1

The Portrayal of Crime in Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul

Jared W. Clark

Department of Communications, University of Connecticut

COMM 3310W, Media Literacy and Criticism

Prof. Yukyung Yang

September 16, 2022

 2

Cover Letter

Dear Professor Yang,

Finalizing my paper, I feel mostly satisfied with the way everything has come together compared

to my original objectives. I was initially concerned that the type of analysis I was hoping to

perform on these two shows conflicted with the actual nature of the assignment, but instead I’ve

managed to both thoroughly analyze the show in the way I’d hoped but also do so under the

assignments restrictions. These restrictions forced me to take a new perspective and even

develop new insights I’d never had before despite my many watches of these two shows. I’d

originally expected to almost solely be focusing on my two selected pieces of media throughout

the entire paper, but learning all about similar literature had caused my original points I expected

to make about these shows to evolve into a more thorough and insightful perspective.

The part of this paper that has received the most improvement over the semester was certainly

the Literature Review, undergoing many different iterations at each step towards completing the

paper. I originally kept trying to force aspects that belonged in the analysis section, but I

eventually was able to integrate many important pieces of information pertaining to this section

that would go on to give more basis and value for the analysis section that was to follow.

The feedback I received was crucial in the paper's development, often highlighting problems I

knew existed but couldn’t quite identify. Even in instances I didn’t fully agree with suggested

changes, that would still show me that the writing that led to this point could be confusing or

misleading for readers and should still be cleaned up in some way.

 3

Introduction

As media has grown larger in modern times than it’s ever been before, it continues to

shape the way people perceive the world around them, whether it be fiction or nonfiction. This

holds even more true in the case of concepts that we see more often in media than in our own

daily lives, as it's nearly the only information provided to formulate an idea on the subjects.

Media content that focuses on subjects far removed from daily life incidentally tend to become

the media that people are drawn to the most, and the creators of this media will naturally often

capitalize on this draw by presenting it to be as interesting and entertaining as possible, even at

the cost of realism (Dowler & Muzzatti, 2006).

There’s probably no better subject in media content that exemplifies this idea than the

subject of crime, a massively popular focus for both fiction and nonfiction media alike. With the

majority of media consumers most likely not witnessing any major crime on a regular basis, but

also understanding that it’s a very real and enthralling occurrence, it becomes a perfect subject of

interest for major audiences. However, truly accurate portrayals of crime are far and few

between, especially in media designed with entertainment in mind over realism. Even when

labeled as fictional, crime-focused media designed for entertainment or even to spread an agenda

can subtly shape the way viewers perceive the real world equivalent, sometimes even more so

than nonfiction media (Dowler & Muzzatti, 2006). Though said nonfiction crime media such as

news stories should in theory give audiences accurate, realistic accounts that they should

naturally prioritize to form their perspectives on, this type of account leaves much to be desired

for many viewers who want to understand the full picture. These portrayals typically don’t

provide much insight on the lives of the criminals involved or the full nature of the events that
 4

lead up to the crime, something that fictional media very often does do, even if, and often

especially if, this media prioritizes entertainment over realism.

This practice of prioritizing entertainment is consistent across most fictional crime media,

as well as most fictional media as a whole, as many find that prioritizing realism would lead to a

more boring story. Some cases, however, will take a different approach, attempting to balance

that line between entertainment and realism to create a product that is both highly entertaining

and leaves viewers with a new, well informed perspective on the concept of crime. The cases I’m

referring to would be the two massively popular television series, Breaking Bad (BB) and its

prequel Better Call Saul (BCS). In analyzing these two shows, I intend to demonstrate that not

only can fictional entertainment media be a uniquely valuable tool for instilling informed and

accurate perspectives of real world concepts, but also that including these elements of realism

can even serve to boost the entertainment value.

