17 Years Ago, Breaking Bad's Best Franchise Villain Was Created By Accident

Published Sep 19, 2026, 6:30 PM EDT After 18 months at Screen Rant, Guy became Classic TV Editor in September 2026, and specializes in leading features content about shows from decades gone by. Having written for and editing several TV, film and music publications, his areas of expertise include comedy and satire, animation, crime drama, Westerns, and political thrillers. Breaking Bad is responsible for several of modern television’s best villains, but one stands apart from the rest as a creation of inspirational serendipity. It helps, of course, that this character is brought to life by one of the best performances in the franchise. Yet, the seeds for his introduction were planted almost a decade before an actor was hired to play him. Although we had to wait until deep into Breaking Bad’s spinoff series Better Call Saul to meet the villain in question, he’s first mentioned in the second season of the parent show. Funnily enough, it’s none other than Saul Goodman himself who says his name in a line that was initially meant to be a red herring, but later became a classic example of Chekhov’s gun. As much as this villain unquestionably made his show better, Breaking Bad’s creator Vince Gilligan hadn’t always intended to bring him into being. His name might have haunted Saul like a specter of fear itself, but we weren’t initially meant to know why. That all changed ahead of Better Call Saul season 4, when co-creator Peter Gould finally convinced Gilligan that this name deserved a face, and a story arc of its own. What resulted was a truly terrifying figure who’s also one of Better Call Saul’s smartest characters. There’s nobody else in the entire franchise quite like Lalo Salamanca. Lalo Salamanca Is The Best Villain In The Breaking Bad Franchise From his affable introduction to Nacho Vargas in the kitchen of the Salamanca family restaurant while making tacos, to the maniacal laughter with which he breathes his last breath, Lalo elevates every scene of Better Call Saul he features in. He’s at once calm and jovial, seemingly carefree but utterly ruthless, profoundly unfeeling but always with a glint in his eye. Lalo is the villain the Breaking Bad franchise didn’t know it needed until he arrived. Even with the lineup of all-time great villains across the original show’s five seasons, as well as Better Call Saul’s first three, he brings something to the table that no one else does. He’s just as level-headed as Gus Fring, but more light-hearted and warmer in manner at the same time. He’s as human as Walter White, only without any apparent vulnerabilities. What’s more, Tony Dalton plays Lalo with genuine charm, charisma, and an upbeat sensibility that belies his profile as a cold-blooded killer. The emotional dissonance between his outward demeanor and the brutal crimes he commits, even during the act of murder itself, is the true mark of a psychopath. It’s utterly chilling to watch, more so even than Walt’s switches into Heisenberg mode, or Mike Ehrmantraut’s routinist approach to his work as an enforcer. Indeed, the scene in which Lalo dispatches Howard Hamlin to his grave, in front of Saul and his girlfriend Kim Wexler, is arguably the scariest moment in the whole franchise. The slow, methodical manner in which he screws a silencer onto his gun, before gently shushing Saul and Kim as though he’s lulling a baby to sleep, sends shivers down the spine of anyone watching. Lalo might not have made it to the end of Better Call Saul season 6, but he certainly went out with a bang. The showdown between him and Gus is arguably the greatest duel in the Breaking Bad universe. Gus needed to live and Lalo needed to die, in order for the timeline of Breaking Bad itself to make sense, but we wouldn’t have been surprised to see the opposite happen. Breaking Bad Created Lalo By Accident In Saul Goodman’s Introduction To The Show Ironically for such a significant character in the franchise, Lalo’s creation was a complete accident on the part of Breaking Bad writer and Better Call Saul co-creator Peter Gould. His name is first mentioned during a scene of the episode in which Saul Goodman is introduced to Walter White and Jesse Pinkman. Kidnapped at gunpoint by Walt and Jesse while their faces are covered, Saul assumes he’s about to be disposed of by Mexican cartel hitmen. However, when his would-be assailants tell him to speak English, he begins to question this assumption. “Lalo didn't send you, de Lalo?" he asks them. Jesse responds, “Who?” and Saul breathes a sigh of relief. We may not know who Lalo is at this point, but it’s clear that he keeps Saul Goodman awake at night, which is enough to understand that he must be a pretty frightening prospect. Funnily enough, the writers of Breaking Bad didn’t know who Lalo was either when they first brought up his name. In fact, Lalo’s appearance in Better Call Saul essentially retcons the line in which Saul mentions him in Breaking Bad. While writing the episode in which Saul Goodman first appears, Peter Gould decided to throw a couple of hispanic names into the dialogue during Saul’s kidnapping scene, to make it sound as though Saul was already in contact with Mexican drug cartels. Gould chose the name “Lalo” specifically because he’s a fan of the soundtrack composer Lalo Schifrin, who’s best-known for writing the theme music for Mission: Impossible. It was a throwaway name which wasn’t meant to carry any further significance for Breaking Bad. Yet, from that point on, the identity of this mystery “Lalo” became a regular topic of discussion in the show’s writers’ room. Gould, in particular, became obsessed with the idea of creating a character with this name, especially when Better Call Saul was in development. Peter Gould Made Lalo’s Brief Tenure In Better Call Saul Count According to an interview Vince Gilligan gave to Rolling Stone in 2020, his creative partner was insisting “We’ve gotta answer who Lalo is,” throughout seasons 1 and 2 of the spinoff. It took Gilligan over three seasons to relent to Gould’s persistent demand and allow him to create the character, but he was right to. Even though Lalo Salamanca only gets 22 episodes in Better Call Saul, the show’s writers, along with actor Tony Dalton, make the most of every last one of them. The character had to be killed off just two seasons after his first appearance, because Lalo staying alive would mean Walter White should meet him in Breaking Bad, which he doesn’t. Nevertheless, he leaves a bigger mark than anyone could have expected on the franchise as a whole. Perhaps even Walt would have met his match in Lalo, if the pair had crossed paths. It’s remarkable to think that one of TV’s greatest villains only exists because of Breaking Bad’s happiest accident, a whole nine years before he was actually created. Breaking Bad 10/10 Release Date 2008 - 2013-00-00 Network AMC Breaking Bad, created by Vince Gilligan, follows a chemistry teacher turned drug kingpin named Walter White (Bryan Cranston) as he attempts to provide for his family following a fatal diagnosis. With nothing left to fear, White ascends to power in the world of drugs and crime, transforming the simple family man into someone known only as Heisenberg. Better Call Saul 10/10 Release Date 2015 - 2022-00-00 Network AMC Better Call Saul follows the early career of small-time lawyer Jimmy McGill, later known as Saul Goodman in Breaking Bad. Set six years before his encounter with Walter White, the series explores his transformation while introducing key figures like fixer Mike Ehrmantraut and kingpin entrepreneur Gus Fring.