IF YOU LIKED · TV SHOW
If you liked Breaking Bad
Seven picks for after Breaking Bad, from Better Call Saul, Ozark and Fargo to No Country for Old Men, Death Note and The Talented Mr. Ripley, with why each fits.
Vince Gilligan famously described Breaking Bad as turning Mr. Chips into Scarface. Its genius is that every step of Walter White's change makes sense when he takes it, so you keep rooting for him long after you should stop. Around that transformation are other pleasures: tension built from silence, consequences that never go away, and the empty landscapes of the American Southwest.
The picks below each have one of those three things. Some are shows with the same structure, some are films with the same desert, and two come from anime and a 1955 novel, both about a clever person becoming a monster.
WHAT WE MATCHED ON
Three things Breaking Bad does well
- An ordinary person turning badWatching someone make one reasonable compromise after another until there is nothing left.
- Consequences that pile upEvery choice comes back. Tension from silence and slow, inevitable trouble.
- Crime in wide open spacesDeserts, small towns and money that does not belong to you.
THE PICKS
7 things to try next
Across movies, TV shows, anime, books. Each pick says which of the three it matches, what it does differently, and one thing to know before you start. Save any of them to a list, no account needed.
01 / TV show · 2015
Better Call Saul
Matches: An ordinary person turning bad
Years before he meets Walter White, struggling lawyer Jimmy McGill tries to go straight while his worst instincts keep winning.
The prequel comes from the same team, and it has a real claim to being the better show. It is a slower, sadder version of Walter's story: a man who wants to be good, surrounded by people who will not let him forget who he is. It also gives Mike and Gus the depth they deserve.
Much slower than Breaking Bad, especially in its first season. It is a legal drama before it is a crime drama.
02 / TV show · 2017
Ozark
Matches: Consequences that pile up
A financial advisor moves his family to the Missouri Ozarks to launder money for a cartel, and every fix creates a bigger problem.
Ozark is the most direct heir: a respectable family man working for a cartel, a family that gets pulled in, and consequences that keep piling up. The big difference is that the whole Byrde family knows, so it is about a marriage turning criminal together.
Shot in a famously dark, blue-gray color grade, and bleak throughout.
03 / TV show · 2014
Fargo
Matches: An ordinary person turning bad
In a snowy Minnesota town, a beaten-down insurance salesman meets a drifter who offers to solve his problems, and things spiral.
Fargo's first season tells a Walter White story in miniature, as Lester Nygaard discovers what he is capable of. It is funnier than Breaking Bad, in a dry Coen brothers way, and each season is a new story you can watch on its own.
Seasons vary in quality; start with the first and treat the rest as anthology episodes.
04 / Movie · 2007 · Joel Coen, Ethan Coen
No Country for Old Men
Matches: Crime in wide open spaces
A hunter in the West Texas desert finds a bag of drug money and is pursued by a killer who cannot be reasoned with.
This is the film Breaking Bad's desert episodes feel closest to: long silences, ordinary people out of their depth and violence that arrives without warning. Anton Chigurh is one of cinema's great villains, and the film won Best Picture.
The ending refuses to give you the showdown you expect.
05 / Movie · 2016 · David Mackenzie
Hell or High Water
Matches: Crime in wide open spaces
Two brothers rob branches of the bank that is foreclosing on their family ranch, while an aging Texas Ranger closes in.
Hell or High Water shares Breaking Bad's understanding of why a decent person turns to crime: money, family and a system that leaves them nowhere else to go. It is shorter, sadder and set in the same sort of empty Southwest.
Slow-burn and dialogue-driven, and the ending is small and quiet.
06 / Anime · 2006
Death Note
Matches: An ordinary person turning bad
A top student finds a notebook that kills anyone whose name is written in it, decides to cleanse the world, and attracts a detective as clever as he is.
Light Yagami's transformation from idealist to tyrant is the anime version of Walter White's, and the cat-and-mouse game with L has the same tension as Walt's battles with Hank and Gus. Each episode ends on a hook.
Many viewers find the second half weaker than the first.
07 / Book · 1955 · Patricia Highsmith
The Talented Mr. Ripley
Matches: Consequences that pile up
A young con man sent to Italy to bring home a rich man's son decides he would rather become him.
Patricia Highsmith makes you root for a murderer the same way Breaking Bad does, by putting you inside his head as he solves one problem after another. It is short, tense and very readable, and it started a series of five Ripley novels.
Ripley is never punished in the way readers expect, which is the point but can be unsettling.
Where to start
If you want more of the same world, Better Call Saul is the obvious next step. For a complete story in one night, watch No Country for Old Men. For a book you can read in a weekend, pick up The Talented Mr. Ripley.
Whatever you pick, give it a fair start: the first half hour of a film, two episodes of a show, the opening chapters of a book or the first hour of a game. Then decide.
How we chose
Prepared by OmniTrackr and reviewed by the site owner before publishing. We started from what makes Breaking Bad work for the people who love it, then looked for titles that share at least one of those qualities, deliberately across formats, because a game or a book can carry the same feeling in a different way. Facts were checked against public sources; the comparisons and caveats are editorial opinion.
These picks are not rankings, sponsored placements or anyone's private ratings. Running times, episode counts and availability vary by edition and region. Links go to OmniTrackr title pages, not shops.
First published October 16, 2026. Checked October 16, 2026. Suggest a pick or send a correction · Editorial standards · Pick for me