I will primarily be using Framing Theory for this analysis, which states that the way

something is presented in media can influence how its audience might process that information

(Chong & Druckman, 2007). There have been plenty of studies that use this theory to study

nonfiction media, but its use in studies of fiction is shockingly scarce despite its many

applications in the area (Mulligan & Habel, 2011). This study will hopefully highlight the

importance of framing in fictional media and influence similar future studies in this area of crime

media. Throughout this paper I will primarily focus on studying relevant episodes throughout BB

and BCS, though I will also be comparing these shows to various short examples from other

crime media.
 5

Literature Review

Crime-based media is a massively popular medium for drawing the attention of the

masses, making it worthwhile to study the question of how this media is actually affecting its

massive audience. Though this media can take many shapes, crime television has been a

particularly popular medium for telling these types of stories, often dominating the television

space as a whole by taking many of the top spots of the last decade in terms of popularity. Series

such as True Detective, Criminal Minds, Peaky Blinders and many more are some of the most

well performing in television, though arguably the most popular of the genre would have to be

Breaking Bad(BB), followed closely by its prequel Better Call Saul(BCS). Breaking Bad first

aired in 2008, following Walter White, a high school chemistry teacher who turned to cooking

meth after receiving a cancer diagnosis that he didn’t have the money to treat (Echart & Garcia,

2013). Better Call Saul went on to air in 2015, following Walter’s lawyer, Saul Goodman, who

was an ex-con man but became a struggling lawyer who wanted to succeed legitimately but

faced difficulty at every turn due to his peers' knowledge of his past (Mittell, 2020). Both of

these shows were massively successful, with Breaking Bad’s audience growing to over 10

million people by its series finale and Better Call Saul’s viewership reaching about 3 million

viewers by its end, and Breaking Bad remaining as the only perfectly rated show on IMDb

(IMDb, 2008). They are both mostly beloved series’ and have faced little controversy, though a

notable recent event involved the erecting of statues of the shows two protagonists in

Albuquerque, NM, the town in which the show takes place. This caused a degree of backlash,

with many complaining that this was glorifying criminals. However, many more refuted this

claim by arguing that this instead honored the actors who conveyed the story of a cautionary tale

about the downfall of these criminals rather than glorifying them, and the statues remain today
 6

(Bergeson, 2022). This clear understanding that the show's audience shares about an

entertainment-based crime show highlights the potential that this medium can have in affecting

it’s audience’s perceptions on real world concepts, though to truly understand this effect it’s best

to understand the preexisting theory behind such a phenomenon.

The main premise of framing theory is that an issue can be viewed from a variety of

perspectives and be construed as having implications for multiple values or considerations

(Goffman, 1974). The way a concept is framed to an individual is the way in which they are

influenced towards conceptualizing or reconceptualizing their perspective on that concept. An

example of this would be when participants of a study were asked if they would favor or oppose

allowing a hate group to hold a political rally, and 85% of respondents claimed they were in

favor if the question was prefaced with “given the importance of free speech”, whereas this

percentage dropped down to 45% when the question was instead prefaced with “given the risk of

violence” (Sniderman & Theriault, 2004, p. 163). This phenomenon shows how important

framing is, as portraying the same scenario in a specific way can literally change how a person

interprets and reacts to it.

This theory is used often in studying nonfiction, as framing is used to describe real world

events in a certain light to fulfill the agenda of whoever is doing the framing (Mulligan & Habel,

2011). However, studies delving into the effects of fictional framing are lacking, despite fiction's

ability to affect viewers' perceptions based on its portrayal of real world concepts just as

nonfiction is (Mulligan & Habel, 2011). A key difference is that concepts in fictional media

usually aren’t framed specifically to set an agenda, but instead in a way that is simply designed

to be the most entertaining version of the concept, disregarding the effects that the portrayal may

have on the viewer's perception of it. Even so, the effects of fictional framing in media are real
 7

and observable, as demonstrated in Mulligan & Habel’s study (2011). The authors conducted an

experiment that tasked participants with watching an entirely fictional film that directly tackles

certain common political issues and framing them in a way designed to influence the viewers’

political views. The results showed that the film successfully changed or affected participants'

views about the subject of focus (Mulligan & Habel, 2011). Though this study is a good

foundation to support the concrete effects fictional framing can have on real world views, it’s a

fairly extreme example, making tackling these political issues its primary objective. Most other

entertainment media, if attempting to address real world problems at all, will do so as more of a

secondary objective with entertainment coming first.

