The SDMB has a lot of Breaking Bad fans. What do you guess will happen to Walt White when Breaking Bad ends? He could be murdered. There are a lot of people who would have motives to kill him: Gus, the Cartel, the DEA/Hank, Skylar, Jesse, Jane’s dad, Gale, or even Walt, Jr. Killing him would be too much of a cliche, though. The cancer will probably return and could kill him. He could enter Witness Protection. He could become the next Gus. He could return to teaching. He could start sampling his supply and OD. If someone kills him, I kind of hope that it would be Walt, Jr. That would be the most surprising killer. I think the cancer is going to get him though.
I don’t think it’ll be Jane’s dad, IMO he hasn’t had enough screen time for that to happen. I could see it being Marie. What Hank has gone though trying to catch Heisenburg has put HER through an incredible amount of stress. If she finds out I think she’ll snap* and even more so if she finds out that Skylar had known for quite some time…Hey, what if they just do a Sopranos style ending. He could be on his death bed with Hank heading over to arrest him, Gus sending someone over to kill him before Hank get’s to him and Marie on her way to pull the plug…then fade to black…what the hell happened, who was it, Hank? Gus? Marie? Cancer? But I don’t see another show having the balls to pull a stunt like that. I’ll say Marie.
*we saw a hint of this last week when she blamed Hank’s shooting on Walt because he bought some weed from Jesse a few years earlier.
Skylar and Walt Jr. will be killed as collateral damage in a botched assassination attempt. Walt will give his meth money to charity and go back to teaching high school chemistry.
You heard it here first.
Other – suicide. Either active suicide, or he’ll refuse treatment when his cancer returns.
He’s smart, but we’ve seen that he can’t control Gus, Jesse, Skyler, Hank, or the cartel. At some point, it’ll all come crashing down. The only thing he can control is how he goes out. Going down fighting (or in witness protection) doesn’t preserve Walt’s image of himself as a good man and it hurts his family. A good man sacrifices himself for his family.
Or he’ll die in a gunfight with bad guys, like Travis Bickle, and be a hero.
The cancer will return, and he’ll be killed before it gets worse. Probably in a way that it’s almost like suicide. I think he almost has to die to end this, and he’ll die when he really has absolutely nothing left to lose.
I voted WitSec*. I see a parallel with the ending of The Shield. At some point the protagonists’ lives start swirling down the drain, and…
Lem: killed by a “friend” and co-conspirator who is worried that he will betray them. I don’t think there is anyone who fits that role.
Shane: kills his family, commits suicide. No way. Above all, Walt cares about his family.
Ronnie: screwed over by Vic, busted and facing a life term. Hmmm. I suppose Jesse could do this, but I just don’t see it. Jesse, as a lifelong fuckup, would bite the bullet and do his time rather than ruin the life of a decent family man. (Yeah, I know I am building my house on sand, but it **could **happen.)
Vic: sentenced to hell - no gun, forced to wear a suit, doing TPS paperwork for two years, forcibly separated from his family. I can see Walt rolling over on Gus and going into WitSec, with his family going into WitSec elsewhere.
Of course, I fully expect that the writers will end Walt’s story in a way that will shock and surprise me and leave me quivering in a fetal position.
*Shorthand used on In Plain Sight.
I’m beginning to think that Gus is connected with way bigger badasses than drug cartels or even the US government. Walt will need to completely change his identity, to go totally underground, to sever all connections. The ‘witness protectin program’ will not be secure enough.
I can’t believe I didn’t include jail as an option in my poll. :smack:
I go with witness protection because it requires Walt to betray everyone he has not yet betrayed.
Another option, somewhat simiar to the witness protection program would be for him to tell Marie (and come clean with Walt Jr if he doesn’t know at this point) that he’s leaving and starting a new life etc etc etc. I’m willing to bet for the right amount of money Saul could make Walter White disappear.
ETA, thinking about it, that would put Skylar and Walt Jr in a lot of danger, they’d probably have to either go with him, or also disappear but to somewhere else.