It’s become so much of a trope of modern visual storytelling that whenever something remotely farfetched occurs, or whenever a character is in a state of mind that may lend itself to experiencing entirely imaginary events, it’s natural for any audience to at least partially suspect that what they’re seeing isn’t meant to be taken literally. It’s a regrettable but undeniable reality of the culture today. So naturally there were a handful who proposed that Walt actually died in the New Hampshire car he tried to steal, and that everything beginning with the keys that seem to magically drop from the sky was merely his fantasy, a kind of dying wish.
Folks who have floated this theory range from New Yorker writer Emily Nussbaum to comedian Norm MacDonald. The thing about it is that it may not be what the writers intended, nor may it hold up to the closest of scrutiny (although it does so rather compellingly so far), but at the very least it emphasizes the unlikelihood of the events that transpire in “Felina,” and add to the mystery of its slightly unusual tone. There is something eerie about the ghost-like way Walt moves through the world of this final episode. He doesn’t look like himself, at least not the Walter White or Heisenberg looks he carried through the rest of the series. He wanders slowly, somehow evading all eyes of the law. I find it more satisfying to think that the story ended literally, that Walt dies in the meth lab in a state of perceived conquest that slips through one’s fingers the more they think about it, but the fact that it could also be explained as a fantasy of some kind just makes the ending that much more rich and interesting.
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