One of the most imaginative and engaging TV shows of recent memory was “Breaking Bad.” Fascinating in its concept about a mild-mannered college chemistry professor who receives a fatal medical diagnosis and ends up cooking meth to earn the funds he wants to leave his family for support after he is gone, it pushed a bunch of boundaries and was a dynamic tale rich with surprises and strange turns. Few modern series compare with the superb performances, tense plotting and absurdist humor of its drama, to cite some but hardly all of its qualities.
It’s one of those shows that I fully intend on watching again in full as soon as I have the bandwidth to do so. And I fully expect it to reveal new pleasures when I do so. It lifted its two antihero stars, Bryan Cranston (Walter White) and Aaron Paul (Jesse Pinkman), to stardom. It presented some compellingly thorny moral and ethical issues and expanded in quite challenging ways how much we might love a character in spite of the evil things they do. And damn – it was consistently entertaining. It was a series that confronted contemporary issues as well as such usual aspects of dramatic storytelling like love, friendship, family and marriage from new vectors that made the viewer think and react in ways one hadn’t before.
It’s a modern masterpiece. And in the new marketplace for TV viewing spun off both a worthy prequel series, “Better Call Saul,” and, more recently, a sequel movie, “El Camino.” It all highlights how this new and different TV environment offers many ways to bake and cut cakes.
“Better Call Saul” took one of the better “Breaking Bad” characters – oily attorney Saul Goodman – and filled in his backstory in a way that I must confess I liked almost as much as the show that originated it even if it was far less groundbreaking and less gripping than the crackling intensity of “Breaking Bad.”
Due credit for that goes to the character of Saul Goodman from “Breaking Bad,” played with a masterfully sleazy brio by Bob Odenkirk. “Better Call Saul” rewinds to some six years before the timeframe of “Breaking Bad,” when Goodman was known by his birth name, Jimmy McGill, a struggling lawyer when the series begins who was in his past a bit of a grifter.
His legal career is an attempt to follow after his older brother Chuck, partner in a respected Albuquerque law firm. But on an extended leave due to an arguably believable affliction of electromagnetic sensitivity that may be real and may just be in his head. He’s portrayed with skill by Michael McKean, and the core of the series is how Jimmy tries to be a loyal brother and help his maybe/maybe not ailing brother and how both in their ways betray one another.
It also has a secondary thread of Jimmy’s romantic relationship with Kim Wexler, a junior lawyer at Chuck’s firm. And as the series unfolds, we are introduced to a number of “Breaking Bad” characters and aspects of that series. As “Better Call Saul” ends (with Jimmy becoming Saul), it dovetails nicely into the beginning of the “Breaking Bad” tale.
“El Camino” speeds off from the explosive ending of “Breaking Bad” – that’s as spoiler as I’ll get – to follow Walter White’s younger protege Pinkman as he tries to avoid the lawmen on his tail. Though generally well-received by critics, I found the film less engaging than the two other series. Plus, while “Better Call Saul” could exist without “Breaking Bad,” “El Camino” is inexorably tied to the original show. And in the end, well worth watching by anyone who enjoyed “Breaking Bad.”
While writing this, I felt the urge to wish for a work that follows what happened to Jimmy/Saul after “Breaking Bad,” which we get glimpses of in “Better Call Saul.” It’s a series that morphed nicely into a franchise. So why shouldn’t its creators follow the thread even further?
Populist Picks
Documentary Film: “Sid & Judy” – With the theatrical movie “Judy” recently hitting theaters, this superb Showtime movie is an ideal companion piece. Centered on her relationship with Hollywood producer/talent manager Sid Luft, Garland’s third and longest-lasting husband, it brings both to life through recordings and their writings, respectively read by Jon Hamm and Jennifer Jason Leigh. It helps balance her image as a troubled, doomed figure by showing her wit, charm and brio.
Documentary Film: “Feud” – This PBS “American Experience” episode examines in full the conflicts between the Appalachian hillbilly families of Hatfields and McCoys within the wider cultural, historical and regional context to richly showcase the story behind the legend.
Rob Patterson is a music and entertainment writer in Austin, Texas. Email orca@prismnet.com.
From The Progressive Populist, March 15, 2020
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