There are multiple different forms that popular crime media can take, whether they be

unadulterated accounts of real crime, bastardized accounts that present themselves as at least

partially true but skew or change details to boost entertainment value, or entirely fictional crime

stories, usually designed with the sole focus of entertainment. Most would naturally assume that

it’d be the real crime accounts that would be the most effective in communicating how crime in

the real world is like to viewers, leading most framing studies on crime media to focus on the

nonfiction side of the medium. However, there's evidence that could point to fictional media

being just as strong, if not a better, communicator of the nature of real world crime when

presented correctly.

Some of these studies highlight a phenomenon in which even accurate accounts of crime

can cause viewers to form inaccurate perceptions of the real world, as demonstrated in the

concept known as Mean World Syndrome (Dyson, 2011). This concept is the idea that viewers

observing media coverage of real world events such as crime will develop an unrealistically

negative view of the world, and this is due to the bias of the media to cover the negative side of
 8

subjects as they attract greater audiences (Dyson, 2011). News outlets will scarcely focus on

instances where crime is not happening, instead searching for any instance of the most

concerning, shocking or terrifying events to occur, skewing the viewers perception of reality to

assume that these events are far more common than they are. The accounts themselves may be

entirely accurate, but the framing that news outlets present the world as a whole inevitably

creates an inaccurate perception of the topic. This problem boils down to crime being a more

entertaining subject to audiences than other real world subjects, and this entertainment factor is

the reason crime is inaccurately represented in many other instances.

Reality crime shows are usually framed to make the most entertaining story possible out

of a “nonfiction” account of crime, though this practice can often cause the realism of the

account to suffer (Dowler & Muzzatti, 2006). Despite potential inaccuracies, reality crime shows

thrive because viewers believe that it’s realistic, giving them the benefit of appealing to people’s

interest in real world events as well as entertaining storylines, even if the reality is that this media

may only be detracting from their understanding of real world crime. Sarapin’s study (2012)

highlights just how powerful these effects are, finding that shows such as CSI and Law & Order,

despite only being loosely based off real events, can affect viewers to such a degree that their

decisions as a juror in real crime cases are influenced (Sarapin, 2012).

Then there is the crime media that is wholly fictional and does not hide this fact from the

viewer, focusing on the entertainment value of crime to attract audiences without trying to sell

itself as being an accurate documentary of “true crime”. As viewers gravitate towards media that

is at least presented as realistic to form their real-world conceptualizations, it can be assumed

that viewers will not fabricate real world ideas about a topic based on information from media

that is publicly fictitious. However, as demonstrated in Mulligan & Habel’s findings (2011),
 9

viewers don’t necessarily need a portrayal of crime that claims to be nonfiction, only a portrayal

that can convince the viewers that it is comparable and accurate to the real world. This is what

we can observe in the film Mulligan & Habel (2011) use for their experiment, as the film being

watched by participants strives to be comparable to the real world so that viewers may see that

comparison and believe that what they learn from the movie is a lesson that's applicable to their

real life (Mulligan & Habel, 2011). When studying crime in particular, a similar piece of media

with a focus on crime is the perfect subject of study, and there may be no better media for this

task than BB and BCS.

Methods

This study analyzes the intentional use of fictional entertainment media to change

audiences' perceptions of crime via Breaking Bad and its prequel Better Call Saul. These artifacts

were chosen as sending a message to audiences about crime is a central theme in the show,

making its influence on audiences potentially different to other crime media that tends to affect

audiences' real world crime perceptions despite prioritizing entertainment over realism and

giving inaccurate portrayals. The research for this paper was conducted by watching both

Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul twice, taking notes during the second viewing. The priority of

my observations during these viewing was the instances of crime, though this would apply to

both short and long term instances. For instance, a scene all about an elaborate con or a train

heist is an obvious points of focus, but there are also examples of criminal activity that is

ongoing for episodes, seasons or even the majority of their respective show, and these examples

are even more integral to this analysis as they tend to be the most carefully designed to create a

message about crime for the viewers. In the end the majority of referenced material from the
 10

shows were broad storylines that spanned the majority of their respective shows, though

specifically referenced moments include season 1 episode 2 & 3 of Breaking Bad as well as all

of season 4 of Better Call Saul. This research alongside my investigation of previous literature is

what informed the creation of the themes I’ve decided to focus on and analyze.

