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In the TV adaptation of the movie Limitless, they introduced a new character named Brian Finch. Throughout the series, Finch constantly speaks with the audience, trying to communicate with the audience.

There was a similar manner in the movie when Morra seems to say his life story to the audience, but Finch seems to go further and try to interact with the audience. Now, he never shows any indication (as far as I remember), that he knows him being a character in a TV show, but without going that deep, he always tries to talk to the audience. unlike Morra did, which is more similar to telling his story.

So everything combined Finch did, can it be considered that Brian Finch really did break the fourth wall?

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  • I'm looking for Executive Producer confirmation, before I make an answer, but I would say he did. Even when I look it up on Google, most reviewers comment on him doing so.
    – Darth Locke
    Commented Jun 27, 2019 at 12:49
  • Especially "Brain Finch's Black Ops" Episode, I'm pretty sure he directly talked to the audience there.
    – Darth Locke
    Commented Jun 27, 2019 at 12:57
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    I don't understand the question: I haven't watched the series, but isn't a character acknowledging/talking directly to the audience the very definition of breaking the fourth wall? tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BreakingTheFourthWall
    – Luciano
    Commented Jun 27, 2019 at 15:50
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    @DarthLocke He constantly gave out mixed-feelings about that, IMO. before posted here, I did lil googling and found few of similar reviews, but they weren't giving out much credibility to their opinions
    – Vishwa
    Commented Jun 28, 2019 at 3:01
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    @Luciano as Locke said, show is not clear on Finch's intentions. sometimes it illustrated that Finch is spitting out his mind for us, similar to someone narrating the story, sometimes he just talks to himself, sometimes he talks to audience and/or someone else around him or some imaginary character. (he has several copies of himself he even used to talk to).. so tl;dr; it's complicated
    – Vishwa
    Commented Jun 28, 2019 at 3:04

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Yes, He did.

Confirmation from Executive Producer Craig Sweeny Speaking with IndieWire:

“I do write whatever the weirdest thing on procedural TV is at any given moment,” he said when Indiewire spoke with him after the screening. “‘Medium’ was very strange and ‘Elementary’ had some very high-concept episodes as well, so I know how to inject that into a CBS show. There was a talking fetus in the first episode and no one said, ‘Take out the talking fetus.’ We have breaking the fourth wall and singing in the second episode and they’re not telling us to take it out. They’re saying they like it. So, for now anyway, they’re letting us have fun.”

Consensus from Recaps/Reviews:

Vulture - Brian Finch's Black Ops - Recap

Things get a little weird, though, when mysterious men break into Brian’s apartment, interrupt his fourth-wall-breaking monologue, Tase him, and kidnap him. “Oh, that’s not how it goes,” he notes.

TV.com - Brian Finch's Black Ops - Recap

And, thankfully, the episode did the smart thing by paying respect to Ferris, especially with that familiar opening sequence, without diving too far into shot-for-shot remake territory. This tactic was helped a great deal by the fact that Limitless already employed a variety of devices to get Brian talking to himself; stretching that a bit further to a couple fourth-wall breaking nods to young Mr. Bueller only added to Brian's shaggy dog charm off the NZT.

i09 - Arm-ageddon - Recap

So to catch the arm hacker, Brian uses NZT to become a hacker himself. (“Did you hack the New York Stock Exchange...?” is a sentence that escapes Rebecca’s mouth at one point.) While Brian’s breaking the fourth wall making fun of “hackers at work” montages in TV shows and movies, he doesn’t subject us to rapid vignettes of overly determined typing; instead, we get Vines of cats.

IGN - Brian Finch's Black Ops - Review

After a decidedly serious episode last week, Limitless steered back into more comedic territory with a full-on Ferris Bueller homage, complete with character references, fourth-wall breaking monologues and music from the 1986 film.

No Fourth Wall - TV Trope Listed Under Limitless at tvtropes.org

Some series can go their entire lives without breaking the Fourth Wall once. Some series will occasionally break the Fourth Wall for a few moments of comedy, but outside of that the Fourth Wall is in full effect.

And then there are these.

A series with No Fourth Wall doesn't just break the fourth wall, it vaporizes it. There might as well not be one. Characters will make references to "the last episode" or "next issue". They'll criticize the production, writing, management or even the audience. In extreme cases, they'll refuse to go on acting. Expect there to be large amounts of Medium Awareness, such as characters in a comic pointing out the use of panels. No Fourth Wall often leads to characters being extremely Genre Savvy, or frequent lampshading of Genre Blindness.

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