Better Call Saul starts on Netflix - AVForums First Look

Or rather you'd better call Jimmy McGill

by Steve Withers
Movies & TV Shows News

13

Better Call Saul starts on Netflix - AVForums First Look
The decision to follow up Breaking Bad with a prequel series seemed like a strange decision for creator Vince Gilligan.
However the fact that Better Call Saul was going to be based around Saul Goodman, easily one of the most popular characters on Breaking Bad certainly made sense. As conceived, the new show will centre on the trails and tribulations of small-time lawyer Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk) in the time leading up to him opening his strip-mall law office in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Whilst the new show will take a more darkly comic approach than Breaking Bad, it does still use the established one hour running time rather than the fully comedic thirty minute slot that was originally suggested. The show’s title actually comes from the title of the eighth episode of season two of Breaking Bad, which is when Saul Goodman first makes his appearance; it’s also Saul’s catch phrase and is used in his TV ads.

If you’re wondering why Odenkirk’s character is called Jimmy McGill in the new show that’s because it’s his real name. At some point he changes it to Saul Goodman because, as he puts it, the name sounds more Jewish and a bit like “it’s all good man”. The new series takes place six years before Breaking Bad and charts Jimmy’s transition from ambitious small-time lawyer to the morally challenged legal legend who puts the criminal in "criminal lawyer.”
There are enough great lines, laughs, new characters and surprises to make Better Call Saul worth watching.
As with the final season of Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul is being shown each week on Netflix here in the UK. So the first episode was available to stream on Monday the 9th of February and you’ll be able to see the rest of the series each Tuesday, starting from the 10th of February. As an aside, whilst Breaking Bad was shot on 35mm film Better Call Saul is shot digitally at a resolution of 4K, which hopefully Netflix will support going forward.

So what was the first episode like? In a word - promising. It begins with the present day Saul Goodman who is currently in hiding after the events of Breaking Bad and working at a Cinnabon in Nebraska. This pre-credit sequence is in black and white before flashing back to earlier, colourful and presumably happier times. Of course happiness is relative and this earlier incarnation, still using his real name of Jimmy McGill, is struggling as a legitimate lawyer.

As played by the excellent Bob Odenkirk, McGill is certainly goofy but then Saul was often the comic relief in Breaking Bad, so a slightly more humorous approach works. At the moment McGill is a struggling but honest lawyer, taking what work he can get, including defending a bunch of guys who broke into a morgue and had sex with a severed head. Needless to say it doesn’t take him long to start looking for other angles, especially after he literally bumps into a pair of skateboarding con artists.

There are other new characters including his brother Chuck, played by Michael McKean, who is also a lawyer but currently house-bound because he thinks he suffers from electromagnetic hypersensitivity. Aside from the new characters, we also see a number of familiar faces although we won’t spoil the surprise by identifying them in this review. However we can say that the first episode of Better Call Saul delivered some great lines, some genuine laughs and a few surprises; thus doing enough to ensure we're looking forward to the next episode.
Follow AVforums on Google News

To share your thoughts on the above, click the Discussion tab and post a reply.

Related Content

Solo: A Star Wars Story Trailer Finally Arrives
  • By Steve Withers
  • Published
Lucasfilm release Star Wars: The Last Jedi BTS Video
  • By Steve Withers
  • Published

Latest Headlines

Where to watch the 2024 Oscar best picture nominees
  • By Andy Bassett
  • Published
Freely TV platform set for a Q2 UK launch
  • By Ian Collen
  • Published
AVForums 4K and Blu-ray Podcast: 29th January 2024
  • By AVForums
  • Published
Back
Top Bottom