Well those guys sure look familiar, don’t they? Bronze statues of mythical methamphetamine cookers Walter White and Jesse Pinkman were installed at a convention center in Albuquerque on Friday to celebrate the Breaking Bad TV series and its entertainment legacy. Here’s what you need to know.
According to new reports, local politicians including Albuquerque mayor Tim Keller joined Breaking Bad stars Bryan Cranston, Aaron Paul and director Vince Gilligan to help unveil the artwork, donated by Gilligan and Sony Pictures. The 2008-2013 show and its ongoing prequel Better Call Saulhelped fuel a renaissance in filmmaking across New Mexico, while also cutting close to Albuquerque’s real-life struggles with drug addiction and crime.
Fans Surprised By Breaking Bad Statue In New Mexico
Gilligan said he recognized that the statues of “two fictional, infamous meth dealers” will not be universally cherished in New Mexico. “In all seriousness, no doubt some folks are going to say, ‘Wow, just what our city needed’, and I get that,” Gilligan said. “I see two of the finest actors America has ever produced. I see them, in character, as two larger-than-life tragic figures, cautionary tales.”
Still a fixture on Netflix, AMC’s Breaking Bad follows the fictional underworld trajectory of a high-school science teacher, played by Cranston, and a former student, played by Paul, as they team up to produce and distribute meth amid violent, cliffhanger plot twists.
The show and its lead characters already are lionized on T-shirts and airport merchandise, while tour guides in Albuquerque shepherd fans to former film locations in a replica of the RV from the show that doubled as a meth lab.
New Mexico has long struggled against the toll of addiction, with more than 43,000 deaths linked to alcohol and drug overdoses in the last three decades. Albuquerque also currently contends with a record-setting spate of homicides. Surging overdose deaths from meth and fentanyl surpassed heroin and prescription opioids as the leading causes of drug overdose deaths across the state in 2020.
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