I watched Breaking Bad finally and throughout the whole thing I was just constantly thinking about how many people idolized Walter White and absolutely hated Skyler. Watching the show puts a new perspective on that, because throughout the whole thing I’m thinking “people rooted for this guy?” in the back of my mind. Sure, at the beginning you can sympathize with him (most people turn to crime because of financial issues after all), but he makes so many awful decisions and overall just proves himself to be a manipulative piece of shit who’s driven more by pride and self-fulfillment than anything else. The whole thing feels like a critique of toxic masculinity and the failures of private healthcare, with Walter consistently refusing the outside help offered to him as the bills keep climbing higher.
Because okay, Skyler was by no means perfect and made bad decisions of her own, but even then, they’re not out of nowhere given the circumstances she’s in. If you found out that your husband with lung cancer has been secretly cooking meth, I’m not sure you’d handle it in the best way either. Also there are far worse characters in this show if we wanna go down that route. She wasn’t supportive of Walt tho so…I guess that makes her more reprehensible than neo-nazis and drug kingpins?
I feel this whole interpretation at least partially stems from the false correlation of protagonist = good guy, but really, I think one of the major factors is simply the very mindset the show is criticizing. It’s a very similar situation as with the whole Fight Club ordeal: people (mostly men) identify with the ideas that are being critiqued through fiction and fail to understand that the criticism is even there. They only see a reflection of their own mindsets, and if there’s a woman standing in the way of that reflection, she’ll become the target of vitriolic hate.