Breaking Bad has been hailed as one of the greatest TV series of all time. Now the pressure is on for its spin-off, Better Call Saul, to deliver, writes Debashine Thangevelo
SO Better Call Saul is finally coming to our screens – and Breaking Bad fans can’t suppress their excitement to see one of their favourite badass characters return.
That’s unsurprising given that Breaking Bad has gone down in the TV annals for myriad reasons. It was listed as one of the Top 10 TV series (for five years) in The American Film Institute. It had author Stephen King succumb to its allure. He even compared it to Twin Peaks and Blue Velvet. Sir Anthony Hopkins penned a letter of praise to the show’s star, Bryan Cranston. And in 2013, Guinness World Records named Breaking Bad the highest-rated TV series of all time. During its five-season run, it bagged 16 Emmys, and, overall, walked away with 110 accolades from other award ceremonies. That’s not taking into account the hypnotic effect it had on some of our leading celebrities, who tweeted about their devastation to see it end.
But, in Hollywood, the end of one journey, as remarkable as it was for Breaking Bad, can mean the start of a new one.
That’s where Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould come in with Better Call Saul. The show runners have homed in on Saul Goodman – one of the series’ favourite characters – to keep Breaking Bad’s legacy alive.
Before he was the slick criminal lawyer introduced in the second season, he was James Morgan McGill, a cash-strapped public defender in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Of course, he was never without ingenuity in trying to change around his rather ruinous circumstances – not that it works in his favour.
Viewers have developed an appetite for the morally contaminated protagonist. And he delivers.
The polarity of seeing this man, broken, on the brink of bankruptcy to him brushing off the defeat by scheming his way out of his predicament, is masterfully handled. Saul is a multilayered character. That he is blessed with a silver tongue and a concealed Machiavellian disposition makes him interesting, too.
Just to shed some clarity, Walter White and Jesse Pinkman won’t be appearing in this spin-off, which starts six years earlier. However, Jonathan Banks, better known as Mike Ehrmantraut (the cleaner), is one of the leads. And Raymond Cruz pops up as his trigger-happy Mexican gangster character, as do his henchmen.
Bob Odenkirk, who plays Saul, says: “I think Vince and Peter have a great time creating highly conflicting ethical situations where personal drive juxtaposes with good behaviour. The character has to navigate a complex and sort of ever-changing prism of ethical choices. And that is fun to watch with this character. Also, Saul Goodman is not who he is – as he tells Walter White the first time he meets him. So in this show, you are getting to meet who he (really) is.”
Of course, revisiting his character’s former self involved a lot more work for the actor.
He admits: “Yeah, I had to rethink him. He’s a different guy and far more dimensional than Saul Goodman was on Breaking Bad; a much richer character, but by necessity. He’s on screen a lot more and the story is about him. So I had to talk to Vince and Peter to figure out these new sides of the character.”
THE CREATORS’ TAKE
Shedding light on how they planned to introduce this spin-off to fans, Gilligan notes: “I have to admit a big part of the fun for us in setting the series as a prequel six years earlier, is that it allows the sky to be the limit in the sense that all the characters who are deceased when Breaking Bad ends, could theoretically show up.”
Gould adds: “Walt and Jesse will not appear in season one. We want this show to stand on its own.”
As for the protagonist meandering on this path of depravity, Gilligan offers: “Usually in fiction, goodness always leads to a happy ending. And we all know, in life, sometimes being ethical lands you in the shitter, so to speak. I’m sure everyone who is watching, remembers what a slippery, two-faced unethical guy Saul Goodman was.”
Gould elaborates: “He’s willing to kill Badger right away. When we started to think about who this guy was, and how he got to be that way, we found that wasn’t the guy we are starting with. We learnt that there’s a lot more nuance to his ethics.”
WHAT CRITICS ARE SAYING
Alan SepinWall (HitFix): The Saul Goodman of Breaking Bad couldn’t carry a series, and Gilligan and Gould have wisely humanised him to the point where Jimmy McGill (and Bob Odenkirk) can. He’s no saint – one of the highlights of the first episode involves him hypnotising a pair of young con men with rapturous tales of his days as a slip and fall artist known in Chicago as “Slippin” Jimmy’ – but nor is he the completely cynical, amoral operator who will tell Walt and Jesse the easiest way out of a dilemma is to murder Jesse’s friend, Badger.
Jeff Jensen (Entertainment Weekly): As a satire about self-creation, as a subversive poke at those who find wish fulfilment in anti-hero fantasy, Better Call Saul has promise and purpose.
Unfortunately, the show does not yet know how to entertain anything but deep-dive service.
The energetic visual storytelling engages, but the deliberate pacing left me restless. I like the offbeat black comedy and downbeat poignancy, but the qualities don’t mix well at present.
• Better Call Saul airs on M-Net Edge (DStv channel 102) on Wednesday at 9pm.