For seven years, Better Call Saul has succeeded against all odds. Conceived as a spin-off to Breaking Bad at the height of the AMC crime drama’s popularity, Saul never felt like a premise that could work. An hour-long drama about a character – the slick-talking sleazebag lawyer played by Bob Odenkirk – who was, to all intents and purposes, mere comic relief? Seems a bit thin. The only word more ominous to viewers than “spinoff” is “prequel”, and Saul was both. Half the cast are 15 years too old for the roles they’re playing. And yet none of this mattered. Whether or not you think Saul outshone its predecessor, creators Vince Gilligan, Peter Gould and co crafted a brilliant, compelling and endlessly inventive series that silenced pretty much all doubters. This was true right up to the end.
Saul came to a close last night (15 August), with “Saul Gone”, a deftly cathartic episode that finally saw Jimmy/Saul (Bob Odenkirk) face up to his many, many misdeeds. After being dobbed in to the police by Marion (Carol Burnett) at the end of last week’s episode, “Saul Gone” starts with our man on the run. This inevitably doesn’t last for long; for the last half-season, Jimmy has acted like a man who transparently yearns to be caught. Finally, he is. For a bit of extra legal firepower, Jimmy hires his old peer Bill Oakley (the ever-amusing Peter Diseth), who makes an enjoyable return in the most low-key of several victory-lap cameos. Ultimately, though, it’s not a legal reckoning that Jimmy seeks, but a moral one.
