Why Did Walter Kill Mike? (Explained)
Breaking Bad is one of the most beloved drama series in television history, with the twist of lead protagonist Walter White causing viewers to stay on the edge of their seats.
While some television series may be afraid of killing off fan-favorite characters, Breaking Bad never allowed any of the characters to feel safe or too secure in the story.
The tale of Walter White’s downfall and the rise of his drug-innovating alter ego Heisenberg watches his connection with characters rapidly change over the course of five seasons, proving that not even his love or gratitude for others can withstand the sinister pressures of the illegal underworld.
Why Did Walter Kill Mike?
Walter White killed Mike Ehrmantraut for insulting him and damaging his pride after Mike blamed him for the downfall of their drug operation.
Mike viewed Walt as someone with a big ego that couldn’t accept being under the direction of Gustavo Fring and wanted to be the leader himself.
As a screaming match between the two men ensues, Ehrmantraut calmly takes the bag from White’s hand and gets in his car.
Just as Mike Ehrmantraut realizes that something is missing from his bag, he spots Walter White pointing his handgun at him from outside his car window as White takes the shot.
Despite the immense pain and the blood spewing from his wound, Ehrmantraut still tries to drive away.
Ehrmantraut doesn’t make it far before he crashes into a rock, leaving White to reflect on what he just did.
In an attempt to make things right, Walter White runs to Ehrmantraut’s car and finds that his former ally escaped from his crashed vehicle.
White follows a trail of bloody footprints, leading him back to the riverbank to find Ehrmantraut barely sitting upright as he listens to calm waters flow during the final moments of his life.
When White tries to speak up or apologize, Ehrmantraut is quick to hush him and begs White to let him die in peace.
Fans of Breaking Bad often see this moment in the series as the beginning of the end for Walter White and the takeover of the infamous drug lord, Heisenberg.
Why Did Skyler Stay With Walter?
Skyler White stayed married to Walter because she knew that the disaster that hit their lives originally started out of love for his family.
When Walter White first began cooking meth, he did it in order to ensure that his family would have plenty of money despite his having cancer and knowing that he would die soon.
Although White takes a twisted path to make the necessary amount of money to keep his cancer treatments and post-death costs from running his family’s finances into the ground.
This loving father was once worried more about his wife, disabled son, and newborn daughter never having to go a day without what they needed than his safety.
When Skyler found out about what her husband was doing to provide for their family, she was shocked but she also understood the kind of person Walter was.
After the initial panic cleared for her, Skyler White was able to think about the logical steps that her husband took to get to the decision he made and became a valuable business partner.
While her husband spent his days cooking meth and dealing it after dark, Skyler was able to serve as a seemingly innocent car wash owner.
When Heisenberg wasn’t trying to take over the local drug ring, Walter took on a secondary job at the car wash to earn more money and credibility.
Despite Walter White’s original intentions, Heisenberg’s desire for power, fueled by his paranoia, led him to focus more on his business than his loved ones.
Between the pressure of keeping his identity hidden and cancer eating away at him, White quickly became a different man from the one Skyler had married.
Does Walter White Appear In Better Call Saul?
Yes, Walter White appears in the season six finale of the Breaking Bad spin-off series Better Call Saul.
The final episode of the season is aptly called Breaking Bad, similar to how Saul Goodman’s series got its name from the first episode he appeared in.
Brian Cranston, as the meth lord Heisenberg, doesn’t appear until 30 minutes into the finale and is only on screen for a total of seven minutes.
Although Cranston may not get a lot of screen time, the conversation between Saul Goodman and Walter White is incredibly meaningful and filled with allusions to the original series.
The flashback scene from the 11th episode of Better Call Saul season six takes place during the 15th episode of Breaking Bad season five.
During the flashback, Goodman and White are hiding in Ed Galbraith’s bunker with nothing but a broken water heater and a couple of cots.
To break the silence, Goodman attempts to ask White what he would do with a time machine.
With White being an impatient man of science, he quickly snaps at Goodman about even thinking of the possibility of a time machine and instead tells him what Goodman truly wants to talk about is regret.
White goes on a short tangent about how if Goodman wants to talk about his regrets, he should simply say that he regrets the choices he’s made and that Goodman should quit hiding his regret behind an imaginary, solve-all-your-problems device.
