MOVED

Alyssa Rosenberg - “With Jesse, his behavior is more like an adult abusing a child, which was one of the reasons watching him touch Jesse was so clammy. One of the show’s first iconic lines was Jesse’s delight at discovering that Walt had discovered a way to circumvent the central problem of meth production, obtaining pseudoephedrine. But it’s what comes after “Yeah, Mr. White! Yeah, science!” that matters. Jesse demurs, saying he’ll leave the state and start over. And Walter reels him back in, neatly undercutting Jesse’s self-esteem, but promising that Walt can be the one to make Jesse a real boy.

Walter does dreadful things to Jesse, allows Jesse to shoulder responsibility and crippling guilt for them, and feeds on Jesse’s vulnerability by convincing the younger man that only Walt can restore him to wholeness, whether by sending Jesse to rehab or reenlisting him in an expanded drug production scheme. Jesse has sought out other mentors, most notably in the last season, Mike. But one of the great tragedies of the show is its illustration of how the claws Walt’s sunk into Jesse’s brain exert a more powerful pull than Mike and Gus’s treatment of Jesse as someone with potential. Walt has groomed Jesse to respond to his own guilt and shame more strongly than to straightforward affirmation, perverted his job as a teacher so they only thing Jesse is supposed to learn is Walt’s authority.“  – Walter White, Abuser