Dexter or Breaking Bad??

wow...you've missed a LOT of nuance if that's your analysis. Walter's character has completely and utterly transformed. His character arc has been a freight train since day one. At this point in the show, you're correct, he has very little "inner struggle", but his ruthless/egotistical sadism has been hard won and developed episode after episode. The Walter White that killed Mike and ordered the hit on the 9 is a very, very different Walter White than the guy who was panicking in tightywhities in the dessert.

On the other hand, Dexter is devoid of feeling and empathy (inherently free of internal struggle by his own admission) and has been the same character for 6 seasons. Outside of some of the larger season, half-season overarching stories, Dexter is two notches above a typical serial procedural in its "Dexter discovers murderous scumbag who outplayed the system and doles out his brand of justice" format. The show is formulaic, and has become totally stale and has officially jumped the shark.

The biggest difference between the two shows is that Breaking Bad is a specific story with a definitive 3 act structure and a premeditated conclusion (not unlike The Wire) whereas Dexter is a show about the exploits of a specific character. The character is an interesting and well fleshed out one to be sure, but there's no real building momentum to the show. It's our protagonist thrown into an arbitrary conflict that is ultimately resolved, and then the cycle starts anew with almost no connection between them. The brilliance of Breaking Bad is that it takes the mold laid out by Sopranos and takes it a step further. Both shows feature a protagonist guilty of atrocious behavior, and yet they're presented in such a way to be sympathetic. You never doubted who to "root" for in the Sopranos, however.BB has done the impossible and is truly unprecedented in that it has made a once sympathetic and justifiably malicious character and pushed him beyond redemption. The mere fact that Walter has become unlikable and that we the audience have come to understand that he is no longer a man in dire straights doing a criminal thing in order to provide, but rather a raging, megalomaniac with a superiority complex is incredible. You could look at BB as the traditional cop show told from the other perspective. Most shows like this would've had Hank as the protagonist, and it's like as the show wraps up, he's been the "main character" all along. I could go on and on, but I've ranted plenty.

I like Dexter, have seen every episode, but man...even trying to be objective and taking into consideration literary merit, acting, filming, editing, and on and on, BB mops the floor with Dexter.

The only shows that have been on air that are as good or better than Breaking Bad have been The Wire and The Sopranos.

I've posted this link before, but it's relevant. The recaps written weekly on Grantland about BB (and many other great show like Homeland...which is fucking INCREDIBLE btw) are as much fun as the show itself sometimes. Andy Greenwald is the author of them all, and each and everyone is worth reading. Here's the one for the finale:

http://www.grantland.com/blog/hollywood-prospectus/post/_/id/56724/breaking-bad-season-5-episode-7-gliding-over-all

also my dad (on left) kinda looks like walter white

or at least walt reminds me of him, and they're behaviorally similar as well. /dadclaim

He looks like a bitch.

I'm gonna go with dexter, because I literally don't like a single character in Breaking Bad...

Turns you on, eh

bump