Analysis

The themes I’ve designed my analysis around each concentrate on different aspects of the

portrayals of crime across BB and BCS that set them apart from many other common crime

portrayals in entertainment media. The main pattern visible throughout these shows is that they

aren’t designed with the sole purpose of entertainment but also to build the idea in the audience's

mind that the crime that they’re observing is comparable to real world crime. This is most

explicitly applicable in the shows’ display of the less interesting side of crime that crime

entertainment media usually excludes, both building that idea of realism for the audience as well

providing an opportunity for some kind of valuable story progression. The shows also place great

emphasis on making viewers understand where the beginning of this journey into the world of

crime starts, how even realistic, innocent civilians can turn to crime. Most importantly, the show

wants viewers to remember how this story ends for those who take this path, staying consistent

with their message even if it means a tragic end for a beloved character.

Crime as Tedious and Difficult

Most crime entertainment media tends to focus on the most extreme parts of crime, such

as intense bank robberies, shootouts, drug deals gone wrong, etc., but they often skip over a lot

of the setup that brings the criminals to this moment. This is unsurprising, as a lot of what goes

into crime could be covertly shopping for materials, patiently scouting locations for hours, or

long, meticulous pre-planning, and this side of the field could seem inherently boring to
 11

audiences that are simply looking to be entertained. However, BB and BCS prove that, if

implemented correctly, including this side of crime can not only be entertaining on its own, but

become crucial in making the crime as a whole more impactful and meaningful to viewers. Every

single season of Breaking Bad includes at least one scene where characters are simply cleaning,

among many other small, tedious tasks or hiccups required to intelligently commit their crime,

and showing viewers this side of the process that they’ve never considered makes the crime feel

less like a movie plot device and more like something that takes place in the real world, as well

as making everything the characters accomplish as a result of these tasks feel more earned.

One of the earliest and strongest examples of this takes place over the course of the

second and third episodes of Breaking Bad, “Cats in the Bag…” and “...and the Bags in the

River,” respectively. When two gangsters try to force Walt to teach them his method of cooking

meth so they could kill him off afterward, Walt instead uses his ingredients to create an explosion

of gas that kills one of the gangsters and mortally poisons the other. In similar crime media, this

would likely be the point where the conflict is essentially resolved and the story could move on

without having to address the situation any further, but what instead happens is two episodes of

Walt and his partner Jesse trying to figure out what they should do about these two men who are

still lying in their meth lab RV. Both of these characters are very inexperienced criminals by this

point in the show, unsure and afraid on how they should approach cleaning up this crime scene.

Flipping a coin on which gangster each of them should deal with, Walt and Jesse would each go

through their own scarring conflicts as part of this cleanup, with Jesse having to deal with the act

of disintegrating the dead gangsters body in acid while Walt has to decide what to do with the

one that survived, locking the man up in the basement weighing the pros and cons of killing him

or letting him go. Not only does including this entire process allow for major character
 12

progression for Walt and Jesse, but it causes the viewer to realize how much more complicated

committing a crime like this actually would be in the real world, as well as horrifying. Despite

this series of events being responsible for making the entire situation feel more real to viewers,

it’s ironically not the type of story you’d likely hear in even real crime accounts. This is why

there’s power in using fictional stories to portray real world concepts even over real stories, as

despite being a story that may never have actually occurred, it paints a picture for viewers that

will influence viewers to see crime more accurately than even a nonfiction story may have.

