This feature was published on Wired.co.uk in August 2018
When it was first announced, in 2013, that Vince Gilligan and co-writer Peter Gould were creating a spin-off series from Breaking Bad – a prequel set around the rise of Bob Odenkirk’s farcically grotesque, ‘criminal’ lawyer Saul Goodman – few people could have predicted that four seasons later, the show would yet to have introduced its main character, Saul Goodman.
Instead, the show has chosen to slow down the hyper-real world of Breaking Bad – with its planes falling out of the sky, with its exploding wheelchairs, with its meth Nazis – and focus instead on a character study of Jimmy McGill, the hapless former con man Saul used to be. Measured, mesmeric, dense, the show burns with a pace that could be described as uncompromising – gradually strengthening its connections to Breaking Bad, gradually developing Jimmy’s metamorphosis into Saul, but holding firm to its belief that the journey is meatier, more thematically interesting than the destination. It’s bold – and it scares the hell out of Gilligan and Gould.
“I am suffused with fear,” laughs Gould, who originally created the character of Saul in 2009, while writing on Breaking Bad season two. “I really hope people stick with us. But our theory has always been that these characters fascinate us, so they’ll fascinate the audience. We had this wonderful, unexpected once-in-a-lifetime success with Breaking Bad, and that’s bought us a lot of audience trust. People have trust that we’re putting things on screen for a reason and that there will be a pay-off eventually. And we try not to abuse that trust. Having said that, we premiered episode one of season four at San Diego Comic Con recently, and it is a quiet, intimate episode. And the audience’s silence scared me. But then towards the end something happens and suddenly you could hear breath explode – people were quiet, but they were with the characters the whole time.”
“I’m always scared too,” chips in Gilligan, also laughing, “but I feel like if you can see what everyone else is generally doing and then try and go the opposite way, you’ll never go too far wrong.”
One of the many reasons that Better Call Saul has been able to maintain this pace is because of the fascinatingly complex relationship between the charismatic, loyal but morally dubious Jimmy and his older, smarter, stuffier brother Chuck (Michael McKean), a brilliant lawyer housebound by a psychosomatic illness which makes him believe he is allergic to electricity. Season four picks up almost immediately after season three, which saw Chuck – after years of intense feuding with Jimmy, and having just lost his law firm – burn himself alive in the grip of a mental breakdown. For Jimmy – who sincerely loved Chuck, even after it was revealed that he had tried to sabotage his legal career – it’s going to hit him hard.
“Jimmy has surprised us over and over again with his depth and complexity,” says Gould, “and as we started thinking about this we came to understand that his process for mourning Chuck is going to be a unique one. And potentially one that drives him closer to the goal that we all know we’re heading towards – although sometimes with dread – the idea that this guy Jimmy McGill is gonna become Saul Goodman. And I think this event is one of the things that really gives us insight into how that actually happened.”
In a way, Jimmy is already Saul Goodman, and always has been. One of Chuck’s main beliefs about Jimmy – and one of the main themes of the show – is that even when he tries to change (he starts in the mail room of Chuck’s firm; he studies in the evening for a law degree) he can never truly escape his days as Slippin’ Jimmy, a small-time con man whose signature was slipping on ice to collect compensation. And although this prejudice may appear cruel and unfair, Chuck does have a point. For even when Jimmy tries to do good — such as helping his lawyer girlfriend Kim (Rhea Seehorn) land a new client — his instincts are to cut corners, to play low and dirty. And when that instinct meets extremity (say, money trouble, or the suicide of his brother) it tends to bend towards something darker.
“It could be argued conversely that a lot of Jimmy’s badness was brought on by his relationship with Chuck,” says Gilligan. “And as much sympathy as I do hold for Chuck, I think Chuck’s generally disapproving and unsupporting attitude towards his brother actually sent Jimmy further and further down the path of being Slippin’ Jimmy.”
