Breaking Bad is considered by many to be a masterpiece. So it should be no surprise, given its many accolades and awards won, that the New York Times recently christened it as the best television show of all time, beating over a hundred candidates.
The series received high praise from the New York Times, which called it “exquisitely performed, meticulously shot”, and further stated that “what made the show incomparable was its humanistic moral investigation”. The show centers around Walter White (Bryan Cranston of Malcolm in the Middle fame), a chemistry teacher who, upon learning he has an advanced form of lung cancer, enters into the methamphetamine trade with his former student, Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul), to make enough money to secure his family’s future. The series is a tale of corruption, depicting Walter White’s fall from grace as a normal husband and father into a terrible villain hellbent on running a meth empire.
Breaking Bad stands among 99 other series on the New York Times best television show list. At number two on the list is The Wire, HBO’s seminal series about the criminal underbelly operating in Baltimore, Maryland. Other series included on the list include Veep at number 7 (the satirical take on the vice presidency starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus), Mad Men at number 3 (the series about ad executives in the 1960s), and Game of Thrones at number 6 (the fantasy series about a dynastic struggle for power over the Iron Throne).
Breaking Bad aired from 2008 to 2013, with 5 seasons and 62 episodes. A spin-off movie, El Camino, followed the series finale in 2019, while another spin-off, Better Call Saul, aired from 2015 to 2022, with 6 seasons and 63 episodes under its belt. Created by Vince Gilligan, the series has long been considered a gem of a television show, with many twists and turns keeping the audience on its toes.