I think it is ... at least, I hope so. I've only seen the first twoLog In. In the first one, Saul (trying to sell his services to a treasurer who just 'lost' his company $1.5-million) stated that 'lawyers are like life-insurance; you hope you never need it, but it's terrible to "get caught without it"!' In the second one, he advocates for a couple of scammers & gets their punishments lessened from "death" to "one broken-leg each." And through it all, Saul is just trying to survive comfortably. Aren't we all? More-to-the-point, aren't all lawyers just trying to survive? (No ill will, no malice; but most-often just not caring how comfortable your living is )
Yea lawyers are like that all over the world, at least the rich ones are. I work in the court and I see how they beheave and who their clients are and the show pretty much depicts it. They will sometimes lose the case just to squeeze some money out of their clients. Most of them don't know too much about law and are poor practitioners but when the people who they represent know even less than them everything is possible.
I haven't watched Better Call Saul yet, but I did watch all of Breaking Bad. I *wish* real life lawyers were like Saul, haha. I've met a few real-life lawyers in my time, and Saul is much more entertaining (and, surprisingly, more morally questionable) than any in my experience I agree with you when you say lawyers are just trying to survive, though. I do think it's easier to justify bad behavior when you can blame it on "just doing your job," though.
For criminal defense lawyers, it think certain aspects of the show are realistic. A lot of the time definitely know their client is guilty and they are just trying to negotiate down the sentence. Also realistic is the fact that they have so many clients that they sometimes get them mixed up and are not focused one case all the time, like a client may hope is the case.
Before you hire a lawyer, you should, do a thorough background check of the lawyer. To be quite honest, you have some real idiots that somehow managed to pass through legal education or Law school. Before anything takes place between you and the Lawyer, ensure that you are comfortable with the Lawyer. And please remember that it is you who employ the Lawyer!!