Hank's story has a "Hero's journey" arc, but Hank is not the hero of the story. Walt is the hero of the story, and on Breaking Bad, this is the midwit's meme.
Low IQ/High IQ: Walt is the hero of the story
Midwit: Walt is not the hero of the story
The hero's journey of Walt is:
- Beginning, Walt is a coward, he walked away from opportunity due to reasons, knocks up Skylar, gets married, takes the job as a high school chemistry teacher, sells his company for $5k to the partners who make it into a huge empire
- Entering the threshold: Walt faces his mortality, he realizes that he wasted his potential, and failed to take care of his family. He starts cooking meth, (initially) to get exactly $737k.
- Transformation: Walt realizes that cooking meth by using his knowledge of chemistry to produce the purest meth known to man, makes him feel his true potential ("If I don't show up for work, a business big enough to be listed in Nasdaq goes belly up", conversation)
- Return: [To avoid spoilers, Those who have seen it, they know who he saves in the last episode]
Moral: Don't waste your life, lest you be forced take drastic measures like Walt in order to realize your true potential
Hank's story has a "Hero's journey" arc, but Hank is not the hero of the story. Walt is the hero of the story, and on Breaking Bad, this is the midwit's meme.
Low IQ/High IQ: Walt is the hero of the story
Midwit: Walt is not the hero of the story
The hero's journey of Walt is:
- Beginning, Walt is a coward, he walked away from opportunity due to reasons, knocks up Skylar, gets married, takes the job as a high school chemistry teacher, sells his company for $5k to the partners who make it into a huge empire
- Entering the threshold: Walt faces his mortality, he realizes that he wasted his potential, and failed to take care of his family. He starts cooking meth, (initially) to get exactly $737k.
- Transformation: Walt realizes that cooking meth by using his knowledge of chemistry to produce the purest meth known to man, makes him feel his true potential ("If I don't show up for work, a business big enough to be listed in Nasdaq goes belly up", conversation)
- Return: [To avoid spoilers, Those who have seen it, they know who he saves in the last episode]
Moral: Don't waste your life, lest you be forced take drastic measures like Walt in order to realize your true potential
Hank's journey is more of a 'classical hero'.
- Beginning: A coward, full of pompous bravado.
- Threshold: Tortuga blast, twin assassination attempts
- Transformation: He becomes a brave hero, goes after Walt.
- Return: "Walt, you want me to beg?", "It's ASAC Shrader"
I think the following are important observations:
1. Skyler is more competent at crime than Walt.
2. Walt is a wonderful and passionate teacher.
3. Jesse is a coward.
4. Hank treats his wife like a child yet remains with her.
5. Hank's wife is like a child.
6. Mike is a highly sympathetic monster.
7. Skyler doesn't try to control and stop Walt. Instead, she wisely tries to remove herself and her children from his drug kingpin lifestyle.