How odd will the Breaking Bad spin-off starring Bob Odenkirk’s lawyer character, Saul Goodman, going to be? Well, think about![]()
Better Call Saul: Breaking Bad Spinoff Gets Greenlight (Video)
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‘Where the Ladies At’? 15 Network Notes for TV Execs in 2015
Many people are looking back and talking about the best/worst of 2014, but let’s take a different tactic here and talk about what we want, and don’t want, to see in 2015. Are you listening to us, network executives? These notes are for you!
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Winter Arts Preview 2015: Top 7 Television Premieres
Is your New Year’s resolution to spend countless hours inert in front of a television set? Good! Ours, too.![]()
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Does ‘Better Call Saul’ Live Up To The Hype?
Everyone knows that hype can kill a project long before it even gets off the ground, especially in the television world. ![]()
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Near Honor Students, All: ‘Better Call Saul’ Premieres, Unnecessary and Brilliant
Let me be clear: I do not need Better Call Saul. I don't think anyone needed it. When the first rumors of this show came out, people validly pointed out things like "Spinning off a minor character for a comedy version of one of the most acclaimed dramas of our time is cray" and "LOL WUT" and "Bring back Mr. Show!" (Which is also happening!)
See, I don't think anyone doubted this show would be AMAZING. Obviously, Vince Gilligan is a genius and can do whatever he wants, and so is Bob Odenkirk so there you go. Even though there was a lot of speculation over ways this show could fail, I highly doubt anyone really expected it to be anything less than A- material.
I'd give it a solid A for the pilot--which seems at once like a completely different structure from Breaking Bad while simultaneously existing in the exact same world--and the little revelations I had during it felt very Deep-with-a-capital-D.![]()
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‘Better Call Saul’ 1×4: The ‘Donnie Darko’ Years
So...still not sure what to make of Better Call Saul, which seems to be Breaking Bad season 1 funny, which is to say, not quite a comedy. Not even like a Fargo-y, dark comedy (though look, "comedy is comedy" as a wise man once said about Family Guy), because BCS doesn't revel in the macabre. Oh sure, it likes it's gore, but more in the way Wes Anderson likes eccentric-looking pets. It's just a little tableau, putting hatchets in the hands of two twins (ZOMG!). And look, last night, that man in the alley isn't even dead, because short-long-cons are back! (God, miss you Sawyer.) And Gus Fring? Let's face (off) it: the shock of that scene is totally made all the more whimsical because like, an old man blew him up with a bomb connected to a bell on his wheelchair. How very...macabre! Vince Gilligan, are you sure you're not secretly Wednesday Addams? Or maybe like Aubrey Plaza? Because you are one droll-ass motherfucker.
But see, my issue with this show--starting even with the SPECTACULAR classic wallet-Rolex con (Medium Cons 101, you guys) that was none the less David Blaine AH-MAZING because I didn't even see it coming-- was that it's tone doesn't seem sustainable. Breaking Bad wasn't, ultimately, a comedy, though it was had moments of pure comedic brilliance. Better Call Saul is, as far as I can tell, not going in the direction of an hour-long romp of Ask Manson-like "bits."![]()
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‘Better Call Saul’ 1×5 Recap: Compassionate Care
In Leslie Jamison's beautiful collection of essays, The Empathy Exams, she opens with an exploration of a convention of Morgellons disease sufferers out in Austen, in a story that originally ran in Harper's under the headline "The Devil's Bait." Symptoms of Morgellons include coarse fibers and fuzz growing out of the skin, invisible to the eye except to those who know where to look (and have a high-powered microscope). The only problem is that doctors, the CDC, and most of clinical medicine not found on the confines of the Internet have all but claimed that Morgellons does not exist. That the people experiencing the feeling of these threads and fibers--who pick at their face or torch their arms or itch until they give themselves permanent scars and scabs--are suffering, yes, but from a manifestation of a disease entirely in the mind.
