El Camino adds no redemption to Breaking Bad, but ups the insight into Jesse Pinkman

Writer-director Vince Gilligan brings an underlying confidence to nearly every moment of El Camino, the Breaking Bad sequel movie he made for Netflix. The carefully choreographed cinematography, Aaron Paul’s raw and committed performance, Gilligan’s faith that those who tune in will have keen memories for the details of his AMC series Breaking Bad — the Netflix original film successfully makes the case for its existence, even though it’s two hours of content that didn’t necessarily need to be made.

It’s not that audiences and critics are tired of revisiting Gilligan’s nuanced examination of morality and corruption, as seen through the prism of Albuquerque’s best and worst people. The spinoff series Better Call Saul has drawn a faithful...

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