In the Shadow of the Sickness Unto Death: Walter White’s Transformation into the Knight of Meth

Abstract

This chapter provides an analysis of Walter White’s transformation into Heisenberg in terms of Søren Kierkegaard’s “stages of life” and Carl Jung’s “process of individuation.” Rendering the Heisenberg transformation from the existentialist perspective regarding love and death and from the psychodynamic perspective regarding the archetypal dimension and self-realization goes toward addressing a number of the questions which surround the shift in Walt’s moral compass given his terminal prognosis. This chapter explicitly addresses two of these questions. First, this chapter provides a moral account of Walt’s escalating decisions during his transformation, while neither sacrificing a notion of his free will nor advocating for acceptance of the imminence of death as justification for the perpetration of immoral actions. Second, this chapter provides an account of Walt’s participation mystique in the Heisenberg transformation. That is, as Walt overpowers various Breaking Bad villains, he incorporates their nefarious traits into the Heisenberg transformation.

Death erases all distinctions…

—Søren Kierkegaard, Works of Love ¹