substantial. The amount of drama in Breaking Bad keeps the audience coming back every week, and that cannot be said for a lot of shows.

Michael G. gave it a9:
Very good, a bit derivate of "Weeds" (try summing up the plot in a few sentences and you realize how similar the two really are), but "BB" is somewhat more realistic and definitely more hard-hitting. It really doesn't hold back--and you better have a strong stomach to be able to deal with all the extreme close-ups of Walt's protean suffering. Definitely a keeper for next year, if only because the entire first season read like one extended pilot--very slow but ultimately extremely satisfying.

Matt K. gave it a10:
It is simply astounding how AMC has been able to hit the nail so squarely on the head with two out of two original series so far. I thought it might suffer from comparisons to Mad Men, but Breaking Bad is easily just as compelling. Well done AMC, you're batting 1000!

Aaron S. gave it a10:
Great show with great acting all around especially from Bryan Cranston.

Peter M. gave it a10:
The story line propels this show along at an incredible pace sweeping the viewer up in its storm. The watcher will hardly know that an entire hour has passed and will be left wanting for more. The characters are compelling and the season finale leaves you pondering the changing character dynamics as well as the arbitrary nature of societal norms.

Breaking Bad SERIES: AMC, Sunday 10:00p (60 minutes)

Breaking Bad
SERIES: AMC, Sunday 10:00p (60 minutes)