Walter White goes on to tell his former lawyer that his biggest regret is walking away from Grey Matter Technologies, but it’s clear from the tone of his voice that White isn’t sincere about his answer.
Even as he gives a fake answer, White’s looking down at the watch that his partner Jesse Pinkman gave him as a birthday present.
Was Walter White A Bad Teacher?
Yes, Walter White is a bad teacher as seen by the way he treats his young partner-in-crime, Jesse Pinkman.
While most people would argue that teaching a former student how to make even better versions of the drugs they’re already cooking illegally is enough to qualify White as a poor educator, one of his biggest mistakes is not having any belief in Pinkman.
Despite being unable to cook their signature meth on the same level without Pinkman, White is constantly undermining Pinkman’s capabilities and forcing him to believe that he needs White if he even wants to have a chance.
Even while Jesse Pinkman was just a high school chemistry student of White’s, his teacher frequently expressed that he felt like Pinkman was a waste of his time.
Between his perceived lack of intelligence and clear lack of dedication, White had written Pinkman off as a nobody before he even had the chance to grow into a full person.
As a high school teacher, White didn’t care about why Pinkman wasn’t performing on the same level as his other students because he put his future business partner in the category of a “slacker” and never gave his situation another thought.
Walter White couldn’t let go of his superiority complex, leading him to ignore the needs of his struggling students and instead spend his time demanding recognition for his achievements from his students.
The first teacher in Jesse Pinkman’s life that instilled in him the self-belief he needed to achieve was, shockingly, Gustavo Fring.
While White was constantly telling Pinkman that he was nothing without White’s knowledge, Fring is the one who finally tells Pinkman, “You can do this.”
It’s only as Jesse Pinkman begins to become more confident in himself does he finally see that he’s a capable individual.
Why Did Walter White Leave Grey Matter?
According to Breaking Bad creator, Vince Gilligan, Walter White left Grey Matter because he felt inferior working at the massive company made up of equally intelligent people.
Between the complicated relationship he has with Gretchen Schwartz and the sudden power dynamic change, White isn’t able to stomach his job at Grey Matter Technologies for long.
Before working as a chemistry teacher, White was once a promising young chemist during the 1980s who formed the company Grey Matter with his college friend, Elliot Schwartz.
This is where he originally met and began dating Gretchen, who served as a lab assistant.
Following a falling out between White and his former girlfriend, White decided to sell his share of the company for $5,000, and Gretchen went on to marry Elliot Schwartz.
This is the moment when Walter White becomes the everyday man that fans meet at the beginning of Breaking Bad.
Although White appears to have moved on by marrying Skyler and starting his own family, he was secretly holding onto that resentment for years.
The resentment eventually evolved into a constant need for intellectual superiority, leading to the creation of Heisenberg.
Is Walter White Being Added To Fortnite Or MultiVersus?
No, neither Walter White nor any of the characters from the Breaking Bad counterparts will be making it into either Fortnite or MultiVersus.
Although fans from both games have pleaded with game developers and the original creators of the Breaking Bad franchise, all that remains are the false rumors surrounding Walter White’s gaming debut.
Fortnite players began speculating that Walter White and Jesse Pinkman would join the popular battle royale’s cast of pop culture icons after an abandoned trailer was found in a desert section of the map.
Although the trailer wasn’t a precise duplicate of Heisenberg’s original meth lab, it did share the same color scheme and featured a similar folding chair out front.
If players walked inside the abandoned trailer, they would find two beds, two sofas, and plenty of coolers for storing hidden goods.
This theory was supported further when the character, Gustavo Fring, was proposed during a recent character survey.
Rumors of Walter White and other Breaking Bad cast members began to spread across the internet when fan artists began posting their concepts for what each character would look like in the Fortnite art style.
Shortly after rumors of Walter White appearing in Fortnite began to arise, the Warner Bros.-owned character quickly became one of the most requested characters for the party brawler title MultiVersus.
MultiVersus is a free-to-play, online multiplayer fighting game similar to Nintendo’s Super Smash Bros. series, featuring a wide variety of characters from shows such as Game of Thrones, Scooby-Doo, Rick & Morty, DC Comics, and more.
Fans of Breaking Bad and MultiVersus were quick to create skins, movesets, and swappable abilities for Walter White that were so convincing that the game’s director Tony Huynh had to debunk the rumors of White’s arrival to the All-Star cast while commending the fan base’s work.