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Gus Fring Died as Zombie on ‘Breaking Bad’ Thanks to Special Help from ‘The Walking Dead’

Gus Fring Died as Zombie on 'Breaking Bad Thanks to Special Help from 'The Walking Dead'

Gus’ death on Breaking Bad had a special helping hand from ‘The Walking Dead’ team.

As impressive as Breaking Bad was and is for its writing, directing, characters, and plot, the visual effects on the show are rarely spoken about. One feature viewers might have overlooked was the vivid representations of characters dying, generally in a gruesome manner.

There might be some fans who flinch at how explicit the gore can still be. Breaking Bad was not always for the faint-hearted, particularly whenever violent deaths have occurred out of the blue after prolonged, subdued moments.

The fact that the show shares the same network (AMC) as The Walking Dead meant Breaking Bad resembled the former in one of the episodes. As impossible as the gruesome scene was in reality, it still unsettles us to this day.

All of us remember Gus Fring (portrayed famously by Giancarlo Esposito) was ultimately in a huge cat and mouse game with Walter White (Bryan Cranston). The two begin by being nice enough to each other, even if they’re forced into being business partners.

Gus recruits Walt to create more meth, adding to further problems. Inevitably, the two butt heads after Walt murders two of Gus’ frequent dealers. This was after Gus had shielded Walt like a bodyguard because the former knew that the latter was a priceless asset.

Due to Walt turning into a serial killer and taking down those getting in his way, Gus attempts to murder Walt himself. Then it was the case of one trying to outmaneuver the other, with Gus eventually biting the dust.

Walt really turned into an evil genius, letting people overlook his scheme every single time. Gus obviously never imagined Walt would carry the potential to do anything excessively horrific, like planting a bomb on Hector Salamanca‘s (Mark Margolis) wheelchair.

Gus’ death came from a bomb exploding on Hector’s wheelchair when the former visited the latter in a nursing home. Hector had a stroke and was paralyzed, rendering him incapable to speak, so he triggered the explosive by ringing a bell.

Hector always carried a massive hatred for Gus, therefore agreeing to Walt’s scheme to put a bomb on the wheelchair as a means of suicide/murder. With Hector ready to sacrifice his life to kill Gus, a pretty chilling scene took place in the Face Off episode.

Owing to all the tiny details present in Breaking Bad, the title of the episode is quite clever. When the explosion goes off, viewers witness Gus heading out the door with half his face blasted away.

It was later confirmed the makeup on this was provided by the special effects team from the popular zombie apocalypse show The Walking Dead.

Many fans likely couldn’t believe their eyes when they saw Gus come out looking like an undead with half his face ripped to shreds. Avid fans presumably figured this was a subtle reference to The Walking Dead, which was still very new to AMC when “Face Off” premiered.

From all accounts, this was the only instance the Walking Dead Special Effects crew was involved in Breaking Bad. It was likely for the best not to include too many scenes like this and just to depict the grim nature of death in the meth underworld. Unsurprisingly, nobody else died like a zombie on Breaking Bad.

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Last modified: January 6, 2021

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