For the majority of Better Call Saul‘s six-season run, it was hard to weigh it against Breaking Bad, but there is one moment where the former got better than its predecessor. Better Call Saul had every right to fail, or at least disappoint, coming on the heels of one of the most popular shows ever — especially with its focus being on the comic relief character of Breaking Bad. Yet, under the watch of Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould, Better Call Saul paved its own path and became much more than just a Breaking Bad prequel.
The two shows were more or less on equal footing throughout Better Call Saul‘s run. Breaking Bad delivered more standout episodes of television, but Better Call Saul turned out to be the more consistent show, episode to episode. Then, at the end of Better Call Saul season 6, episode 9, “Fun and Games,” the show overtook Breaking Bad. It seemed like any other episode of Better Call Saul until the final moments, when the show jumped forward in time and saw Jimmy McGill fully transformed into Saul Goodman, moving things right into the Breaking Bad timeline. Not only was this unexpected, but it was also one of the boldest decisions made by either show. Up until that point, the point of Better Call Saul seemed to be to show Jimmy right up until when Saul first appears in Breaking Bad. Instead, it boldly ventured right into the heart of Breaking Bad and beyond.
Why Better Call Saul S6 Ep 9 Was When It Got Better Than Breaking Bad
Jumping ahead in seemed like an odd choice for Better Call Saul at the time, as it skipped over what was thought to be the crucial moments of Jimmy’s transformation to Saul. The decision was a stroke of genius because everything that the show needed to do for the character was already done. It wasn’t one big moment that turned Jimmy into Walter White’s lawyer; it was a lot of little moments throughout his life that brought him there. And instead of showing the final moments, Better Call Saul recognized that all the character work was done and made a much more interesting choice.
Breaking Bad is known more for shocking twists than Better Call Saul is, but the time jump in season 6, episode 9, “Fun and Games,” was the biggest shock of all and the moment the prequel transcended above its predecessor. Better Call Saul avoided the problem most prequels have — that the audience knows what’s going to happen — by centering all the drama around Jimmy on new characters like Kim and Nacho. Yes, it was known where Saul would end up, but it wasn’t clear what would happen to Kim, or what her fate would do to him. At this point in the show, it still wasn’t clear if Kim would get a happy ending, which is why this shock ending, with only four episodes to go, was more emotional.
Kim & Jimmy’s Breakup Set Up BCS To Have A Better Ending Than Breaking Bad
Kim and Jimmy were too good for each other, with Jimmy heightening Kim’s flaws. Kim breaking up with Jimmy was the last thing that set him on the path to becoming Saul Goodman, and the show knew that. That is why this was the moment that the fully formed Saul appears, setting up Better Call Saul to have a better ending than the Breaking Bad finale.
Every season of Better Call Saul opened with a black-and-white flash-forward of Jimmy now going by the name Gene in a post-Breaking Bad world. Better Call Saul season 6 did not open with this motif, so it wasn’t clear if the show would end with that scene, or if it would have a whole episode dedicated to it. The actual result was much bolder, with the final four episodes focusing on Gene’s timeline. Better Call Saul delivered a twist no one saw coming, and it did it not just for the shock value but for the stronger, emotional character work that it allowed, making it a more mature decision than other twists in Breaking Bad.
With where Jimmy’s fate clear from the start of Better Call Saul, the show did something unexpected and made the majority of the final episodes set after the end of Breaking Bad. Prior to this, the sequel film El Camino looked set to be the only post-Breaking Bad story, but by using Better Call Saul to finish the story, it not only worked as a great finale for its own show, but for the entire Breaking Bad universe. Cameos from Walt and Jesse could have just been fan service, but their scenes added depth to both shows and to the whole Breaking Bad world. These hard choices are what tipped Better Call Saul into being better than Breaking Bad. It’s hard enough to make any series one of the best shows of all time as it is, but Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould did it twice.
