‘Better Call Saul’ Episode Titles Have Secret Hidden Meanings
If you’ve watched Breaking Bad but somehow haven’t yet seen Better Call Saul, you’ll probably at least remember Bob Odenkirk’s character, the sleazy billboard lawyer Saul Goodman. Odenkirk did an incredible job making the character seem human and believable despite his being a bit of a con man. Fans loved this character, so when Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould announced they would be continuing the Breaking Bad story by focusing in on where Saul Goodman came from, people were psyched to tune in.
Of course, since Gilligan and Gould were involved, the show was always destined to be layered with hidden meanings. Rumor has it that even the colors people wear in Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul are indicative of their personalities or moods, so it’s safe to say that there was plenty of symbolism baked into the new show and any minor detail could matter … including the episode titles.
‘Better Call Saul’ is a prequel to ‘Breaking Bad’
The basic premise of Better Call Saul is that it’s set in the early to mid-2000s, just before the Breaking Bad story began. It follows con artist Jimmy McGill as he goes about the task of transforming himself into Saul Goodman, a semi-reputable criminal defense attorney who somehow finds himself with his hands in the cookie jar of a Juarez-based drug cartel.
Other Breaking Bad characters that pop up are Gus Fring and Mike Ehrmantraut, both of whom get far more developed backstories in Better Call Saul. The show actually shows us Mike and Saul pretty separate from one another until later in the series.
Rather than being a story solely devoted to Saul, it ends up being more like a series of prequel vignettes that help flesh out the already well-developed world of everyone in Breaking Bad.
Many ‘Better Call Saul’ episode titles have hidden meanings
One thing about both Better Call Saul and Breaking Bad is that nothing is a given and all sorts of things can be a message. Both shows are loaded with hidden puzzles and riddles for astute fans to pick up on.
One such place where there appear to be some coded messages is episode titles for Better Call Saul. For instance, have you noticed how every single episode throughout the entire first season ended with the letter O? There was only one exception, an episode entitled “Alpine Shepherd Boy.”
The only reason that one broke the pattern is that it was supposed to be called “Jell-O” and the producers wanted to avoid a lawsuit for using a brand name. What the symbolism of the O could remain unclear but it’s obviously an intentional choice.
On top of that, if you take the first letters of each episode from that season, you’ll find that they unscramble to spell “FRING’S BACK.” Considering that Giancarlo Esposito’s character Gus Fring was a fan-favorite character from Breaking Bad, this deeply hidden code message would have been a welcome premonition of Gus Fring’s eventual arrival in the show.
‘Breaking Bad’ was loaded with similar symbolic meaning
Fans of Breaking Bad won’t be surprised at all to hear all this because the same was true of Breaking Bad from the jump. Even years after the show ended in 2013, fans still love speculating about the minutiae of the show to see if they can uncover the symbolic treasures within.
As with Better Call Saul, even the episode titles could have secret meanings on Breaking Bad, as did the number of episodes itself. There were 62 total episodes of Breaking Bad, a show heavily associated with the periodic table because of its chemistry-teacher-gone-dirty premise and its opening credits.
The 62nd element in the periodic table is Samarium, which is used primarily to help cancer patients relieve pain. In this way, the number of episodes was symbolic of the hero, Walter White, whose story was contained within them.