This first example sets a precedent that the viewer will become familiar with seeing

throughout the rest of Breaking Bad, with the less popular sides of crime being transformed into

a valuable storytelling tool as well as an essential part of getting the intended full picture about

crime across to viewers. Quietly picking up dead drops, running legal laundering businesses like

a car wash or fast food restaurant, every corner of the business that most audiences wouldn’t

have even considered. This pattern isn’t only present in Breaking Bad, however, and is arguably

even more prevalent in its prequel. This is largely due to the different characters we follow in

Better Call Saul, a show that has the stories of multiple characters throughout its run as opposed

to BB’s sole focus on Walt’s story. Thanks to this we get three, or on occasion four, different

perspectives into the criminal world, that being Saul Goodman, Nacho Varga, Gus Fring, and

Mike Ehrmentrout, a criminal lawyer, high level gangster, drug kingpin, and said drug kingpins

top enforcer, respectively. All of these characters go through the difficult and unexpected

struggles necessary to actually succeed in their criminal fields, whether it be Saul meticulously

planning some way to stage crime scenes, Nacho collecting money from lower level gangsters,

or Gus running his real cover business as a fast food chain owner. However no character's story

better exemplifies this theme then Mike Ehrmantraut, who is easily one of the most successful
 13

criminals in the show, not because of his effectiveness with a gun or his powers of intimidation,

but because he’s an incredibly patient and cautious criminal.

Despite Mike being one of the most beloved characters throughout these two series’, his

story is largely made up of him doing the seemingly boring dirty work, such as bugging houses

or managing lower level criminals. However, his being so effective at these less bombastic but

more important tasks that allow him to rise up in the criminal ranks so quickly, making his way

to becoming the top enforcer of Gus Fring, America's largest drug kingpin, in an incredibly short

amount of time mostly through merit alone. There are many examples that highlight this but one

of the greatest in Better Call Saul would be his managing of the construction of an underground

meth lab, a process that spanned nearly all of season 4. This meth lab is an iconic location in

Breaking Bad, though few thought to ask the question of how a gigantic underground lab could

have been secretly constructed under a major city, that is until BCS made viewers realize just

how major and complicated of an undertaking this process would actually be. Overseen by Gus

but managed by Mike, a team of German workers would be flown into Albuquerque, where over

the course of nearly a year they would live in a neighboring warehouse and chip away at the lab's

construction. This setup seems like it adequately explains how this job was done, but upon

hearing this plan Mike felt thorough adjustments were necessary for it to go over smoothly. In

order to keep the workers morale high living in a warehouse for so long, he would have them

receive a basketball course, TV and other comfortable living accommodations. To keep the

sound of underground explosions unheard they would drive trucks over grated above ground to

mask the sounds. He aimed to address any unexpected hang up in this bold construction project,

every minor problem that viewers of the original series never would have even imagined went

into the creation of the meth lab. This paints a picture for viewers of what pulling off crime on a
 14

massive scale in the real world might look like, why it’s rarely seen, and if it is, the amount of

organization and planning had to go into a single illegal project.

The careful inclusion of every minor inconvenience that goes into crime through these

series was incredibly effective in making the crime and the criminals feel more immersive and

real, but they weren’t just included blindly. Every scene of cleaning or organizing or managing is

never just that, but it also makes sure to include something else essential throughout the scene,

such as opportunities for character growth or providing important information to viewers. This

aspect is essential as it is why the show's creators are able to get away with using the medium of

fictional entertainment to convey these real world ideas, as the entertainment side of the scene

keeps the viewer invested while the realistic side keeps the viewers immersed in the real world

message the show wants to share.

Crime as a Downward Spiral

Despite the criminals of these shows also being our protagonists that the show tries to, at

least initially, convince viewers to like and sympathize with, BB and BCS are very consistent in

making clear what falling deeper and deeper into the criminal world does to a person's character

and their life. Sometimes the show will indeed choose to make crime look fun, usually when the

character we’re following is having fun themselves. However, this only serves to make us realize

as the show goes on that this is how people fall into this criminal underworld, and it never once

ends well for these characters, especially when they receive repeated negative reinforcement by

their successes that make them spiral even deeper into their criminal behavior. This pattern

presents itself in almost every major criminal character, even the ones that remain likable and

sympathetic throughout practically the whole show, such as Jesse or Mike. However, the absolute
 15

best demonstrations of this pattern are unsurprisingly the main characters of their respective

shows, Walter White and Saul Goodman.

