*This article contains spoilers for the Netflix Breaking Bad movie “El Camino.”
In his search to find a new home in Alaska for the character Jesse Pinkman from television’s popular series Breaking Bad, show creator Vince Gilligan told the CVN that he Googled it.
“I spent some time looking at various highways. I was thinking to myself, ‘How would you get up there?’” Gilligan told the CVN this week. “I was looking at the major highways into Alaska. The Haines Highway, from all accounts on Google, seemed to be among the prettiest.”
In the final sequence of the movie released last month that wraps up the Breaking Bad storyline, a man who prepared a fake identity for Pinkman tells the fugitive: “This is Alaska. Forty miles in that direction, gets you to Haines.”
Gilligan said from the television and movies he’s watched, and from the books he’s read, Alaska symbolizes to him “the last frontier” and “a beautiful land with not that many people where you have to rely on yourself.”
“From the (Google) search I did, I thought it would be a good place for Jesse to live,” Gilligan said. “I hate to admit it, but there’s not a deeper reason than that.”
In the film’s final sequence near the border station, Pinkman, flanked by snow berms, gazes into a backdrop of evergreens, mountains and blue sky.
“It’s quiet,” Pinkman said.
“Not many of us get a chance to start fresh,” his accomplice says toward the final scene, before Pinkman drives toward Haines along a snow-covered highway.
Gilligan said the scene was filmed outside of Jackson, Wyoming with the Grand Tetons in the background. He said because of low cloud coverage, the film crew didn’t need to perform “digital trickery” to mask the easily recognizable Tetons. Although he wanted to film the final sequence along the Haines Highway, it was too cost prohibitive.
When asked if residents should expect to see film crews wandering Haines for a sequel, Gilligan said he has no current plans for the story’s continuation, but left the possibility open-ended.
“That ending may indeed be the final happily-ever-after moment, the end of Jesse’s story,” Gilligan said. “Or it may not be. If there is a sequel, I image we would definitely come visit Haines and learn more about it.”
When told about Haines amenities including Dalton City, the set from Haines’ last appearance in a feature film, “White Fang,” Gilligan said he “had a feeling (Jesse) went to a better place.”
“It sounds like Jesse would have a great time up there,” Gilligan said. “He would enjoy the brewery and maybe get a job with the ski manufacturer. It sounds to me like the very nice people of Alaska would welcome him into the community.”
But if the story does pick up in Haines, Gilligan might want to consult with police chief Heath Scott for insight into rural Alaska policing. When informed of El Camino’s happily-ever-after ending for the reformed meth manufacturer, dealer and fugitive from the law, Scott quipped: “That’s funny. I take exception to that, just a little.”