Breaking Bad was no stranger to pop culture references, mentioning everything from the 1978 Burt Reynolds vehicle Hooper to Saul derisively calling Skyler the Yoko Ono to Walt’s John Lennon (Badger is Ringo). But it’s one thing to have Todd’s ringtone be “She Blinded Me with Science” — it’s another to directly pay homage to Pulp Fiction through visual parallels.
It goes beyond the trunk shot, too. The drugs scenes are filmed the same way, Jane and Mia look like they could be sisters, and Walt and Jesse get cleaned off the same way Jules and Vincent do, with a hose outdoors. Jesse also picks out a weapon in a way that would make Butch proud, and Hank and Vincent share a penchant for reading books while sitting on the can.
Jorge Luengo Ruiz put together a video showing all the similarities, set to the tune of “Misirlou.” Probably for the best that Vince Gilligan didn’t end Breaking Bad with the Dick Dale surf-rock classic, although I expect Quentin Tarantino to use “Negro y Azul: The Ballad of Heisenberg” in The Hateful Eight.