There is no clearer example of this spiral than that of Walter White himself, with his

descent starting at the beginning of Breaking Bad and ending only a few episodes before the very

end of the show. Starting off in the show as a genius chemist with a dead end job as high school

chemistry teacher, no money, hardly any respect from his friends or family, and receiving a

sudden diagnosis of terminal cancer, Walt only sees one direction to turn toward to possibly “fix”

his tragic life so far, that being using his chemistry knowledge to produce meth. It’s easy for

viewers to understand why he would move in this direction based on learning his situation just

from the first episode, as his family couldn’t possibly afford his cancer treatment and they would

continue to struggle greatly after he’d pass without financial help. However, upon Walts initial

success he is motivated to continue going bigger and bigger with his meth operation, and as he

gains respect and notoriety in the criminal underworld an ulterior motive for his actions becomes

increasingly more responsible for his decisions. Walt believed that he deserved fame and respect

throughout his whole life, having co-founded a company that he was cut out of early on before

this company went on to become valued in the billions decades later. Having felt cheated out of

this glory his whole life, his success in the criminal world under the pseudonym Heisenberg

filled this void in him and kept him on his path of descent even when he’d far surpassed his need

for any more money. As life as Heisenberg took over Walts’s life, his family started to fall apart,

and his morality seeped away until his pride and arrogance reached a final tipping point and led

to his downfall. Walt’s story perfectly illustrates how any innocent bystander has the potential to

become not just a criminal but a monster, a perspective that isn’t offered not just by other

fictional media, but by most nonfiction crime accounts as well.

 16

Saul Goodman, being the Breaking Bad team's second approach to a main character, is

arguably an improvement as a protagonist compared even to Walter White, at least when it

comes to taking the viewer on this journey of descent alongside the protagonist. Walt becomes

less and less sympathetic and agreeable as his pride takes precedence in his decisions over his

morality, but Saul manages to stay mostly consistently sympathetic to viewers even as he falls

deeper and deeper into immoral and unnecessary crime. The show takes great effort to send the

message that Saul really is a good person at heart, that the world around him shaped him to walk

the criminal path, but also that it was his decisions that were inevitably responsible for his fate.

This is most strongly exemplified by Saul's relationship with his brother Chuck, an intelligent,

renowned and successful lawyer that Saul admired so greatly that he left his life of con-artistry to

try and follow in Chuck’s footsteps as a lawyer. Despite Saul’s skill as an honest lawyer paired

with his desperation to legitimately succeed, he faced constant roadblocks, ones that he knew he

could easily surpass through his incredible talent as a con artist. This culminated in his discovery

that it was his brother Chuck who had been actively sabotaging his career, believing that Saul

could never change from his ways as a conman and that he could never be a legitimate lawyer.

Despite the hatred this created between them, Saul in the end took these words to heart, believing

that he couldn’t change and fully embracing taking the easy road by cheating his way to success

as a lawyer at every opportunity, even as it hurt more and more innocent people around him.

Saul’s descent is especially easy for viewers to follow him along with because they make taking

the easy, criminal road seem reasonable and even fun, at least in the short term. It’s only when

the consequences finally catch up to Saul do both he and the viewers understand the gravity of

what Saul's actions have actually caused.

 17

A massive reason these two shows are so successful in immersing viewers and pushing

its message about crime is because we come to see these criminals as real people rather than just

villains. In other similar media the protagonists of BB and BCS would very likely be the

antagonists of the story, and viewers would receive a much more one sided and dehumanized

version of criminals. It’s only when we can follow a criminal's entire descent that viewers begin

to understand them for what they actually are, people that made very bad decisions, or so these

shows preach with these themes. However, even seeing these characters degenerate as they sink

into their criminal lifestyles, the message of the shows would not be complete without showing

where this lifestyle brings a person in the end.

