Walt and Jesse had a toxic relationship without a doubt, as Jesse was a broken man after a while, and Walt was the guy that helped do this in part. But for all that, Walt always had a soft spot for Jesse, as he’d been his teacher and became his partner in the drug trade, no matter how many time Jesse did something stupid that could have endangered their business and their lives. The thing was, there was loyalty between the two of them, no matter how messed-up it appeared at times or how much they just needed to get away from each other. They had their spats, there’s no doubt about that, as Jesse was slowly falling apart at different points in the series, and Walt had to be there to snap him out of it or pick him back up and get Jesse back on track. But when it came to cooking meth they were partners, and they worked best together since each man knew how to anticipate the other, they knew each other’s moods, and they simply fit as a team. It might not make sense to some folks, especially those that haven’t watched the series, but these two men were actually best when working alongside one another. Their overall relationship was a bit screwy to be certain, but despite everything that Walt did, and he did a lot, he still had a hear when it came to Jesse. He did his best to preserve his family, and ended up losing them obviously since he couldn’t stop, but for one reason or another he always came back for Jesse.
There’s no doubt at all that Walt was more dangerous than Jesse could ever be, as he was a manipulator that could get people to do what he wanted and was also able to plan ahead or in the moment as he needed to. Along the way towards securing the kind of money that could keep his family safe upon his passing, Walt did a number of things that his old self would never do, trading his own sense of morality for a chance to keep making money that continued to put both him and Jesse in the fire without a discernible way out. A lot of times we did get to see that he had at least one pure motive for doing what he did, but it was all too often squashed by the bad things he continued to do. At one point Walt had almost no redeeming qualities, which is kind of interesting since going into the series Walt was the straight-laced individual that wouldn’t think of hurting anyone or even looking at someone in the wrong manner, where Jesse was the young punk that didn’t care and was ready to do whatever he needed to in order to get what he wanted and survive. As the series went along however they eventually started to trade roles, though Jesse never became a legal-minded individual as Walt had once been. Walt though, became someone that was simply too dangerous to deal with unless one knew him, trading his nice guy look for something a little more hardened and becoming Heisenberg in a very profound way.
The fact that they stood up for one another at various points in the series made it obvious that as hard as it was to keep their relationship going there were elements of that relationship that they couldn’t escape. The same effect can be seen in a lot of relationships that people experience in real life, as there are a lot of us that have known people that we can’t stand at all times but still feel something for all the same. We might know that any connection with said people is bound to be toxic and make us wonder why we keep going back, but there’s something, some quality that person has, that makes us keep on going back regardless of the fact that we know what’s going to happen and what the eventual outcome will be. We go back because we know there’s something there, even if there’s the chance that it’s not something we need or should want in our lives. That’s part of what went on between Walt and Jesse, they knew the relationship was toxic but there was still something there that they both needed, be it practical or not. Jesse was there to look after Walt and basically do what he instructed, while Walt was there to manipulate Jesse and still somehow bring him back from the brink when he absolutely needed to. That kind of toxicity is hard to stay away from as it’s been seen throughout history, but it’s something that acts a lot like a drug as well. In any case, Walt had a heart when it came to Jesse, which is ironic in a very twisted way.
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