In
an interview with Kim Masters on KCRWs The Business, FX president John Landgraf explained why he turned down the show, which would later become a critical and commercial hit for AMC.
We had three dramas with male antiheroes and we looked at that script and said, Okay, so heres a fourth male antihero, Landgraf recalled. The question was: Are we defining FX as the male antihero network and is that a big enough tent?
Added Landgraf: Look, it was a wonderful script. If I had known Vince Gilligan was going to be one of the best showrunners in television, and Breaking Bad was going to be literally one of the very best shows in television, I would have picked it up despite the concept. But the truth of the matter is anybody who does what I do for a living, whos honest, will tell you that youre making decisions based on too little information all the time, and you make good ones and you make bad ones.