Two New Spinoffs

Today I'm writing about two completely different spinoffs that have just been announced, and two makes a trend, so there's my excuse to lump them together. The first, which has been all over the news, is that the "Breaking Bad" spinoff about shady lawyer Saul Goodman is officially a go at AMC. "Better Call Saul" is reportedly going to be a prequel series, though the extent of the involvement of the core creative talent of "Breaking Bad" is not yet clear. The second is potentially bigger. Warner Brothers and J.K. Rowling are returning to the "Harry Potter" universe with an adaptation of Rowling's "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them."

Spinoffs are tricky things. They're not inherently problematic, but there have been lots of bad ones over the years. It's hard to say at this point if either of these new spinoffs will be successful, though I think both have a relatively good shot. Television shows that spin off a minor character tend to do better than direct sequel series. The most successful spinoff in recent years has been "Frasier," which followed the erudite bar patron we first met on "Cheers." There has to be a significant degree of separation between one show and the next, and "Frasier" worked so because it put the main character in an entirely new context that stood on its own. There were a few crossovers over the years, but none of them making much impact on the show. Compare this to "Angel," which had a lot of difficulty establishing itself separate from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" until the later seasons. Many of the most interesting bits of these early years were crossover stories.

"Better Call Saul" looks promising because it has the potential to expand the little world of Saul's law office in some different directions. Walter White is only one of his many clients, as the show has alluded to, and Saul didn't become a shady lawyer overnight. "Better Call Saul" will likely be another dramedy, but there's enough flexibility with the premise that it could conceivably be a straight comedy. I'm a little wary of them going the prequel route, because Bob Odenkirk isn't getting any younger and it creates a limitation on where the series can go, but then it also significantly reduces the ties to "Breaking Bad." Walt and Jesse wouldn't be able to make appearances in any significant way, though others like Mike and Gus might. We'd also be able to get into Saul's personal life - all those ex-wives and secretaries would finally get names. I expect we'll be getting a better picture once "Breaking Bad" ends and we find out if Saul survives the series or not.

"Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" will almost certainly attract a lot of attention because J.K. Rowling is involved, and the original book is part of the canon "Harry Potter" universe. However, this project strikes me as a little riskier. The "Fantastic Beasts" book is only 42 pages long, intended to be a recreation of a textbook on magical creatures commonly used by the students at Hogwarts. The film will follow the adventures of its author, Newt Scamander, as he travels the world having encounters with the fantastic beasts. It'll be set about seventy years prior to the events of "Harry Potter." I imagine the first film would do very well, as Rowling herself has agreed to write the script and it would benefit from the Potter series' sterling reputation. However, Warner Bros. very clearly wants another franchise, and that's where things get tricky.

One of the elements that made "Harry Potter" so successful was that it was finite. It built up to a big finale and then stopped. Warners, who made so much money from the eight-film franchise, has been trying to figure out a way to keep capitalizing on its success ever since. "Fantastic Beasts" is their answer. Getting Rowling to script the first movie cements their credibility, and then they can take subsequent installments wherever they want. However, there's a lot of risk here. There's not much by way of a pre-existing story since the book was really just ancillary material for the Potter series. This will be Rowling's first stab at screenwriting, and there's no guarantee that she's suited to it. We've seen a lot of "Potter" clones come and go over the years. Also, an open-ended franchise will lose momentum a lot quicker.

The idea of these two spinoffs holds a lot of promise, but we'll have to wait and see what the execution looks like. I can easily imagine a worst case scenario where "Better Call Saul" comes out too wacky or "Fantastic Beasts" turns out to be another generic CGI action-fest. But with the right people involved, maybe Saul Goodman could be the next Frasier Crane and Newt Scamander could be the next Harry Potter.

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