Better Call Saul: reviews of the Netflix Breaking Bad prequel

Better Call Saul, the highly anticipated new prequel series from Breaking Bad co-creators Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould, has aired on internet channel Netflix leaving critics to debate whether it's as good as the original. The series is set six years before Breaking Bad and focuses on Saul Goodman, Walter White's unscrupulous but cunning lawyer, played by Bob Oldenkirk.

The series tells the story of how a put-upon small time lawyer called James McGill reinvents himself as the fiendishly cynical Saul Goodman. So is it everything Breaking Bad fans could hope for? Critics are divided.

Sean T. Collins in Rolling Stone asks: "Will Jimmy McGill's long, winding road to Saul Goodman be worth the trip?" The answer, he says, is "yes". Collins calls Odenkirk "a major comedic talent", and says the opening episode of the new series "makes the case that you've got a lot to look forward to".

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Chris Harvey in the Daily Telegraph agrees. "The prequel to Breaking Bad isn't just unmissable, it's as good as the original." From the first superb comic vignette involving, of all things, breadsticks, we know instantly "we’re in the hands of a master", says Harvey.

Better Call Saul was always going to sink or swim in Odenkirk’s central performance, says Gerard Gilbert in The Independent, and "he certainly proves up to the task. But it's too early to tell, says Gilbert, if the transformation is going to be as compelling as Walter White's.

"I fear there will be a lot of people disappointed, or else trying to mask their disappointment as they stare forlornly at their favourite Los Pollos Hermanos mug trying to tell themselves the prequel is everything they wanted," says Christopher Hooton, also in the Independent. The pilot pulls in all directions, says Hooton, and it struggles with uneven tone and genre.

But the new series does have "intriguing elements", admits Hooton. "So hopefully it will settle into its own groove as the weeks go by as it is at its best when it forgets about its mighty descendant."

Weekly episodes on Netflix, with new episodes every Monday.

Better Call Saul: can spin-off from Breaking Bad succeed?

22 January

Better Call Saul, a spin-off from hit TV show Breaking Bad, debuts on US television early next month. There is still no news of a UK release, although web-streaming company Netflix has said it will show the programme here "shortly after" it has aired in the US.

The new show lays out the back-story of a supporting character from Breaking Bad, which focused on the exploits of terminally-ill chemistry teacher Walter White (Bryan Cranston) who became a drug producer and dealer to support his family.

Better Call Saul centres on Saul Goodman, White's attorney in Breaking Bad. Played by Bob Odenkirk, Goodman is a cheap and dubious criminal lawyer with an office in a shopping mall. The show is set in the early 2000s.

Now critics have been given the first three episodes, ahead of the TV premiere. The first verdicts are in - and most pundits seem to think the show needs more time before they can hail it as a success or failure.

"Better Call Saul really isn't much of a comedy," says the Hollywood Reporter. But that's the point - though there are funny moments of black humour in the first two episodes, this is "more drama than comedy".

The stakes are high, says the Reporter: a successful spin-off from "one of the greatest dramas in TV history" would be an almost unheard-of feat. Whether or not the attempt has worked "will be settled in the weeks and months (and maybe years) ahead", says the Reporter, staying on the fence.

Salon says the first three episodes do not have the "heightened emotional stakes that made [Breaking Bad] such addictive viewing" - but there is still time for the show to develop.

"Aesthetically and tonally similar" to Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul nonetheless shows promise of being able to carve out its own niche while still providing a satisfying follow-up to its predecessor.

Indiewire agrees that with each episode the show gets "richer and more complex [and] more its own show, its own story". Giving the series a B+, it says the drama focuses on the "tedious and unglamorous" nature of actual law practice.

This is a good thing, says Indiewire, as it provides the show with its own distinctive identity. There are flaws though - Better Call Saul leans too heavily on pop culture references and does not give women or minority actors much prominence.

However, Odenkirk's performance is praised by Indiewire: "All this time he wasn't just a talented sketch comedian. He had incredible depths of humanity available to him."

As for what happens in the episodes, the critics remain fairly discreet. ET Online can't resist telling readers that the first episode boasts a twist "so shocking" it was kept from the cast as they were filming.

The site gushes: "Your jaw will be on the ground when [character names redacted] make an appearance in the very last scene."