>I have yet to hear a concrete argument for the fantasy/dream
>that is based in something that takes place on screen.

Well, like I said above, I think it's at least ambiguous enough that it can be debated. (Is that not why we are here?! To debate our interpretations of art?!) I consider the episode and I see an unprecedented avalanche of amazingly convenient coincidences that dwarfs anything else the show has ever asked us to accept. I also see a fairly significant departure in tone (both in terms of style and content) from the episodes that preceded it.

My interpretation, though, is a little more complex and considered than simply, "I didn't like the ending, so I'm going to pretend it's a dream."

To me, everything that comes after the scene when the cops approach him in a stolen car (!) stuck in the snow, the episode plays absolutely *perfectly* as a defeated, depleted man playing out his final plan in his mind. I mean, it really does play perfectly. To me, every single thing that happens in the episode is exactly how Walt would have imagined it happening. I won't keep beating a dead horse and citing the myriad reasons why I think the interpretation really holds up, but I really do think it does.


>It's certainly an interpretation that people who don't want
>Walt to win will cherish. So it's your projection of the
>ending you WANT, without having anything actually *there* to
>root it in, outside of sheer willpower.

Eh, it's not just for moralist reasons, though that IS probably part of it. It's also probably at least partly a reaction to a show that consistently defied convention trotting out such an insanely far-fetched, cliche-riddled conclusion. (Seth Myers & Amy Pohler could do a Weekend Update REALLY?!? segment for almost everything that happens in the episode.) To me, the place where all of this most the most sense - from a storytelling perspective, from a moralist perspective, from a logic perspective, from a believability perspective - is in the head of Walter.


>Again, it's obviously fun to play these games, especially when
>you're disappointed with what's actually on the screen when
>you've loved the show for years and badly wanted something
>different... I'm an English major. I get it.
>
>But when there's nothing from the author's mouth nor from the
>actual artistic output that indicates this "fantasy"... yeah.
>It's just not actually there imo.

I mean, Ebert is on record as reading the very last scene of Taxi Driver as Travis Bickle's dying fantasy, even though Paul Schrader has explicitly stated that it's intended as a literal, ironic ending. To me, the intent is almost irrelevant. It *can* be read either way, so it really just boils down to however an individual chooses to see it.

Whatever. It's just my interpretation. I think it works and holds up on a whole fucking ton of levels, and although I have no concrete evidence that it was intended, it makes total sense to me regardless. I don't begrudge someone for not agreeing at this point. I actually think (and hope) part of the the point was to make it debatable.

(Not sure you remember this, but we disagreed on whether the ending of TAKE SHELTER was a fantasy, too...)