It was hard to say goodbye to Breaking Bad when the show went off the air back in 2013. Aaron Paul may have left the role of Jesse Pinkman behind, but he didn't leave everything behind, having scavenged an incredible prop that is almost certainly one-of-a-kind. Aaron Paul is now the proud owner of the demolished head of drug kingpin Gus Fring.
In a chat with Seth Meyers on Late Night, Aaron Paul had this to say about the peculiar prop:
I have his head. Like no joke I actually have that head in my media room. I do it on purpose – not telling [people] – because they don’t see it right away, when they walk downstairs. But then, you can tell when they see it; they’re just like, ‘Oh shit.’
“Oh shit” is probably the appropriate reaction to walking down a flight of steps into a media room and finding a head with half the flesh stripped off. Still, it’s probably a great way for Aaron Paul to figure out if his guests have actually seen Breaking Bad. The “Oh shit!” from a Breaking Bad fan is likely very different from an “Oh shit!” from somebody who has no idea why this young actor has such a creepy half-head in his home.
The cranial remains of Gus Fring is an unusual souvenir to be sure, but it's also be a great reminder of one of the most incredible arcs in the history of Breaking Bad, if not all of TV. Fring was outmaneuvering Walt and Jesse at every turn, and it was only by sheer luck and happenstance that our merry meth cooks had survived long enough for Walt to come up with a final scheme to take out the kingpin. After learning that Fring had made a mortal enemy out of the wheelchair-bound Hector Salamanca, Walt convinced Hector to blow himself and the unsuspecting Fring to smithereens. Fring’s final living and breathing act was to walk out of Hector’s room and adjust his tie before falling to the ground with his face looking like…well, with his face looking like this:
Half of his face may have been gone, but at least his tie looked snazzy. The death of Gus Fring is one of the biggest moments of the whole of Breaking Bad, so it’s only fitting that somebody from the cast was able to smuggle the gruesome head off set. Better for Aaron Paul to get to use it to scare houseguests than for it to gather dust in a warehouse somewhere. Kudos to Paul for having the gumption to go for such an incredible prop. Personally, I’d love to know how he did it. Hopefully, he didn’t have to try to fly anywhere with the head, since that kind of baggage could definitely lead to some awkward conversations with airport security.
Don’t forget to take a look at our schedule of summer TV premiere dates to see what you’ll be able to watch in the near future. If you want to see the whole clip of Aaron Paul on Late Night with Seth Meyers, head to the next page and check it out!
