Breaking Bad as a Greek Tragedy
The Breaking Bad television series, created by Vince Gilligan, follows the general structure of a Greek tragedy and is the modern day version of a Greek tragedy. Before we can explore why this is so, we need to understand what constitutes a traditional Greek tragedy. According to Collins Dictionary, a Greek tragedy is “a play in which the protagonist, usually a man of importance and outstanding personal qualities, falls to disaster through the combination of a personal failing and circumstances with which he cannot deal”. This can be broken down into four elements: (1) the protagonist is important and respected. He has to be in a high place in order to have a great fall; (2) the protagonist has to be likeable,…show more content… Oedipus leaves Corinth in an effort to try and stop this prophecy from coming true. On his journey, he killed a man over an argument they had and this man turns out to be Oedipus’ real father. Later, Oedipus arrives at Thebes and receives a message that his father has died of natural causes. He is relieved as now the prophecy cannot be true. However, this was not his biological father. His biological parents abandoned him when they received the prophecy that he would one day murder his…show more content… The audience pities Oedipus because despite being a good man with good intentions, he has all of these horrible events happen to him. He tried doing everything in his power to avoid the prophecy. In the very last lines of the play, the chorus shows their pity for Oedipus: “behold this Oedipus, — Him who knew the famous riddles and was a man most masterful; not a citizen who did not look with envy on his lot—see him now and see the breakers of misfortune swallow him!”(Sophocles,