The Fascinating AMC Series Better Call Saul

While it may not be to everyone’s taste, I find AMC’s drama, Better Call Saul (starring Bob Odenkirk and Rhea Seehorn) to have been an exquisitely produced series and a great morality tale. Although it does not directly speak of God and His graces for our moral development and conversion, it shows our own role in shaping our own character – for better or worse – by the choices we make.  It is a morality tale extraordinaire and quite unlike almost everything I have ever seen on television!

In addition to great length, engaging storytelling, and characters with multiple names (which are intriguing), I find fascinating similarities between Better Call Saul and Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Russian classic, Crime and Punishment. (Yes, I am of sound mind and quite serious.)

A Curious Comparison

Better Call Saul was spread across six seasons (including COVID-related interruptions), while Crime and Punishment is spread across 576 pages (Bantam Classics edition).  These are works which require patience!

Here are examples of the fascinating characters in both works:

You suffered; it’s unspeakable.
I met your husband – a few times….
You and he are victims
And so am I.
Two years ago, a man came into my office.
He said his name was Mayhu (sp?).
He wanted one of my clients to lie – under oath.
He offered me money.
I declined. Any lawyer would.
That night, as I was leaving my office, I was attacked.
Two men threw a sack over my head.
They hog-tied me, and they drove me out into the desert.
When they pulled the hood off,
I was kneeling in front of an open grave with a gun pointed at my head.

(Jimmy McGill, aka Saul Goodman, aka Gene Takovic, aka Viktor St Claire)

My killing a loathsome, harmful louse,
a filthy old moneylender woman
who brought no good to anyone,
to murder whom would pardon forty sins,
who sucked the lifeblood of the poor,
and you call that a crime?

(Crime and Punishment, Rodion Raskolnikov, aka Rodya, aka Rodka)

Same Genre

Better Call Saul is a prequel/sequel to Breaking Bad, which primarily looks at a small time con artist, who becomes a lawyer and subsequently descends into serious crime.  While I confess to being amused by some of his elaborate cons, the writers did an excellent job of showing these cons, ultimately, not to have been victimless.

Crime and Punishment has a similar theme, primarily looking at an aspiring lawyer and his own descent into serious crime.  My imagination was greatly aided by recalling the characters from the 1998 TV movie version of Dostoyevsky’s novel, which starred Patrick Dempsey and Ben Kingsley.

In addition to magnificent main characters and storylines, both works are filled with colorful supporting characters and side stories.

Though Better Call Saul’s main character is Jimmy McGill, he uses the moniker Saul Goodman, throughout much of his unethical legal activities.  When he must assume another identity for fear of other criminals, he becomes Gene Takovic, mustachioed Cinnabon manager.  Trying to get back in touch with an old love, he becomes Viktor St Claire in the belief that Kim Wexler will understand an inside reference.

Similarly, Crime and Punishment’s aspiring lawyer, Rodion Raskolnikov, is also known to his intimates by multiple names, as Rodya and/or Rodka.  The love interests for Jimmy and Rodion are Kim Wexler and Sonya Marmeldova respectively, for whom the protagonists ultimately aspire to become men of good character.

The stories conclude with Jimmy in a fierce prison and Rodion imprisoned in terrifyingly cold Siberia. Yet, neither place seemed as foreboding and awful as the main characters might have imagined. For both Jimmy and Rodion, confronting their worst fears was proving far better than continuing with unrepented guilt from their past crimes!

Variously Happy Endings

While Jimmy is joined briefly in prison by Kim, they appear to be going their separate ways.  Rodion on the other hand is joined in Siberia by Sonya, and it actually appears that they will have a happily-ever-after marriage!

While Better Call Saul does not specifically address Jimmy’s or Kim’s relationship with God, Dostoyevsky makes it very clear that relationships with God are absolutely important for Rodion and Sonya.

If you have read this far and are not too offended by my comparison of Better Call Saul to one of the greatest works of Russian literature, do yourself a favor and binge watch this fabulous show.  And even better, also read Crime and Punishment.