Crime as a House of Cards

Coinciding with the downward spiral that these characters experience is where it

eventually all ends, and that end is consistently not a happy one, not only for the criminals

themselves but also for everyone who was caught in their wake. The crimes they commit may

begin to feel safe, stable, and have the potential to grow the operation even further, but the

further this path is taken, the greater the potential there is for catastrophic consequences. Viewers

are made aware of this repeatedly, as characters are given opportunities to escape this lifestyle

with as much damage mitigated as possible, but turn down these opportunities until all doors

have closed, and in the end they’re left with an even worse outcome then they could have

imagined. Walt believed that he was safe and untouchable, until one stray piece of evidence he

left in his house was found leading to his discovery and his drug empire to topple in an instant.

Saul largely believed the same, until an old cartel associate, whom he should have known never

to involve himself with, returned, executing a close associate in front of him and his wife,

destroying their relationship and leading to him losing everything he cares about. Both of these
 18

characters likely had a reckoning due in the eyes of viewers due to the heinous actions we’ve

seen them commit, but they certainly aren’t the only ones to receive comeuppance for their

criminal lifestyles. Any character, even the ones with seemingly noble goals, ends up paying for

their choice to pursue a life of crime instead of finding another way, and two other characters that

strongly exemplify this are Nacho and Mike.

Nacho, a high-ranking gangster within the Mexican cartel, was already in this high

position when viewers first meet him, and it quickly becomes apparent why. He is essentially a

perfect fit for the job, he’s intelligent and tough, intimidating but reasonable, and he’s loyal to his

bosses. That is until Nacho’s boss, Mexican cartel don Hector Salamanca, decides that he wants

to get Nacho’s father, a kind, straight-arrow man who works hard and legitimately, involved in

their drug distribution business. This was the beginning of the end for Nacho, as every effort he

makes to prevent this from happening only further solidifies how doomed Nacho inevitably is,

and things quickly turn into a matter of survival for him and his father. Despite doing everything

“correctly”, this path Nacho chose had completely backfired on him, and even in trying to make

things right in the end by protecting his father, he’d already fallen too far down this spiral to

recover, and all he could hope to do was mitigate the disaster that was coming for him and his

family.

This is taken even further with Mike, who is possibly the most sympathetic criminal

throughout these two shows. Despite usually acting blunt and even rude towards most people

throughout the show, audiences learn that Mike does this all to provide for his daughter-in-law

and granddaughter, as well as that he very strictly follows a code of not ever involving anybody

who isn’t already a criminal in any of their criminal activity. Many viewers of the show would

think fondly enough of Mike to believe that he may be an exception to this pattern of
 19

comeuppance, but he too passes up one too many opportunities to get out with what he could and

his family would never see the money he worked so tirelessly to illegally acquire for them.

Though it’s not totally uncommon for stories about criminals to end with them meeting

the consequences of their actions, BB and BCS’s commitment to ensuring that absolutely

everybody who chooses this path will eventually pay for it in some way makes it stand out and

clearly highlights what the creators are trying to say. Combining this theme with all the immense

effort that went into making the journey that brought the characters here as immersive and

sympathetic as possible is what makes it so memorable and effective to audiences.

Discussion

Through my analysis of BB and BCS I’ve identified the primary ways in which these

shows separate themselves from similar media in a way that makes them more effective in

communicating their message and influencing audience perception on crime. The consistency

between these themes is that they are all intentionally designed not just to entertain but also to

actively try and change how audiences perceive crime in the real world, which is unlike the

majority of other fictional crime media as well as most fictional entertainment media as a whole.

Presenting crime as difficult and tedious makes the presentation feel more real to the audience,

making any points the show is trying to make about real world crime more impactful as well as

making a point on its own about what real world crime actually looks like and what kind of

people criminals actually are. Consistently showing viewers that downward spiral is designed to

both show how real people such as themselves could end up a criminal as well as immersing

them into the perspectives of criminal characters so they may have a deeper understanding of a

real world group of people that are often presented as immoral and two-dimensional. Repeating

to viewers the idea that a criminal lifestyle will eventually always lead to ruin is of course an
 20

idea that the show wants viewers to take to heart about the real world, that there is always a

different path to take instead. Everything here was designed to frame crime under a light that the

show believes accurately reflects crime in the real world, as opposed to media created with the

sole focus of maximizing entertainment at all costs.

