Other main characters include Jimmy's romantic interest and colleague Kim Wexler (Rhea Seehorn), his brother and rival Chuck McGill (Michael McKean), Chuck's law partner Howard Hamlin (Patrick Fabian), drug dealer Nacho Varga (Michael Mando), drug lord Gus Fring (Giancarlo Esposito), and cartel enforcer Lalo Salamanca (Tony Dalton).

He and Gould considered making a half-hour legal comedy featuring Saul and his various clients, but settled on an hour-long tragedy showing how he develops into the character seen in Breaking Bad.

[9][10] It is primarily a prequel that focuses on Jimmy McGill, a former con artist aiming to gain respectability as a public defender, and chronicles his gradual transformation into his eventual Breaking Bad persona of Saul Goodman, the flamboyant criminal lawyer with ties to the drug cartel.

While at HHM Jimmy befriends Kim Wexler, a fellow mailroom employee who completes law school and becomes one of the firm's associates, and their friendship later turns romantic.

Jimmy is motivated by Chuck's success to finish college and complete a Juris Doctor degree through a correspondence law school, the fictitious University of American Samoa.

As his interactions with criminals continue, Jimmy takes on the persona of the colorful Saul Goodman, and he starts to draw on his conman past while his work as an attorney goes from questionable to unethical to illegal.

They initially considered making it a half-hour show where Saul would see various clients – celebrities in guest roles – in his strip mall office, similarly to Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist, but they had no idea how to write for this type of format.

[27] Having learned several lessons from Breaking Bad related to foreshadowing without writing the foresight, Gilligan and Gould gave themselves more flexibility in how Better Call Saul's plot would develop over its run.

Gilligan described the writing approach as if developing two separate shows, one that centered on Jimmy/Saul, Kim, Chuck, and Howard, and a second on the more familiar Breaking Bad characters like Mike and Gus.

[39][40] Rhea Seehorn auditioned and got the role of Kimberly "Kim" Wexler in April 2014, her character being described as "prestigious attorney ... whose hard life is complicated by her romantic entanglements with somebody else at the firm".

[48] By the next season, Gilligan said that the show had been on long enough that any reuse of Breaking Bad characters would require more than "just a cameo or an Alfred Hitchcock walkthrough", and that their appearances would need to be essential to the story.

[49] Breaking Bad lead actors Bryan Cranston and Aaron Paul regularly said they would be open to reprising their respective roles as Walter White and Jesse Pinkman on Better Call Saul.

[55] Plans were initially made for Betsy Brandt to reprise her role as Hank's wife Marie Schrader in a cameo in the second season, but the writer's room objected, considering the idea to be distracting for audiences.

[59][60] After the series ended, Gould mentioned his desire to bring back the remaining Breaking Bad characters for the finale, but he and the writing staff could not find a proper way to have them fit into the story.

This was foreshadowed in the penultimate episode of Breaking Bad, "Granite State", in which Saul tells Walter: "If I'm lucky, a month from now, best-case scenario, I'm managing a Cinnabon in Omaha.

This includes the inflatable Statue of Liberty balloon that sat atop Saul's office, a drawer of burner phones kept in his desk, and a bus stop bench that advertised his business.

Gould and Gilligan were inspired by the poor quality of early VHS tapes and the notoriously low production values of 1980s public-access television, and from the fact that Saul Goodman's ads on Breaking Bad were done in a similar style.

This caused many to theorize that this symbolized Jimmy McGill's storyline gradually transitioning to that of his post-Breaking Bad alter-ego Gene Takavic, whose scenes were entirely in black and white.

During "Nippy", the title sequence features Saul Goodman's "World's Greatest Lawyer" mug falling off his desk and shattering on the floor, as was typical during a season's tenth episode.

[88] The remaining three title sequences retain the blue background, but briefly flash to an image previously unseen in the intro, with a distorted version of the theme song playing underneath.

[92] The secondary timeline takes place in 2010, following events of Breaking Bad's finale, where Saul has fled Albuquerque and hides in Omaha, Nebraska under the alias Gene Takavic.

[111] It was released on Blu-ray and DVD in region 1 on November 24, 2020; bonus features include cast and crew audio commentaries on every episode, deleted scenes, and various behind-the-scenes featurettes.

[117] The complete season was released on Blu-ray and DVD in region 1 on December 6, 2022, with bonus features including cast and crew audio commentaries on every episode, deleted scenes, outtakes, and various behind-the-scenes featurettes.

In 2008, in another series of flashbacks that take place during the events of Breaking Bad, it is revealed during one of their earliest encounters that Saul had deduced that Walter White was the mysterious "Heisenberg" who is producing the high-quality crystal meth in the New Mexico area.

The website's critical consensus reads, "Better Call Saul continues to tighten its hold on viewers with a batch of episodes that inject a surge of dramatic energy while showcasing the charms of its talented lead.

The website's critical consensus is, "Better Call Saul shows no signs of slipping in season 3, as the introduction of more familiar faces causes the inevitable transformation of its lead to pick up exciting speed.

The website's critical consensus is, "Grounded by Bob Odenkirk's endlessly nuanced, lived-in performance, Better Call Saul's fifth season is a darkly funny, vividly realized master class in tragedy.

The website's critical consensus is, "Better Call Saul remains as masterfully in control as Jimmy McGill keeps insisting he is in this final season, where years of simmering storytelling come to a scintillating boil.

[155] Craig Elvy of Screen Rant also opined that the series was better than its predecessor, saying: "Jimmy McGill's spinoff leaves a very familiar legacy – sustained and enthusiastic praise from audiences and critics, capped by an ending that satisfies across the board."

"[156] Jeremy Urquhart of Collider made a comparison between the quality of both series, saying: "Breaking Bad succeeds as a crime-thriller tragedy with a fast-paced plot, and Better Call Saul works as a slower-paced, character-focused drama (with some dark comedy)".