Ozymandias

While we don't usually post much in terms of TV content, this subtle, understated promo for the final chapter in the Breaking Bad saga was too good to pass up, narrating a passage from Percy Bysshe Shelley's famous short poem: Ozymandias. The theme of the passage, narrated by Bryan Cranston centers around the inevitable decline of all leaders, and the empires they once built, regardless of how mighty they once were.

I met a traveller from an antique land Who said: — Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert…Near them, on the sand, half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed: And on the pedestal these words appear: 'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!' Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away.