Vince Gilligan and Steven Moffat; Two Sides of the Same (yet very different) Coin
Monday, October 1, 2012 at 11:27AM
WatchingPreacher in Commentary, My Opinions, breaking bad, doctor who, television

Let's get a few things out of the way at once; Doctor Who and Breaking Bad are very, very, VERY different shows. One is a serious drama about a desperate Science Teacher who starts cooking meth to provice for his family, the other is about a space-faring Alien who brings human companions (usually women) on trips through space and time. One is a mature show, with blood, violence, cursing and drugs, while the other is a family show full of silly one-liners, aliens, spaceships, time-travel and fun. Both are great though - they are, in fact, my two favorite series on television right now - which was why I was astonished when I watched Breaking Bad's seventh episode in its fifth season (entitled "Say My Name"), containing a scene eerily familiar to a certain scene in Doctor Who's fifth season. It's time to take a closer look at what these two shows are really about, and why I think they're two sides of the same (yet very different) coin.

NOTE: This post will be concentrating on Steven Moffat's run on Doctor Who, from season 5 and onwards, which was really when the show started to turn into Breaking Bad (arguably).

Breaking Bad's premise can, and has been, formulated into one sentence long ago, by creator Vince Gilligan. The idea was to take Mr. Chips, a beloved schoolteacher from the book "Goodbye Mr. Chips", and turn him into Scarface. In other words, we were going to be introduced to a well-meaning and kind character, then see him eventually turn into a villain. (the same thing was, sort-of, done by Christopher Nolan in his Dark Knight-trilogy, summed up perfectly by Harvey Dent; "You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain).

Doctor Who's premise is, similairly, very easy to lay out; a weird, silly and mysterious man has a blue box that can travel in time and space. He goes on adventures, bringing so-called "companions" with him.

As you can see, these are wildly different premises (and wildly different shows). But when Steven Moffat took over Doctor Who from Russel T. Davies in 2010, the two shows became eerily similair (not that I noticed this until this week). And here, for all the non-believers; here is the proof.

Did that seem familiar?

Both of these shows, with their wildly different premises are, in their current big storylines, about being full of themselves. Greedy is another word for it; greedy for money, for appreciation, for acknowledgement. When The Doctor can go up on a hill and shout to an entire UNIVERSE of enemies; the Daleks, Cybermen, etc. etc. that "I AM THE DOCTOR!", whereupon they all run away... Then he's gotten too full of himself. The Doctor peaked in the fifth season episode "The Pandorica Opens", and has been facing the consequences of becoming a threat, becoming a target ever since, through the season six-story of The Silence and the Ponds (which, arguably, began in the first episode of season 5). The threat got so great, in fact, that at the end of season 6 The Doctor faked his own death, claiming that "I got too big. Time to step back into the shadows." But still on its way is a prophecy that the Silence wanted to kill him to stop; “On the fields of Trenzalore, at the fall of the eleventh, when no living creature can speak falsely or fail to answer, a Question will be asked, a question that must never, ever be answered.”-prophecy, stating that the end is coming for him, just as it does for Heisenberg.

Walter's peak was more subtle; since Breaking Bad is essentially a more mature show, we've seen the consequeneces of Walter's actions all through the five seasons, although in a wide variety. But if we look at Doctor Who, whose full-of-himself-ness peaked with "The Speech", I'd say that Walter's big peak just happened, in the "Say My Name!"-scene which opened episode 7 of its last season.

This doesn't exactly bode well for our (now thoroughly unsympathetic) Walter in the coming week, not to mention next year's last slate of episodes. But considering that Season 6 of Doctor Who was one of its very best, and that Breaking Bad has gone steadily on an upwards quality-curve during its five seasons, I can't do anything but look forward to see the conclusions of Walter White's story next year, just as I will be front row and center when The Doctor returns this Christmas, after five episodes of a more stand-alone season (because just like the Doctor got too big so did the show, weaving an epic, complicated, timey-wimey plotline over several seasons).

Article originally appeared on Ramblings of the Watching Preacher (http://watchingpreacher.squarespace.com/).
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