What's the Meaning of *Breaking Bad'*s Lost-esque Lottery Numbers?

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The GPS coordinates Walt used to hide his millions on last night'sBreaking Bad immediately drew speculation as to their meaning amongst fans. Image via jfmezei/Twitter

Spoiler alert: Spoilers for Sunday night's episode of Breaking Bad—"Buried"—follow. Proceed with caution.

A weird thing happened last night on Twitter: Lost co-creator Damon Lindelof talked about a series of mysterious numbers and their enigmatic role on a TV show.

Wait, what is this, 2009? Well, not exactly. After watching the latest episode of Breaking Bad, where a series of numbers–34, 59, 20, 106, 36, 52–played a crucial role, Hollywood Reporter chief TV critic Tim Goodman commented, "Part of me wishes I could see the smile on the face of @DamonLindelof after tonight's #BreakingBad episode. The lure & lore of numbers." After all, it's hard to see a lottery ticket with potential huge numerical significance on a TV show without thinking of the now-infamous "4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42" of Hurley's winning lottery ticket on Lost.

Lindelof's response? "My smile has nothing to do with numbers and everything to do with the brilliance of Breaking Bad." Fair enough. AMC's crystal meth drama is hitting so hard right now it doesn't need Walter White's lottery ticket numbers to mean anything. However, on a show so carefully constructed, it's hard not to wonder: Are those numbers more than just the coordinates to Walt's stashed cash?

The Breaking Bad fandom immediately kicked into gear after Sunday's episode to decode the meaning of: N 34, 59', 20", W 106, 36', 52," and it wasn't long before people figured out the Easter egg. The show didn't want to use the real coordinates for Walt's dramatic burial scene–the same spot where Walt and Jesse did their first cook in the RV–since it was filmed on Navajo land, so the real location it points is Q Studios in Albuquerque, where Breaking Bad is filmed. (Also, one of the shooting locations for The Avengers.)

Regardless, is there a deeper in-story significance to the numbers? Is Breaking Bad trying to pull a Lost? WIRED asked the show's writer's assistant Gordon Smith and script coordinator Jenn Carroll—who ostensibly fact-check the show—about the numbers and whether or not they have Lost-ian significance.

Smith's answer: "Nope. Not even a little. Walt needed to find an inconspicuous way to encode the numbers for his family in the future, and the lottery seemed like a good medium for hiding them in plain sight."

Bummer. However, it's still incredible that in just a few short years television has gone from a passive medium to something so meticulously deconstructed that fans would be breaking down those numbers and be guessing about their significance in a matter of hours. There are even folks speculating at the meaning of Walt's license plate. Thanks to the internet we now live in a media-consumption landscape where everything—colors, locations, numbers, signs, etc.—can be picked apart communally in near real-time, and Breaking Bad is no exception.

That means Smith and Carroll have to perfect anything that might be poured over by fans looking for clues, which is why Carroll had to ensure that the GPS coordinates were accurate—using an art director's smartphone app—and get approval from the studio to use them. She also added ensured the accuracy of something else that most folks would probably never see: The coordinates on Lydia's phone when she calls in Todd and his uncle's neo-Nazi posse to take out Declan's meth-cooking crew. They're actually for an airport: Phoenix Sky Harbor, aka "America's Friendliest Airport."

"We wanted them to be in Arizona, but not somewhere where fans might think there was actually something hidden," Carroll said. "So our clearance folks at [Breaking Bad's studio] Sony suggested using an Arizona airport, which worked out perfectly – no one will get very far digging a giant hole in the center of the tarmac."

That's not the only fun fact—pardon the pun—buried in Sunday night's episode. It turns out it is possible to encode GPS digits on New Mexico lottery tickets—Walt simply had to buy six rounds of the state's Pick 3 game, which instead of automatically placing the digits in numerical order allows players to choose the order themselves.

Also, what grounds did the authorities have for holding Jesse Pinkman for, essentially, giving away money? It turns out you can get picked up by the cops for Robin Hooding around throwing stacks of cash out your window. To find out what, exactly, the improper distribution of thousands of dollars in cash would be, Carroll asked law enforcement officials, who noted that it would be considered reckless endangerment and careless driving. Also, driving around with duffel bags of cash usually would lead officers into thinking drugs were involved in some way.

"I went to the source and cold-called the Albuquerque Police Department," Carroll said. "Basically: Hi, officers, is it okay to drive around with $5 million in my car? Asking for a friend."