“But,” counters Gould, “I think the other side of that is that just because you understand someone’s behaviour doesn’t mean they can’t change it. And it’s all about the decisions that Jimmy makes; he does have free will, he is not a victim of circumstances, he knows right from wrong. I think in the end you have to hold him responsible for the bad things that he does, and in a lot of ways, when he becomes Saul Goodman, the world is a worse place because of his presence in it. It’s a very interesting thing because in the writers’ room we want to understand him, but understanding is not excusing.”
Balancing the inherent malevolence of an antihero with the entertaining elements that also make them so engaging to watch is a tricky subject that Gilligan is all-too-acquainted with. For one of the most interesting facets of Breaking Bad, which celebrated its tenth anniversary earlier this year, was what New Yorker critic Emily Nussbaum once called the ‘bad fan’. ’They’re the Sopranos buffs who wanted a show made up of nothing but whackings,’ she wrote. ‘They’re the Girls watchers who were aesthetically outraged by Hannah having sex with Josh(ua). They’re the ones who get furious whenever anyone tries to harsh Don Draper’s mellow.’
And in the case of Breaking Bad, they were the guys who idolised Bryan Cranston’s Walter White, who cheered on his descent into evil instead of being repulsed by it, and who poured scorn on his wife Skyler White, a character whose biggest crime seemed to be that she would like her husband to stop cooking meth. The hate became so intense in fact that actress Anna Gunn wrote a column in the New York Times about it, citing misogyny towards a TV wife that didn’t just ‘stand by her man’. Were Gilligan and Gould conscious of the ‘bad fan’ in approaching Jimmy’s own descent into darkness?
“I don’t know if it should change the way a writer tells his or her story,” says Gilligan. “You approach any character day by day, moment by moment, decision by decision, and the best kind of storytelling is when we slow up and say, ‘what does Walter White want at this moment? What’s between him and his desire?’ You’re letting the character dictate to you… And honestly, you’ve got to tune out all the reaction to it as much as you possibly can, without allowing for too much feedback that might change the story in ways you don’t intend.
“Having said that, [the reaction] was somewhat dismaying. It’s weird because I don’t wanna bite any of the hands that have fed me so well for the past decade but yeah – people loved Walter White more than I ever would’ve guessed, and people hated Skyler White and I never saw that coming at all. My 80-year old mom who is just as sweet and lovely as she can be, who loves Hallmark movies and stuff, she wanted Walter White to get away at the end!”
As Better Call Saul reaches its fourth season, as it edges closer and closer to the day that Jimmy becomes a lawyer so amoral that it’s played for laughs, the prequel’s ties to Breaking Bad are becoming clearer. Season three, for instance, saw Mike fall into the employ of fan-favourite fried chicken druglord Gustavo Fring (Giancarlo Esposito), whose storyline serves as a conduit for most of Better Call Saul’s callbacks and cameos.
“Gus Fring is endlessly fascinating,” says Gould. “There were things that were taken for granted on Breaking Bad – Gus Fring almost seemed like a magician who was producing places and things and events. This season – I think we get more of a glimpse behind the curtain of how Gus Fring makes things happen and specifically why the events of Breaking Bad went down the way they did.”
“I think Breaking Bad fans are going to rejoice when they see some of the episodes this season,” adds Gilligan. “There are scenes in season four that would’ve been right at home in Breaking Bad. You really do get two shows for the price of one.”
But of course, what many fans want – and which both Gilligan and Gould have been asked about many, many times – is for the prequel to include cameos by Bryan Cranston’s Walter White, and his profane, drug-dealing sidekick Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul). But is this something they actually want to do themselves? Or is it something that they feel pressured into shoehorning into the show?
“We’ve already let the cat out the bag that yet again this season we won’t be seeing that happen,” says Gilligan, “but just as a fan I’d love to see them. But nothing can happen on this show, or in this universe, inorganically. If the opportunity never presents itself for Walt and Jesse to appear in Better Call Saul then I’m guessing we won’t have them appear. Even though people might be disappointed, I think it’d ultimately be for the good because people would understand that there’s a real thought, a real plan behind this. Having said that, I’m dying to see Walt and Jesse show up on this thing. But it’s going to happen in its own proper time – or not at all!”
If there’s one thing that’s become crystal blue clear, Better Call Saul will not be rushed.