“Breaking Bad” fans watching the spinoff “Better Call Saul” didn’t have to scour the screen for vestiges of the Walter White drama.
“There’s loads of those,” said “Saul” star Bob Odenkirk during a recent interview at the TV critics’ press tour in California. “But [co-creator] Vince [Gilligan] does nothing as a hoot. He does nothing indulgently.”
Whether it be familiar faces and locations or subtle winks to “Bad” viewers, “Saul’s” callbacks to the original are a value-added perk in a series plenty capable of standing on its own.
Here are 10 shout-outs to “Breaking Bad” — some more obvious than others — in Sunday’s stellar debut of “Better Call Saul.”
If you haven’t seen the premiere or “Bad,” stop reading and hop to it. Toot sweet, as Saul would say. Even Badger is smart enough to know there are spoilers below.
1. That sweet Cinnabon opening
Last time we saw Saul Goodman (Odenkirk) in “Breaking Bad,” he was about to get out of Dodge — er, Albuquerque — and assume a new identity.
“If I’m lucky, a month from now, best case scenario, I’m managing a Cinnabon in Omaha,” he told Walter White (Bryan Cranston) in the series’ penultimate episode.
“I guess I’m lucky,” Odenkirk quipped during our interview.
“Better Call Saul” opens in the present day with a long, melancholy, black-and-white scene featuring former Saul, who’s really Jimmy McGill, disguised as a sad sack named Gene. He’s a bored-but-paranoid manager of an Omaha Cinnabon going through the motions of baking breakfast buns while The Ink Spots’ old-timey “Address Unknown” plays in the background.
2. Tale of the tape
Just before the show reverts to its main timeframe — six years prior to the start of “Breaking Bad” — Jimmy covertly digs up an old VHS tape and pops it into his recorder. We hear the cheesy late-night commercials that were a hallmark of the former criminal lawyer. The camera closes in on Jimmy’s forlorn face.
Sidebar: “Breaking Bad” ranks as one of the most creatively shot series on television, and “Saul” seems intent to carry on that tradition. Gilligan deftly directed the pilot, filming the opening sequence in color but later draining it out for a black-and-white effect — an interesting twist on the typical use of black-and-white to convey the past, not the present.
3. Heads up
The noggin of that giant inflatable Statue of Liberty perched on Saul’s strip-mall law office pops up in the title card. In the three episodes I’ve seen, each title card features a different iconic image associated with the old Saul.
4. Loyola’s loyalty
Jimmy arranges to meet his prospective clients, the Kellermans, at Loyola’s diner on Central, where he tells the couple, “I don’t go looking for guilty people to represent. Who needs that aggravation?”
It’s the same Route 66 joint that was a favorite haunt of Mike Ehrmantraut (Jonathan Banks).
5. Speaking of Mike…
The sight of this stone-faced “fixer” working in the courthouse parking lot was bound to warm the hearts of “Bad” fans. Saul’s dearly departed P.I., who once threatened to break the lawyer’s legs, is one of several “Breaking Bad” characters resurrected for the spinoff.
“A big part of the fun for us … in setting the series as a prequel six years earlier is that it allows the sky to be the limit in the sense that all the characters who are deceased when ‘Breaking Bad’ ends could theoretically show up,” Gilligan said during the “Better Call Saul” panel at press tour.
Two characters we won’t see, at least not this season: Walt and Jesse (Aaron Paul).
“We’re not saying it will never happen,” Gilligan said coyly. “We’re not saying it will happen.”
At which point Banks, pretending to be bitter about the way things went down with Walt, piped up. “Well, I’m saying it’s never going to happen.”
6. Starter car
Much ado is made about the crappy Suzuki Esteem driven by Jimmy, who we know will one day be Saul, tooling around Albuquerque in a white Cadillac DeVille with plates that read LWYRUP.
Sidebar: It’s also striking to see Jimmy dressed in boring white shirts and conservative dark suits, considering Saul’s sartorial style. It’s like a box of Crayolas threw up all over his closet.
7. Nailed it
Jimmy’s hovel of an office is located in the back of the Asian-operated Zen Nail Spa, where Saul liked to get his heels buffed and his toenails clipped on “Bad.” Saul tried — unsuccessfully — to convince both Walt and Jesse to buy the nail salon to hide their respective drug profits.
“It’s the best money laundry a growing boy could ask for,” Saul once told Jesse as they sat in pedi chairs.
Sidebar: The hot water heater crammed behind Jimmy’s desk is reminiscent of the grandiose faux Ionic columns featured in Saul’s workplace.
8. Twinning
This one may be a stretch, but it sure makes for a compelling parallel: The goofy, ginger-haired brothers Jimmy ropes into his car crash scam are like the comical flipside of another set of siblings: Juarez Cartel hit men Leonel and Marco Salamanca (Daniel and Luis Moncada), the scary twins who attacked Hank (Dean Norris) in a parking lot.
9. Board again
One of the best parts of the premiere was watching “Slippin’ Jimmy” of Cicero in a colorful skateboard park, recounting the roots of his con-artistry for the Starlight Express bros. Again, maybe I’m reading too much into this, but hear me out: The sights and sounds of the skateboards brought to mind the cold open in “Blood Money,” where the empty pool at the Whites’ abandoned home had been usurped by local skaters.
10. That ending? Tight, tight, tight!
“Breaking Bad” episodes yielded some great cliffhangers over the years. So did the premiere of “Saul.” We’re left with Jimmy staring down the barrel of a gun as the arm of Tuco (Raymond Cruz) yanks him inside the house.
Of course, viewers unfamiliar with the “Breaking Bad” universe have no idea that Tuco — the series’ first real antagonist — is a hella crazy drug dealer with a doctorate in badassery.
Simultaneously servicing an old and new audience is a balancing act Gilligan and co-creator Peter Gould have had to get used to.
“I think people will be able to get it and follow the story without ever having watched ‘Breaking Bad,’” Gould said. “We did strive to make it its own, self-contained thing. There’s nothing worse than feeling like you’re not in on the joke when you’re watching something.”
Added Gilligan: “Even if you don’t know who Tuco is, it’s a guy with a big-ass gun.”
READ MORE: Lori Rackl’s review of “Better Call Saul”
A new episode of “Better Call Saul” airs on AMC at 9 p.m. Monday, the series’ regular time slot.
P.S. — A fan called to my attention Monday morning another sly nod to “Breaking Bad” that I missed the first time around:
@lorirackl What about the tortoise reference when Saul is flipping channels?
— Rocco Russo (@MrRoccoRusso) February 9, 2015
The tortoise that appears briefly on Jimmy/Saul/Gene’s TV looks a lot like the one that gave the severed head of DEA informant Tortuga (Danny Trejo) a ride in the desert before going boom.