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tvDownload’s Emmy Predictions, Part 2: Outstanding Writing and Directing
In the week leading up to the 2015 Emmys, tvDownload's Drew Grant and Vinnie Mancuso will discuss their predictions, hopes, dreams and fears. The only rule? There are no rules. And also, no unnecessary Jon Hamm tangents. Think you're bold enough to step? Check out our the horses we'd betted on for the Creative Emmy categories, which aired Saturday night.
Today's discussion: Variety, Limited, Comedy and Drama: Who will win for Writing? Who will win for Directing? Are we sure we know the difference between the two when it comes to television? Let's find out!![]()
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tvDownload’s Emmy Predictions, Part 4: The Outstanding Drama and Comedy Debate
We debate the winners of Outstanding Comedy and Drama series, and whether or not they even make sense. ![]()
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Breaking Funny: Bob Odenkirk of ‘Better Call Saul’ Returns to Comic Roots He Planted
Netflix's 'With Bob and David' is a four-episode reunion of sorts with David Cross, a return to Mr. Odenkirk's “first and greatest love.” ![]()
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Writers Guild Awards 2016: ‘Mr. Robot’ Up for Best Drama, No Love for John Oliver
The Writers Guild of America, East and Writers Guild of America, West announced today the nominations for the 2016 Writer's Guild Awards, which honors outstanding achievements in writing across several mediums.![]()
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‘Better Call Saul’ Season Premiere Recap: The Calm Before the Storm
This is the way 'Better Call Saul' season two starts: Not with a bang but a whimper.![]()
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Writers Guild Awards Wrap-Up: ‘Mad Men,’‘Inside Amy Schumer’ and Elaine May Win Big
On Saturday night The Writers Guild of America held simultaneous award ceremonies on the East and West Coast, giving out over 25 awards in various categories.
The ceremonies are much less glamorous than the Globes, the Oscars, and even the Screen Actors Guild, but the presentation of these awards do annually provide some inspiring words, pearls of wisdom and moving moments that would otherwise not be captured and shared.
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‘Better Call Saul’ Recap 2×02: Mike Drop
When Jonathan Banks is on screen as Mike Ehrmantraut, there’s no one else you’d rather be watching.![]()
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‘Better Call Saul’ Recap 2×03: Mike v Jimmy: Dawn of Injustice
'Better Call Saul' is two of the best shows on TV right now.![]()
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‘Better Call Saul’ Recap 2×04: Mike Ehrmantraut’s Punch-Out!!
Mike’s material has all the benefits of Jimmy’s—the restraint, the quiet desperation, the slow slide into criminality. ![]()
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‘Better Call Saul’ 2×06 Recap: Enjoy the Silence
This week on Better Call Saul, Mike Ehrmantraut learned the wisdom behind the old adage “Be careful what you wish for.” ![]()
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‘Better Call Saul’ 2×08 Recap: Masterpiece Theater
Did Larysa Kondracki just have her Cary Fukunaga moment? The director of “Fifi,” last night’s Better Call Saul, opened the episode with a single four-minute-plus shot that swirled and soared around a border crossing and the drug-courier truck attempting to pass through it every bit as complex and stunning as the multi-minute gang shootout that made Fukunaga a superstar on True Detective. But that famous sequence ended its episode. This was one was merely the beginning of an hour of some of the most carefully composed, strikingly shot, drop-dead gorgeous television of the year. With frequent BCS cinematographer and Breaking Bad veteran Arthur Albert riding shotgun, Kondracki crafted a visual achievement to rival anything on either of those shows—or Mr. Robot, Hannibal, and any other compositionally audacious series of recent vintage you’d care to name. Forget Jimmy McGill and Kim Wexler: Larysa Kondracki should be the one setting up her own shingle.![]()
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‘Better Call Saul’ 2×09 Recap: Collateral Damages
Tonight’s episode of 'Better Call Saul' is a rare case in which a Good Samaritan is true to his namesake. ![]()
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‘Better Call Saul’ Season Finale Recap: Foiled Again
Better Caul Saul has chronicled the parallel paths of Jimmy McGill and Mike Ehrmantraut, and those paths lead nowhere but down.![]()
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