‘Breaking Bad’ Final Season Teaser: Walter White Waxes Poetic
We're just a couple of weeks away from the premiere of the final season of 'Breaking Bad' -- or the final half of it, anyway. The latest teaser for the upcoming premiere goes minimalist, with the camera panning over dusty and familiar landscapes, featuring objects that have become iconic for the series: the RV, Heisenberg's hat, etc.
Bryan Cranston, in character as Walter White, recites "Ozymandias," a poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley, which you can read in full below. The poem highlights a man consumed with power, but when he died, all that remained were his words. His inscription reads, "Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!" and yet there is nothing to show for his supposed works.
It's very much in keeping with Walter White, who has built an empire on manipulation, greed, and lies, and the poem leads us to wonder: what will be left to show for everything he has done when the series ends? When Walter White is gone, what will be left of his fabricated kingdom? This is definitely the most inspired and contemplative teaser so far. And here's that poem in full:
I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said: `Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear --
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.'