These findings certainly reflect the basic principles of framing theory as defined by

Goffman (1974), but also give a new insight as to how to utilize it most effectively in fiction. If

fictional media makes little to no effort to convince viewers of the accuracy of real world

concepts, the expected effects of framing hardly come into play. Just as we see in Mulligan &

Habel’s study (2011), taking this extra step to add believability to a fictional piece can have a

massive impact on how much framing will actually affect the viewer.

With Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul being some of the most successful television

series of the past several decades, they serve as evidence to the idea that a show that balances

both entertainment and accurate framing of realistic concepts could serve to boost the

effectiveness of both of these sides past any media that focuses on one or the other. Despite

including some realistic, potentially boring sides of crime, BB and BCS are ludicrously

successful as pieces of entertainment, and despite being an exaggerated, fictional story about

made-up crimes, BB and BCS have arguably spread their message about real world crime more

effectively than many real world crime accounts such as documentaries or news stories.

This study was inherently quite limited, as there’s hardly any quantifiable way to test the

exact effects certain aspects of these shows have on their audiences real world perceptions, and

the closest I can get to accomplishing this goal is to analyze the techniques they make use of and

how those techniques should theoretically affect viewers. There are multiple approaches future

studies could take to pursue this field of research further, focusing either on acquiring as
 21

quantifiable results as possible or analyzing other media for similar effects. Experimental studies

that actually measure participants' reactions to aspects of the shows could potentially provide for

some more strongly supported conclusions, though even this approach would be difficult as

indirect media influence on real world perceptions could likely be subtle or take time to manifest.

Another side of this field worth covering is exploring different media that also attempts to strike

a similar balance between entertainment and accurately framing real concepts to find out if

finding this balance affected how much success the show received.
 22

References

Mulligan, K., & Habel, P. (2011). An experimental test of the effects of fictional framing on

attitudes. Social Science Quarterly, 92(1), 79-99.

Sniderman, P. M., & Theriault, S. M. (2004). The structure of political argument and the logic of

issue framing. Studies in public opinion: Attitudes, nonattitudes, measurement error, and

change, 133-65.

Dyson, R. A. (2011). The mean world syndrome diminishes human security. Journal of

Human Security, 7(1), 1-6.

Sarapin, S. H. (2012). The effects of crime-drama TV viewing on mock-juror self-efficacy,

adherence to judicial admonitions, verdicts, and verdict certainty in a murder trial

(Doctoral dissertation, Purdue University).

Echart, P., & García, A. N. (2013). Crime and punishment: Greed, pride and guilt in Breaking

Bad. In A Critical Approach to the Apocalypse (pp. 205-217). Brill.

Goffman E. (1974). Frame analysis : an essay on the organization of experience. Harvard

University Press.

Chong, D., & Druckman, J. N. (2007). Framing theory. Annual Review of Political Science,

10(1), 103-126.

Lyons, S. (2021). The (Anti-) Hero with a Thousand Faces: Reconstructing Villainy in The

Sopranos, Breaking Bad, and Better Call Saul. Canadian Review of American Studies,

51(3), 225-246.

Mittell, J. (2020). Better Call Saul. How to Watch Television, 3, 13.

Dowler, K., Fleming, T., & Muzzatti, S. L. (2006). Constructing crime: Media, crime, and

popular culture. Canadian journal of criminology and criminal justice, 48(6), 837-850.
 23

Tracking Shots (2022). Better Call Saul: Why Vince Gilligan Made Committing Crimes Boring

and Hard. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zE9-8ffrYo

IMDb.com. (2008). Breaking bad. IMDb. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0903747/

Bergeson, S. (2022). 'breaking bad' statues slammed by New Mexico Republicans for 'glorifying

Meth Makers'. IndieWire.

https://www.indiewire.com/2022/08/breaking-bad-statues-slammed-by-republicans-1234

752732/