Better Call Saul is still great — but it hasn't overcome its prequel problem

Better Call Saul arrives for a confident second season — but the events of Breaking Bad still cast an inescapable shadow

Jonathan Banks as Mike Ehrmantraut and Bob Odenkirk as Jimmy McGill - Better Call Saul Season 2.
(Image credit: Ben Leuner/AMC)

"The sunk cost fallacy is what gamblers do," says Jimmy McGill, the man who will eventually remake himself as shady lawyer Saul Goodman, in the second season premiere of Better Call Saul. "They throw good money after bad, thinking they can turn their luck around. I've already spent this much money or time — and I gotta keep going."

Jimmy is talking about his long, painful path toward becoming a successful lawyer — but his speech works just as well as a metaphor for the series in general. Better Call Saul, which arrived as an unwieldy sounding prequel-sequel hybrid to Breaking Bad, has long since established that it's telling its own distinct narrative, with unique themes and rhythms to match. But the problem that holds back every prequel remains: We already know how this story ends.

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Travis M. Andrews

Travis M. Andrews is writer and editor from New Orleans. He has written for Time, Esquire, The Atlantic, Mashable, The Washington Post, and The Times-Picayune. When he was younger, he wrote on his mother's walls. She was displeased. For more about Travis, please visit www.travismandrews.com or follow him on Twitter @travismandrews.