Walter White could’ve easily scapegoated Gale Boetticher and gotten off scot-free in Breaking Bad season 4, but his pride wouldn’t let him give someone else credit for his genius. When Walt’s DEA agent brother-in-law Hank Schrader was recovering from an assassination attempt, he took it upon himself to investigate Gale’s murder.
After the events of Breaking Bad’s season 3 finale, viewers knew exactly what happened to Gale. Gale was learning Walt’s formula so that Gus Fring could bump off Walt and hire Gale to fill his place. So, Walt sent his partner-in-crime Jesse Pinkman to Gale’s apartment to kill him, which forced Gus to keep Walt alive.
As Hank reviewed the case files and pieced it together, he got surprisingly close. Although his DEA colleagues laughed at him for suggesting that a charitable chicken entrepreneur was secretly a drug lord, Hank correctly deduced that Gus had been working with Gale on an illicit meth distribution operation. His theory hit just one snag: he mistakenly thought Gale was Heisenberg.
Of course, we all know that the real Heisenberg was under his nose the whole time. All Walt had to do was let Hank keep believing that Gale was Heisenberg, and that Heisenberg was dead, and he could’ve kept up his double life. But Walt’s pride wouldn’t let Gale take credit for his genius, so he dug his own grave.
Claiming Gale Wasn’t Heisenberg Was Walter White’s Worst Breaking Bad Mistake
In season 4, episode 4, “Bullet Points,” Hank brings Walt in to help with his investigation into Gale’s murder. He wants Walt to look over some of the chemical formulae in Gale’s notes and translate them into simple terms for him. Walt covers his own back by explaining that the “W.W.” described in Gale’s notes is Walt Whitman, not him.
But in the following episode, “Shotgun,” over a family dinner, Hank announces that he’s giving up his investigation into Gale’s death. He feels some sense of closure in knowing that the man he thought was Heisenberg is dead, and that’s good enough. But a drunken Walt just can’t keep his trap shut, and insists that Gale isn’t the real genius of the operation.
This gives Hank a renewed interest in the case, and he gets right back to investigating the details of Gale’s murder. Hank eventually figures out that Walt is the “W.W.” from Gale’s notes and pieces together that his own brother-in-law is the elusive meth cook he’s been chasing. None of that would’ve happened if Walt had just let Hank believe Gale was Heisenberg.
This is easily Walt’s worst mistake from Breaking Bad’s five seasons. Despite his meticulous nature, Walt made plenty of careless mistakes throughout the series. He accidentally told Skyler about his second phone, he killed Mike Ehrmantraut for no good reason, and he left an inscribed copy of Leaves of Grass sitting on his toilet.
But the biggest mistake he made was convincing Hank that Heisenberg was still at large. It was Walt’s most avoidable misstep, since he had the perfect scapegoat right there, but at the same time, it was inevitable. Hubris was always Walt’s greatest weakness, so it was guaranteed to be the cause of his downfall in one way or another.
Walter’s Pride Prevented Him From Letting Someone Else Take The Fall For Him
When Hank first brought Walt in to help with the investigation into Gale’s murder, Hank really laid it on thick that he thought Gale was a genius. This really stuck in Walt’s craw, because Walt has always felt that his genius is underappreciated. He felt undervalued at Gray Matter, and he definitely felt undervalued as a high school chemistry teacher.
In the rational part of Walt’s mind, he knew it was in his best interest to keep Hank in the dark. But in the egotistical center of his mind, he really wanted to take credit for his own genius. It would really bother him that Gale was recognized for his chemical purity, even if that meant he could walk free.
Even Walter Admitted Pride Was His Downfall At The End Of Breaking Bad
In the final episode of Breaking Bad, after going into hiding for a year, Walt returns to Albuquerque to settle all his old scores in one last hoorah. But before he confronts his enemies with a machine gun mounted in the trunk of his car, he sneaks into Skyler’s new apartment to set the record straight with her.
Just when it seems like we’re about to get yet another monologue about how it was all for the family, he admits that he did it for himself. He was the best at cooking meth, and he liked being the best at something, so he kept doing it long after his cancer cleared up and he had more money than he could spend in a lifetime.
Walt’s pride was his downfall, and even he can recognize that in Breaking Bad’s series finale. If he’d taken the money from Gretchen and Elliott, he would’ve been fine. If he’d gotten out of the drug business when Mike and Jesse wanted to, he would’ve been fine. But his pride kept getting in the way.
- Release Date
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2008 – 2013-00-00
- Showrunner
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Vince Gilligan
- Directors
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Vince Gilligan, Michelle Maclaren
- Writers
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Peter Gould, Gennifer Hutchison, Vince Gilligan, George Mastras, Moira Walley-Beckett, Sam Catlin, Thomas Schnauz
