The best and worst TV spin-off series

Breaking Bad prequel Better Call Saul, a comedy-drama covering the earlier career of Walter White’s crooked lawyer Saul Goodman (the brilliant Bob Odenkirk), makes its much-anticipated US debut tonight and lands on Netflix in the UK tomorrow. A scroll through small-screen history tells us that TV spin-offs can go either way…

FRASIER

The most successful TV spin-off ever, this gong-garlanded 90s sitcom saw Kelsey Grammer’s pompous psychiatrist Dr Frasier Crane, a regular at the bar in Cheers, relocate to Seattle following the breakdown of his marriage back in Boston, move in with his cranky retired cop father and start his own radio phone-in show. Tossed salads and scrambled eggs… Hit!

JOEY

How YOU doin’? When the globe-conquering Friends came to an end, food-fixated himbo Joey Tribianni (Matt LeBlanc) left Manhattan to try his luck in Hollywood – and this NBC spin-off was born. It recaptured neither the magic nor popularity of its parent show, and was cancelled midway through its second series. Miss!

LEWIS

Seven years after the demise of much-loved Inspector Morse, hangdog Kevin Whately reprised his role as DS Robbie Lewis – now promoted to DI and with a sidekick of his own in DS Hathaway (Laurence Fox). It was such a ratings success that a second spin-off – Endeavour, a prequel about the young Morse in 60s Oxford – followed five years later. Hit!

THE GREEN GREEN GRASS

Only Fools and Horses creator John Sullivan gave cackling car salesman Boycie and wife Marlene their own vehicle, relocating them from Peckham to a Shropshire farm. It got big figures at first but soon slumped. Sullivan didn’t learn his lesson and launched the even worse Rock & Chips, a 60s-set prequel about young Del Boy. You plonker. Miss!

TORCHWOOD

A year after Russell T Davies rebooted Doctor Who, he came up with this sexed-up spin-off for Captain Jack Harkness (John Barrowman). Set at Cardiff’s Torchwood Institute (Torchwood is an anagram of Doctor Who), it followed a team of hot young things tackling alien incidents and attracted a cult following, but its uneven tone saw it shunted among three channels. CBBC spin-off The Sarah Jane Adventures was more convincing. Miss!