Better Call Saul and 3 Other Best TV Series About Lawyers and Justice
Thrilling series that don't need action scenes to keep viewers on the edge of their seats.
Bright, charismatic heroes cheat, risk their lives, weave intrigue, and break the rules. But justice still prevails. We present a selection of the best series about prosecutors, lawyers, and judges.
1. Your Honor, 2020-2023
After Breaking Bad, Bryan Cranston took on another controversial character, playing Michael Desiato, a New Orleans judge. According to the plot, the judge's son, high school student Adam, accidentally hits a motorcyclist and flees the scene.
Frightened, Adam confesses everything to his father. At first, Michael thinks about doing the right thing. Then he learns that the victim of the tragedy is the son of a vengeful crime boss, Jimmy Baxter. The judge helps his son cover his tracks to save him from the mob's vengeance.
Your Honor presents the tragedy of a man who broke the law for the sake of his family. Only this time, the shock of moral degradation is experienced by a successful judge who previously embodied justice.
2. Better Call Saul, 2015-2022
During the filming of Breaking Bad, showrunner Vince Gilligan and screenwriter Peter Gould decided that Walter White needed a lawyer. When the cunning and charming Saul Goodman burst onto the scene, they immediately began brainstorming a spin-off for this character.
The series shows the emergence of an antihero. Jimmy has too much bad luck. He is betrayed by his brother Chuck – a role model and his only relative. His eccentric personality is suppressed, his talents are not recognized.
Only Kim Wexler, a decent lawyer, admires Jimmy for who he is. But their love story is too traumatic. As the man experiences failure, misfortune, and forced compromises with fate, he loses his moral bearings.
3. Boston Legal, 2004-2008
In the 1990s and 2000s, television was dominated by conflicted characters, gangsters, lawyers, and reality shows about lawyers. From 1997 to 2004, one of the most popular series was The Practice about the activities of a law firm, and its no less dramatic spin-off Boston Legal.
The plot revolves around the lawyers at the elite firm, but the narrative focuses on the ambitious Alan Shore, a secondary character in The Practice. Alan will use any means necessary to win, finding loopholes in the law and exploiting the weaknesses of judges, juries and prosecutors.
4. The Staircase, 2022
December 2001, popular novelist Michael Peterson, who is also a happy father and husband, is spending a cozy evening with his wife, Kathleen, and a glass of wine. In the morning, he wakes up as the prime suspect in a murder.
Kathleen has fallen down the stairs and died. The cause of death is clearly not alcohol poisoning: there is a suspicious amount of blood on the floor, and there are too many signs of violence on the woman's body.
The series is based on a sensational court case. The structure of The Staircase contains several intriguing lines at once. At the heart of the story are the political issues of post-truth and a detective-dramatic investigation into the slow disintegration of a family.