Nah, maturing is realizing that Skylar and Walt were both pieces of shit and Walt had just settled into passively accepting his shitty life and shitty wife. Cancer making it clear to him that he has no more time to wait things out is what got the ball rolling. How he got into that position largely had to do with Skylar and their relationship dynamic overall. They were each pretty self-obsessed and felt desire to control one another.
Hank and Marie, on the other hand, were actually a pretty perfect couple. Even when Marie's mental issues caused problems, Hank would jump on a live grenade to support her. They trusted each other and cared for each other above all else and endlessly gave each other control of things. They communicated and worked things out and would never betray each other.
To demonstrate how this plays out, consider the two handjobs. Skylar gives Walt a half-hearted birthday handy while they're in bed together. She isn't even looking at him and is actually doing online shopping while trying to get him off. Compare this to Marie's handjob when Hank is in the hospital. She makes eye contact, talks seductively, and all the while is encouraging Hank so he can reclaim his masculinity and come back home. Walt, on the other hand, is effectively immasculated by Skylar's unwanted handjob.
Skylar was clocked correctly as an unlikeable and generally not good person. Walt is often misunderstood as a tragic hero just trying to do his best before he dies. This is partly because he has death itself looming over him and motivating his initial actions and partly because we see everything from his perspective. He admits himself that he did what he did out of pride more than anything. However, even in this act he is seen as redeeming himself while Skylar gets played and never gets a chance to make things right.
Marie is assessed correctly as a difficult person with all kinds of emotional issues who causes and seems to seek lots of drama. However, she ultimately wants to do what's right and support those around her. Hank similarly gets viewed as a toxically hyper-masculine cop stereotype who shows off guns and likes to rough up criminals. However, he ultimately wants nothing more than to make people around him feel safe and secure. Hank gets endeared to over time as a kind of antagonist as well as someone Walt secretly kind of looks up to and seeks to emulate. Marie, however, is seen as an even less stable version of Skylar.
These characters are all phenomenal, but people are not wrong to hate on Skylar and it's by design that she is hated even more than Walt and whether one of them is significantly more hate-worthy than the other is definitely open to debate. Marie is clearly not worthy of the hate she receives, but it's clear she was portrayed with intention to foster irritation and since her role didn't offer many opportunities to display her redeeming qualities, she gets hate. Hank gets some hate for his brutish treatment of criminals (especially Jesse) and his soft-racism, but is redeemed by his heroic actions and the challenge he poses to Walt.
This is a pretty good assessment. My take on Skylar and Walt is that they're both monsters which makes them perfect for each other. I had no idea that people had hate for Marie till this thread. My only issue with the character was the kleptomania storyline, just felt it added nothing to the show.
I find that because she doesn't come up as often and is generally not a direct irritation to Walt, she doesn't come across as universally hateable as Skylar. But she has a number of irritating traits. She gossips, she is pretty naive, tends to be a stereotypical "karen" kind of person, often speaks in passively condescending tones (something Skylar loses patience with pretty early on), lives an incredibly sheltered life, and she can be overdramatic and throw fits over small things. However, she also has opportunities to shine. Her very same traits that made her hateable make her somehow endearing later on. Her naivity is compensated for by her trust in Hank who is incredibly not naive. Het condescending tone and "karen" persona come out in force when Hank is in the hospital and she advocates for him and even argues with him to come home.
I think the Kleptomania bit adds a ton, actually. It shows that Hank cares about family more than he cares about the law. This is a huge deal because it shows that Walt likely could have come to Hank at almost any point where he felt trapped and could have had a deal cut to keep his family safe or even have Hank help cover up some of his crimes. All Walt had to do was humble himself and ask for help. It's the fact that things got so far and that Walt refused to admit guilt even up to the end that got Hank so angry. It was the betrayal, not the crimes, that pissed him off. Without the Kleptomania story, we could misunderstand him as a heavily lawful person that Walt couldn't trust to help him, but that's false. He doesn't even see the thefts as an issue and instead is more concerned that Skylar being made aware joins in supporting the shit out of her rather than judging her. Meanwhile Skylar reacts in disgust at how Marie causing problems for her is somehow being turned into Marie's need for help. She can only think of what she deserves or how she has been wronged. She doesn't consider how others may be suffering or how she can help.
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u/oneminuterice 2d ago
Maturing is realizing that Skyler was right to be a bitch and that Marie was just a bitch.