TV Review: Better Call Saul has surpassed Breaking Bad
Bob Odenkirk as Jimmy McGill in Better Call Saul
- Better Call Saul
- Netflix
Alongside and , was one of the great works of art of the golden era of prestige TV. But unlike other classics of 21st-century television, the series spawned an immediate spin-off in .
This new series was a prequel chronicling the adventures of huckster lawyer, Saul Goodman (Bob Odenkirk). And it represented a huge gamble on the part of the creative duo of Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould. signed off with a devastating finale. Yet the showrunners now risked blotting its legacy. Television spin-offs, after all, have a massively patchy history. gave the world . However, had resulted in . Which side of the line would fall?
Eight years later, as the series returns to Netflix for its final (mini) season we have our answer. told the straightforward story of anti-hero Walter White’s journey from teacher to meth lord. But has pulled off the trickier feat of painting a complex portrait of moral decline and fall.
Saul was introduced back in season one as Jimmy McGill, a flop-sweating struggling lawyer destined to live in the shadow of his more successful brother, Chuck.
Yet across the subsequent six seasons, it has told the multifaceted tale of a sympathetic soul falling victim to his worst instincts. He isn’t a monster in the vein of Walter White. He is something far more chilling: an ordinary person who becomes an accidental villain.
As Jimmy/Saul has spiralled into the dark side so has turned increasingly grim. And goodness did it take another step towards the void with the latest episode (technically installment eight of season six – in reality, part one of its final run of episodes).
Jimmy and his wife and accomplice Kim (Rhea Seehorn) have done some terrible things. But by far the worst is their latest wheeze of framing their old boss Howard Hamlin (Patrick Fabian) as a cocaine addict.
They've ruined his career. They are also responsible for his death. Howard was in the wrong place at the wrong time when cartel sociopath Lala Salamanca (Tony Dalton) confronted Jimmy and Kim – and paid for it with his life.
That was the explosive sign-off to season six part one. And now the series returned with further shocks (we shall avoid details for fear of spoiling). First Lala forced Jimmy and Kim to help him take down his mortal foe Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito). This led to a seismic confrontation between two of the show’s great villains – with results that will alter the trajectory of Saul Goodman’s life permanently.
Here was modern noir delivered with dazzling verve. And it was yet another vindication of Gilligan and Gould. They could have left Walter White in the deep desert after his adventures in crime had come to an end. Instead they did something much more difficult and impressive – creating, with , television that has surpassed even .
