To say that we're conflicted about Better Call Saul is an understatement. Way back in 2012, when the idea of a Breaking Bad spinoff focusing on Bob Odenkirk's wisecracking "criminal lawyer" first emerged, the general assumption was that it was a pipedream, a momentary writers' room whim that would never make it to the pilot stage.

For one thing, Breaking Bad always felt - to an unusual extent - like a closed-ended story, where the fate of the protagonist is set in stone almost from his very first moments on screen. For another, Saul Goodman worked so well because he was used sparingly as black comic relief, and because his brazen wrongdoing was an increasingly compelling contrast to Walter White, who kept insisting he was a good man. In a leading role, the character's completely untested.

But now that AMC has simultaneously renewed the show for a second season and delayed its first until next year (a seemingly logic-defying move), we're beginning to really accept that Better Call Saul is a thing that's happening.

Here are seven things Digital Spy needs to see in the spinoff.

1. Mike being a stone-cold badass



We're not particularly fussy about how Jonathan Banks's wonderfully dry, laconic enforcer is worked into things, although Banks's series regular status suggests he'll be assisting Saul on a day-to-day basis. We just need to see him quietly, wearily, meticulously getting s**t done.

Mike and Saul have a long-established working relationship by the time the former appears in Breaking Bad, but the pair don't seem like an obvious match personality-wise - Mike doesn't suffer fools, while Saul regularly plays the fool (though it's clear on a few occasions that he's actually very savvy and very good at his job). There's definitely some comedic mileage to be had in these two butting heads and learning to work alongside one another.

2. How Saul met Jesse

Ursula Coyote



Aaron Paul recently claimed that he won't appear in the show, because he's too old to play Jesse in a prequel timeline. We call shenanigans on that one, because a) it wildly contradicts just about every previous statement Paul's made and b) those quotes came right before the announcement that Better Call Saul will have a flexible timeline, thus allowing a theoretically limitless number of Breaking Bad players to appear.

Only this year, True Detective proved that it's perfectly possible to age and de-age people over the span of 17 years without any need for distracting prosthetics, so there's no reason at all not to see the circumstances under which Jesse first hired Saul.

Jesse's the one who brings Walt to Saul in season two, explaining that in some circumstances it's better to have a "criminal lawyer" than a real attorney. While there's no need for endless episodes to be devoted to Jesse's amateur meth-cooking days, it'd be fun to see Paul get to play the loveable fool again as opposed to the tortured soul he increasingly became as the show went on.

3. Gus Fring's backstory

Ursula Coyote



Undeniably spectacular though his send-off was (three years on, we're still cackling over 'Face-Off'), Walter White's greatest adversary Gus left a whole lot of loose ends behind when he departed the show.

Breaking Bad's fourth season deepened Giancarlo Esposito's mysterious, terrifyingly impassive Chicken Man chiefly in the flashback-heavy episode 'Hermanos', which simultaneously told us more about his backstory and left us with more questions than ever. There's the ambiguous relationship between the young Gus and his ill-fated friend and partner Max, which viewers took variously as an avatar for the Walt/Jesse dynamic, an extension of the show's surrogate family theme, or an indication that Gus was gay.

Even more intriguing is the moment when Cartel bigwig Don Eladio spares Gus's life, offering only the following as explanation: "The only reason you are alive and he is not... is because I know who you are. But understand, you are not in Chile any more." It's also revealed that Gus emigrated to Mexico from Chile during Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship, leading many viewers to speculate that he had held a position of power before being forced to flee.

Gilligan has stated that the ambiguity of Gus's backstory was intentional, and there's an argument to say that fleshing it out in Better Call Saul could cheapen the character's potency in Breaking Bad. But since Jonathan Banks's Mike has been working closely with Gus for a while by the time of BB, it feels likely that Esposito could have some role to play.

4. How Walt poisoned Brock



The only way that Bryan Cranston could realistically be worked into Better Call Saul, beyond a cameo, is through episodes that deal directly with the Breaking Bad timeline. And what's the most significant unexplained event involving both Walt and Saul in that timeline? The poisoning of Brock.

It's one of the only times in the show's history where the audience isn't in on Walt's plan. The process of how on earth he got Brock to eat the highly poisonous Lily of the Valley plant is kept entirely off-screen, which didn't sit right with us at the time.

But eagle-eyed fans did pick up on the fact that Huell lifts the ricin cigarette from Jesse's pocket in Saul's office, and it's made clear through brief snatches of dialogue later on that Saul enabled Walt to carry out the plan. "I didn't know the kid was gonna end up in the hospital," he later complains. We're more conflicted about the prospect of seeing Walt again than any other aspect of this spinoff, but if it's going to happen, this is as good a reason as any.

5. A post-disappearance Saul

Ursula Coyote



After his involvement with Walt ultimately forced him to skip town with a new identity, via the oft-referenced "vacuum cleaner guy", Saul grimly predicted that the best case scenario for his future was "managing a Cinnabon in Omaha". Is he right?

Much as we'd love to see what happened to Jesse after Walt frees him from the neo-Nazis in Breaking Bad's finale, there is literally no plausible way to work that into the Better Call Saul plotline - even if Saul felt any residual loyalty to Jesse, he's not dumb enough to risk blowing his cover identity by seeking out a (presumably) wanted felon with known ties to the old Saul Goodman.

But since we've always been dimly suspicious of this whole "guy who can make you disappear" notion (what if he's actually just a hitman?), knowing what became of Saul would give us some sense of closure.

6. Walt as Jesse's teacher

Doug Hyun AMC



We know what you're thinking. Walt met Saul for the first time in Breaking Bad, but that's not to say they've never been in proximity to each other before. Walt's more than self-absorbed enough not to notice Saul (assuming he wasn't wearing one of his louder shirt-tie combos), if the latter was, say, hanging around JP Wynne High School.

This could actually be a cute way to work in a Bryan Cranston cameo that doesn't distract much from the overall storyline, while giving fans one last taste of the unmatchable Cranston-Paul chemistry. Saul's trying to get hold of his client Jesse, maybe because he's in trouble or owes him money, and ends up witnessing the tail end of a conversation between Jesse and his exasperated chemistry teacher, who's kept him behind after class to try and get him to apply himself.

One of our great unresolved wishes for Breaking Bad was a flashback to the days when Mr White was just Jesse's chemistry teacher (along the lines of the Walt and Skyler house-buying flashback in 'Full Measure'), and Jesse was just a naive slacker. One of Saul's very first scenes (culminating in the catchphrase that would ultimately give his spinoff its title) takes place in Walt's classroom, so he clearly knows how to find his way around that establishment without arousing suspicion.

7. Huell



What happened to Saul's outsized, near-silent, peculiarly loveable bodyguard? Did he find a new gig after Saul vanished? Is he still at that safe house? Enquiring minds need to know!

What do you want to see in Better Call Saul? Let us know in the comments!

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